One often quoted line about teaching little kids is:
They have very short attention spans, so be sure to change activities every 10 minutes.
The thing is, have you ever seen a little kid get so engrossed in something that they just completely forgot about everything else?
Have you ever seen them watch their favourite TV show all the way through?
Listened to their favourite song for a 1,000 times in a row on repeat?
Wanted their favourite picture book read over and over again?
The fact is that if you’re having to change activities every few minutes, it just means they are too boring for the kids!
Luckily with Genki English you don’t often have that problem (it’s usually the opposite and we can’t throw them out afterwards!) but one thing I’d like you to keep in mind, is a saying that comes from the writing world…..
An activity can never be too long, just too boring.
If you get it just right, you’ll have their solid attention for as long as you like! π
Be genki,
Richard
Oh yeah!
recently I have to smile and sometimes really be very decided to go on to another activity, because whatever we do the kids shoutγ”One more time”.
This year again the “Make a face” beats it all~ they just have soooo much fun doing it again and again and again and again. So I made up so many versions to “secretly” train different skills!
..and when I started teaching I was even told to change activities all 2 minutes (not 10!!!!), and I believed it for a long time~so preparing those classes was a disaster.
With GE it is dead easy!
Yeah, I love it when the kids won’t let me move onto another activity…even though I feel we have to change, haha.
This articulates very well what I’ve been thinking. Currently I work at a place where we are supposed to break up the class into 5 minute segments and I guess it is largely because of this short attention span theory. I guess it also accounts for the ‘go slow’ scam a lot of schools run. Make it meaningful and memorable and the students will have a better shot of remembering it. By the way, I’d be interested to see a list of schools that use Genki English in Japan, as it might be helpful when I come to look for a new job.