Fun with words
SELINE AUGUSTINE
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Far away from the school curriculum, the workshop on Vocabulary Expression had kids uninhibitedly enjoying themselves.
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Games and puzzles: Learning something new.
Playing with words, word building, word games and alphabet puzzles spell having a good time while picking up the language. “Vocabulary Expression” was an hour and a half session when five to nine-year-olds uninhibitedly enjoyed themselves at the British Council recently. Even before the programme started there were a couple of kids like Aravind Suresh of Standard II who was busy reading Dr Seuss’ book The Cat in the Hat. When asked at t
he outset what they thought will happen in the next 90 minutes, the children chirruped saying “How to speak better”, “To improve your English”.
Different approach
Padhma Priya and Archana Shah, resource persons from Sishlok, believed that they needed to present a format different from the classroom curriculum and which will sustain the interest of very small kids. Hence they got the children started with visual expression. First the kids had to identify from the assortment of animals those which live in water and colour only them.
Words like walrus, octopus, whale, and shark became familiar and then began the happy task of shading the outlines. The names of the colours were now rolling off their tongues with ease as they exchanged sketch pens, pencils and crayons amicably among themselves.
The children found the group exercise of naming things a lark. As also the Postal Service. Seven-year-olds holding forth on email and courier service was a treat to listen to. When it came to learning Healthy Habits, looking at the picture of a bottled drink, seven-year-old Nishicka piped up “I like junk juices”. Learning the lexicon, anyone?
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