Growing up is an exciting time. Children are curious and open-minded, and every day welcomes a new thing to learn. They are constantly exploring and discovering themselves and the world around them. But children also have to face many challenging times too as they get older. It is, therefore, important that we teach our young people to be aware of their own wellbeing and self-care, what they can do to lead a balanced and healthy life, and give them the tools they need to help them in difficult times, both mentally and physically.
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Have a look at below. Itdescribespeople’sbasic needs for good mental and physical wellbeing.
Self-actualization– Children need to be aware of their own feelingsand understand how to process them.
Esteem –Children need to growinconfidence, feel valued and receive praise for their achievements. Having hobbies and intereststoo is key.
Love/belonging –Children need to develop meaningful relationships or feel part of a community. This could be friendships, family, a class,acluborschool.
Safety– Children must feel safe in their surroundings.
Physiological–Children must have a home and access to food, water, sleep and exercise.
Ask them to make a list and share your ideas together as a class or as a family.What do they do to look after their mental and physical health?Are there any things thattheydo lots of or don’t do enough of? What can they start doing or try to do more of?
Alternatively, you could also ask themtoput the followingitemsin order of importance. Ask them,‘What makes you happy?’,‘What is important to you?’
Let’srefer backto the hierarchy of needs and see how they can link into reading.
Self-actualization–Disney Kids Readerscan help increaseempathy and self-awarenessthrough reading about other characters’ emotions and putting ourselves in their shoes. It can help us to understand and process our own emotions too. For example, in Inside Out, we see Riley struggle with her emotions when her family moves to San Francisco. Through the characters of Joy, Sadness, Fear, Anger and Disgust, we can see how normal it is to feel a range of emotions and not feel happy all the time.
Esteem –Disney Kids Readersalso help children to develop confidence and self-esteem as they progress through thelevels. By completing the wide range of activities at the end of the books, children can see that they are learning and improving their English skills as well as havingfun reading a book.
Readers can also help us navigate difficult moments in life and teach us resilience and strength in challenging times. When we read the stories, we see how the characters overcome obstacles and deal with their problems. This can teach children key lessons and help them tackle their own problems in the real world.
For example, many of the charactersgo through difficult times to which children can relate. InThe Jungle Book, Mowgli is scared but then his friend Baloo comes to help him.In Frozen II, Elsa goes on a difficult journey to restore justice for the people of Arendelle andThe Enchanted Forest.
Love/belonging –Reading Disney Kids Readers as a class, in pairs, or as a family can really strengthen relationships and a sense of belonging, which is such an important part of children’s development.Sharing a book is something specialthatcanallow people todevelop common interests andthereforemake children feel that they are part of a wider community.
Safety– Childrencan feel safe and more secure when a parent or a caregiver reads to them before bed.Disney Kids Readersare perfect bedtime stories and help children to fall asleep listening to theirfavoriteDisney characters on exciting adventures.Also, in times of stress,reading can help reduceanxiety,allowing children toenjoy the presentmomentand escape the real world for a little while.
Physiological– Reading exercises your brain. In addition to physical exercise, reading isanexcellent mental workout which is so important to children’s health. Ask the children tomemorizesome pages from the reader and recite it without looking or ask them tomemorizethe phonics rhyme on the phonics page. You could also ask them to memorize the key words from the glossary list and see how many they remember.
Now try out some of the activities below which can be linked to the Readers which will help your children/young learners focus on their wellbeing.
This activity is calm, relaxing and mindful for the children to complete. The world is a busy place, and this activity links in with the idea of self-actualization and esteem. Painting or drawing keeps our mind focused on one task, and reduces stress and anxiety. It can help us process difficult emotions and can cheer us up when we are feeling down.
Encourage your young learners to paint or draw a peaceful scene that they can imagine themselves in. It could be a beach, a forest, or even outer space. This activity allows children to express their creativity and imagination while also promoting relaxation and mindfulness.
Need:Self-actualization, Esteem
Self-awarenessis such a useful toolfor our wellbeing– through this activity, the children take a moment each dayto read a few pages of a book and thenlook insidethemselvestothink about how they are feelingbefore and afterreading. This is powerful, as over time the children will understand that reading is a good way to calm the mindand manage emotions–something that can help them improve their own wellbeing and feel safe.
Encourage your learner to write down their feelings in a diary after reading and reflect on how the reading has affected their emotions. This activity promotes self-awareness and emotional intelligence, which are crucial for maintaining good mental health.
Need: Self-actualization,Safety
Emotional intelligence is suchanimportant part of life. Understanding how someone is feeling through body language, such as facial expressions, gestures and body movements, can be useful when someone is sad, angry or upset. It can help us decide what they need and can help them feel listened to, loved and valued. In this activity, the children practice this by analyzingthe characters’ emotions.It will help children build confidence when dealing with difficult or sensitive topics with family and friends.
Choose a Reader with a diverse range of characters and ask your learner to identify and describe the emotions shown by each character. This activity promotes empathy, communication skills and social-emotional learning.
Need: Love/belonging, Esteem
This activity is a great exercise for the brain. It helps children tovisualizeand picture different surroundings in their minds and imagine different smells, sounds and textures, and bring them to life. As the children’s minds are focused on one thing, they begin to relax and feel calm. This activity can be a great tool to use before bedtime to help children fall asleep peacefully.
Guide your learners through a guided meditation where they imagine themselves in different peaceful scenes. You can also ask them to create their own scene and describe it in detail. This activity promotes relaxation, mindfulness and creativity.
Need: Self-actualization, Safety
In every story there is a lesson to be learned, and through this activity childrenlearn how to deal with difficult situations through the characters.It teaches children thatalthoughthere are hard times in life, if we are patient, work togetherandshow resilience, then wecanwork through our problems.
Choose a Reader with characters facing challenges and discuss with your learners how the characters handle the situation. Encourage them to think of ways they can apply this to their own lives when facing difficulties.
Need:Belonging, Esteem
This activity is creative and fun and will get the children moving and laughing at the same time. Physical exercise is so important to our wellbeing,so what is better than doing a workout with yourfavoriteDisney character?The children can do these workouts in small groups, with family or as a class.This activity promotes physical health and social bonding.
Choose a few Disney characters and create simple exercises for each one. You can also use props or make it into a game by having the children take turns being different characters.
Need: Physiological
Read our blog post 'Choosingthe right gradedreadersfor young learners' and 'How to motivate reluctant readers' for more reading tips and ideas.
When you’re teaching English to young learners, you might find that there are a few students in your class who are struggling. But sometimes it can be hard to tell why. Is it because their language level is low? Or are they finding classroom work difficult because of a general cognitive difference, like dyslexia?
Do you ever find it hard to keep students focused and on task? Young learners get easily distracted and it can be hard to find ways to keep them engaged.
So what can we do to get, and more importantly, keep our students’ attention? Here are our five top tips.
Young learners have relatively short attention spans. In the classroom, it is rare to have the whole class fully engaged in something for a long time, since the children will have different interests and levels, so it is essential to plan a number of activities for each lesson.
The more variety you can include in the activities and tasks you plan, the easier it is to provide something enjoyable and relevant for each child. Choose short tasks and try to have a couple of extra activities up your sleeve if something you planned doesn’t work well. However, don’t worry if you don’t have time to do them all – you can always save them for a future lesson.
Another way of keeping students engaged is to mix up the classroom dynamics, having a combination of individual heads-down work, pair work, group work, and whole class discussions or games. When planning your lesson, consider how your students might feel at each stage. After doing some reading or quiet work, students may start to become restless, and this is the ideal time to get them up and moving about.
While you are in class, pay close attention to the mood of the class. When you sense that students are becoming distracted or bored, change the dynamics of the activity.
Ever notice that students become lethargic and show a lack of interest? Why not try introducing brain breaks at strategic points in your lessons? Brain breaks are short physical activities or games designed to get the blood flowing and to re-energize students to help them get ready for learning. They range from short activities that last a couple of minutes, to longer breaks that may be suitable if your lessons last more than an hour.
We can vary different aspects of the lesson using the previous strategies, but one thing that rarely changes is the role of the teacher! One way of keeping students involved is by giving them more responsibility and allowing them to take a more active role in their learning.
Peer teaching completely changes the classroom dynamic and has students teach their peers while you take a step back. For primary classes, ask one or two students to take charge of a ready-made activity, e.g. one from your course book. They should give instructions, demonstrate, monitor as necessary, and check answers.
When students are used to doing this, you can start to have them work in pairs or small groups to plan their own activities to use in class.
Of course, nobody is perfect and there will be times when you lose students’ attention and they are not on task. For these occasions, you can use a wealth of classroom management strategies to regain the class's attention. Here are a few techniques:
Finally, if we want our students to be motivated and engaged in our lessons, we must show enthusiasm for what we are teaching. The more lively and animated you are about the lesson, the more the students will want to join you and learn.
There is a strong link between well-being and friendship, which is just as accurate for children as it is for adults. that children with stable friendships are happier, more able to cope with stress, and have higher self-esteem. Moreover, too, and children who experience friendship adjust more easily to school and perform better academically. School friendships are also a valuable way of learning social skills like sharing, resolving conflict, and engaging with peers positively.
Having friends is an important part of school life, and teachers can play a significant role in creating a positive classroom culture and helping children and young people to form friendships. How can you promote friendships between your students? Here are some ideas:
If there is an example of a good friendship in a book you are reading with students or in your lesson materials, draw your students’ attention to it. For instance, The Jungle Book is an excellent example of a story about friendship. Encourage your students to think critically about the friendships that they read about. You can ask questions like:
By discussing friendship regularly in the classroom, your students will learn about the behavior and characteristics of being a good friend.
You can create lots of opportunities for students to build friendships with one another during class time. Design activities that call for pair or group work, and include at least one or two in every lesson. Focusing on a common goal or problem is a great way to encourage your students to bond with one another.As a bonus, this collaborative way of working promotes important 21st century skills like communication and problem-solving.
Another way of promoting friendships between different groups of students is moving them around. Adjust your seating plan regularly to ensure that all your students interact with and work alongside different classmates, to promote positive, friendly classroom vibes.
Friendship is a social skill that children need to learn – and you can help by teaching them. Be explicit about exactly what you expect from them. Saying, “Be kind” is an abstract, vague concept that children might struggle to put into practice. Instead, give them concrete examples of behavior, such as:
When you see a student engaging in these behaviors, draw attention to them and praise them.
But to really convey the importance of school friendships and kind behavior, it’s not enough to tell them. As the teacher, you must model the behavior you’d like to see in your students. Be consistently positive and upbeat in your interactions with students, thank your learners when they offer help with something, and try to refrain from sounding impatient (even when you are!). All these steps will help to build a positive classroom culture where students feel secure, supported and happy.
Conflict is an inevitable part of school life, but you can help students to navigate arguments and other difficult situations in the classroom. If two students argue, you can help them to resolve it with the following steps:
Following these simple steps teaches children a framework for resolving conflict and gives them the tools to process strong emotions.
An excellent way to promote a positive classroom culture is to do friendship-focused activities with your students:
You could do a Venn diagram activity, where students work in pairs to discuss and write down things they have in common and areas of difference. It’s good to pair students who don’t spend much time together for this activity.
Another positive activity is a 'Honey Roast'. Give students enough squares of paper to have one for each of their classmates. Get them to write their classmates’ names on the paper, and then, on the other side, write down a compliment or something they like about that person, for example, “I like your handwriting”, or “You always use kind words”. Collect the pieces of paper and read out some nice examples to the class. Alternatively, give them directly to the students to read to themselves.
