Part 3. Total Physical Response (TPR) with Young’uns

16 Dec 202216 Dec 2022Leave a comment

Martina Bex wrote a terrific post explaining TPR and it is a great place to start – read it here. This post of mine though, will focus specifically on TPR with junior primary students (4 – 7 year old’s). At my amazing current site, I teach junior primary (4-7 year olds) which has been simply divine. Luar Biasa!! With this post, I hope to share the TPR magic used with my JP students and in doing so, begin a compilation of engaging TPR options that have successfully increased my students’ learning outcomes.

TPR is simply ‘learning another language through actions’ (Asher). TPR is based on three understandings; firstly, that language is learned primarily by listening; secondly, that language learning must engage the right hemisphere of the brain; and thirdly, that learning language should not involve any stress (Wikipedia).

While I utilise TPR in every lesson with my junior primary students, it is not pure TPR as created originally by Asher. It is a variation from the many tweaks I’ve made over the years so that it is more compatible with both my teaching style and beneficial for my young learners. Feel free to do this too! I look forward to hearing what works for you in your lessons!!

My previous post outlined how I use class dojo to call the roll which happens at the beginning of each lesson. My expectations for students during the roll is that students will duduk (sit), diam (shush) and dengar (listen). After any sustained focused listening, it is important to follow with an active break with all learners. My current students have only one lesson per week, therefore every single lesson minute is maximised for comprehensible input. TPR is a fun way to get students up and moving while pumping them full of repetitions of target structures. The target structures I choose to use in TPR are critically selected for their usefulness with:

a. class stories,

b. classroom management and

c. potential student travel to Indonesia.

e.g. running, turn around, vomit, walk, jump, fast/slow, stop, look.

Frequent movement opportunities are vital in JP lessons as most young learners struggle sitting for long. I like to keep this equation in mind when planning: 5 year olds = 5 minutes. I.e. after 5 minutes of sustained focused listening, follow with opportunities to get up and move.

TPR can either have all students in a circle together with the teacher:

or just a few working with the teacher:

Remember – there is no one way to implement TCI, TPRS or TPR. Always tweak ideas to suit both your style of teaching and your student needs. As long as the input is 100% comprehensible and comprehended, your learners will acquire successfully.

Here is a list of ways that I incorporate TPR into my lessons:

Circle TPR – (Shoutout to Ibu Anne)

The structures I always begin with are berjalan kaki, stop (yes, ‘stop’ is English, however it is high frequency in Indonesia) and duduk (sit). My TPR format for JP requires us all to stand and move in a circular direction. In a deskless classroom, we all move in the same direction around the kursi luar biasa but in a room with desks, I allow students to choose their own direction to avoid bottlenecks. Students walk as we chant berjalan kaki. They stop when I say stop and then as a finale, I ask students to duduk. A few lessons later, I add berdansa (dance) and then in the following lesson, putar (turn around) is introduced. I love berdansa purely because it’s a cognate and adds fun! Putar is one of those words that is very useful for classroom management.

Other movement verbs I add gradually include berenang (swim), melompat (jump), berlari (run), jatuh (fall), merayap (crawl). I also will add in other target structure verbs into TPR e.g., makan (eat), minum (drink). All great variations to ramp up story asking with actors too!!

Here is some audio to give you an idea of what it sounds like:

Berjalan, berjalan, berjalan kaki x 2

Stop.

Berenang x 4

Berjalan, berjalan, berjalan kaki x 2

Stop.

Berdansa x 4

Berjalan, berjalan, berjalan kaki, x 1

Stop.

Putar.

Makan hamburger, makan hamburger, makan hamburger besar, makan hamburger kecil.

Berjalan, berjalan, berjalan kaki x 2

Stop.

Duduk.

Leading up to this in my lessons, the first PowerPoint slide includes a quirky GIF accompanied by the structure ‘berjalan kaki’:

and the final powerpoint slide looks like this:

New language is introduced before we begin and again, where possible, incorporates a GIF and the structure in writing for emerging readers.

My students absolutely love this. I vary the number of times I say each structure, to ensure it isn’t predictable. If/when students stop participating appropriately, I change to the following.

Gender TPR Instructions

For some teachers, using gender as a way to group learners is maybe potentially troublesome, yet as gender vocabulary in Indonesia is high frequency, I believe it’s inclusion is useful for my students on their familiy holidays in Bali. Although I have yet to teach a JP student with gender identity issues, should that change, catering for all students would remain a high priority and an alternative would be explored.

As you can see from the above PowerPoint slide, there are three instructions. They appear one by one on each PowerPoint slide using ‘animations’ and a presenter clicker. I firstly ask ‘Laki-laki berdiri’ (boys stand up), secondly say Laki-laki + verb (e.g., dance, hop, swim) and then thirdly, ask ‘Laki-laki duduk’ (boys sit down). I then repeat it with the girls who either do exactly as the boys did or do something entirely different depending on the cohort. I used this last week with my 4 year old’s as a change from circle TPR and they loved it. Although a few did ask when we were doing berjalan, berjalan, berjalan kaki (as it is referred to by most students!) The secret is to keep it moving yet with heaps and heaps of repetitions of both the gestures and the language. I even sang a few of the repetitions which was well received! The beauty of having a second group of students repeating the same actions, is the repetition. I intentionally choose the more proficient group to go first to model and also provides opportunities where I can acknowledge student proficiency!

All the Worlds A Stage (ATWAS)

ATWAS works best in the JP context with short stories, super condensed story versions or a single paragraph from a story. I have three ATWAS variations, each of which require students to demonstrate comprehension through movement.

Variation # 1- Using actors to enact the story! I really like introducing the story for the first time this way. It gives me the chance to work one on one with only a few students to monitor their comprehension, reinforce acting ‘rules’ and sensor performances as they act for a highly engaged audience. I begin by asking for actors.

When working with young’uns, it is important to clearly state the expectations before choosing actors every single time! In my spiel, I remind students that I will choose an actor randomly using the sticks to ensure I ask someone who hasn’t yet had a turn. If their name comes up, students need to know that it is highly likely that the audience will laugh at something they say, do or wear, before they accept. If/when a student accepts, I write an ‘A’ on the back of their stick to record it.

*KLB = Kursi Luar Biasa, M= mata-mata, A = actor, C= backwards charades*

I highly recommend ramping up the experience for both actors and the audience using quirky props including hats, glasses, wigs, masks, clothing etc. I source mine mostly from op shops.

I choose the actors as they are needed. It slows the telling of the story and also allows me to restart or retell a part of the story for repetition when adding a new character. Coaching the actors also helps to slow storytelling, check for comprehension, repeat sentences and call for acting ideas from the audience. Before telling the story, it is vital that actor and audience ‘rules’ are revisited. The actor can only do or say what I say. If a student repeatedly and deliberately forgets to follow this, I whisper in their ear that I will replace them if it happens again. Usually thisis enough to help them to self regulate and improve their acting skills. Quirky, over the top acting is encouraged as long as it demonstrates comprehension and is appropriate. The audiences’ role is to sit back and enjoy the show, offer positive encouragement and suggestions when asked.

I usually go straight from variation # 1 into variation # 2 as it both provides an opportunity for students to stand up and move after sustained listening while also maximising the story retelling with the story & acting still fresh in their minds.

Variation #2 – Students stand in a circle facing inwards, hands by their side. I explain to students the following: I am going to tell the story again and I want each and everyone to act it out. I also mention that I will be looking for the action that best matches the sentence I say and that there is no speaking or sound effects unless the character says something (this instruction will need constant reminders). I then say the first sentence which is usually, “Ada perempuan.’ (there’s a girl) or “Ada laki-laki.” (There is a boy). I repeat the sentence slowly numerous times while looking around the circle. When I see a student doing an action that clearly and imaginatively demonstrates what I have just said, I congratulate the student by name to encourage the class to look at what they are doing. I also like to acknowledge there are many ways to act out each sentence, so will try to acknowledge other creative students when appropriate. Also, it’s important to add comprehension checks, especially when it is clear that there are students who need it and/or to celebrate individual student proficiency. Repeat this for each line of the story.

Variation # 3 – In the next lesson, we do another version of ATWAS. This version can take quite a large portion of the lesson, especially the first time. As there is a mixture of both focused listening and actions, students rarely lose interest. It begins with students choosing a partner and I like to clearly demonstrate how this is done each time to avoid hurt feelings.

I like to demo this process in English with a student who has a good sense of humour. Cari satu teman means ‘find a friend’ and to do that, we walk towards someone who is standing up. We then ask that person, “Would you like to be my friend?” and they will answer with either ‘yes please’ or ‘no thank you’. If they say, “yes please.”, you both sit down and wait. If they say no thank you, then the answer is, “no worries.” This continues until there are only two people standing. They look at each other and sit down as they automatically become partners. This last point is super important to clarify with young’uns as several enjoy saying no and then are upset when they are with a person not of their choosing! The class then stands and begins. If there is a student left over, I ask them if they would like to be my friend and they then help me demo the next step. This inevitably turns their frown upside down!

The next PowerPoint slide prompts determining who will be which story character:

A demo of this step is again super important. I begin by looking at my friend/partner and ask them which character they would like to be. They usually answer with Buaya, to which I say, “No problem! I’ll be Elsa and you will be Buaya”. Then I explain that we are going to do a second demo. This demo is OTT but the kids love it and so far, has ensured the majority of pairs are happy with the outcome. I again ask my friend who would they like to be. No matter who they say, I sob and say with a sad, croaky voice, “OHHHH, I wanted to be Buaya/Elsa!” After they recover from my reaction, they usually reassure me, “OK, you can be Buaya!” To which, I thank them profusely for their kindness before suggesting, “How about I am buaya the first time we act out the story and you can be buaya the second time we act out the story?” Thus clarifying with the class that we will do this twice. They will each get their choice of character eventually as well as listening to the story twice!! Input for the win!

From this point, the lesson returns to Indonesian. Students then look at their partner (lihat teman), decide who is who for the first round. When it looks like the decisions have finished, I say, Elsa berdiri (Stand up Elsa). I check that there is an Elsa for each pair. Then I say, Elsa duduk (Elsa sit down). I repeat this for buaya.To begin the story, I again ask, Elsa berdiri and the fun begins. After the story is finished, I ask the class to again duduk (sit). In English, I remind students that we are now going to swap character roles. They look at their friend and ask them if they want to swap roles. Here I state clearly that if one of the pairs wants a change, both must change. I then repeat the process exactly as outlined earlier, however add a twist with the final line of the story. Instead of buaya makan Elsa (crocodile eats Elsa), I swap it so that Elsa makan buaya (Elsa eats crocodile). I love this twist as you will observe immediately who are the fast processors!! I again acknowledge the students who acted out the twist correctly. I repeat the line and do a comprehension check. Then the pairs act the final sentence again! What a hoot! Have you noticed that the first two steps of this ATWAS style are conducted in English? I am a big believer in using English to explain classroom procedures. It both ensures greater levels of understanding, makes it so much more quicker to explain so that we can start the activity asap and reduces student anxiety through incomprehension.

Bu Cathy Berkata (Simon says)

A classic TPR activity but not one I use very often. Students love it though. I am not a fan of games where students get out and then sit out. Instead I prefer to tweak games like this so that instead of focusing on who got it wrong, flip it and focus on students who were successful and couldn’t be tricked!

Circle TPR

– ‘Siapa Punya Strawberi’ (Who has the strawberry?) is a game I did at the beginning of this year and was often requested throughout the year. I like it because there is a focus on a particular structure which in this case is, “Siapa punya?” The class sits in a circle with one student in the middle hiding their eyes. I prefer that the student kneels with their face down, eyes closed and their two hands over their eyes. I then walk around the circle saying siapa punya, siapa punya, siapa punya stroberi? While handing out 3 strawberries to 3 different students. The three students hide the plastic strawberries either under their legs, in a pocket or behind their back. I then ask the student in the centre to ‘berdiri’ (stand up). They then approach 3 different students one by one, asking each, “John punya stroberi?” to which ‘John’ either answers, “tidak punya” and shows their empty hands or “punya” and surrenders the strawberry. The ‘winner’ is the student who found the most strawberries after their three goes, if having a winner is important.

– Duck, Duck, Goose – not one I do often but still worth adding to the list. I like this this game for noun repetitions e.g. laki-laki/ perempuan, ibu/bapak etc.

– ‘Kasih’ (give) (Shoutout to Catharina for this one!) – Students all stand in a circle with one student in the middle holding a hardy soft toy. The teacher calls out to the student in the middle, “Kasih John” (give it to John) and the student heads over to give John the toy before John repeats the phrase substituting his name with a class mates. This game is extremely popular and can get very loud very quickly as the object of the game is counterintuitive. In this game you do NOT want the toy! It’s a good idea to introduce the game with walking to give students time to adapt to NOT wanting the toy! The round finishes when John gently touches the stomach/shoulder of the student whose name was said last before they say, “Kasih …….” To minimise the shenanigans that go along with requesting turns, I recommend that the next person in the middle will be the person on my right and then turns will continue person by person going anticlockwise around the circle.

– Mari Buat Lingkaran (lets make a circle)

This video is one that perfectly combines movement and output through lyrics that are repetitious and limited. Be warned though, the song can easily become an ear worm after playing to back to back classes.

Other TPR ideas: There is a fine line between brain breaks and TPR – but for me, they can be both when the vocabulary required is limited to 2-3 words. Brain breaks that require either unfamiliar Indonesian or only English cannot be considered as TPR. Here are a few that I’ve used.

Tepuk Tangan – Typical TPR structure that I have blogged about previously.

Three levels/Three Structures – I have no idea what this activity is called but, in my head, I refer to it as ‘3 levels/3 structures’ because it works best with three structures represented by three frozen body poses; one standing, one lying down and one either sitting or in the crawl position. For example, buaya – lying stretched out on the ground, kancil – on hands and knees & kafe – sitting on an imaginary chair drinking tea. To play the game, the teacher calls out one of the three structures and students get into the pose for that word. This is a terrific TPR game for students with lots of energy as it wears them out very quickly.

Team TPR is similar to three levels but instead the students are in small teams of 3-4. I haven’t tried this with 4 or 5 year old’s, however it worked well with 6-7 year old’s. Firstly, identify three structures from the story, then create a totally different and quirky frozen tableau for each to represent meaning. Using the structures kafe, buaya and berlari from the Elsa dan Buaya story, ‘kafe’ (cafe) could have one student kneeling on hands and knees to represent a table with the rest of their team ‘sitting’ around the table drinking tea (a flat hand to represent the saucer and the other hand up to the mouth with the pinkie outstretched), ‘Buaya’ could be represented by the entire team lying down side by side with arms open for crocodile mouths, and ‘berlari’ could have all but one student running and looking backwards with looks of amazement while the final student is crouching in the start position for a running race. Quirky poses increase engagement.An important difference between this game and the one above is that I am looking for the first entire team frozen in the pose with all aspects of the pose incorporated. If students wish to compete, points can be wawarded to teams that achieve this. Here is a photo from last year of a group of year 4’s participating in this:

Wii Fit – this one comes directly from La Maestra Loca. It’s perfect for targeting berlari, melompat, stop/berhenti.

Finally:

Hopefully there is something here in this post that you can use in your teaching. I plan to continue adding to this compilation over the next 12 months. If you too have contributions or suggestions, please, please add them in the comments or contact me directly. There are not many posts specifically about TPR for the JP cohort, thus I will truly appreciate your input!!

Part 2: Apa Kabar in the JP Classroom with Class Dojo

30 Sep 20221 Oct 20222 Comments

I have written several posts outlining the various ways I use Class Dojo in my lessons across all year levels. See here and here. This post, though, I will focus on how I use Class Dojo with my 4-7 year olds to call the roll.

I strongly believe in the importance of building automaticity with answering ‘Apa kabar?’ (How are you?) as this is usually the first question indonesian visitors ask my students! Thus, calling the roll with my JP students centres on first introducing and then consolidating the acquisition of bail-baik saja (fine), lumayan (ok) & kurang baik (not so good). Once the acquisition of these structures is solid, calling the roll then becomes another awesome way to gain bonus reps on structures useful for stories e.g., senang sekali (very happy), lapar/haus (hungry/thirsty), panas/dingin (hot/cold). I have also found the absentee data useful for tracking students who are routinely removed from my lessons for music, literacy/numeracy support etc.

I always start with baik-baik saja, then add kurang baik and finally lumayan. The next structure I introduce is senang sekali. Senang sekali (very happy/excited) is included for several reasons. Firstly, it gives students the language to express how they feel about an upcoming special event e.g. birthday or maybe because they are the lucky one to sit in the kursi luar biasa (awesome chair). Being the fourth response students acquire for answering apa kabar, it is a target structure that hopefully is transferred to long term memory in its entirety, not as two single words. The importance of this is that can in the future recall this phrase to review Indonesian word order which varies to English. I get such a buzz when my students use ‘sekali’ (very) in new situations. Today a year 2 student answered apa kabar with ngantuk sekali dan lapar sekali (very tired and very hungry)!! What joy!

Once students have acquired these 4 responses, I introduce them to my apa kabar song

which I created 20 years ago to consolidate all structures plus selamat siang (good day) and terima kasih (thank you). I enjoy creating My Talking Pet videos singing using either cute, quirky or familiar animals for added input. My students never tire of seeing their pets singing or talking in Indonesian! To do this, I invite students to email me digital photos of their pets. These photos are fabulous for reviewing past and present structures and consistently ramp up engagement even further!!

The next responses I teach do not follow any system – they are purely added according to the needs of the students and/or the upcoming story. Often, a student will ask how to say how they are feeling and if many others ask for it too, I add it to the next weeks lesson, especially if it has potential for further usage. Other responses I have taught beyond those already mentioned include; sakit (sick), gila (crazy), pusing (dizzy), kecewa (disappointed), kuatir (worried), marah (cross), sedih (sad), bingung (confused), malu (shy/embarrassed).

It is now week 7, (term 3) and I’ve just moved onto the next step. It’s now their turn to call the roll using Class Dojo. Using the random button on class dojo, a student is chosen randomly. I ask that student ‘Mau mengabsen?’ (Would you like to call the roll?) and they answer with mau or tidak mau. I am a strong believer in avoiding requiring students to ‘perform’ in front of their peers if they are not yet comfortable doing so. I clarify to those who answer ‘tidak mau’ (and there are always a few), that their name will come up again so if they change their mind, they will get another chance.

Those that accept, begin by pressing the following to record that they will call the roll.

This then becomes a visual record of the students who have called the roll. With older classes, this is perfect for sudah/belum repetitions, but with students this year, I am really trying hard not to overload them with new vocabulary. My classes only get 50 – 60 minutes a week, and with 6 days between lessons, I aim to get repetitions on the language already covered to further consolidate its acquisition. Thus, I point to each students name on class dojo and then look at that student and say to them, “Chelsea tidak mengabsen.” following it with a comprehension check (what does ‘Chelsea tidak mengabsen mean’? or how would we say ‘Chelsea tidak mengabsen’ in English?))

When the student gets to their name on the roll, here are two options I’ve tried. The class can chorally ask the student apa kabar or the student calling the roll can ask me instead.

My students love calling the roll, loving interacting with the smart board and love the chance to ‘be the teacher’! It’s a win-win! This is as far as I usually go with my junior primary students.

Do you call the roll each lesson? I am curious to discover what percentage of teachers do and if so, how. What do you do that your students find engaging?

Starting again….

26 Mar 202226 Mar 20223 Comments

I have just finished my first week of teaching Indonesian at my new site. Yes, that’s right, I’ve moved again, and it was the best decision I ever made. After resigning from DECD SA and on the advice of several good friends, I applied for and won a job in Sydney! It has been refreshing working with staff who have my back!!

The main attraction of this job (other than being in NSW), was the potential of being a dedicated TCI/TPRS junior primary teacher. I absolutely love working with JP students – their motivation and engagement is off the chart and consequently their progress is insane. They don’t get hung up on making mistakes, and they give everything and anything a go. It is so rewarding beginning with students usually start with no Indonesian and yet by semester two, our lessons can be 95% in Indonesian!

As always, I have started with Jim Tripp’s “Pleased to Meet You” story. It’s the perfect story to start with – regardless of age – for laying the foundation for future lessons being 95% in Indonesian.

I also love TPR (Total Physical Response) as both a means for keeping students moving and for acquiring verbs. Our first lesson this week introduced berjalan kaki (walk), stop and duduk (sit). Offering young students’ frequent opportunities to move is the secret to increased focus. It sounds like an oxymoron but frequent brain breaks effectively manage wriggles. TPR is a brilliant brain break as not only does it get students up and moving, but also introduces students to structures that will eventually occur in stories e.g. pelan/cepat (slow/fast), berdansa (dance), menyanyi (sing), berlari (run). TPR is a win:win!

Another aspect I introduced last week into my first lesson is calling the roll with Class Dojo. Assessment wise, the data is incredibly helpful for students who are regularly absent from lessons (MiniLit, MultiLit, extra curricula), but it also has another major advantage. It provides me with regular opportunities to target “Apa kabar?” (how are you?) which is usually the first question my students are asked when greeted by Indonesian friends and colleagues. I begin with the basics; firstly baik-baik saja (fine), then lumayan (ok) & finally kurang baik (not so good). These three structures are incredibly versatile and thus are excellent foundation structures.

I strongly believe that we should choose early structures wisely. Look for ones that are easy to say (consider the difference between pronouncing paham and mengerti for early learners), ones that provide a base upon which future structures/ grammar popups can be based e.g. senang sekali (word order) and for intercultural understanding opportunities e.g. kurang baik (less than good). I love ‘lumayan’ (so-so) as it is amazingly versatile. Not only is it useful for explaining how you’re feeling, but is also can be used with adjectives e.g. lumayan besar (sort of big).

Thus, once the basics have been acquired, the roll is the perfect way to introduce other feeling structures that will come up in future stories e.g. lapar (hungry), haus (thirsty), panas (hot), dingin (cold), ngantuk (sleepy) etc.

With JP classes, the aim of the roll is purely acquiring a wide variety of structures, however with MP & UP classes, the aim changes to building automaticity. This is done through adding challenge by timing classes. This starts with classes each lesson trying to beat their own class high score before introducing a whole school challenge to see which class can call the roll the fastest. Can you see the structures needed for this? Brilliant hey?

I really hope that even though my posts will now come from a JP perspective, you will gain ideas regardless. Maybe, in reverse, you will see ways in which what I write about could be adapted into meeting the needs of your cohort. In actual fact, all language learners have the same needs regardless of their age!

2021 Reflection

13 Feb 202213 Feb 20221 Comment

Going through the Indonesian iPad yesterday before handing it back brought back so many memories of my year at KAS. I’d really like to share a few with you!

In first term, I did the ‘Murid Nakal’ story with middle primary. I absolutely love this story – great for acting and also perfect for reviewing behaviour management structures in the target language! I did change the ending this year because being at a new school and not knowing the staff or community, wanted to avoid recrimination for using a story that includes smacking! My 2021 version changed the hitting to push ups which worked but was nowhere near as funny! Here are some pictures of a lesson where we used Martina’s freeze frame idea.

In term 2, the next story middle primary did was the Tutup Pintu story. The students absolutely loved acting with the wigs my daughter gave me. Acting out the story is enjoyable as it not only provides the students with the opportunity to create their own class version but also gives the more outgoing students a chance to be outrageous which is extremely entertaining. In fact, being entertaining is one of my criteria that any student auditioning must demonstrate. Other criteria include following the storyline exactly as it is determined by the class and only speaking when your character has a line. Here are some of my amazing actors:

Year 5/6 Movie Talk – Hadiah

Kursi Luar Biasa

All year levels love KLB! I’ve particularly had success this year with JP classes. It is the perfect vehicle to spotlight one student with quirky questions using target structures. This term they did Catharina’s Ular story, so I enjoyed asking students ‘mau’ sentences incorporating ‘ular’ , ‘atau’ and alternatives based on previous story structures or cognates. I have two snake props, so students could choose between ular besar dan ular cobra! Another question that worked this term was introducing the concept of sarong. This provided discussion about the difference between sarongs for males/females. To begin, I just asked if students , “Mau pakai sarong laki-laki atau sarong perempuan?” After a few weeks, I added the question, “Mau pakai sarong ungu atau sarong kuning?” Great way to limited colours in a meaningful way. I then added the alternative of glasses. “Mau pakai sarong atau kaca mata?” While ‘kaca mata’ is not a cognate, I chose it because not only do I have a selection of different colours but as someone who was embarrassed to wear my glasses at school, I love ways to connect with those students who also wear them!! In the last photo, you’ll notice a Foundation student wearing a sarong and a pair of glasses. He answered my question with, “sarong DAN kaca mata!!” I was thrilled!!

Tepuk Tangan – TPR

10 Dec 20211 Comment

I’ve had fun this term experimenting with hand clapping with my junior primary classes. As my JP lessons almost always involve TPR (Total Physical Response), I am constantly looking out for new ideas to do this. TPR in my JP lessons usually centres around walking, swiming, dancing and hopping. While it only takes a few minutes, it is a great way to get young learners up and moving while listening to target language input. Where possible, I add structures from the current story; this term students vomited a lot from Catharina’s ular story!

I am constantly on the look out for new ideas to help keep TPR novel. While scrolling through my photos recently, I rediscovered my audio recording of a fun warm up/ice breaker called tepuk tangan pramuka shared by Indonesian international students at Flinders Uni in 2019. I found a YouTube clip to help me master it so I could demonstrate it to my classes.

I prefer this clip because it includes three variations of the tepuk tangan pramuka rhythm which, once my students had mastered, helped them suggest some other variations. That too was fun. They had so many ideas including single fingers, fists, back of hands (ouch) and fingers on palms.

To take advantage of its success, I next searched YouTube for other clapping ideas. This video has several great ones.

The first, tepuk semangat, I didn’t feel was right for my students but the following two have been perfect. There are several others that appeared to have potential too, e.g. tepuk koboi, but unfortunately include rifle shooting gestures. The tepuk ikan has greater potential but I think I would repeat ‘berenang’ rather than use the language ‘kenyang’; a Balinese word I typically avoid as it has the potential to cause embarrassment!

Instead, I think the following language would be fun:

clap, clap, clap
berenang,
clap, clap, clap
cari makan,
clap, clap, clap
berenang,
clap, clap, clap
diam!

The first one I introduced was the tepuk hoi, which is the second one on the above clip (fast forward to :27). This was an instant success and has become a successful call and response option.

The tepuk jempol (follows straight after tepuk hoi) was the second one I tried and it too has been popular. I particularly like how much slower it is.

The third and final tepuk tangan I taught the classes this year was the tepuk nyamuk. This one is just great fun!! Fast forward to :41 for tepuk nyamuk. Be warned though, the students in the clip below are shouting, which might be off putting.

On this clip, I also like the ting tong jus (1:30), tepuk jam dinding, (:52) and tepuk coca cola (1:03). The only thing with these is that they are one line short, so I’d tweak them to maintain the pattern.
eg Ting Tong Jus
clap, clap, clap
ting, ting,
clap, clap, clap
tong, tong
clap, clap, clap
ting, tong,
clap, clap, clap
ting, tong jus

While there are hundreds of variations, those that use either familiar vocabulary or incude onomatopoeia are the ones I find the most suitable. Brain breaks work best when only acquired language or quirky sounds are used eg tepuk nyamuk using the sound a mosquito makes when buzzing around your head. These clapping rhythms have been incredibly popular with my JP classes and I’ve had many students tell they enjoyed also teaching them to their younger siblings and parents!!

Bluey Dance Mode

28 Nov 202028 Nov 20202 Comments

Yes, it’s true; I have developed an obsession for Bluey along with my reception students!! So you can imagine my delight when I discovered a Bluey Dance Mode is available through facebook! (Note; this is only available in Australia and consequently to access the mode, you must activate location settings for Facebook.) Essentially this mode superimposes a gif of Bluey dancing to the theme song onto a photo or video. It was originally designed for a competition which closed mid year however thankfully the mode is still available!

This week just gone, I spent time investigating how to operate the mode which involved a lot of silent cussing in the classroom and loud cussing at home!! Joy of joys, I have worked out what I was doing wrong and want to share with you what I discovered to ensure you bypass all the cussing!!

Here are the instructions:

Open this link using a device (I use my phone) that is less than 4 years old and has access to your facebook account.
Scroll down to the link to open Bluey Dance Mode on Facebook

3. This will immediately open Facebook on your device.

4. As you can see Dance Mode is now activated, however for me this was only to take a photo. To take a video, scroll to the far left to the first option:

5. Now click on video.

6. Tap the middle of the screen if Bluey has not yet made an appearance.

7. Tap on Bluey to start him dancing. Note, there is no sound at this point so the dancers must just simply dance to the music in their head (for my little students, this was easy) or you can play the music in the back ground.

8. Tap the Bluey ABC kids button. This will start the recording.

9. When the recording has finished, click the save button down the bottom of your screen. This saves your recording to your device. When you play it back, it will include the music!!

10. Click next to share on Facebook OR

11. Go to your photos and enjoy!! Here is the one I made using the above steps:

Now, all you need to do is try it for yourself and experiment with your own device. Please add comments and questions below. I’d love to hear how this works for you!

‘Pleased To Meet You’ by Jim Tripp – Junior Primary Lesson Outline

8 Feb 201922 Feb 2019Leave a comment

‘Pleased To Meet You’ is without a doubt the best story (I believe) to use as a springboard into TCI/TRPS. In my first year of using TPRS, I used the version below of Jim’s brilliant story with all year levels; R (prep) – year 7. A huge thank you to Jim Tripp for his kind and generous permission allowing me to share it with you. The beauty of this story is its simplicity, quirkiness and economic use of language.

The outline in this post is a blend of a unit of work that Ibu Sharon and I created in 2017 for conference presentations and my own classroom practise. It is designed for preliterate students however can equally be used successfully with all other junior primary year levels. I now teach these lessons with both the straight reception (prep) classes and the composite R/1’s. Thus the year ones in these composite classes work with this story twice and I’m guessing you’ll be astonished to hear that I have not ever had a student comment about this!

If you are starting out on your CI journey and your JP students are also unfamiliar with CI, this outline can also see used successfully with all JP levels as not only does this story introduce structures vital for story telling & co-creating stories but it also is a gentle and engaging way to introduce your students to the language and expectations useful in a CI classroom.

The target vocabulary in the junior primary story version includes the following three structures:
nama saya, siapa nama, berkata (My name is, What’s your name, said)
The following are also in the story: di (at), dari (from), Astaga! (OMG!), autograph & pingsan (faints) but instead of pre-teaching these, I personally prefer to say the words in both languages (Indonesian first followed immediately with the English translation) & incorporate comprehension checks until I assess they were no longer necessary and then just use Indonesian. With my reception (prep) students I use ‘di’ & ‘Astaga!’ but not ‘dari’ or ‘pingsan’; I use ‘from’ & ‘faints’ instead. We all know our own student cohort best and you will know whether to use the Indonesian, the English or both for these ‘bonus’ words. I can’t stress enough the importance of always minimising unfamiliar vocabulary to avoid student cognitive overload. The only way you can fully understand how stressful this can be for your students is to join a class teaching an unfamiliar language as we did with Blaine Ray at the recent 2019 Australian TCI Conference. Please, please, please keep this in mind when teaching.

To personalise the story, I highly recommend using the name of familiar staff from your school in your story. Changing the celebrity name and the location to suit your current student’s interests will also ensure that the story appeals to your students.

It is also important in all TCI stories that cognates and proper nouns (not common nouns) are used. For example ‘McDonalds’ & ’hamburger’ are easily recognisable cognates whereas ‘rumah makan’ (restaurant) & ‘nasi’ (rice) are not. Cognates & familiar proper nouns are a gift to language learners and teachers. They help us to reduce the cognitive load and facilitate the ‘narrow and deep’ mantra that underpins CI teaching.

One final note regards the intentional lesson structure I use when planning activities in my JP lessons. The younger the students, the more important it is to keep activities short and sweet and for every sitting activity, follow it with an up and moving activity. I call this the up/down/up/down format! Students this age need lots of movement and restricted sitting time!

Here is the JP story version;

Pleased To Meet You by Jim Tripp

Taylor Swift di MacDonald’s.
Pak Taylor di MacDonald’s.

Taylor Swift berkata ‘Halo. Nama saya Taylor Swift. Siapa nama?

Pak Taylor berkata ‘Nama saya Pak Taylor.’

Taylor Swift berkata ‘Pak Taylor? Pak Taylors dari PEPS? Astaga!

Taylor Swift berkata, ‘Autograf?’
Taylor Swift faints

English Translation:

Taylor Swift is at MacDonald’s.
Pak Taylor is at MacDonald’s.

Taylor Swift said ‘Hallo. My name is Taylor Swift. What’s your name?

Pak Taylor said ‘My name is Pak Taylor.’

Taylor Swift said ‘Pak Taylor? Pak Taylor from PEPS? OMG!

Taylor Swift said, ‘Autograph?’
Taylor Swift faints

Junior Primary Lesson Outlines

LESSON 1. Target Structures:
nama saya (my name is)
ya/tidak (yes/no)

Welcome: (A huge thank you to Diane Neubauer for her permission to use an adaptation of her wonderful introduction here)
Halo Kelas! Welcome to Indonesian. My name is Bu/Pak (Mrs/Mr)_____. Can you say that?
(Repeat very slowly) ‘Bu/Pak _____ . What do you think Bu/Pak means? Ya! Bu/Pak
means Mrs/Mr and if I was a man/woman, my name would be Pak/Bu ______! Pak/Bu
means Mr/Mrs.
How do you feel about learning Indonesian?
I think learning Indonesian is cool too.
Some students feel nervous/ worried about learning Indonesian. They think it is
going to be hard. Do any of you feel more like that? Thank you for telling me this.
I’m going to share with you a few things which will help you enjoy learning Indonesian and also help you learn it faster.
Go through the rules briefly:
JP – Dengar, Diam, Duduk (Listen, Quiet, sit down)
Do you know any Bahasa Indonesia?
What do you think learning Indonesian will be like?

TCI Activity # 1: Roll
I always begin calling the roll with the statement ‘Ayo mengabsen’.
followed quickly by pop-up English translation; That is Indonesian for let’s call the roll.
I call the roll using class dojo.
Greet each child with a wave & a halo with their name.
Encourage students to reply with Halo Bu Cathy.

TCI Activity # 1: Class Expectations
Direct student attention to the 3 monyet poster. Discuss briefly what they are doing? Sitting, listening and being quiet! Explain that the monyet are being very clever and they are reminding you of what you need to do to learn Indonesian. Clarify that when students are doing the right thing they can earn positive class dojo points and when they are not doing the right thing, they will get a negative class dojo point.
I then refer to the poster throughout the lesson and give class dojo points to students doing the right thing!

(see TPT for a free copy of this poster – acknowledgement to Annie Beach for her impressive artistry)

TCI Activity # 2: Introduce the target structure ‘Nama saya’
1. Say ‘Nama saya’.
2. Explain ‘Nama saya’ is Indonesian for “My name is…”
3. Students echo the teacher with various voices. Voice ideas include growly, squeaky, opera, whisper, very slowly ( I really love saying the structure slowly because it provides youth the opportunity to clearly enunciate it!).
Note that ‘listen & repeat’ is strongly discouraged in CI classrooms however I have found that junior primary students thoroughly enjoy it because of the quirky voices. It is a compelling way for them to hear novel repetitions of structures and the more unusual the voices, the more engaged the students become!
4. Provide the gesture.
5. Do one more comprehension check. (what does ‘nama saya’ mean, close your eyes and do the gesture for….)

TCI Activity # 3: Circling ‘- Nama saya’ (Remember to speak SLOWLY)
Here is the script that I used with my 2018 reception classes:

Say ‘Nama saya Bu Cathy’ and point to myself.
What do you think ‘Nama saya Bu Cathy” means?
Ya; ‘Nama saya Bu Cathy” means, “My name is Bu Cathy.”
Hold up a Dora The Explorer (or any soft toy character that is easily recognisable by that age level).
Nama saya Dora.
Ya! Nama saya Dora.”
Comprehension check: Nama saya Dora means My name is Dora!
Is that right? Is her name Dora?
Ya!!
Point to myself:
Nama saya Bu Cathy!
Ya! (thumbs up)
(Pointing to myself) Nama saya Dora?
No!! Nama say Bu Cathy
Nama saya (their teacher?)
Nama saya Jett? (Use a student’s name from the class)
No!!
Bagus!!
Nama saya Bu Cathy?
Ya!! Nama saya Bu Cathy!
Nama saya Mrs Turley or Nama saya Bu Cathy?
Bu Cathy!
Ya!!
What do you think ya means? That’s right – yes!
Hold up monyet puppet and say:
Halo kelas! (Waving his hand at them) and then:
Nama saya Big Bird??? Monyet shakes his head no.
No!! Bukan!!
Nama saya Cookie Monster??? Monyet shakes his head no.
No!! Bukan!!
Nama saya Monyet?? Monyet shakes his head yes!
Ya!! Nama saya Monyet! Monyet nods his head yes!
What does ‘Nama saya Monyet’ mean?
Ya!! Nama saya Monyet means, my name is Monyet!
Monyet again asks, Nama saya Jett? (student from the class)
Simultaneously with the class, negate this saying bukan!
Nama saya Monyet!
Nama saya Bu (their class teacher)?
Simultaneously with the class, negate this saying bukan!
What does ‘bukan’ mean? Repeat again shaking head. Ya!! Bukan means no.
Bagus!
Monyet again; ‘Nama saya Monyet’.
Nama saya Monyet or Nama saya Jett?
Ya!! Nama saya Monyet!

Repeat this with other student names from this class and each time, Monyet waves to that student!
Continue circling with other cards/props until you feel students have sufficiently grasped the target language or the students are becoming restless.

TCI Activity # 4: Fun Target structure Repetitions (to get more repetitions of the target structures use games, fun rhythms or songs that do not contain any unfamiliar vocabulary.)
Choose one of the following ‘nama saya’ activities:
1. Clapping: Clap hands twice and then knees twice while simultaneously saying intimate to the clapping; ‘Nama saya Bu/Pak ______,’ then repeating the clapping rhythm for the students to echo you, in time with the rhythm. Continue using students names by going around the circle with the students echoing! In the second round, encourage individual students to say it using their own name with the class & you echoing.
2. Piccadilly Circus – students stand in a circle with one child in the centre holding a soft a ball. They walk/run to someone in the circle and say as they hand over the ball, “Nama saya _____”. The 2 students then swap places & the person with the ball then walks/runs to someone different and says “Nama saya ________”. You can vary this game by asking students to sit down after they have passed off the ball or you can add another different coloured ball and play it with 2 balls.
3. dum dum dah dah – (replace dum, dum, dah, dah with Nama saya)

LESSON 2. Target Structures:
Siapa nama? – What is your name?

TCI Activity # 1: Roll (Getting to know the students and familiarising them with how each Indonesian lesson begins)
I always begin calling the roll with the statement ‘Ayo mengabsen’ and again follow this immediately with a pop-up English translation; That is Indonesian for let’s call the roll.
Call the roll using class dojo and as with the previous lesson, greet each child with a wave, a halo and their name while encouraging students to reply with Halo Bu Cathy.

TCI Activity # 2: Review & Expand Student understanding of Class Expectations
Review the 3 monyet poster and the benefits of sitting, listening and being quiet in Indonesian lessons!

TCI Lesson Activity # 3 – Nakal/Pandai
(Introduce your preferred behaviour management system. Here is a link explaining in more detail how I manage my very successful JP behaviour management system.)
Discuss nakal/pandai and reiterate what is pandai in kelas Bahasa Indonesia and what is nakal di kelas Bahasa Indonesia. Link to tiga monyet and give class dojo points to students being pandai.
Introduce and sing together the following song to reinforce tiga monyet.
satu, satu, duduk, duduk, duduk.
dua, dua, diam, diam, diam.
tiga, tiga, dengar, dengar, dengar.
satu, dua, tiga, duduk, diam, dengar.

Put a stick up on the board next to the pandai poster using blutack and again reinforce diam, dengar, duduk.

TCI Activity # 4: TPR (Total Physical Response)
1. Revise meanings for berdiri, duduk. (stand, sit) &
2. Introduce perempuan/ laki-laki (girl/boy).
3. Explain/translate ‘perempuan’ is Indonesian for “girl” and ‘laki-laki’ is Indonesian for “boy.”
4. Students echo the teacher with various voices. Voice ideas include growly, squeaky, opera, whisper, very slowly ( I really love saying the structure slowly because it provides youth the opportunity to clearly enunciate it!).
5. Brainstorm for a gesture for the structures (e.g. girl = hand pretending to puff up hair & boy = stroking beard or drawing a moustache)
6. Do one more comprehension check.

Here’s my script from my 2018 reception classes:
Jett (student name) laki-laki.
Jett laki-laki? Ya Jett laki-laki.
Julie laki-laki? Bukan. Jett laki-laki.
Jett laki-laki atau Julie laki-laki?
Ya Jett laki-laki.
Repeat for a female student.
Repeat using SpongeBob. SpongeBob laki-laki atau SpongeBob perempuan?
Comprehension check. and move to incorporating laki-laki & perempuan:
Perempuan berdiri.
Jett perempuan atau Jett laki-laki? Ahh, Jett laki-laki! laki-laki duduk.
Perempuan duduk.
Laki-laki berdiri.
Jess laki-laki? Jess perempuan? Ya! Jess perempuan! Jess perempuan duduk!
Laki-laki duduk!
**Comprehension check often**

TCI Activity # 5: Circling – ‘Siapa Nama?’
From a bag, take out 2 puppets and begin a puppet show:
Bert: Halo kelas!
Bert: Nama saya Mr Banana.
Teacher says: Is that right? No!!
Bert: OK! Nama saya Bert!
Bert: Siapa nama? (to puppet 2 – SpongeBob ). (Comprehension check)
SpongeBob then asks a student sitting at the front, Siapa nama? (comprehension check).
SpongeBob (to Bert): Nama saya Jett (repeating name given by student).
Bert: Bukan!! Bukan Jett.
Bert points to Jett and says ‘Jett’ while nodding head. Points to SpongeBob and shakes his head saying, ‘Bukan Jett’. Points to Jett again and while nodding & waving says, ‘Halo Jett!’
Repeat for several students.
SpongeBob: ‘Nama saya Bu Cathy?’
Teacher: Bukan. Nama SAYA Bu Cathy!!
Bert: Siapa nama (to SpongeBob). (Ramp it up by being theatrical!!)
Teacher: Siapa nama? (to SpongeBob & again to the class)
Encourage class to answer.
Bert & SpongeBob say together: SpongeBob!
SpongeBob: Ya, Nama saya SpongeBob

TCI Activity # 6: Fun Target structure Repetitions
1. Raja Monyet (monkey king).
Students sit in a circle, with
one child in the middle with his/her eyes well covered. Select another student who will be the ‘Raja’ (king) and give them a name, which is familiar to your students. For this story, the ‘Rajas’ name would become Pak Taylor or Taylor Swift! The student in the centre is then invited to choose 3 different students (one at a time) and ask each, “ Siapa nama?”(What is your name?). All students except for the ‘raja’ answer with “Nama saya & their own name”(My name is _______) but the Raja answers with ‘Nama saya Taylor Swift.”(My name is Taylor Swift) With this answer, everyone must swap seats. Teacher can then choose a new ‘Raja’ and a new person to sit in the middle.
2. Last year I wrote a song that uses a very slow ‘skip skip, skip to my Lou‘ tune:
Siapa nama?
Siapa nama?
Siapa nama?
Siapa nama?
Nama saya Bu Cathy!
3. I also created a new game which is perfect for reps on siapa nama & nama saya with junior primary students:
Students walk together in a circle around the room in the same direction with music playing. When the music stops, each student has to drop to the ground like a rock with their eyes closed and their face facing downwards. ( It is important when explaining how to play this game that students understand that if they are not tucked up like a rock, they can’t be covered with the sarong, so I recommend before playing, ask a student to demo curling up like a ‘rock’ beforehand with their face facing the ground.) I walk with the students while the music is playing and when the music stops, and all the student are curled up like a rock, I cover one student with the sarong. As soon as I ask, “Siapa nama?”, students can sit up and walk over to the student covered by the sarong and stand around him/her without touching the sarong (or student) and answer my question. I restate every answer with ‘Nama saya (suggestion)?’ and if I say the right name, the student under the sarong jumps up! This became one of the most requested games last year!! Over the year, I gradually phased out the music and incorporated TPR language into the game and sometimes, I even covered two students with the sarong!!

TCI Activity # 7: Farewell Song; (Tune: If you’re happy and you know it clap your hands)
Sampai jumpa, Sampai jumpa, Sampai jumpa
Sampai jumpa, Sampai jumpa, Sampai jumpa
Sampai jumpa murid-murid/ anak anak (or simply kelas _______)
Sampai jumpa Bu/Pak_______,
Sampai jumpa, Sampai jumpa, Sampai jumpa

LESSON 3. Target Structures:
berkata – said

TCI Activity # 1: Roll
At this stage, I simply say their name and when they answer, I just greet each person with ‘halo (+ name). At this stage of the year, this is purely for me to start attaching names to faces.

TCI Activity # 2: Behaviour Management – ‘Nakal/Pandai’

TCI Activity # 3: Introduce the target structure ‘berkata’
1. Write ‘berkata’ on the board. (except for reception/prep classes)
2. Explain/translate ‘berkata’ is Indonesian for “say/speaks”
3. Students echo the teacher with various voices. Voice ideas include growly, squeaky, opera, whisper, very slowly ( I really love saying the structure slowly because it provides youth the opportunity to clearly enunciate it!).
4. Brainstorm for a gesture for the structure and choose one that replicates the one you personally want or was chosen in a previous class.
5. Do one more comprehension check, (close your eyes and do the gesture for….).

TCI Activity # 3: Circling
Create a powerpoint of characters who have saying that are well known for your student cohort. What worked well for me was adding an animation for the ‘saying’ to delay the text until after you have brainstormed as a class and included heaps of reps of ‘berkata’. If students can’t remember exactly what the character is known to say, I prompt with ridiculous suggestions. e.g. Dory berkata, “Let it go”? And I don’t just say ‘Let it go”….. I sing it theatrically!! Boy, does that get a great response!!
For my junior primary students the following were very successful:
Spongebob berkata ‘Krabby Patty’.
Elsa berkata ‘Let it go.’
Pikachu berkata ‘Pika, pika.’
Bob the Builder berkata ‘Can we fix it? Yes we can!’
Dory berkata ‘Just keep swimming!’

TCI Activity # 4: Target Structure Reps Activity
To get more repetitions of the target structures and provide students with a chance to move around, use games or fun rhythms that only contain familiar vocabulary or cognates. e.g.
Students stand in a circle. Teacher says a sentence from the powerpoint and the students each mime it. Teacher then regards the selection of actions while repeating the sentence over and over before celebrating the students who have demonstrated it creatively and theatrically. Incorporate comprehension checks when necessary.
This activity is excellent for priming students for ‘All the World’s a Stage’ which benefits from OTT actions.

TCI Activity # 5: CI Activity – Tell the Story “Pleased to Meet You’ using puppets/soft toys/actors
Using the props that you feel most comfortable with, tell the story, circling & triangle each new detail for which students require repetitions. Remember the most important tip that Blaine shared with us at the conference; add characters not new sentences!
Note: With reception aged students, I recommend telling the story and save co-creating for older students.

TCI Activity # 6: CI Activity – All the Worlds a Stage
In pairs, students act out the story as it is told to them by the teacher.
Here is how I introduce All The Worlds A Stage to students for the first time:
1. Students stand in a circle. I say the sentences in order, starting at the beginning. Each student mimes that sentence exactly. I acknowledge the students who do a brilliant job of this, encouraging creativity and exaggerated actions.
2. Then I ask students to duduk before explaining that “Cari satu teman dan duduk” means “Find a friend and then sit down’ and that the last two people standing will automatically become partners. (If there is an odd number, either I will offer to be that persons partner of they will be told to join in with a pair and make a group of 3. This depends on the activity. For ATWAS – I invite the student to be my partner.) We practise finding a friend a few times to both review the language and the process.
2. Once the class is sitting down with their friend, I ask the class to watch my demo. I turn to my ‘friend’ and say in English, do you want to be SpongeBob or do you want to be Bu Cathy?” I answer their response with ok! Then I ask my ‘friend’ to do another demo. Again I ask them ‘Do you want to be SpongeBob or Bu Cathy?’ Whatever they answer with, I say sadly and pretend to cry, “Oh, I wanted to be that.” We then discuss as a class what to do when both want to be the same character. I usually model saying to my ‘friend’ you be Bu Cathy this time and I’ll be Bu Cathy next time. OK?
The best thing about doing ATWAS twice is the REPETITION!! Score!
3. Partners choose who they will be. I then say in Indonesian, SpongeBob berdiri. SpongeBob duduk. Bu Cathy berdiri. Bu Cathy duduk. (This is largely to double check that there is one of each character in each partnership as well as being the perfect opportunity to sneak in some sneaky TPR).
4. I then say very slowly, sentence by sentence with as many reps as possible & acknowledging awesome acting;
“Bu Cathy berdiri.
Ada perempuan.
Nama perempuan Bu Cathy.
Bu Cathy di MacDonalds.
Bu Cathy duduk.
Spongebob berdiri.
Ada laki-laki.
Nama laki-laki SpongeBob.
SpongeBob di MacDonalds.’
Bu Cathy dan SpongeBob berdiri.
SpongeBob berkata, “Halo! Nama saya SpongeBob” (pause for students to echo).
“Siapa nama?” (pause for students to echo).
Bu Cathy berkata, “Halo Spongebob.
Nama saya Bu Cathy.” (pause for students to echo)
SpongeBob berkata, “Bu Cathy? (pause) Bu Cathy? (pause again) Bu Cathy from Port Elliot Primary School? (pause again).
Bu Cathy berkata, “Ya. Nama saya Bu Cathy.”
SpongeBob berkata, “Astaga! Autgraf!”
Bu Cathy autographs (I encourage students to write on their friends hand with a finger!)
SpongeBob faints.

The above is repeated once more from step 2 but before we start, I explain that each pair needs to check if either wants to swap characters. If one person wants to swap, they must swap but if no one wants to swap, they can stay the same!

TCI Lesson Activity # 7 – Nakal/Pandai
Menghitung! comprehension check!
Count the tally in Indonesian and then if the pandai tally is more than the nakal tally, remove the stick from the board and ask the class, “Siapa nama?” Restate suggestions with ‘Nama saya Jett?” Bukan! I also throw in laki laki & perempuan here to give clues.
eg Nama saya Jett? Bukan. Saya bukan laki laki. Saya perempuan.
Once we have guessed the name of the student on the stick, they can choose an item from the Treasure Box.

Farewell Song; ( Tune: If you’re happy and you know it clap your hands)
Sampai jumpa, Sampai jumpa, Sampai jumpa
Sampai jumpa, Sampai jumpa, Sampai jumpa
Sampai jumpa murid-murid/ anak anak (or simply kelas _______) Go
Sampai jumpa Bu Cathy,
Sampai jumpa, Sampai jumpa, Sampai jumpa

Lesson 3 & Beyond…

This lesson’s main focus is the parallel story. I love to make PowerPoints from my parallel stories using well known characters and then record myself telling the story. This can then be uploaded to YouTube for students to listen to firstly in class and then repeatedly in their own time at home.

Here is an example of one of my adult co-created parallel ‘Pleased To Meet You’ story.

I haven’t uploaded a junior primary one yet. The one I made last year was not successful because I used Ronald MacDonald & sadly in every class there were students who were familiar with an M rated film about an evil clown, so it won’t be used again let alone uploaded!

From this point, I usually base my lessons on TCI activities suitable for preliterate students that are fun ways to get. more repetitions on the parallel story.

I also highly recommend continuing to incorporate TPR to build up a classroom context vocabulary with words such as putar (turn), duduk di kursi (sit in a chair), berjalan kaki (walk), antri (line up), berdansa (dance), stop, melompat (jump) & berlari (run). Restrict this list of words to those that will help you minimise the use of English in the classroom and also words that you know will be necessary for future stories! There is no single list of TPR words because we all teach differently!!

Assessment:
At this level of schooling, open assessment of preliterate students will be based entirely on observation due to students inability to read and write.
Here are a few recommended closed assessment strategies perfect for this age group:

Listen & Draw – Teacher says a sentence from the story, students listen to the sentence and then illustrate the sentence to demonstrate comprehension. While the students are drawing, teacher observes who is drawing and who is not. By asking one of the students who is drawing to translate the sentence into English, provides evidence that the sentence was comprehended successfully while also providing a comprehension check for those who had yet to begin drawing.

Simon says – Teacher says a word (eg duduk) but precedes it with ‘Simon says’ (replace this with Bu/Pak & your name) if the students are to do the action. If the word is said alone, the students do not move.
Note: Traditionally, all students who do the incorrect action are asked to sit or stand out. I try to avoid this if possible and permit the students to continue playing the game. Much more enjoyable for everyone and also ensures all students are participating; thus providing more observation data!

Create a class book – Organise the story so that one sentence is on one page. Print the pages on A3 and distribute randomly to students – if more students than pages, arrange duplicate copies. When the illustrations are completed, reduce them on the photocopier to A4 (you’ll be amazed at how much this improves the illustrations) and then bind.
Optional – laminate each page.
Credit Annie Beach & Amy Vanderdeen for this strategy.

For older JP students other assessment tasks could include:

Unjumble words from a sentence taken straight from the story.
Sequence sentences from the story.
Match pictures and sentences from the story.
Flyswatter game.
Create individual book copies – Use the booklet setting on the photocopier with a sentence from the story on each page. Students illustrate one page at a time while the teacher reads the text out. It becomes very clear very quickly which students have acquired the language.
(Students can then take the booklet home to read to parents, siblings and pets!)

If you have any other CI activity ideas that could be added to this unit of work, please add them to the comments below!! All contributions gratefully accepted!

Indonesian Folktale – Kancil dan Buaya

9 Oct 201829 May 20191 Comment

I have been focusing on this folktale this term with my year 1-3 classes. The first and last time I taught this story was back in 2015 and it has been fascinating looking back over my lesson plans from that time as it was the first year I taught using TCI.

I’ve been having so much fun with this story that I want to share with you a few of the pre story ideas I came up with for the story. Probably though, before I go any further, I should share with you the TCI version of the folktale that is based on the one that Annie, Sharon & I co-created in 2015.

Ada kancil.

Kancil tinggal di hutan.

Di hutan ada sungai.

Kancil berjalan kaki ke sungai.

Kancil lapar.

Kancil lihat mangga dan mau seberang sungai.

Kancil tidak bisa berenang.

Kancil lihat buaya di sungai.

Buaya lapar.

Kancil berkata, “Halo buaya. Ada berapa buaya di sungai?”

Buaya berkata, “Kurang tahu.”

Kancil berkata, “Ayo buaya, antri. Saya mau menghitung.”

Buaya antri.

Kancil seberang sungai dan melompat dari buaya ke buaya dan menghitung.

Satu, dua, tiga, empat, lima, enam, tujuh, delapan, sembilan, sepuluh!”

Kancil putar dan lihat buaya.

Kancil tertawa! Ha! Ha!

Buaya marah. Grr. Grr.

Kancil senang sekali makan mangga.

Kancil terlalu pandai.

Translation: There’s a mouse deer. The mouse deer lives in the forest. There is a river in the forest. Cancel walked to the river. Mousedeer is hungry. Mousedeer saw a mango and wanted to eat it. Mousedeer can’t swim. Mousedeer saw that there were crocodiles in the river. They are hungry. Mousedeer said, “Hallo crocodile. How many crocodiles are in the river?” The crocodiles said, “Don’t know!” Mousedeer said, “Line up so that I can count you.” The crocodiles lined up. Mousedeer jumped from crocodile to crocodile and counted. One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, ten. Mousedeer turned and looked at the crocodiles. Mousedeer laughed. Ha! Ha! The crocodiles were cross. Grr. Grr. Mousedeer happily ate the mango. Mousedeer is too clever!

Prestory telling:

My structures for this story have been:
Kancil- mousedeer
bisa – can/able to
seberang sungai – cross the river

Other structures that were covered through TPR & brain breaks include:
berenang – swim
tertawa – laugh
antri – line up

structures not covered; just translated whenever it was said;
kurang tahu – don’t know

To introduce the kancil/mouse-deer, I googled pics of them which I shared with the classes. There are also a few great youtube clips. This is one of my favourites:

Easily the best fun I had was introducing the structure ‘bisa’. My first lesson was a hoot thanks entirely to Ibu Anne. I added to my powerpoint, pictures of people doing things and then asked the class, “Siapa bisa….” ( Who can…?) When students put up their hand to indicate that they could do the said skill, I stated, “Bu Cathy mau lihat!” (I want to see it), Students happily got up and demo’d their skill in front of the class. The actions included playing violin, playing drums, gymnastics, singing (I gave them a microphone for this!), dancing (firstly waltz, secondly floss, thirdly line dancing) and then finished with flying! The flying was hilarious. In between 2 lines of students, I placed a chair at one end and I stood at the other end with my arms out-stretched, asking, “Siapa bisa terbang ke Bu Cathy?” (Who can fly to Bu Cathy?) Everyones hand went up! Students then one by one, volunteered to stand on the chair and fly to me! After each effort, I would sadly state, “Oh, tidak bisa terbang! (Oh, can’t fly!)” This was such a great lesson! The creativity of students to fly to me was awesome!
For the followup lesson focusing on ‘bisa’, I struck gold when I popped into the performing arts classroom and discovered receptions students learning how to do pair balances with our brilliant Performing Arts teacher, Natalie Bond. Here are a couple that I have used successfully:

Google ‘simple pair balances’ and there are heaps! I have to add here though, that I was very fortunate in that Natalie did all the teaching of how to do each safely, how to work out who does what and that they each needed to take it in turns if one partner had to do a different action to the other.

My next target structure that I introduced was ‘seberang sungai’ (crossed the river). I intentionally added this into the story because it is a phrase that is so easily adaptable. It could become seberang {ruang} kelas (cross the class {room}) or even seberang jalan (cross the road). After much thought and research on the internet, I knew I wanted to have the students crossing a make believe river. Most ideas I found required equipment/props I didn’t have or would be bulky to pack up & store between lessons. I hit upon an easy yet successful substitute by fluke during one of the lessons. I noticed that as students stood up to move to one side of the ‘river’, there were cushions on the floor! Light bulb moment! I asked my star student (the one sitting on the Kursi Luar Biasa) to spread the cushions throughout the river and then told the remaining students they were all kancil who wanted to ‘seberang sungai’. I explained that they had to jump from cushion to cushion and if they fell in the river, they became a crocodile. (kancil melompat dari cushion ke cushion. Kancil jatuh di sungai, jadi (become) buaya di sungai). I add the English after words not yet acquired. This was so engaging, that students sat quite patiently waiting for their turn to seberang sungai! It also gave me heaps of opportunities to say ‘seberang sungai’ over and over again.

My follow up for ‘seberang sungai’ was to show a few pictures I found on the internet of Indonesian students crossing rivers to get to school which provided great opportunities for intercultural PQA.

I also found a few pictures of crocodiles crossing rivers at Cahill Crossing in the NT and then cheekily finished up with this picture:

Students were indignant when I circled ‘kancil seberang sungai’ and laughed when I explained that there is a make of car in Indonesia called a ‘kancil’!!

Look what I have also just found!! How cute!

I enjoyed introducing ‘berenang‘, ‘antri‘ & ‘tertawa‘ – via TPR & Brain Breaks.

‘Tertawa’ (Laugh) is in a great Indonesian song/rhyme that has been a huge hit with students of all ages. I found it on youtube originally but have adapted it significantly from a CI perspective. It goes like this:

Here is my 2017 year 2/3 class demonstrating it:

Antri (line up):
For this, I incorporated ideas I learned while observing Annabelle Allen at iFLT 2019. I simply ask the class to ‘antri, tinggi sampai pendek’. (line up, tallest to shortest). This is very hard for students to do without talking, so once again, I used Annabelle Allen’s technique of stopping them and demonstrating ways in which they could achieve this using the Indonesian they know, then letting them go again. The first time I did this, I had to stop them several times to give kudos to those students who were using Indonesian – such a positive way of getting in those sneaky reps! Other ‘antri’ ideas include;
-hari ulang tahun (birthday months) – although I did have quite a few students who didn’t know theirs!
-mau punya buaya (wants to own a crocodile)
-nama, A sampai Z (by name, A to Z)
If you can think of any more – please add the ideas in the comments below. One I planned to do but abandoned because I anticipated too much English discussion was foot size. I think this would work better with older students!

Berenang (Swim) is easy to incorporate into TPR & mata-mata (spy). In terms 3 & 4 for mata-mata I have been trialling a variation of this to keep it novel. Students love this part of the lesson and woe betide if I forget it! It isn’t strictly great TCI as it is largely listen and repeat, but for junior primary aged students, I have found it a terrific way to begin my lessons and get them thinking in Indonesian and can also be an impressive demonstration for visitors of just how much these young’uns have acquired!
So this term, I have a slide in my powerpoint of the language we are focusing on currently. It looks like this:

I limit the number of words so that it isn’t too overwhelming for the students with poor literacy. I then ask them each to choose one word for which they know the gesture. I remind them that they are not to speak, the class speaks. The mata-mata take it in turns to gesture and the class calls out the Indonesian word that it represents. Overall this has been a successful adaptation however there have been a few students, generally those with poor literacy skills, who misunderstand the instructions and make up their own gesture. Unfortunately this results in everyone calling out a random word, often in English! I am hoping that with lots of modelling and student demonstrations, this will gradually decrease!

Storytelling:
I told the story towards the end of the term several times. The first time using pictures on a powerpoint and the second using student actors. The best thing about this story is that it easily accommodates an entire class of actors. I randomly choose the kancil using my class collection of paddle pop sticks, and the remaining characters in the story are acted out by whoever wants to. The remaining actor parts include:
hutan (forest)
sungai (river) &
buaya (crocodile).
I do not limit the. numbers of any of the above parts because any variation becomes an almost parallel story!! The first class acted out the story so well, I asked them to do it again the following lesson do that I could take photos of them to make a class book. The book looks amazing! My kancil was very expressive.

It’s now the school holidays, and I am looking forward to planning fun activities based on this story for next term that will provide plenty of opportunities for assessment ready for the upcoming term 4 reports.

Observing Ibu Anne’s Circus

28 Mar 201813 Apr 20184 Comments

I am here in Victoria this Easter enjoying a well earned break with Ibu Anne. Today was the last day of term here (SA has 2 more weeks) and I’ve taken heaps of notes while observing her lessons. If ever you are in Victoria and want to see TCI in a junior primary setting, I highly recommend a visit to her school. Her students impressed me constantly with their confident comprehension of Indonesian and at times it was hard to believe that her students are Prep’s – Year 3!

Here are my notes for each year level:

Prep Classes:-

With her Prep classes, Anne is trialling a system whereby each step of her lesson is prompted via a powerpoint page. I really liked how this worked. The first page incorporates an app Anne has discovered that allows you to add voice to a photo of a dog. Anne began her Prep classes with either a photo of her dog Kasper or a student’s dog singing her welcome song! The classes absolutely loved singing along with the dogs!

The second page was calling the roll and with this year level, Anne simply encouraged them to answer with ‘ada’ & ‘tidak ada’ (here/not here). No wonder the students at her school have acquired ‘ada/ tidak ada’ so solidly! She calls the roll using class dojo, marking the absences immediately and at the end, asks, “Berapa tidak ada?” (how many students are away?) which provided her with an excellent opportunity for students to count together with her!!

After the roll, Anne turned off the smart board to focus on the retelling the harimau (tiger) & Elsa story. She began this with ‘mata-mata’ (spy), using the 2 pandai (clever) students (1 laki-laki/boy & 1 perempuan/girl) selected during the previous lesson and invited them out to the front with her to choose two new pandai students while Ibu Anne revisited all the structures from the current story. I love using ‘mata-mata’ with preliterate students as it is a terrific brain break on one hand and a useful way to observe & assess levels of acquisition. Once or twice I have assumed a class was familiar with a structure only to discover during mata-mata, they definitely hadn’t!

After mata-mata, Anne then used colourful magnetic pictures attached to the smart board to retell the story, Elsa dan Harimau that the students found highly engaging. I don’t think we utilise puppetry enough anymore! It is novel for youngsters today! She then retold the story using the magnetic pictures, encouraging the students to gesture and speak with her. Next, Ibu Anne asked for two actors to come out and help her retell the story once more. The tiger mask was a huge hit and enabled her to have several pairs act out the story, one after the other! I love the “Aduh” (Oh no!) at the end of the story because it allow the entire class to join in the finale. Ibu Anne finished by showing her video of this story on her Youtube channel which again was the same story presented slightly differently which maintained student interest! Wow – how many reps of the story did Ibu Anne manage? Amazing.

As the class had been sitting for quite a while by this time, Ibu Anne did the following brain break: she played a familiar Indonesian children’s song and asked the students to walk around the room while it played. When the music stopped, she asked her students to freeze and listen to her say one of the following words from the story: harimau, pohon or rumah. If she said rumah (house), students had to stand and make a triangle roof over their heads with their arms, if Anne said harimau (tiger), they had to drop to their hands and knees and if she said pohon (tree), they had to stand up tall with their arms out, hanging like branches. I really enjoyed the added bonus of having an Indonesian song incorporated into this brain break because it allowed a break between the actions!

The target structure Anne revisited next with her Prep classes was “Ada apa?” (What is there?) She had a calico bag full of objects (all cognates). She pulled each one out, one by one, stating ada truk (there is a truck), ada burger (there is a burger), ada es krim(there is an ice cream) etc, before setting each down on a table where the students could see the display. Each item provided a perfect opportunity for reps of ‘ada’ (there is)! Once the bag was empty, the class and Ibu Anne counted the total number of props together – altogether there were 15. Ibu Anne then put the items back in the bag and asked the class again, “Ada apa?” to see if they could remember them all. Each time, a student correctly remembered an item, she drew a picture of their answer up on the board, circling each while incorporating ‘ada’, counting the total after each correct suggestion. The students thoroughly enjoyed counting the drawings together.

Ibu Anne then handed out a worksheet with pictures of a variety of cognates and students had to listen and circle only the ones that Ibu Anne pulled out of the bag. Students then coloured all the pictures that were circled. Ibu Anne recommends using pulling out exactly the same objects for each class to make marking easier.

Kelas 1

All year one classes are held in the Indonesian room. Class teachers bring their students to the room where Ibu Anne greets each student as they enter her room. Students then walk to the front of the room and sit quietly waiting for her to finish. Ibu Anne follows the last student into the room and with this class, she picked up her ukulele and began playing it. This immediately and beautifully focused the students however as the ukulele was out of tune, Ibu Anne quickly and surreptitiously tried to tune it but the students collapsed about with laughter. Even to their ears, the ukulele sounded strange. Once tuned, the ‘duduk diam dengar’ (sit down, be quiet, listen) song sounded gorgeous on the ukulele. It was a highly compelling way to begin a class.

Roll
I loved how Ibu Anne sings the Selamat siang song (see kelas 2 observations for details) with her older students. It begins with the usual Selamat siang, Apa kabar, baik, baik saja, lumayan, kurang baik and then included lapar sekali, sedih sekali, marah sekali. The success of this song was evident during the roll call as many students used this language.

After mata mata, Ibu Anne worked on the song, Aku Seorang Kapiten, for an upcoming competition for Victorian students. This competition isn’t compulsory for her students, but hopefully many will bravely try out and blow everyone away with their proficiency. I can’t remember what else students have to do, but if you are interested in learning more about it, ask on one of the Facebook pages!

Kursi luar biasa
Ibu Anne has created a Kursi Luar Biasa powerpoint for each year level, each one building on the language they have acquired from the previous year level. All slides provide many opportunities for the student being interviewed to shine. Students can either tell the truth when answering questions such as:
Tinggal dimana? (Where do you live?)
suka makan apa? (What do you like to eat?)
Mau apa? (What do you want?)
Siapa nama? (What is your name?)
Apa kabar? (How are you feeling?)
Punya binatang apa? (What animals {pets} do you own?)
On each page, Anne has pictures that incorporate everything a student of that age would relate to. I learned about LOL dolls, magnetic slime, 3D pens just to name a few! Also on the pages were a few quirky pictures to keep it compelling.

Brainbreak
This year level also enjoyed writing their names with their right and left hand, left/right siku (elbow), hidung (nose) & (pusar) belly button. Lots of laughter.

StoryTelling
Ibu Anne showed a PowerPoint that she had made called, “Buaya Suka Makan Donut” (The Crocodile Likes to Eat Donuts). The ingenious part of this powerpoint were the video clips embedded into each page of the naughty buaya snatching donuts from various staff members including the principal. The students loved watching the expressions on the faces of the principal & their teachers and requested watching it again and again! I highly recommend copying her idea!!

Assessment
Anne had planned an assessment task based on this great story, but with a school wide subway lunch delivery, the class had to return to their room early. This is the task Ibu Anne had planned to do: Anne had drawn up a grid and in each box was a different pic from the Buaya (crocodile) story. Students would need to look at each one of the pics which were in no order. To demonstrate that students could retell the story in the correct order, they needed to write a number in the box by each drawing.

Kelas 2:-
Anne began her lesson with the Selamat Siang song that included panas sekali, capai sekali, dingin sekali, marah sekali, sakit sekali before finishing with sampai jumpa.

Here is the song – (sing to the tune of Frere Jacques)
Selamat siang
Apa Kabar
baik baik saja
lumayan
kurang baik
senang sekali
marah sekali
sakit sekali
dingin sekali
panas sekali
terima kasih/sampai jumpa

English translation:
Good day
How are you?
Just fine
ok
not so good
very happy
very cross
very unwell/sick
very hot
thank you/goodbye

Then when Anne called the roll, the students confidently answered with a variety of answers fluently. When discovering that a student was absent, she would ask the class, “kenapa?” (Why?) If students said, family holiday, she would ask, “Liburan?” (Holiday?) If they again answered “Yes/Ya”, she would walk over to the dimana poster and point and pause before asking ‘Di mana?” (Where?) I loved this as it provided the perfect opportunity to get reps on ‘dimana’ as well as saying the names of various countries in Indonesian. It was interesting to hear the number of students who were currently holidaying in India, Queensland, Malaysia and Japan. Totally represents the multicultural population at Annes school!

Mata-Mata
It was great to see Sharon’s ‘mata-mata’ happening in Victoria slightly differently to the way Sharon and I do it (and we both do it slightly differently as well!) My students enjoy mata-mata (spy – along the lines of the Indonesian police) and it was great to see a way to keep doing it yet with a twist. Anne uses the 2 winners from the previous lesson to be the next mata-mata; a boy and a girl. The girl must choose a boy and the boy must choose a girl. I am definitely going to incorporate this into my next lesson plan. Currently my students choose their friends which are generally the same gender – so this idea would encourage them be more selective! I also loved the way Anne asked the mata-mata, “Ada laki laki/perempuan pandai? Siapa nama?” (Was there a clever boy/girl? What is their name?) Great way to sneak in a “siapa nama” rep!

Anne did a brilliant brain break with this class which she acquired from a colleague, Jodie Underwood. All the students stood up and followed Anne’s instructions:
Tulis nama pakai tangan kanan (Write your name with your right hand)
Tulis nama pakai tangan kiri (Write your name with your left hand)
Tulis nama pakai siku kanan (Write your name with your right elbow)
Tulis nama pakai siku kiri (Write your name with your left elbow)
Tulis nama pakai hidung (Write your name with your nose)
Tulis nama pakai pusar (belly button) (Write your name with your belly button)
By the end of it, everyone was in fits of giggles and totally relaxed. It was so lovely.

Kursi Luar Biasa (The Awesome Chair)
Anne has made up power-points for each year level; each incorporating the language she needs reps with. The questions circle suka (like), nama (name), apa kabar (how are you), mau (want) and have really significantly helped her students to acquire this vocabulary. Anne has painted a chair in brilliant eye catching colours and patterns which a student sits on to answer Anne’s personalised questions.
After asking the person in the kursi luar biasa the questions, Anne then invites the other students to say one thing that they heard about that person. This is such a great opportunity for the 4%ers to shine and also to measure student acquisition. Anne accepts answers both in Indonesian and English, praising both with the English restated in Indonesian. She then adds tallies to the kurang pandai/pandai (clever/not so clever) points; 2 points for Indonesian and one for English. Separately she notes who spoke in Indonesian correctly and after the lesson, takes a photo of her notes to add to her assessment checklists.

StoryTelling
After Kursi Luar Biasa, Anne showed the class a powerpoint she’d made about Pak Eh-Eh (Mr Pooh). The story itself was very short – perfect for this age group – and had them 100% engaged! In Anne’s story, Pak Eh-Eh went to the Western Treatment Plant (local) searching for a friend. I loved how Anne explained simply what happens at the plant while getting heaps of reps of eh-eh! It was a great story to introduce the structures teman (friend) & banyak (many)!

Anne finished this lesson by showing the class her YouTube channel (Indonesian Fun For Juniors) and encouraging students to watch the Pak Eh-Eh video and others over the holidays.

Kelas 3 –

Ibu Anne started her year 3’s with a powerpoint that had her dog, Kasper, singing her welcome song (see kelas 2 for lyrics) to the class. Her students went into raptures, but not as much as Ibu Anne did when one student shared that she too has a schnauzer – a mini salt & pepper schnauzer named Abbie. Ibu Anne then dug deep to re-channel her thoughts away from Abbie and back to the lesson! (If you ever want to see this – just casually drop the word schnauzer into your conversation with Ibu Anne and watch the dreamy transformation appear on her face!)
Ibu Anne’s roll calling procedure differs slightly for her year 3 students. Whereas with her younger students, Ibu Anne calls the roll; her year 3 students take it in turns to call the roll. I love how they use a long pointer with a pointy finger on the end to point to the names as they work through the names on class dojo. I also loved how when the student reached his/her name, the class together asked the student, ‘Apa kabar’!

The brain break Anne then did was the “buka tutup” (open/close) song. It’s super awesome observing students in another school having fun with songs my students also enjoy!

Free Write Assessment Task
I was really pleased Ibu Anne included a demo of how she does free writes with her students. My students struggle with free writes and I also struggle with presenting them in ways that don’t instantly raise up their affective filters.
Ibu Anne began by having the class watch the Buaya Makan Banyak Donut video. She then asked the students to brainstorm for words from the story and wrote them up on the board with cute pics to support comprehension. The students found this incredibly helpful for many reasons. A student I stood behind was not a risk taker with her spelling and while happy to write, baulked at writing words if she wasn’t 100% confident with the spelling! Other students appreciated it because the words became writing prompts for parts of the story they had overlooked!
Anne next showed the class her free write master sheet and explained how to use it; write one word per line and not to miss any lines as this helps when counting the total number of words.
She further added that students were to use only the words that are in their brain; they were not allowed to ask for the translations of any unknown words and that everyone will start writing at the same time and to keep writing until the timer goes off. If students finish the retelling, they could start writing a new story or make up their own sentences using the words in the board.
Ibu Anne next explained that there are different ways to write free writes:
Level 1 – put the brainstormed words into sentences.
Level 2- retell the story.
Level 3 – retell the story with added original ideas.

Sharing
After 10 minutes of quiet writing, Ibu Anne stopped the class and invited them all to “Duduk di lingkaran’ (sit in a circle). Students brought their writing to the floor where they sat in a sharing circle and Ibu Anne explained the ‘Ripple Effect’ ( Robyn Cotter). She invited students to each read one of their sentences out aloud into the silence. She further clarified that if it’s quiet, just start reading. Do not speak if someone else is talking and finally, you can only read once.
This was absolutely beautiful. Students took it in turns to read and listened respectfully to each other. They stopped if they heard someone speaking at the same time and waited for the next silence. Next Ibu Anne encouraged those people who hadn’t had a go yet. She explained to the others who were keen to read a 2nd sentence, that there were still people in the class who had yet to read and then encouraged the others who had not read yet to have a go. It was unbelievable the number of quiet ones who were empowered to share into the respectful silence. One of the last sentences shared was about their class teacher made us all laugh! Buaya makan Bu Kip (The crocodile ate Mrs Kip)!

As the free writes were collected, students got quite restless so Ibu Anne silently held up a sign that said: ‘please show me that you are ready to listen’. Students were instantly intrigued and focused on reading the message. They then re-settled very quickly. A terrific quiet way from ( Robyn Cotter) to engage and refocus literate students! I highly recommend it!

Thank you so much Ibu Anne for encouraging me to visit your school so that I could observe you once again. I’m especially grateful considering that it was the last day of term 1 for you and that you were dead on your feet. Considering all of this, I was blown away with the high level of student engagement in all year levels! Not bad (actually it was impressive) for the last day of term 1. I love how you have incorporated student interests into Kursi Luar Biasa e.g. current popular toys, running competitions and popular hobbies e.g. naik skuter! The slide in your kursi luar biasa PowerPoint asking the awesome student if they can run fast (bisa berlari cepat?) and then challenging them to a race at the front of the classroom in front of their classmates – (allowing them to win) is ingenious!!
I learned so much from this brief visit; from both the teaching observations and from our many conversations where we shared and built on our ideas. I enjoyed implementing many of the above ideas into my teaching and it gave me the energy to get through the last 2 weeks of our term 1.

Terima kasih dan salam hangat,

Bu Cathy

PS; Acknowledgement to Ibu Anne for the title of this post!!

Erin Gotwal Part 1 & 2

9 Feb 20189 Feb 20186 Comments

Here I sit, planning my 2nd week of lessons for my junior primary classes. I must keep in mind that many students are preliterate, especially the brand new reception students (5 year olds)! I have been searching online for activities suitable for preliterate students and stumbled across these 2 inspiring videos.

While Erin’s students are definitely not new reception students, I love how she supports everything she says with text and/or illustrations. This reduces the cognitive load for her very young students by supporting comprehension. Ingenious.

Erin uses so many techniques that are perfect for R-2 students. Watch and enjoy!

https://app.schooltube.com/video/2a8bccee1acf1ede4018/Erin%20Gotwals%20Part%201

http://bit.ly/oZbYDO

PS. If the links don’t work for you, google Erin Gotwals part 1 & Erin Gotwals part 2.

Indonesian Teacher Reflections

Belajar Mengajar

Category: Junior primary

Part 3. Total Physical Response (TPR) with Young’uns

Part 2: Apa Kabar in the JP Classroom with Class Dojo

Starting again….

2021 Reflection

Tepuk Tangan – TPR

Bluey Dance Mode

‘Pleased To Meet You’ by Jim Tripp – Junior Primary Lesson Outline

Indonesian Folktale – Kancil dan Buaya

Observing Ibu Anne’s Circus

Erin Gotwal Part 1 & 2