Hello Exam Seekers,

It’s been a while since I post something on the blog, especially about young learners I know, I know… I don’t know what happened to my creativity, it simply vanished. I mean… I had all the posting schedule for the young learner’s exams (Pre A1 Starters, A1 Movers, A2 Flyers), but once they were over, my creativity was also over.

I know that part of this lack of creativity is due to having too much to do. As you all must know by now, I’ve finally started the Exam Seekers Youtube Project – if you haven’t checked yet, make sure you check us on Youtube! 🙂 – and I also started teaching at another school recently, so I was still managing my routine. Well, I still am, but I couldn’t leave you guys without new content, so today I bring you something new! 🙂

As many of you know, whenever you start a course for teachers focused on teaching kids – or pre-service training -, there is always one word attached to this learning process, do you know which word is it? It’s FUN!

The tutors and the coordinators want children to enjoy the English classes – as much as we teachers do -, so they expect us to make the learning process for young learners something that they will enjoy. That’s not all random.

1. You have to keep in mind that they are children, and therefore they are at a stage of life in which they must be playing. Many kids already have many activities to do. Some parents put them to play sports, play musical instruments, do other extracurricular activities and have extra English classes. So it is important to make these classes enjoyable for them.
2. Also, many children remember language more easily when they learn through creative activities.

So here are some ideas you can try at school (if you are a teacher) or at home (if you are a parent) to help your children (sons, daughters, or students) to take their first steps to learn English in a way that they won’t feel they’re going through a learning process. These activities are focused on Cambridge’s first three exams for young learners – Pre A1 Starters, A1 Movers, and A2 Flyers.

• Encourage children to read English-language books with interesting pictures and topics.
• Read with your kids, or help them read for you – Cambridge has a selection of readers for you to choose from.
• Cut up a short story into different pieces. Ask your child to put it back together again in the right order. Then read the story aloud together.

• Watch English-language TV shows. Turn off the volume. Guess what the people are saying. Then listen and ask “were you right?”.
• There are may youtube channels with stories or people playing.
• Play songs and encourage learners to sing.
• Play guessing games such as I spy something that starts with the letter…

• Encourage children to draw pictures and posters. Ask them to add written labels and descriptions.
• Choose some words your child knows. Write the words and make some mistakes. Ask your child to pretend to be the teacher and correct your spellings.
• Help your children find a picture that interests them. Ask them to write a 20–30-word story about it.
• Play with words: unscramble letters, spelling bee, etc.

• Find simple cartoon strips. Ask your child to look at the pictures and tell a story.
• Ask your child to tell you some of the things they see on car journeys. That car’s red! I can see three buses! Accept mistakes. The important thing is for the children to say English words without worrying.

• Use the Pre A1 Starters, A1 Movers, and A2 Flyers wordlists to play Pictionary. Each player must draw something, without writing any words or speaking. The other players must guess what they are drawing.
• Give your child a list of things to find. For example, a tree, a bird, something ‘yellow’, something ‘old’. You could play this on a walk, on a rainy day with household objects or during a long car trip.
• Show the picture cards, ask the child to close their eyes and remove one item, then ask them to guess the missing one.

These are just some ideas for you to use with your young learners. There are other activities you can use to practice with your kids or students. Cambridge has some free resources on their website:

• Parent’s newsletter: free tips and English activities;
• Games: free interactive games in English to making learning fun and motivating;
• Learning activities: free resources that help children practice the skills tested in Cambridge English Qualifications.
• Sing and Learn: watch Cambridge series of free videos with subtitles – children can sing along and practice their vocabulary.
• Exam preparation materials: Get sample tests, wordlists and posters to prepare young learners for their exam.

If you want more tips, make sure you comment in the comment section below!

————x————

That’s it for today! Please like the post and follow the blog on:

• youtube.com/c/ExamSeekers
• facebook.com/ExamSeekers
• instagram.com/ExamSeekers
• twitter.com/ExamSeekers

You can also listen to this post at Anchor!!!

Have a great week,
Patricia Moura