Young learners should have fun with English

Teaching English to young learners has become a trend nowadays. In every school, English is

taught as one of the main subjects. In teaching young learners is not like teaching adults,

children have their own way of learning. Since children like to play and have fun, the

learning and teaching process should be suited with the nature of the children themselves.

One of the forms of fun activities for children is through music, and songs are the common

form of music that children know.

Who are the children? Review of both theoretical treatise and research-based reports which

are underpinned by socio-cultural theories which strive to understand children from

children’s own perspectives will lead us to a clear conclusion that children are children not

little adults. As repeatedly shown in peer culture studies, children have their own culture

ways of doing things which are different from that of adults. Given this thinking, children

should be treated and appreciated in their own right.

The works of Bruner (1996) and later works of Piaget (1975) have provided very useful

insights into how children learn. More specifiacally, Bruner (1996) proposes a hierarchy of

children’s learning modes: enactive (which means relying on physical activities), iconic

(which represents residual mental images resulting from the contacts with material entities),

and symbolic (which comes later by way of symbolic means such as language).