4 Language skills and learning objectives combined

The materials we will use are those common and available at school: blackboard, a New Testament for each boy in the classroom (paperbacks are quite cheap if purchased), digital projector with laptop, pen and paper. At different stages we will use crayons and materials for drawing.

4 LANGUAGE SKILLS AND LEARNING OBJECTIVES COMBINED

The way we teach children in the primary school depends on their development stage. We shouldn´t ask a child to perform an activity involving complex verbal tenses if he/she has not yet achieved such a control of time conceptualization. On the other hand, requiring a 11-12 years old boy too childish activities will result in demotivation. According to Phillips (1993), holistic learning decreases with age. This means their approach to language is not intellectual in the first years. This has advantages and disadvantages. As they grow up, more sophisticated and intellectual activities can be done.

Some other aspects to be considered in the selection of activities are these (Phillips, 1993):

- Children must understand in a very simple way what we expect them to do. Our instructions shouldn´t leave any room for questions like: “But, teacher, then, do I have to write it on the paper….?” Clear explanation of academic tasks derive in better performance regardless the stage. “It is critical for English learners to have instructions presented in a step-by-step manner, preferably modeled or demonstrated for them” (Echevarría, Vogt, & Short, 2010: 85).

- Scaffolding, as based in Vygotsky’s socio-cultural psychology (Echevarría, Vogt, & Short, 2010). Tasks must be within children abilities, i.e., achievable, but at the same time sufficiently stimulating so that some degree of satisfaction can be drawn from success. This is the field that Vygotsky described as learner’s zone of proximal development (ZPD). Progress is made possible thanks to cultural mediation provided by school activities. In the course of the activities, teacher can practice verbal scaffolding in various ways like paraphrasing, using ‘think-alouds’, providing correct pronunciation by repeating students’ responses, slowing speech and so on. Together with it, we have procedural and instructional scaffolding.

Also, this theoretical framework reminds us of the beneficial effect that activities involving grouping children can operate, provided at least one of them is ahead of the rest, helping his peers to progress thanks to his mediation.

- Activities should be largely orally based, and the younger the more.

- We must allow sufficient wait time for student’s responses. Wait time is the lapse between utterances during an interaction. Many teachers are scared of the void and fill in the silence. We will also let children fully express themselves, letting them to go on speaking even if a controlled practice is at stake.

- Written activities must be used sparingly with young children; a bit more is possible at the end of the primary school. Children under 7 are not proficient even with the mechanism of writing. On the