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As you may have figured out for yourself, singing and teaching songs is one of the easiest and useful ways that you can teach English to children. It works for adults as well, but children are certainly the most receptive to songs. An ESL teacher from Hawaii and New York who is presently working in Japan, named Reannon, runs a blog called “Taken By The Wind.” In her blog, she writes about the power of songs as a resource in ESL tutoring and teaching. She writes, “It’s not so much having a huge knowledge-base of songs that’s important as it is knowing which songs are best used in an ESL classroom. The idea behind using songs in your lessons, is in order to review particular vocabulary or grammar…and not just to entertain or kill time. So before you decide to teach the kiddies a song, ask yourself this: How is this song useful?”
This is good advice for whatever you teach. If you are running out of ideas or a class is especially difficult, it is tempting to want to talk about anything or teach anything to just fill in time. However, you really do need to stop and consider why you are teaching what you are. Reannon goes through a list of 10 songs that we typically learn as children in our own native speaking culture, but that really do not seem to have a real purpose for an ESL tutoring session. It is important to then collect as many ideas and resources BEFORE entering a classroom or tutoring situation so you can draw upon them when you need to fill in time. She gave a list of 7 children songs that she thinks are relevant and the lessons that they teach. Feel free to borrow these ideas as useful tools for your own resource collection. They are the following:
- The Hokey Pokey (In/Out, Body Parts)
- Head, Shoulders, Knees and Toes
- The Walking Song (Actions)
- The Rainbow Song (Colors)
- The Colors of Our Clothes (Colors, Clothing)
- The Hello/How Are You Song (Greetings)
- One Little, Two Little, Three Little Fingers
If you are like me, you may not know all of these songs, but understand the idea behind it and can think of others I could use in my own tutoring situations.
I guess one of the main points of all preparations and resources is to have fun and don’t be afraid to get a little crazy. Kids will love you for it, and it will help you be a little more free and creative in all your other teaching exploits.
If you want to follow along with more of what Rannon’s blog has to say, you can track her at http://reannon-takenbythewind.blogspot.com/2008/06/when-wheels-on-bus-have-long-since.html .
Good point about songs. Not only does it make learning English easy, it’s also fun . . . and it offers potential moments for different types of cross cultural exchange, such as new musical styles, etc.