Hallo,
I've been teaching English for the past two years. I am particularly worried about one of my pupils, a 12-year-old girl, who is progressing very very slowly - if at all. She learns her grammar rather mechanically, and it soon becomes clear that she cannot tell the difference between tenses and she cannot use whatever grammar she has learnt effectively or creatively in different contexts. She has been learning English for four years now and, when I ask her, for example, to write a verb in the simple past, she asks "is this the -ing? the -er? (comparatives) the -ed? the was?" and so on, until she gets it (at the moment, I do not use standard terminology, but rather adopt her way of distinguishing between phenomena, but I am not sure this helps). Things are equally difficult when it comes to vocabulary. She learns her vocabulary for our lesson and then seems to forget everything. We are still struggling with simple verbs like "want", "go", "take", and even "be" and "have".
I do not wish to label children, because I suppose one can never tell whether it is all down to pure laziness or lack of interest or skill and adeptness - I usually think that there is always more than one explanation or reason. But of course, whichever explanation I give, the problem is there and has to be dealt with. Till recently, I was patiently repeating words and grammar, hoping that this would help. But seeing no change, I've decided to just read with her as many texts as possible, teach the essentials of grammar and avoid the details that might confuse her, and ask her to translate the texts word by word, hoping that she will at least learn eventually to recognise some of the basic vocabulary. We even read some of the British Council Stories and do the activities. But I am not at all sure this is the right approach. Hence this message!
I would be very happy to hear your suggestions, as I often feel at a loss.
Many thanks in advance,
K.
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But in my oppinion , you should let the kid with less attention for a while . Kids sometimes do strange things to draw attention upon them .
Thank you for the comment, Janitorial16. The idea has indeed crossed my mind, but I suppose in that case the target must be rather her parents - we're having a one-to-one lesson, so she has my full attention anyway, unless there is something that I'm missing. In fact, wondering recently whether she does indeed strive for her parents' attention, I decided to be more patient with her and try to show her that she could progress, if only she could focus a bit more and try a bit harder. But I see no difference - yet, anyway. I often think she misunderstands completely the meaning of progress: when she was asked recently whether she can speak English well, she replied "of course". Quite puzzling.
To be able to observe a sudden change in her attitude you need to make a sudden change in yours . It is kind of tricky , but you should push things a little in several directions to see wheather she reacts or not . But my guess would be she is following something , like you said , maybe to draw more attention from her parents .
In psychology it happens very often that kids assume their playrole and do it for the audience without even realizing they're doing it .
Keep us posted on this one . Thanks
Hello Kaydee.
The child you mention exhibits many of the traits of dyslexia. There are simple tests which can be found on line to see if this is the case here. Simply Google 'tests dyslexia' and see if any of the results will help.
If that yields no positive result then you may need to seek advice from an educational physcologist who will do the testing for you.
Treatment for dyslexia is well researched and in most cases, extremely fruitful. I have 1st hand knowledge of this!
Don't be put off giving the child encouragement, we all need lots of that, especially if we are having difficulties.
Rubik
Hi
Have you tryed some variety in your classes? How about some fun and games? Kids and adults learn better when they are motivated. Using games and activities in your classes will definitly help motivate the kids.
"Present simple" is just a label, they probably know it context (or at least they should if they were already taught it). So for example if you asked them to use a word in the context of a sentence, e. g., in a cloze exercise where they choose the appropriate tense to fill in the blank, they would probably know it.
I'd try using some new esl games and activities to spruce up your classes. They say there are three learning styles (auditory, kinesthetic, and visual), so everybody is learning differently. Here's a test http://www.ldpride.net/learning-style-test-b.html
I'd try some different styled activities.
Based on my understanding of what you wrote here...I'd try that^^
Ian
Kaydee, I just look at the dozens of hits you get from Google and think that so many will just cloud the issue. One I can heartily recommend is this: http://www.xtraordinarypeople.com/x-factor/
On re-reading your OP the more convinced I am that this might be the problem. No amount of explanation or repetition will help if the child has dyslexia; a very different approach is called for. Present simple will stay with the child for but a few moments and past participles, even less.
There is lots of help available on this site and if you need one, a tutor will be allocated to help you.
Reading through the list of famous and succesful people who are dyslexic will show you that this condition should not be a stumbling block to a child's developement.
I wish you well and let us know how you get on.
Hallo, and many thanks to all of you.
@rubik101: I have wondered myself whether this is a case of dyslexia, and you are right that I should perhaps use a test to make sure. It is just that if she were dyslexic, she would have problems with spelling, wouldn't she? (Unfortunately, I don't know much about dyslexia). The problem is that she can manage with spelling, but it is as if her learning has an expiry date: she learns whatever she has to learn for the lesson and next week she will have forgotten 90% of it, if not all of it. Sometimes I feel that the only things she can spell and write and use are the things she had learnt before coming to me or the things she has been seeing a lot over these past four years - hence my worry that I'm doing something wrong.
As for her grammar, she can manage a cloze or any other exercise, as long as she does not have to make a distinction between tenses or phenomena. So, I can introduce a new tense, ask her to do a number of exercises, but when it comes to choosing between the simple past and the past continuous, she can hardly manage on her own.
What worries me most is that she cannot use whatever knowledge of English she has in order to produce either written or oral speech in English - at least not in the way my other students can, even those who are younger than her. I can't tell whether this has to do with her intellectual abilities (or the way they have been formed by the general education system), with her learning style or with her psychology, some kind of deeply embedded notion perhaps concerning learning that does not allow her to enjoy it properly and creatively. But then again, perhaps I expect too much of her - or of everyone, actually? Perhaps not all children are ready to use a foreign language after four years, perhaps I should allow her more time. It's just that I feel that if children don't start using the foreign language early in their learning, they will not feel comfortable using it later on either.
@lip1358 I do try games occasionally, but as this is not a proper class but a one-to-one lesson, they can hardly become very lively or exciting. I've been also using computer games and the internet for stories and games. In the past, I would often get pretty disheartened by the fact that, once the game was over and we had to go back to the book, it would seem as if we were at point zero again. But I have decided not to use the book for the next month, wishing to see whether the idea of a book lying there in front of us functions negatively in a sense.
We had no lessons for 15 days, it was our Easter holiday, and I took the opportunity to do some reading on teaching ESL. I also thought a lot about Janitorial16's suggestion that I should make a sudden change. We have only had a week of teaching so far after the holiday and in that week we have not yet used our books, but I decided that we should use games or random exercises instead and speak as much as possible in English. The idea did seem to excite her, but for the time being we are using very elementary stuff, the present tenses, words for clothing or external appearance etc. I avoid terminology, trying to instill the knowledge through repetition or gentle correction. We have another month to the end of the year and I thought I should use that time to see if this approach would bring about any changes. I fear that whatever progress there might be, it will be a rather slow one, but perhaps it's worth a try. But I am not at all sure that her parents will be that understanding when they realise that we have not progressed at all in the book. Books and curricula can be very helpful, organising as they do knowledge into chunks and guiding both teachers and students, but in this particular case I feel I almost hate the idea of having to follow the trodden path that will lead to an exam.
Hoping I have not bored you to death, I thank you all for your comments and your help once again. I will look dyslexia up and I will ask her to take that learning style test.
all best,
k.