Reading techniques: Mice

1. Scanning: Which of these mice could live in the Antarctica?
2. Reading between the lines: Do you think that the Jumping mice likes insects?
3. Predicting: How many kinds of mice exist?
4. Guessing meaning from the context: Read the text, what do you think these words mean: tail, cables, grams.
5. Skimming: What do you think this text is about?
6. Intensive reading: Complete this table with the information that appears in the text:

 

MICE	LENGTH	WEIGHT	FOOD	FEATURES
PYGMY MOUSE
JUMPING MOUSE
HOUSE MOUSE
HARVEST MOUSE
DORMOUSE   Produced by: María Racionero and Lorena Seco

Activity of a picture.

The author that we have chosen to carry out this activity based on a painting, is called Piet Mondrian.

 

 

 

It´s a very suitable picture for infant education because they can learn the different colors, sizes and also it´s a good way to introduce other kind of shapes like circle, trinagle among others.

 

 

 

We will introduce this painting by asking our pupils some questions like the next ones:

 

- How many colours do you see in the picture?

-What colours do you see?

 

Then we will play a game. The teacher will say a colour and the children, that wear that colour, will clap their hands. For instance: "Clap your hands those who are wearing something blue".

 

After a while, we will continue asking some more questions and we will work the different sizes of the shapes:

 

-What kind of shapes do you see?

-Can you find a square in the class? and a rectangle?

- Then, they will cut the shapes of the picture and they can create their own painting.

-We can introduce another kinds of shapes like circle, triangle,... and we can support this new concepts with realia.

 

 

 

Finally, they will paint a huge Mondrian picture in a mural.

Produced by: María Racionero and Lorena Seco.

 

I can´t hear you (Activity after listening this song)

The activity that we have created to improve the vocabulary that appears in the song is for instance the game of Simon´s says in which the teacher is going to say:

-Clap your hands.
-Raise your hands.
-Move your toes.
-Count to three.
-...







So each child will do what the teacher has said before.


Produced by: Cristina Beltrán Sabater and Lorena Seco Molinero.

Activity of the alien´s listening

- Before Listening:

First of all, we can create some boxes of different colours (pink, green, yellow and purple). Then we give them some objects with different colours to each child, so at the end the colours will be repeated. So to explain better the activity, the teacher will show them, like an example. The activity will start when the teacher asks to the children about a colour (stand up the children who have a yellow object) and then they have to introduce the object inside the corresponding box.

 

- While Listening:

 

Simon says: The activity consists in saying for example one action that appears in the alien´s picture, so they will have to do it. For instance: Simon says drink a glass of water.

 

- After Listening:

 

Role play: They have to act like if they are in a bar.

 

Activities of Theme 1: Second language teaching methods

1. It has been said that the Grammar- Translation Method teaches students about the target language, but not how to use it. Explain the difference in your own words.

The differences of this method is that you can learn the grammatical rules and vocabulary translated by heart, instead of acquire it. For instance, when you are going to do an exercise of grammar or vocabulary you will do it directly because you study like that. So for that reason you don´t internalize it and you don´t know why you are using it. The best way to learn how to use it, is making errors. The important thing is to develop communicative competences. The grammar is useful to communicate.

 

2. In the Grammar-Translation Method, grammar is treated deductively; in the Direct Method, grammar is treated inductively. Can you explain the difference between deductive and inductive treatments of grammar?

 

The fist thing that teachers do is teach the rules of grammar and it is not the right way. If you give a situation to your pupils in which prepositions are used it´s better for them to understand it instead of give them rules and tables to study without explain it.

 

     - Inductive = You give imputs (situations for the children).

     - Deductive = You give the rules and that´s it.

 

3.Which of the following techniques follows from the principles of the Audio-Lingual Method, and which ones don´t? Explain the reasons for your answer.


a- It´s not connected with Audio Lingual Method however it´s connected with Grammar-Translation Method.

b- It´s not connected.

c- It´s not connected.


5. Asher believes that foreign language instruction can and should be modelled on native language acquisition. What are some characteristics of TPR that are similar to the way children acquire their native language?


The simple structures and commands. The most important thing of the TPR is the imitation and the orders because children learn like that, for instance: Open the window. It´s a way of getting inputs. And also it´s important to have an enviroment where children feel comfortable.


7. A lot of target language structures and vocabulary can be taught through the imperative. Plan part of a TPR lesson in which the present continuous tense, or another structure in the target language, is introduced.

Aim: Learning the present continuous tense.

Activity: “Simon says”. The teacher is going to give some instructions and students have to follow them. For instance: “Simon says jump in the air” and the students have to jump. When they are jumping, the teacher is going to say “We are jumping” and all of them have to repeat it. Then, we do the same with other verbs (read, drink, run, walk…), so the students can learn that the present continuous is used when you are doing something in this moment and they can learn the structure in a funny way.
 

Produced by: Cristina Beltrán Sabater, Eva Martín Vega, María Racionero García, Patricia Martín Cano and Lorena Seco Molinero.