ACET (Association of Children’s English Teachers)

Check the Regulars Lounge for a new discussion topic!! Click here.

Good attendance, lots of great activities and songs, as usual, and some “almost new-comers” (first seen last month at Devon Thagard’s Super Simple Songs presentation). Welcome to our first regular meeting, Ihsan and Catalina!

Thanks to Emi for a nice warm up song. What was this, by the way? Comment below please

Grace followed with a really excellent selection of activities:

1) Song “I have a joy” track 12, from Songs and Chants, with some good, hilarious, actions (especially “all over me” – ask Craig for the special variation) 

2) Teaching colours to babies using American Sign Language (very interesting! Details can be found on the internet) Used various colour flashcards, a colour chart made from decoration rings available from ¥100 stores. Used additional colour strips (the decoration rings)  and the colour charts to do a matching activity between mother and baby. Very nice. Also used a classic “Rainbow Song” track 4 from Songs and Chants to intoduce the sign language. Grace uses the sign language because just using the MAT method (students repeat 3 times after each vocabulary item) can be too boring for younger students.

3) Grace developed the colours theme for Kindergarten aged students with colour flashcards on the white board – kids get points by throwing a sucker ball at the cards on the white board. By the way Grace, where can you buy the cool sucker balls you were using? At this point Craig interjected with his numbers sucker ball game which looked mega simple but really fantastic. Kids throw sucker ball at board and have to get it in the circle, and say the number in order to score the points within the circle. Kids that don’t say the number don’t get the point. Balls that land outside the circles get minus 10 points or whatever the teacher chooses.Any numbers ok. Great idea Craig. Apologies for the hand-drawn iPhone sketch!

4) The final colour activity was a little more difficult – a game for 2 teams who have to go to the teacher to collect decoration strips of each colour contained on the colour chart. The first team to get all 7 colours is the winner. The whole class then gets to figure out what remaining colours are needed to complete the losing team’s set.  Kind of a missing/deduction game variation. Various other missing game variations were then discussed and played, including using  the white board, one card above the head, two cards above the head, behind the back, etc.

5) Setsuko Toyama missing game (or deduction game). Really excellent game which the players were totally into, and easy to see it being a huge hit with students. Seems that one problem might be with the smart kids always winning, so a bit of subtle cheating, or division of students into teams required. Unfortunately it is quite difficult to explain briefly here! Sorry folks! Any descriptions gratefully received.

Grace also suggested this link for some Mothers’ Day craft ideas http://www.dltk-holidays.com/mom/index.html (link now fixed)

Many thanks again Grace for a great presentation.

Yoriko was up next with a brief discussion about the learning pyramid and retention levels.  Not all members could agree whole heartedly, but most people seemed to think that if we can get our kids to teach their classmates, then they will probably retain more. Craig made a good counter argument but I cant recall what it was. Could you comment below please, Craig?

Emi then introduced the fabulously gruesome Mr Gumpy’s Outing, and Three Billy Goats gruff.  Nicely read, and definitely very entertaining for kids.

Finally, Miki and I managed to get the computer and projector set up (with AMIKAS assistance, thank you very much Mr AMIKAS technician), and Miki talked how she is using and encouraging her teachers to use different media in her school’s ESL classes. She introduced a number of very interesting looking websites whichher kids have been very enthusiastic about using (=enthusiastic about English class), but unfortunately I didn’t get the handout

We also had a practice run through of “who took the cookie?” from Super Simple Songs! Loved the cork cookies made from coasters! Why didn’t anyone take any pictures? I think we were all so into the presentations and activities that we didn’t even stop to think about that!

So Miki, when you read this, please could you mail it to me and I will put the links up here.  Thanks Miki.

Finally, I ran through the website structure and talked about how to use it a bit more interactively, but I wasn’t sure if my message really got through. Anyone is welcome to post topics for discussion, but these are probably best emailed to the vice-president at the usual email address. I will add discussion pages upon request. (Actually I am thinking about having a “noticeboard” page/section for info on events that members are participating/interested in. What do you think?)  People can then comment as they wish, just like on other blogs.

Thanks everyone again for coming, and especially to Miki for her mega effort (she actually hulked her coffee making machine with her all the way from Yanagawa just so we could all have some delicious coffee) bringing the laptop, my slide show, coffee, give away materials, Lindy Lizard books to look at, AND the genuine super triple  fudge cake straight out of Charlie’s Chocoloate factory in her kitchen!

Finally I’d like to recommend a book I have started reading “Teach like your hair’s on fire” by Rafe Esquith. Have just read the first few pages only, but it already sounds really inspirational. Thanks to Ben Cook and his inktails website for that one!

If I have forgotten or omitted anything or made any mistakes above, please just leave a comment below. Thanks, Jonathan.