Any individual who has worked with preschool english class children knows that they learn mainly by discovering their world utilizing their imagination and engaging in pretend play. The link between imaginative, or pretend play, and language is particularly substantial. Communicational and vocal abilities build as kids develop scenarios, appoint roles and direct the activity, and jump “in and out of several positions”.
Improving language and communication fluency
The conversational application of language promotes fluency. While grasping a play, kids are motivated to pay attention to, potentially read and afterwards recite their lines over an amount of time. By repeating the words and phrases they become familiar with them and have the ability to express them with increasing fluency. On top of that, drama also teaches them to pronounce their words properly and to aim their voices when they speak, helping them to become understandable and confident speakers. Using drama to instruct English also aids to enhance the comprehension and retention of a word. By the time a kid has read, rehearsed and acted out a scene focusing on words ‘irritated’, as an example, there is little chance of ever forgetting it. The same would not be true if the word had been memorised by rote for a vocabulary examination.
Giving children motivation
Naturally, every child has a need to fit in. See an apathetic kid in the class come alive on the playing fields and play his heart out for his team. That is where he feels he fits in, his abilities are appreciated and he belongs to the group. Lumsden, in Student motivation to learn, mentions that “if students experience the classroom as a nurturing, encouraging space where there is a feeling of belonging and everybody is valued and appreciated, they will often tend to take part more completely in the process of discovering”
The secret lies in the teacher’s passion
The teacher’s own passion additionally goes a long way in the direction of motivating a kid. Any individual who has instructed a classroom of children know how swiftly they pick up and reflect your state of mind. If you think your English grammar class is boring, so will they! By utilizing drama as a teaching method and giving a fictitious reality of a story to children, they will derive far more fun from the class and fun is always motivating.
Implement One-minute Theater
One-minute Theatre, like Human Slideshow, can be utilized to summarize chapters, books and other reading material. Due to the detail required in order to perform theatre, students are naturally pushed towards carefully understanding the writing rather than just vaguely remembering the tale.
As an example, I utilize this strategy when presenting acts by Shakespeare. If the pupils have a simple understanding of what will occur in the act prior to they start reading, it takes some of the stress off, and we can collaborate on performing scenes and making sense of individual lines and speeches.
You can offer pupils a recap of a full play or of smaller sections of it, then ask them to review it, assign characters and put together a one-minute play that goes with the recap. Don’t be a stickler for time. If their plays take 2-4 minutes, that’s great too!
