Story Books for Meaningful Learning
How can the teacher use story book as a theme to help students to achieve meaningful learning where they can comprehend and use the new words that they learn from the story book?
INTRODUCTION
The ESL students of Ironside State School come from non-English speaking background. Therefore, they are lacking or having minimal range of useful vocabulary as they are used to speak in their own mother tongue. Even if they do know how to spell or read the new words, they cannot comprehend or put the words into use as the new words do not have any meaning for them.
This action research is based on theme-based learning, where it is defined as a vehicle for teaching a range of skills and content by integrating curriculum areas around a topic (Mumford, 2000). This method of teaching links curriculum and build on children’s interests. Thus, by building on their interests and life experiences, young people’s attitudes, skills and knowledge are developed in meaningful ways. Besides, it activated inquiry and communication thus resulting in enthusiastic participation in the learning process.
Therefore, in this paper, I would focus on how I build students’ English comprehension and achieve meaningful learning by using story book as a theme in teaching new words to the students. I choose to use story book as the theme for teaching new words to the students because it is interesting and have graphics and pictures that will equip the visual learners. From the story, I developed activities and plans for the students in order to get them to understand and comprehend the new words that are extracted from the story book.
FIRST PLANNED ACTION
In this first planned action, the first thing that I did was read the chosen story book by the cooperating teacher. I had to stick with the big book on insects as to follow the teacher’s weekly plan for the 6 pupils of year 2 ESL students. The theme for the week is insects and the aim is to introduce insects and their body parts. Then, to
INTRODUCTION
The ESL students of Ironside State School come from non-English speaking background. Therefore, they are lacking or having minimal range of useful vocabulary as they are used to speak in their own mother tongue. Even if they do know how to spell or read the new words, they cannot comprehend or put the words into use as the new words do not have any meaning for them.
This action research is based on theme-based learning, where it is defined as a vehicle for teaching a range of skills and content by integrating curriculum areas around a topic (Mumford, 2000). This method of teaching links curriculum and build on children’s interests. Thus, by building on their interests and life experiences, young people’s attitudes, skills and knowledge are developed in meaningful ways. Besides, it activated inquiry and communication thus resulting in enthusiastic participation in the learning process.
Therefore, in this paper, I would focus on how I build students’ English comprehension and achieve meaningful learning by using story book as a theme in teaching new words to the students. I choose to use story book as the theme for teaching new words to the students because it is interesting and have graphics and pictures that will equip the visual learners. From the story, I developed activities and plans for the students in order to get them to understand and comprehend the new words that are extracted from the story book.
FIRST PLANNED ACTION
In this first planned action, the first thing that I did was read the chosen story book by the cooperating teacher. I had to stick with the big book on insects as to follow the teacher’s weekly plan for the 6 pupils of year 2 ESL students. The theme for the week is insects and the aim is to introduce insects and their body parts. Then, to