MARIA SOLER SANSEGUNDO

WORKING WITH CHILDREN

First of all, we have to create optimal conditions for childrens learning.
All children are unique and their ability to process information and learn,
also in personal preferences and learning styles.
We can use C-WHEEL as a tool for helping us to create optimal
conditions to maximize childrens learning.

The C- wheel segments are:

1. Context:
The context for a primary classroom needs to:

Be natural, real and untestable

Be relevant and make sense to the child
Allow for the discovery and construction of meaning
Allow for learning to be active person and experiential

 Encourage the use of language as a vehicle to do things which have a

real purpose
Support childrens understanding.
2. Connections
You have to build connections in a number of ways;
These include connections;

To other areas of learning

To the childs real life experience
To the way the childs life (culture)
To what the child already knows about the world
Between what is learnt and how it is learnt.

3. Coherence
Coherence is a factor in creating optimal conditions for learning in both the
short and longer term. It is important that learning should never seem bitty
or fragmented to children and also you have to provide reasons for doing
things that children can understand and perceive as relevant, and when
relationships of the outcomes to their own learning is made explicit and
explained.
4. Challenge
it is important to get the level and balanced of linguistic and cognitive
challenge right for children.
The concept of the proximal development is helpful in pitching activities
and learning sequences at an appropriate level of challenge for children.

Flow is another relevant factor in relation to challenge and creating

optimal conditions for childrens language learning. Flow is to do with
feeling emotionally positive and motivated towards a learning activity and
your own performance.
When level of challenge is right and children experience flow this leads
to a sense of achievement and success.
5. Curiosity
Related to the concepts of challenge and flow it is important to arouse
and maintain childrens curiosity, to generate a desire to learn and find out
about things, and to make the act of learning interesting and enjoyable.
6. Care
Another essential factor in creating optimal conditions for learning is the
affective climate created in childrens learning environment. All children
need to feel treated and cared about as individuals rather than as a group to
be controlled.
Scaffolding is the metaphorical term used to describe the special kind of
help given by the teacher at one time to make it possible for the child to
progress from imitating, repeating or copying to being able to perform
more competently and independently.
Using positive language is another important factor in creating environment
of care.
7. Community
In order to create optimal conditions for learning, we need to work creating
a sense of community in the classroom where;

Activities are shared experiences and event

Children are encourage to cooperate, help and respect each other
Diversity is positively valued
There is natural communication in a social environment
Children are given opportunities to respond in personal and choose
what they want.

8. Creativity
We have to develop creative thinking skills as an integral part of
language lessons;
Allows hidden talents to emerge
Increases personal investment and ownership
Develops fluency and flexibility in thinking
Allows for humor and fun

MANAGING CHILDREN POSITIVELY

The main aim of managing children positively is to create and maintain a
happy working environment in which the norms and rules of classroom
behavior are respected and children are engaged in purposeful activity and
feel secure and motivated to learn.
For this, you may find useful to consider their seven Rs;
1. Relationships
Every teacher has their own unique personality and teaching persona and
will go about establishing relationships in different ways, the following
general points help in getting off to a positive start;
Learn the childrens names as soon as you can
Avoid having favourites
Listen to what children have to say
Build up childrens confidence and encourage them to believe they
can succeed.
Be patient if you need to explain or give instructions more than once.
Create time for personalized moments in which you convey that you
know and care about each child as an individual.
Model behavior that you would also like the children to adopt.
Use praise appropriately to provide feedback and effort.
Use humor
Keep calm at all times
Be consistent

 Mark and return work promptly

2. Rules
Rules may either be imposed by the institution or established as a
part of your working parameters. It is important that any rules you
establish are perceived as fair by the children and that you can
actually enforce them.
The most effective rules are ones which are expressed using
inclusive language e.g.: we must talk quietly in our classroom

3. Routines
Routines are established patterns of behavior in which everyone
knows what is expected of them and what they should do.

4. Rights and responsibilities

Rights and responsibilities are often two sides of the same coin, for
example if you have the right to use the classroom crayons, then you
have the responsibility to share them with others when they need to
use them as well.

5. Respect
Respect is the glue which holds together all the other Rs. respect can
be modelled in all yours behavior such as using the childrens names,
being polite, respecting personal space
The most important thing about fostering an atmosphere of mutual
respect as a part of managing children positively is to remember that
respect works two ways.

6. Rewards
Reward system can be devised in all kinds of different enjoyable
ways, for example suing stars, stickers, points if used effectively,
they can help promote collaboration, appropriate behavior and
individual as well as class effort. However, if used without care, they
may also have the opposite effect.
The kinds of rewards systems which generally work most effectively
are ones where individuals are rewarded and the reward contributes
cumulatively to a prize which is won by the whole class.

MULTIPLE INTELLIGENCES

LISTENING AND SPEAKING

When children start learning English at primary school, there is usually an
emphasis on developing listening and speaking skills.
Learning to listen
When learning to listen in English, children are actively engaged in
constructing meaning and making sense of what hear. To do this, they use
not just language but their knowledge of the world is provided by the
context.
Developing listening skills
in L2 as in L1, children develop listening skills before speaking skills. It is
enriching to expose them to language that is ahead of their productive
competence, as their understanding is guided and supported.
When you do a listening activity, it is often useful to plan for the following
three stages: before, while and after.
Learning to speak
Speaking is a complex skill and the difficulty for children a foreign
language should not underestimated.
Spoken interaction and spoken production
Speaking skills can be broadly divided into two areas: spoken interaction
and spoken production: spoken interaction refers to the ability to ask and
answer questions and handle exchanges with others, spoken production
refers to the ability to produce language.
Frameworks for speaking activities
Whatever the childrens age, it is important to provide frameworks for
speaking activities which encourage them to use English.
Pronunciation
Is important to provide lots of models and to build up childrens
confidence thought the acceptance of approximate pronunciation.

READING AND WRITING

Reading and writing are two sides of the same coin.
Learning to read
Reading is a vital skill. Through learning to read English, children develop
positive attitudes, strong motivation and a sense of achievement.
When to start reading
The answer is neither clear-cut nor conclusive and depends on the context
and a range of factors, such as the childrens L1 , how much English they
already know and their own interest.
What is involved in reading
Reading competence involves constructing meaning and making sense of
written text.
When children read in English, they need to learn to make use of visual,
phonological and semantic cues in an integrated way and to relate these to
their previous knowledge.

How to approach teaching reading

As a start, it is a good idea to ensure that the childrens classroom is a
literate, creating a weather and date chart, making a birthday

Whether at word, sentence or text level, reading activities should be

meaningful and create a reason and purpose for reading which practice one
or more sub-skills.
As well as developing intensive reading skills, it is important to
develop extensive reading for pleasure too.
From reading to writing
in the initial stages of learning to write, young children need to
develop han-eye coordination and fine motor skills, and the effort and
concentration which goes into forming the letters and words is a challenge
in itself.
As a children progress, they can be introduced to writing short texts,
which may either be based on a model.

How to approach teaching writing

When setting up writing activities, it is important to create
motivating and meaningful contexts, a reason and purpose for writing and
also to ensure that the children have a sense of audience and who they are
writing for.
During the writing process, it is important too to encourage children
to be responsible for checking and correcting their own works and give
them experience of different genres and areas of writing in addition to
initial writing.

A little reflection

In my opinion all the contents we have seen in this lesson are very
useful for our future profession, and specially to learn which are the aspects
that we have to consider to encourage children to learn English.
Of course, every teacher, every class and every child is different, but
this is what make education a real challenge for the teacher, who have the
responsibility to create the best conditions for a positive learning.
We have seen relevant aspects like listening and speaking or reading
and writing and which is the best way to start learning English and
motivate children to do it, so lets do it in our future.