Learning Body Parts through Song
I. Rationale
This activity is designed for young children from about three to ten years old but is adapted to be used by middle and high school students in the Iñupiaq language setting. Students learn to sing a song that goes through common body parts.
This activity supports language development by a) creating opportunities for meaningful and authentic interaction, and b) helping to develop a community of learners.
A) Creating opportunities for meaningful and authentic interaction.
Gilmore (2007) discusses the benefits of using authentic materials for L2 teaching and learning. Not everyone agrees on what constitutes an authentic material so Gilmore lists some criteria that have been proposed in the literature. This activity falls under the criteria of being “language produced by a real speaker/writer for a real audience, conveying a real message” (p. 98). Gilmore (2007) reports that some researchers associate increased student motivation with the use of authentic materials (p. 107).
Ellis (p. 223, 2009) discusses the use of task-based language teaching and lists key precepts.
1. The primary focus should be in ‘meaning’ (by which is meant that learners should be mainly concerned with processing the semantic and pragmatic meaning of utterances.)
2. There should be some kind of ‘gap’ (i.e. a need to convey information, to express an opinion or to infer meaning.)
3. Learners should largely have to rely on their own resources (linguistic and non-liguistic) in order to complete the activity.
4. There is a clearly defined outcome other than the use of language (i.e. the language serves as the means for achieving the outcome, not as an end in its own right).
Ellis (2009) believes that task-based learning is intrinsically motivating and affords learners a rich input of target language (p. 242). This activity aligns well with all of Ellis’ key precepts for task-based learning.
B) Developing a community of learners.
One of the standards for foreign language learning is that students use the language both within and beyond the school setting. According to Phillips and Draper (1999) “A community can be a community of learners of different ages or in different locations. The idea here is that the classroom provides the means so that students can interact beyond their classroom walls.” “The intent of the ‘lifelong learning’ standard is that students from the beginning develop the tools, the habits of mind, and the motivations that allow them to independently pursue activities using language throughout their lifetime.” (p. 68).
Lave (1991) studied apprenticeship communities of practice and discussed how the development of knowledge within that community also went hand in hand with a change in identity. I am working to help my students to identify themselves as learners of the language with important roles to play within a community of other learners.
Description
Students have struggled to learn their body parts in Iñupiaq. Most of them had been taught a body parts song while in elementary school but the song only taught five different body parts. I had observed students trying to remember one of the five body parts by going through the song but it wasn’t very much help because it only covered five body parts. I used the song that students already knew to create more verses for teaching the other body parts.
My first step was to divide the body parts I want to teach into groups of five. Once I had my groupings and the pictures for each body part I used Keynote to create a slide for each verse. I project the song onto the SmartBoard and switch slides for each verse. I have the students touch each part as we sing. I try to make it memorable so when I can I do things in an exaggerated fashion. So instead of just touching my cheek I slap it. When I say tongue I stick my tongue out which makes me sound really funny. When saying butt, I wiggle my but outrageously. We play around with doing verses slowly and then speeding up. Anything to add variety and excitement to the activity.
Even though high school students have trouble learning their body parts they feel that this song is too babyish for them. To get around this I teach it to them with the understanding that they are then going to teach it to younger children. They learn all the verses but take turns being in charge of a specific one when we work with the younger children.
This activity is designed for young children from about three to ten years old but is adapted to be used by middle and high school students in the Iñupiaq language setting. Students learn to sing a song that goes through common body parts.
This activity supports language development by a) creating opportunities for meaningful and authentic interaction, and b) helping to develop a community of learners.
A) Creating opportunities for meaningful and authentic interaction.
Gilmore (2007) discusses the benefits of using authentic materials for L2 teaching and learning. Not everyone agrees on what constitutes an authentic material so Gilmore lists some criteria that have been proposed in the literature. This activity falls under the criteria of being “language produced by a real speaker/writer for a real audience, conveying a real message” (p. 98). Gilmore (2007) reports that some researchers associate increased student motivation with the use of authentic materials (p. 107).
Ellis (p. 223, 2009) discusses the use of task-based language teaching and lists key precepts.
1. The primary focus should be in ‘meaning’ (by which is meant that learners should be mainly concerned with processing the semantic and pragmatic meaning of utterances.)
2. There should be some kind of ‘gap’ (i.e. a need to convey information, to express an opinion or to infer meaning.)
3. Learners should largely have to rely on their own resources (linguistic and non-liguistic) in order to complete the activity.
4. There is a clearly defined outcome other than the use of language (i.e. the language serves as the means for achieving the outcome, not as an end in its own right).
Ellis (2009) believes that task-based learning is intrinsically motivating and affords learners a rich input of target language (p. 242). This activity aligns well with all of Ellis’ key precepts for task-based learning.
B) Developing a community of learners.
One of the standards for foreign language learning is that students use the language both within and beyond the school setting. According to Phillips and Draper (1999) “A community can be a community of learners of different ages or in different locations. The idea here is that the classroom provides the means so that students can interact beyond their classroom walls.” “The intent of the ‘lifelong learning’ standard is that students from the beginning develop the tools, the habits of mind, and the motivations that allow them to independently pursue activities using language throughout their lifetime.” (p. 68).
Lave (1991) studied apprenticeship communities of practice and discussed how the development of knowledge within that community also went hand in hand with a change in identity. I am working to help my students to identify themselves as learners of the language with important roles to play within a community of other learners.
Description
Students have struggled to learn their body parts in Iñupiaq. Most of them had been taught a body parts song while in elementary school but the song only taught five different body parts. I had observed students trying to remember one of the five body parts by going through the song but it wasn’t very much help because it only covered five body parts. I used the song that students already knew to create more verses for teaching the other body parts.
My first step was to divide the body parts I want to teach into groups of five. Once I had my groupings and the pictures for each body part I used Keynote to create a slide for each verse. I project the song onto the SmartBoard and switch slides for each verse. I have the students touch each part as we sing. I try to make it memorable so when I can I do things in an exaggerated fashion. So instead of just touching my cheek I slap it. When I say tongue I stick my tongue out which makes me sound really funny. When saying butt, I wiggle my but outrageously. We play around with doing verses slowly and then speeding up. Anything to add variety and excitement to the activity.
Even though high school students have trouble learning their body parts they feel that this song is too babyish for them. To get around this I teach it to them with the understanding that they are then going to teach it to younger children. They learn all the verses but take turns being in charge of a specific one when we work with the younger children.
Reflection
I did this activity with all of my high school students. It has really made a difference in how well they can recall the names of their body parts in Iñupiaq. Some students have really struggled with having to lead a verse with a group of younger students but doing so has made the activity authentic as it is impossible not to notice the younger children’s pleasure at getting to sing the song. The young children's classrooms we go to do not have a SmartBoard so I printed the slides on card stock and we take them with us so that my students have a sheet to look at if they forget the order of the body parts for their verse.
I only started doing this activity the last quarter. I’m looking forward to doing it from the beginning of the school year. I have another children’s song that I have adapted to include more vocabulary and have divided up the verses in a similar way and the students are learning a lot from that one as well. I want to figure out a way for my Spanish students to also be able to have these authentic teaching/learning experiences but I don’t know of any younger children here in Barrow that are trying to learn Spanish. I’ll have to keep thinking about it.
I did this activity with all of my high school students. It has really made a difference in how well they can recall the names of their body parts in Iñupiaq. Some students have really struggled with having to lead a verse with a group of younger students but doing so has made the activity authentic as it is impossible not to notice the younger children’s pleasure at getting to sing the song. The young children's classrooms we go to do not have a SmartBoard so I printed the slides on card stock and we take them with us so that my students have a sheet to look at if they forget the order of the body parts for their verse.
I only started doing this activity the last quarter. I’m looking forward to doing it from the beginning of the school year. I have another children’s song that I have adapted to include more vocabulary and have divided up the verses in a similar way and the students are learning a lot from that one as well. I want to figure out a way for my Spanish students to also be able to have these authentic teaching/learning experiences but I don’t know of any younger children here in Barrow that are trying to learn Spanish. I’ll have to keep thinking about it.