Young students

[rossjk1]

I am a freelance english teacher in switzerland and im having difficulty in adapting my teaching method for the different students owing to the large age gaps between them.
I have two at around 7 years old,
two at 11 years old,
one at 12 years old,
one at 30 years old
and another at 40 years old.

Previously i was teaching adults which i was coping fine with but particularly with the youngest im having difficulty with keeping there lessons interesting for them. They are more interested in video games than learning english. Particularly with one of the eight year olds. Im battling to stimulate an interest in reading. I have tried numerous differnt approaches to getting him to read(all kind of books!) The only one so far he has taken an interest in is asterix!!!I also have great difficulty with getting him to do grammar. We have started cambridge messengers 1 with him. He has the level for it easily but getting him to concentrate is another thing!!He pretends to not know the answers to any of the questions to test me!Its very testing!!!!!!!

Thanks for your help.

[beascarpetta]

I'm not quite clear on how advanced this obnoxious eight-year old's English is.
Couldn't you bring in some visual stimuli like DVDs (with English subtitles) and have him fill in a questionnaire afterwards?

Let me know if you need any stuff since I've got eleven-year-olds on my hands and their English is poor at best.
Still,they took to 'Pirates of the Caribbean'(highly unsuitable for an eight-year old I might add) like ducks to water.

[Teaching English Games]

Hello there,

For the 7, 11 and 12 year olds I recommend trying out a free play skit that I have available as a sample from my book of ESL plays for children.

The play scripts can all be adapted to any number of pupils between 1 and 15 - this means that if you have a one to one - say the 12 year old - then you put the play on with her and you act one of the parts - the pupils takes all the other lines - there are notes telling you exactly how to do it for each play.

First you teach the key vocab and phrases in the play using games. Then when the main language is known you start to put the play together for ten to fifteen minutes or so of each lesson.

These plays are written for beginners with repetition - but they are still fun and always have some kind of twist or joke in them - or they are just plain cute.

If you need game ideas I have those too.

Here's the link to the plays page - the free play is about half way down and you can scroll to it if you do not want to read all the info about using plays and drama in class for ESL.

ESL plays for children

All the best
Shelley