Vanya Koleva is a last year student teacher at "Preschool pedagogy and a foreign language" at Konstantin Preslavsky University of Shumen, College Dobrich. She is interested in various creative things as making dolls and other toys. She loves digital and paper painting. She studies graphic and web design. Email: libertade@abv.bg

 

Note

This article is part of Project 08-61/24.01.2024 of Dobrich College, Shumen University. Bulgaria.

 

Introduction

Teaching foreign languages to very young learners is very important for their future development. It contributes to their confidence and self-esteem when they start school, facilitates the development of their personality, opens opportunities for communication with foreigners, reveals potential for professional development in future. Learning English is very useful in using the Internet and computers and would be a good extra in studying computer technologies and programming. Foreign language is useful at a later stage when children start studying biology, geography, chemistry at school because they will be able to recognize words of foreign origin and will be able to create associations between notions, e.g. the names of the chemical elements. When children are raised with English songs (English as a foreign language), they often make cross references between English and Bulgarian, e.g. they asked how is “mama” in English and found mum and mama very similar. Yesterday while we were having pizza, they remembered that it is the same in English and I explained that it is Italian dish and the word is of Italian origin and enters all languages with the product; when we had broccoli, they said “like in the song”. Learning a foreign language is an opportunity to meet a foreign culture, to find similarities and differences, which enriches their personal development and their socialization.
 

Multiple literacies in teaching very young learners

When children have met the foreign language at a very early age, they will easily acquire it later on and this will facilitate the process of learning it at school. Starting with attractive, colourful, vivid memorable materials as songs and video clips, we can aid children’s foreign language development. Each video can be used for the development of various types of literacies and 21st century skills (for lists of multiple literacies and 21st century skills see Ilieva 2021 and Ilieva 2022a). In the modern world a lot of authors talk not simply about literacy, but about multiple literacy (Blake 2016, Burniske 2000, Humble 2003, Walsh 2010). This variety of literacies is necessitated by the multimedia communication and our world which needs citizens that are literate in various spheres (health literacy, social literacy, environmental literacy, nutritional literacy, critical literacy). Ilieva (2021: 48) points the literacies developed through video materials as integrative links to other subjects:

“The surrounding world, which unites natural world and social world at the kindergarten: civic/civil, community, participatory, personal, connections, cultural, global, historical, home, work, school, street, social, religious, environmental, geographic, health, nutritional; Physical education: dance, kinesthetic; Mathematics: mathematical literacy or numeracy.” (Ilieva 2022b: 125)

She claims that “using video instead of songs makes language still more vivid, and the material more attractive” and presents examples of songs and the literacies, skills and cross-curricular links we can develop through them. She (Ilieva 2022a: 311) outlines the criteria we have to use when choosing free online video materials: “that there is a text (with sentences) and not only enumerating words;” to bear in mind “the characteristic features of young or very young learners,” the “grammar and vocabulary they would teach, discussion topics, cross-curricular links,” the list of modern literacies and skills, and the potential to contextualize a variety of games and activities through the material.
 

Small scale experiment

The subject

The subject of this small scale experiment are my own children. My daughter is a year and a half and my son is four years old. When choosing the songs, I kept in mind the above mentioned criteria and the children’s preferences.

 

Methodology

My children listen to English songs almost every day. When my son comes home from the kindergarten, he is usually very tired and rarely listens to music; sometimes when he is ill, he stays at home. When the children are at home, I let them listen to their favourite songs as soon as they wake up in order to have great mood, to get up happy and energetic. They listen to songs they are already familiar with and they like. After breakfast we listen to familiar songs and I include new songs or songs they have not listened to very often and we dance and sing together. I show them new dancing moves that suggest the meaning, I articulate the new words clearly. I let them have fun and try not to organize it as a learning process. In the afternoon, after their nap, sometimes they listen to songs again. They have fun without my participation. They do not listen to music that intensively every day. For example, when they are ill, I let them watch stories on a video – something that is more calming. When they are tired after a walk, I do not play songs so that they can have some rest. When one of the children hums a song, I play it. This is the way I choose the songs for our small experiment.

 

Materials

All the materials mentioned further develop visual literacy and partly multimedia literacy, as far as these are video materials; dance and kinaesthetic literacy when the children dance and demonstrate movements or point to objects; entertaining skills, the skills of listening actively, speaking, using emotional intelligence.

 

Examples of suitable songs and video clips we have already used with comment on results

1. Head Shoulders Knees & Toes

It is a song for children, documented in 1912, the author is unknown. It is very popular today, it is sung in many languages by a lot of people all over the world. Children love it because it is easy and memorable. It can be danced. The dance consists of showing each body part that is mentioned. This is a kind of visualization that activates movement and visual memory. Visualizing by showing and touching is a presupposition for easy understanding, fast acquisition and retain in long-term memory. Knowing the parts of the body is an important part of the child’s development. My daughter (a year and a half) loves dancing while watching the video of the song. She tries speaking but now what she does successfully during this song is raising her hands when the children on the video touch their heads and putting them down when they touch their knees. My son (who is 4) copes successfully with this dance and with the pronunciation and understanding of the words. I have chosen this clip because it has the potential of developing tolerance to all children: social literacy (there are children of various races and a child in a wheel chair).

 

2. Twinkle Twinkle Little Star

This is a song by Jane Taylor in the early 19th century. Nowadays it is famous as a lullaby. Emotionally it has the effect to settle down, it is associated with the night, the stars and going to bed. Melody is easily remembered, and my children like it very much. This is my son’s most favourite song. He hums it since he was 1-2 years old and now he sings it very well. My daughter also likes the song, she even successfully tries to sing it although she is only a year and a half. On his bed my son has stars and he says “Look, they twinkle.” This clip also develops social literacy (various races) and scientific interest and literacy: the children see their mates using a telescope, watching the night sky, etc.

 

3. The Wheels on the Bus

An American folk song for children, written by Verna Hills which first known publication is in 1937. Children love the repetition of the words and sounds at the end of the sentences. This makes the song funny and very attractive, easily remembered and sung with ease and with pleasure. It is a TPR song (total physical response), there are other versions of it; another video clip is very dynamic with a bus full of people, passing through the town, by sea, mountains, meadows, various plants: trees, bushes, grass, flowers; through rain, over the zebra crossing, by an observatory. There are a few versions of the song. My children like repeating the words of the horn, of the baby and they are especially impressed when mum says “shh.” They have fun with this song, they laugh a lot, my son asks about the meaning of everything. They learn parts of the car and when we travel in our car, they repeat the item and say its words: wipers say / go “swish, swish, swish,” signals – “blink, blink, blink,” motor – “vroom, vroom, vroom,” etc. We can describe nature, children, pay attention to safety precautions: all children are with safety belts. My daughter is impressed by the ribbons and the hairpins of the girls. This song is very effective for developing 21st century skills and literacies.

 

4. Old MacDonald Had A Farm

This is a traditional song for children written by Thomas d'Urfey as an opera in 1706. It is funny for the children, as it focuses their attention on the farm animals and the sounds they produce. Children adore imitating the animal sounds, this way they study the animals, their own vocal abilities, compare the animal sounds in English and in Bulgarian, and have great fun. My little daughter only repeats the animals’ sounds looking at the animals, my son differentiates the animals, can name them in English, can connect an animal and its sound. He likes animals very much and studies them with interest. He loves the surrounding world lessons. Near our house there are some pigs and as soon as he sees them he says both “gruh, gruh” (the Bulgarian sound of the pig) and “oink, oink.” The video shows a farm, mountains, a pond, animals, musical instruments, thus fostering environmental literacy. Children also remember here and there through it and can practice counting the animals.

 

5. Five Little Monkeys Jumping On The Bed

It is an American folk song for children by an unknown author. It is a TPR song; it can also be played with fingers and gestures. Monkeys in this song are children’s favourites. Through it children get acquainted with the numbers in English, they start counting up and down (mathematical literacy). They learn to be careful in order not to fall down and hurt themselves because they don’t like going to the doctor: elements of citizenship. My daughter jumps like the monkeys in the song, my son’s attention is attracted by the content: he counts the monkeys saying the numbers in English and is very worried about their falling because the doctor will have to come. This way the song develops empathy in him. The song fosters social literacy: we see a doctor coming and going with an ambulance, having a stethoscope, making a bandage or putting a plaster on the injured monkeys, setting rules (No more monkeys jumping on the bed) and praising (Good those monkeys…) at the end.
 

Conclusions

Children’s songs presented as video clips give children the opportunity to easily create links between the word and its meaning, between the verb and the action performed, to make conclusions about the mood. Listening to songs and watching the video clips, children have great fun and at the same time they acquire new words in the foreign language; they receive and learn information realizing cross-curricular links to mathematics, surrounding world, music. When dancing with the video clips, children develop physically, improve their physical and movement culture, they learn to be tolerant, to be careful and to keep safe in order to stay healthy (citizenship literacy), and the most important thing: they are happy, they are merry and cheerful. For a mother, like me, this is the most important result of work with video clips: the children to learn, to develop physically, socially, personally, cognitively and to think while having fun.
 

References

Blake, C., (2016). Defining Multiple Literacies: The Expression of Learning in Many Formats. Concordia University Nebraska, Professional Resources, https://online.cune.edu/defining-multiple-literacies/.

Burniske, R. W., (2000). Literacy in the Cyberage: Composing Ourselves Online. Arlington Heights: SkyLight Professional Development.

Humble, J., (2003). The Importance of Multiple Literacies. High Performance Learning. https://www.highperformancelearning.com/the-importance-of-multiple-literacies/.

Ilieva, Zh., (2021). Books and songs for children for developing multiple literacies. JoLIE (Journal of Linguistic and Intercultural Education), 2021, 14:1, pp. 45-63. doi: https://doi.org/10.29302/jolie.2021.14.1.3, ISSN: 2065-6599.

Ilieva, Zh., (2022a). Developing Materials for Young Learners. Annual of Konstantin Preslavsky University of Shumen, Faculty of Humanities, Proceedings of the Jubilee International Scientific Conference “Humanities – Traditions and Challenges”, Vol. XXХIII A / 1, Linguistics, Translation, Media Studies and Teaching Methodology, Shumen: Konstantin Preslavsky Publishing House, 2022, pp. 309-317. ISSN 1311-7300 (print), ISSN 2603-512Х (online) https://www.shu.bg/wp-content/uploads/file-manager-advanced/users/faculties/fhn/izdaniya/godishnici/2022/1/God_FHN_T1.pdf

Ilieva, Zh., (2022b). Free Online Video Materials in Teaching English to Young and Very Young Learners. Edu&Tech (Education and Technologies Journal), 2022, 13:1, pp. 124-129. ISSN 1314-1791 (print), ISSN 2535-1214 (online) https://www.edutechjournal.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/11/1_2022_124-129.pdf

Walsh, M. (2010). Multimodal literacy: What does it mean for classroom practice? In Australian journal of language and literacy, 2010, 33: 3, pp. 211-239.
 

Resources

Head Shoulders Knees & Toes https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZanHgPprl-0 .

Head Shoulders Knees & Toes https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Head,_Shoulders,_Knees_and_Toes

Twinkle Twinkle Little Star https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hqzvHfy-Ij0

Twinkle Twinkle Little Star https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Twinkle,_Twinkle,_Little_Star

The Wheels on the Bus https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HoB8yFgek3U

The Wheels on the Bus https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Wheels_on_the_Bus

Old MacDonald Had A Farm Super Mario Bros. Wonder (youtube.com)

Old MacDonald Had A Farm https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Old_MacDonald_Had_a_Farm

Five Little Monkeys Jumping On The Bed https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b0NHrFNZWh0

Five Little Monkeys Jumping On The Bed https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Five_Little_Monkeys 

 

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