Engaging Children with Action Stories and Storytelling
Action Stories and TPR Techniques
Action Stories or TPR Stories: Children can participate in stories using TPR (Total Physical Response) with a few simple techniques. They can:
- Mime the story as it is read/played on an audio device.
- Perform pre-arranged actions when they hear key words read out.
- Listen and stand up when a character speaks or acts.
- Look and point to key illustrations/frames of the story.
These actions will make the story come to life and help the children internalize the language.
Action Stories: Phased Approach
First Phase
The teacher pre-teaches words and ensures students understand sentences by listening to instructions and imitating actions. It’s important that the teacher adapts the teaching pace to the students’ pace of learning by introducing sentences gradually, one after the other, and always repeating the previous sentences before introducing the new one. It is also important that the teacher strictly keeps to the order that the sentences are presented.
Second Phase
The teacher gives instructions in the same order as before, but this time, they don’t provide a model for the action. The students must listen and carry out the instruction without seeing the teacher acting it out.
Third Phase
Once the students can carry out the actions easily, the teacher changes the order of the instructions. As you can see, action stories are fun for the students, and they feel successful.
Final Phase
Students use a worksheet from their books as they listen to the same action stories from their audio CD. The children listen and put the pictures in the correct order. This consolidates their learning and, in an action-oriented way, shows how well they have understood the sentences they have just learned. They can do so by writing numbers or, if they haven’t learned to write numbers yet, they draw the corresponding number of dots onto the dice at the top of each of the pictures as shown on the worksheets.
Storytelling Techniques
Quality in Stories
How do we know if a story is good or not? It is subjective, but some features may help: If a story can capture children’s attention and interest, then it might be a good tool for language teaching. If children like a story, they will feel motivated to learn. However, we must bear in mind that not all good stories will be good for our teaching goals; we cannot forget our language learning objectives.
Choosing a New Story
There are some aspects we must take into account when choosing an appropriate story for our students:
- Values and Attitudes: Are they offensive?
- Structure: If the story is organized according to the prototypical structure, stories are more easily accepted and understood.
- Dialogue/Narrative: The choice of a text with more or less dialogue or narrative depends on how we want to use the story. Narrative can be a good source for grammar patterns, while dialogue is a good tool to learn expressions for conversation.
- Language Use: Repetition of vocabulary is very useful for foreign language lessons. We can use stories with some new vocabulary to learn new items or stories with familiar vocabulary we want to recycle.
New Language
We can find:
- Language that has been previously learned and should be recycled.
- New language that should be processed.
- New language that might be learned or not, depending on children’s interest.
If new words are not key to understanding the text or can be easily deduced from context or with the help of pictures, listeners/readers will be able to cope with them.
Reading Tips
- Choose a book or a story according to its quality and children’s interest.
- Find new words and those that are likely to be difficult for the students. Before reading the book, go over the words with the children using flashcards and help them with pronunciation and understanding. Afterward, allow the children to look through the pictures in the book to give them some idea of what will happen. You can use a picture worksheet to ‘write’ (if they can), point, or put a mark on their predictions, or simply ask them what they think will happen.
- Read the story aloud, trying to use the right rhythm, melody, and pronunciation. Read slowly and with expression. Don’t be afraid to ham it up! (perform in an exaggerated way). As you read aloud, encourage your children to get into the act.
Invite them to describe pictures, read bits of text, or guess what will happen next. After reading the story, ask them questions about the book, for example: What was the setting? Who was the main character? etc. Expect lots of questions, especially from young children.
- Take time to answer these as you go along.
- Dramatize roles in the story with them.
Retelling the story in the foreign language can be a very demanding task for children. We can ask them to draw, put some pictures from the story in order, or match some sentences and pictures, etc. Depending on how much time remains in the classroom, you can allow children to play games based on the reading, guessing games, or a competition of who can pronounce the words correctly. It is important to keep the children motivated. Each teacher should have a reward system that will encourage children’s love for books and reading. This is the way to turn children into lifelong readers. Try to read to your children daily or as frequently as possible.
Book Covers: Summary
Part 1: Introduce Several Book Covers
Comment on pictures: colors, drawings, objects, saying sentences like: “Isn’t that a cute picture?” Make some suggestions about the content: “I wonder if this book might be scary, but it has such beautiful colors. This book cover looks silly. And this book cover, it looks like a lot of photos!” Don’t tell them the titles at this point.
Part 2: Compare Two Book Covers of Different Genres
- Choose two books of different genres and let them make a choice by saying: “Hmmm, which one would you like me to read?”
- Once they have chosen a book, ask: “Why would you like me to read this book?” Suggest some reasons why: “Oh, because there’s a little girl in the picture,” explain what’s on the cover in picture terms.
Parts 3 and 4: Read the Book Cover: Concepts
Tell your children we’re going to start at the top. You start by pointing at the title with your finger and say: “This is the title of the book.” Then use your finger, working from left to right, reading the title and sounding words out. Comment on the pictures again: “Now let’s look at the picture of the book. What do we see?” Connect the picture along with the title: say: “Oh, the picture has something to do with the title.” Give the author’s and the illustrator’s name. Suggest the plot: “I wonder what the book might be about?” Let’s turn the page and find out.
Turning the Page
Say “Turn the page.” Open the book and look at the first page, compare it with the book cover (if possible). Go on reading by saying: “Let’s turn the page and see what the story is about.” Comment on the picture briefly (“What a beautiful picture, but let’s see what it says”) and start reading the page from top to bottom and left to right, sounding out words.
Benefits of Using Storytelling
- Promote a feeling of well-being and relaxation.
- Increase children’s willingness to communicate thoughts and feelings.
- Encourage active participation.
- Encourage use of imagination and creativity.
- Foster cooperation between students.
Performance Techniques
- Tell yourself the story in your own words.
- Use story skeletons to help you remember the key events.
- Think of the plot as a series of connected images.
Performance Skills
- Vary the volume, pitch, and tempo of your voice (enunciate clearly and exaggerate expression).
- Use your face, body, and gestures.
- Maintain engaging eye contact with the audience.
- Create a charismatic presence.
- Use different exaggerated character voices.
- Use your space/be dynamic.
Conditionals
0. Present Simple + Present Simple (Muy Probable)
1. Present Simple + Will/Won’t + Verbo (Probable)
2. Past Simple + Would + Verbo (Irreal)
3. Past Perfect + Would Have + Past Participle (Had) (Imaginario)
