696. Who's the best rider, you think?




One day teacher of English B said to teacher of English A ,”Normally boys can begin to understand Subject, Verb, etc., when they are about 10 years, according to my experience. I don’t know in girls’ case: also at that age?



Some years ago I taught private classes to a boy of 10, half hour each. After helping do his homework, I started to speak in English. One day we were working on the comparative of adjectives. I put a blank sheet onto the table. And I drew objects or puppets, while having him answer to my questions, ‘What is bigger, House 1 or House 2?’ Also I wrote the adjective in its comparative form, with double ‘g’. We repeated some more comparisons. I used other adjectives, as well a few he hadn’t learned yet. I asked him about real objects of the room, then things out of the center, Real Madrid and Barcelona soccer teams, people, sometimes with a slight stroke of humor. We did the same with the superlative.



Sense of humor - but don’t use it too much - is a good booster for learning. Some exaggerating, unexpected comparisons... all this together with meaningful messages, are important for learning a language.” / Photo from: Stan Burza Speedway Racer - Racing at the RDS irishpressrleases ie


Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

3658. Language Facts or Communication in Class?

  I teach English to adults. It’s so great … and demanding.  Adults have some characteristic way of learning the language. For example they tend to focus on specific grammar patterns and ways of saying things in the target language. Well, it’s something I also do when learning that language myself. And it is something I cannot change. It is something we can take advantage from, anyway.  Even in that way they can learn quite a lot. You know, it doesn’t matter they would ask me questions in class that show they are focusing on grammar. It’s ok. It’s ok ever if also we as teachers facilitate there is plenty of communication in English in class.  I mean, do not confine as a teacher to teach grammar and language facts, but provide a lot of communication in class.  When some newcomer arrives at one of those groups of mine – and I’m thinking of one specific group – that new student says kind of, Oh I can see my classmates have a lot of fluency while in my case … Why do the other students have
Read more

2064. Connecting people from different countries

Image
Something we teachers of English or other languages have to bear in mind when teaching adults is that the students should learn and practice communication, and we shouldn’t confine our classes to give them facts of the languages.  Also in kids’ case.  The point isn’t for them to know information about the language, yet to learn how to communicate in that language.  Thus we could plan our classes with that aim.  I state all this because we could dedicate a long time to teach facts, information, something nearly dead, say.  In this way, besides we contribute to connect people from so varied countries. It’s something brilliant, isn’t it? / Photo from: people-happy-cheering bachflowerssingapore wordpress com
Read more

758. Irregular verbs now and then

Image
One day teacher of English B said to teacher of English A, “English irregular verbs are an interesting grammar point Spanish students have to study year after year, increasing the list of them each academic year. Quite many more verbs of this type existed in Old English, before the 11th century, perhaps most of the English verbs then. In other words, the way each verb took the form of past simple and past participle was more complicate than the simple – ed ending. With centuries passing, fewer and fewer verbs remained as such ‘irregular’ verbs, in fact those verbs native speakers used very often. Because of that those verbs remained being ‘irregular’, while most of the English verbs, roughly speaking, were taking on the regular form of – ed for past simple and past participle. This can be due just to linguistic evolutions that actually occur in every language, with the language common people speak, year after year. Beside the fact that many words, so verbs too, were entering in the E
Read more

2445. We Had Nice Teachers To Remember!

Image
Families have a nice and indispensable role in kids’ education.  School just helps, among other things to win knowledge and PRACTICE of technical school subjects: math, sport, grammar and spelling… Also school educates people, more specifically: teachers, we teachers help parents and families in their kids’ education.  At school you win some values, like solidarity, environmental friendship, knowledge and practice..., as I said. And all what teachers, we teachers can provide, because of our own education, values and virtues: we set examples, either positive or we can show flaws in our behavior.  I’ll give you one example. At my primary education we had a teacher that taught us how to read the Bible, the New Testament more specifically.  We had nice teachers, and they taught us how to learn… and to love their subjects. I can state that - about most of my teachers. / Photo from: teacher1 www geledes org br
Read more

382. A school... of fish

Image
Just to thank HeatherA for following my blog. I just wrote some words of gratefulness on the website of British Council, but as you receive new RSS, you'll see this appreciation by me. I'm afraid you may have not seen my gratefulness on British Council website, because I've written it right today, June 22. Picture from www phillaird com
Read more