Page 32 - 彩虹橋 第四十三期家長通訊

Q&A with Mr. Boris
Q&A with Mr. Boris
Q&A with Mr. Boris

By Mr. Boris Choy

Q1. How does ECLC strike a balance between language learning and
thematic or storybook teaching?

One thing I love about teaching English is finding creative ways to integrate
language learning with content learning. I find that it makes language instruction
more interesting for students and helps to create a cohesive and holistic
learning experience.

One of my favourite examples came during the “Resources of the Earth” topic
with the K1s. We began with an exercise where the students had to imagine that
they were trees, forming the branches, leaves, trunks and roots with the different
parts of their bodies. Then, we discussed the choices we made and compared
our body parts with those of trees. This was an opportunity to expand our
vocabulary by learning the names and functions of different tree components.
We learned a song and made some artwork to consolidate our thematic and
language learning.

From there, we reflected on how we can draw
resources from trees for our own use. In this case,
we decided to squeeze some oranges to make
fresh orange juice! This also gave us the chance to
integrate some more language learning in the form of
the letter “o” and its letter sound. Students used their
senses to explore the oranges and used the orange
rinds to stamp some letter “o” shapes.

We were able to take it another step further. When
squeezing the oranges, students noticed the seeds
falling from the fruit. This led to a discussion about
how seeds, along with water, sun, and soil, can
produce further plants, trees, and fruit. With this in mind, we set out to examine a variety of fruits and
investigate the seeds within them. The K1 students chose their favourites and set about recording their
observations.

Finally, the K1 had a good laugh reading Who Will Plant
a Tree? by Jerry Pallotta. The story was perfect for
recapping the vocabulary and concepts we had learnt
so far, but also for raising further questions about the
significance of seeds and interactions between plants,
animals, and people within the Earth’s ecosystems.

As in this case, content and language integrated
learning is effective because the content side and the
language side are mutually reinforcing. Furthermore,
students can discover new concepts with English as
the primary medium, minimising the distance between
thought and the target language.

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