Opis:

As ten year olds enter grade 4, they leave the safety of lower primary years and have to face a lot of challenges and new responsibilities. Several new teachers, several separate subjects, several sets of requirements. On top of that, they don’t know much about how to organize their study process or how to develop successful learning strategies. Can we, as their English teachers, do anything to help out, make the transition less stressful, and the learning process more effective?

I firmly believe we can, as long as we take into account our students’ real developmental capabilities and limitations. And adjust our teaching strategies and materials to memory capabilities, attention span, and motor skills of 10 year olds (rather than 11- or 12-year olds). We will talk about the amount of scaffolding and assistance our students require – at the start of grade 4 and in subsequent weeks, months and years. While the final destination – graduating from grade eight – may seem a difficult and faraway goal now, I am going to show that we are going to get there. Together.