Teaching the Little ´Uns

I have come to actually really enjoy my marathon hour-and-a-half long English classes with the fourth grade kids. Although there can be definitely moments when it is overwhelming (say, when they are all coming up to you, shoving their notebooks in your face to show you that they finished copying the alphabet and demanding that you write excellent or perfect so that they feel validated), it is really quite enjoyable too.

A good example of a fun moment from yesterday´s class with 4b was when I was singing a basic good morning song with them (to the tune of Frair - I have no idea how to spell that - Jacques). Now, a gringo with a terrible singing voice is funny enough, but then I let them also pick what style I would sing in. We went through abuelita, niño, baby, mujer (they loved that one), and finished with monkey style in which I jumped all over the room and scratched my armpits and what not while singing. I guess I just was in really good spirits and feeling very into being silly - a formula that definitely seems to work to a tee with the young ones.

I have also implemented a system in which I have the kids broken down into teams. I find that it helps me keep the discipline positive - for instance, instead of getting frustrated with a kid or telling him to sit down over and over again, I can be like ¨oh man, I really think that this team does not want to earn points because they just don´t seem to be listening¨ or I can focus on the positives of what are going on, like ¨team monkeys are really working hard, they are looking for some serious points¨- and the kids have latched on to the idea. When I go team by team at the end of class giving points and explaining how each team did that day, the kids are just spell bound. And I imagine that as more time passes, they will be thinking about it more and more in the class itself.

Another little moment to share from yesterday was not quite as positive, though I think I handled it well. In my fourth year of secondary class, my brain was spazzing a lot for some reason and I kept having to erase what I had wrote or add something else in with what I had been explaining. I could tell the kids were quite lost and myself was feeling very much all over the place. So I just stopped, sat own on a desk and asked the kids how they were doing. I said, ¨let´s talk about something else for a few minutes¨ and then just chatted a bit with them. Then I apologized for being all over the place and confusing and told them we would go back to the beginning and go over it all again. They seemed to understand it much better the second time and I personally felt like I was being much clearer and precise with the present simple tense (which we were reviewing). So a negative scramble did have its positive ending.

Oh, and one more thing - I am definitely struggling with getting kids to actually do their homework and have tried to add in more reminders (stopping by the classes on days I don´t teach them, reminding them at the beginning of the day) and talked with them about why this is happening, but am very open to any and all suggestions on the matter. Please help!