Teaching Reading and Writing

Teaching reading is the process of giving lessons and giving instructions to students so that students can understand the message from the author through written language or medium of words.

The importance of teaching reading: young learners should be taught to read many types of books from an early age. Reading leads to good writing. Reading can build confidence and language proficiency.

Approach to teaching reading: phonic approach, whole word approach, language experience approach

Activities for young learners: decoding games, word search bingo, word families.

Teaching writing is providing information and instructions systematically about how to express ideas and feelings through writing instruments.

The importance of teaching writing: Can train the ability of young learners in thinking, Imagination is well developed, young learners can know and understand more vocabulary.

Approach to teaching writing: pragmatic approach, rhetorical approach, critical approach, expressive approach.

Activities for young learners: story chains, picture description, cards and letters.

Learning a Second/Third Language at Home and at School

Language acquisition is closely related to how children acquire words, meanings, structures, and pragmatics. It is nothing but related to the processes that occur in the minds and attitudes of children.

Billingualism is having or using two languages especially as spoken with the fluency characteristic of a native speaker.

There are two benefits of being Bilingual: Metalinguistic awareness (manipulating and labeling language), Executive control functions (helping children to switch between conflicting rules by suppressing one.)

THE EFFECT AGE:

The critical Period Hypothesis (CPH)

In language acquisition, it is recommended that children who start learning a second language when they are less than 11-12 years old have a lot of input and involvement in the environment.

Younger Learners v.s Older Learners

Children are sensitive to the sounds and the rhythm of new languages. They enjoy copying new sounds and patterns of intonation. Younger learners are less anxious and less inhibited and they can spend more time devoted to the language compared with those who start later.

Older learners use more efficient strategies, have more mature conceptual world to rely on, have a clearer sense of discourse and have a clearer sense of why they are learning a new language. Older learners are more analytical and give attention to detail.

Learning a second language at Home

The role of parents in mastering a second language is: parenting, facilitate, communicate, collaborate, interests, habits and performances. Parents have a critical part in their child's language learning growth and success. Maintain a positive attitude toward learning and discuss the importance of learning a second language with your child. Your child will be a successful bilingual with your help and encouragement.

Learning a second language at school

School is part of a formal environment, which is organized formally and carefully, and where the school prepares for the learning process in the classroom, which is led by the teacher. Students are directed to the teacher in a formal atmosphere in such a way as to understand the system or laws and regulations of the language being studied.

Sternberg (1979: 166) mentions the characteristics of the language learning environment in the classroom as follows:

• The language learning environment in the classroom is strongly colored by the class social psychologist factors which include adjustments, disciplines, and procedures used.
• In the classroom environment, pre-selection of linguistic data is carried out.
• In the classroom environment, grammatical rules are presented explicitly to improve the quality of students' language
• In the classroom environment, teaching tools are provided such as textbooks, supporting books, blackboards, tasks to be completed, and so on.

Teaching Young Language Learners (Second Edition). Annamaria Pinter. Oxford University Press 2017

Policy: Primary ELT Programmes

There are policies on EYL program activities such as: Listening (Listen and Imitate, Listen and Repeat, Listen and follow instruction, Listen and Match), Speaking, Reading, Writing.

There are several types of contextual factors: Language teaching or settings, educational frameworks, Status English and attitude to English.

Motivation is decisive in learning language especially if it is not your mother tongue. Motivation also can be defined as a key in learning other languages. The first language is a natural part of growing up, whereas the second foreign language is a result of motivation and hard work.

According to Dornyei, there are four main stages or components of motivational teaching:
•   Create motivating conditions for learning. This means creating a pleasant and supportive environment in the classroom. 
•       Introduce initial motivational techniques such as talking about values, showing positive attitudes to learning, creating materials that are relevant for the learners, and establishing expectations of success.
•       Teachers need to take care to maintain and protect their learners’ motivation by offering stimulating activities and fostering self-esteem, self-confidence, and cooperation among learners. 
Motivating teachers take care to turn evaluation and feedback into positive experiences.

Source: Teaching Young Language Learners (Second Edition). Annamaria Pinter. Oxford University Press 2017

Learning The First Language at Home and at School

The first language is also referred to as the mother tongue. Mother tongue is the first language mastered by humans from birth through interaction with fellow members of the language community, such as family and the environmental community.

The acquisition of a first language leads to the way children learns their mother tongue. For example, with Babbling, babbling is considered an early form of language acquisition because babies will produce sounds based on the language input they receive.

The acquisition of the first language is very influential on the cognitive and social development of children. Children begin to recognize verbal communication with their environment.

Adults help children learn languages mainly by talking to them. usually occurs when a mother coaxes and talks with her baby with her child, and occurs when a teacher patiently repeats instructions to an inattentive student.

'Baby talk' has simpler vocabulary and sentence structure than adult language, exaggerated intonation and sounds, and lots of repetition and questions.

the first language is obtained through:

The role of input and interaction

by the time children are four or five years old usually learn to use their mother tongue to communicate in their environment.

Research in the 1970s, such as the study by Catherine Snow in 1972 (in Fletcher & Garman, 1986), showed that mothers' speech to their babies was slower and more repetitive than their normal speech to adults. They used various simplifications and modifications in their speech and these were shown to be very helpful in making the input comprehensible to children.

The role of Universal Grammar

The famous linguist Noam Chomsky argued that children often produced language that they could not have heard in natural interactions with others.

All children who learn English as their mother tongue produce past tense words such as looked and tired. They attach regular past tense clues to irregular verbs.

The influence of school on first language development

Language use at home

At home most of the communication is embedded in a shared direct context, the use of school language is more independent of the direct context.

Parents/Caregivers naturally scaffold their children's language in dialogue.

It is often difficult for children to make the leap from using home language to school, from implicit to more explicit ways of using their first language.

Language use at school

With more complex grammar, children will learn to deal with types of clauses, complex sentences, and rules for connecting ideas in speaking and writing. They will also acquire formal, literary, historical, and ancient phrases and relate variations of their mother tongue, as well as other regional accents.

Children will continue to learn about their first language in school, and they may find a standard version of their first language that may be very different from the dialect spoken at home.

Sources:

Teaching Young Language Learners (Second Edition). Annamaria Pinter. Oxford University Press 2017

Children First Language Acquisition At Age 1-3 Years Old In Balata. Bertaria Sohnata Hutauruk. IOSR Journal Of Humanities And Social Science

How Young Children Learn Language. Dr. Bruce D. Perry.  https://www.scholastic.com/teachers/articles/teaching-content/how-young-children-learn-language/

Language Use At Home And School: A Synthesis Of Research For Pacific Educators. Zoe Ann Brown, Ormond W. Hammond, and Denise L. Onikama. Pacific Resources for Education and Learning. 1997
Linguistic Society of America. https://www.linguisticsociety.org/resource/faq-how-do-we-learn-language

https://kbbi.web.id/bahasa

My Experience of Teaching English to Young Learners

Hello everyone, my name is Dharmasari Padma. I want to share my experience teaching English to young learners.

In the past (at 15 January 2020), when I was studying in the 1st semester of the Education Profession course, I once did a teaching practice for the children of 'State Elementary School 07 Pagi Cawang', East Jakarta. I teach basic English to elementary school children, such as numbers, animals, objects around us. Some children already know the meaning of what I teach, and some children are do not know the significance of what I teach. I find it complicated to teach them because they are often noisy.

I feel happy because I can practice teaching even if it's only for one hour.

Here are some photos and there is also a video link

https://youtu.be/wZEl84RTfV8

Space

The universe we live in is made up of billions of stars, planets and galaxies. Earth where humans live, is in the Milky Way galaxy.

A galaxy is a huge collection of gas, dust, and billions of stars and their solar systems. A galaxy is held together by gravity (NASA). A galaxy is a group of stars that make up a system. Galaxies consist of more than one large celestial body surrounded by other celestial bodies. In astronomy, a galaxy is a vast system of stars, dust, and gas.

The phenomenon of the Milky Way Galaxy Sling or commonly referred to in international languages as the Milky Way, is a sky appearance that resembles a disk around which more stars appear.

Sources:

https://www.cnnindonesia.com/teknologi/20210504190114-199-638540/mengenal-selempang-galaksi-bima-sakti-bisa-dilihat-saat-sahur 

https://www.kompas.com/tren/read/2020/09/13/100200165/why-galaxy-place-bumi-berada-disebut-bima-sakti-?page=all.

Competition

I once participated in a competition with my friends. I have participated in art competitions and exhibitions (ACE). I took part in the hand lettering or calligraphy competition at President University, March 25 2018.
There are not only hand lettering competitions, but also illustration competitions and art exhibitions. Me and my friends really enjoyed the competition there.
Me and my friends none of us won the competition there. Even though we didn't win, the most important thing is that we have experience participating in competitions.