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Characteristics of Young Learners: Tbi-5B

The document discusses the characteristics of young language learners. It outlines several theories on child development and language acquisition from scholars like Vygotsky, Bruner, Gardner, McKay, Reddy and Goppy, and Armstrong. The key points are that young learners have short attention spans, learn best through interaction and imitation, respond well to praise and rewards, differ in language experience, and are highly imaginative. The conclusion summarizes that teachers should vary activities, encourage students, avoid favoritism, use repetition and realia or pictures to effectively teach young learners based on their characteristics.

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37 views13 pages

Characteristics of Young Learners: Tbi-5B

The document discusses the characteristics of young language learners. It outlines several theories on child development and language acquisition from scholars like Vygotsky, Bruner, Gardner, McKay, Reddy and Goppy, and Armstrong. The key points are that young learners have short attention spans, learn best through interaction and imitation, respond well to praise and rewards, differ in language experience, and are highly imaginative. The conclusion summarizes that teachers should vary activities, encourage students, avoid favoritism, use repetition and realia or pictures to effectively teach young learners based on their characteristics.

Uploaded by

ulfihulia
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© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
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TBI- 5B

Characteristics of young
learners
Member of GROUP 2nd

Lola rizky Fifi nur


Ulfi hulia
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1908103206 1908103126 1908103181
INTRODUCTION
To be able to enter the young learners’ world, the teacher should recognize their
characteristics. Because Children are unique learners and they can easily imitate something
for example a language. To know a language, they need an environment surrounded by
targeted language that is meaningful because of the context and because of the way the
teacher speak to them. As a language teacher, it is better that before teaching young learner,
teachers should know the young learners’ characteristics in order to give ease to understand
them. The characteristics cover their ways of thinking, their attitude, their aptitude, learning
language, et cetera.
Theories of characteristics

01 vygotsky 04 McKay

Reddy and
02 bruners 05 Goppy

03 Gardner 06 Armstrong
vygotsky
Vygotsky believed that language and people around children have important role to the
children stage development. This theory is labeled as socio cultural theory. He believed children
are active learners but they also can learn faster when they interact with adults. By the help of
adults, children can do and understand more than when they do it themselves.
bruners
For Brunner, language is the most important tool for cognitive growth and he has
investigated how adults use language to mediate the world for children and help them for solve
problems. Bruner concept is mostly known as scaffolding and routines. Scaffolding is talk that
supports a child in carrying out an activity (Cameron, 2001: 8). Another concept is routine which
means habit which make it possible for the scaffolding activities to happen (Cameron, 2001: 9).
Gardner
Dr. Howard Gardner, a professor of education at Harvard University. Gardner theorizes that
people do not have just an intellectual capacity, but have many kinds of intelligence, including
musical, interpersonal, spatial-visual, and linguistic intelligences. Learning styles, on the other
hand, relate to an individual's personality and learning preferences. The problem with the concept
of learning styles, Gardner explains, is that not only are they only vaguely defined, but research
has also found little evidence that teaching to a student's preferred style has an effect on learning
outcomes. (Gardner, H. 1983;2003). For teachers, one strong implication of Gardner’s theory is
that children are likely to have different preferred ways of learning. For example, whilst one child
may prefer a verbal explanation, another may prefer ‘hands-on’ (kinesthetic) learning, while yet
another may prefer to follow pictures or diagrams.
McKay
In terms of the characteristics of young learners, McKay (2006) states that children bring to their language
learning their own personalities, likes and dislikes and interests, their own individual cognitive styles and
capabilities and their own strengths and weaknesses. Therefore, it can be assumed that children need special
treatment and assessment in language learning because they each learn language differently. He provides an
example that the attention span of children’s brain in the early stage of school is generally short and is only 10 to 15
minutes long. Consequently, children can be easily distracted from their learning. As they develop, children may
willingly do a task that the teacher gives them, but they may drop it when they find some difficulties in it.
Reddy and Goppy

Reddy and Goppy (2013, p. 32) have said that teaching children who have a limited understanding of
English can face barriers because as children speak their first language at home so they may encounter some
difficulties understanding the meaning of simple English phrases. Thus, it is important that teachers build a good
relation with their young learners since many factors can influence their learning of EFL.
Armstrong

Armstrong (2006, pp. 96–99) has claimed that the children’s level of creativity runs mainly
in the neo–cortex (brain membrane) from when they are born until they are ten years old. After
that, it will decrease as the brain elasticity does. These facts prove that children can more easily
learn and understand concrete materials because they can observe physical features and movement
which will stimulate their thinking.
conclusion
we can conclude that the characteristics of young learners are
1. They have short attention span. So teachers should vary their techniques to break the
boredom. They should give varied activities as handwriting, songs , games etc.
2. They respond well to praising. Always encourage them and praise their work.
3. They differ in their experience of language. Treat them as a unit, don't favour those who
know some English at the expense of those who do not know.
4. They are less shy than older learners. Ask them to repeat utterances, resort to
mechanical drills.
5. They are imaginative. Use Realia or pictures to teach new vocabulary related to concrete
meanings.
6. They are less shy than older learners.
9.     They enjoy imitating and skillful in listening accurately and mimicking what they have
heard.
10.   They respond well to rewards from the teacher.
11.    They are imaginative but may have some difficulties distinguishing between
imagination and real world.
references

Gardner, H. (1983;2003). Frames of Mind. The Theory of Multiple Intelligences. New York.

BasicBooks.McKay, P. (2006). Assessing young language learners. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Reddy, B., & Goppy, M. (2013). Challenges in teaching ESL to very young learners. Journal of Communication Education,
10, 31–35.

Armstrong, T. (2006). The best schools. Bandung: Kaifa.

Cameron, Lyne (2001). Teaching Languages to Young Learners. United Kingdom: Cambridge University Press.

Muthmainnah.Inna, dkk,. Jurnal Tarbiyah: Jurnal Ilmiah .ependidikan Vol. 8 No. 1 Januari – Juni 2019 (63-74)
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