Last night, the lesson plan for the class I was covering wasn’t from the student’s book, but one designed by the school. The lesson content for the kindergarten class was an extension of the transport unit the students had been studying.

It was on giving directions.

Throughout the course of a single two hour lesson, students in this Kindergarten English class were expected to learn a few new vocabulary words, and also the concepts of left, right, forward as well as the different meanings of traffic light signals. The final productive exercise for the lesson was a pair work exercise. It involved a map that students were to have colored and added some detail to. The students were then to speak to each other, to help navigate a cut-out vehicle around the map.

It was a great lesson plan.

For a primary level student. 

Like other lessons designed by the school, this was a developmentally inappropriate lesson.

Clearly, the person who had designed the lesson had little experience teaching kindergarten level students. This particular lesson was to be delivered to students who had just over 200 hours in-class experience. Students in a class at this level could potentially include children as young as three years old.

Would the parents have been impressed by their children being able to understand directions?

Absolutely.

However, what they don’t see (or understand) is the long-term harm that comes from teaching students in a developmentally inappropriate way.

Developmentally inappropriate teaching, is a growing problem in western countries. In some circles it is known as a “push-down” curriculum, where (kindergarten) students are expected to know as much as possible, as soon as possible, so that they can perform well on standardized tests. What was once taught in the first grade, or primary school, now gets taught to Kindergarten students. The way some schools approach STEM and STEAM is an example of this.

I certainly see evidence of a “push down” style curriculum in the EFL and ESL very young learners space. And, because children are actually highly capable, its easy to be seduced into thinking that teaching in this way is clever. I certainly was.

I’ve also noticed that schools sometimes like to teach the children advanced concepts so that they can impress the parents. Whilst working at an international kindergarten, I had requests to teach very young children things I believed were inappropriate for their age level.

My response was short and simple.

No.

And I explained to them the reasons I don’t want to teach in that way. However, I left shortly thereafter, because they consistently put the school’s interests ahead of the child.

I’ve also taught two year olds at public schools in ways that I would no longer choose to. I’ll write more about teaching two year olds English another time.

The same school that created the transport lesson, also uses developmentally inappropriate tests for their very young learners. Again, they were written by someone with little or no experience in teaching English to very young learners. VYLs are a completely different group to young learners. The tests the school created involve numerous grammar questions using structures that most children would otherwise learn in early primary years. Implementing (and teaching to) those tests is stressful for both the students and the teachers.

If the students don’t perform well on the tests, the parents get concerned. However, the kindergarten students are not performing well on primary school level tests. And, if they do perform well, the parents are impressed, which only serves to encourage more age-inappropriate teaching.

Returning to developmentally appropriate lessons.

I think the lines are occasionally blurry as to what might be inappropriate to teach. It is another reason why teaching English to very young learners isn’t easy.

Also, to be fair, sometimes teachers at various language schools (like mine), simply don’t have the depth of knowledge, skills and awareness of teaching in the very young learner space to understand what they’re doing. In this case, they’ve created lesson plans that would be perfect for older students, but not for three to five year olds.

If you’re faced with teaching age-inappropriate concepts and content, I would strongly recommend you have a discussion with your school. Point them to the extensive body of research that shows the long-term ramifications for the child of them learning this way. Also, you can try to adapt the lesson content to something that is more suitable to their age level.