The Importance of Games When Learning English as a Foreign Language at Primary School

Games activity in the foreign language lesson is one of the basic ways of learning English at primary school.

This post was written by our TEFL certification graduate Özden G. Please note that this blog post might not necessarily represent the beliefs or opinions of ITTT.

What is a game?

The game - one of the most important means of education of children. Lessons from the use of games are an effective means of training and education, as the rest of the common construction of the lesson and the introduction of the game story took the attention of the entire class. In the game pupils get into a situation that allows them to critically rate their knowledge in an active step, cause this knowledge into the system.

In the present method and practice of teaching children in primary school focuses on the optimal combination of different forms, methods and teaching aids. In recent years, significantly changed the priorities of primary education. Ask the children if they love stories and games. Sure, all the answers are going to be “yes”.

Under the conditions of modern life, most parents can not spend free time to communicate with children and their development (working late, at the best time to check homework.) Hence we see that parents, in most cases, unable to develop the thinking of their children. As you know, of great importance in the educational process is learning motivation. The game makes the lesson interesting and accessible, helping to increase the activity of children to learn skills and improve the quality of education.

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Game concepts contain qualifications like:

• The game is an independent type of developmental activities for children of different ages.
• Children play is the freest form of their activity. We study the world, offers a wide scope for personal creativity, activity, self-knowledge, self-expression.
• The game - the first stage of the child's preschool, primary school of his/her conduct, and equitable regulatory activities of primary school children, teenagers, young adults, changing their goals as they grow older students.
• The game is the practice of development. Children play because they evolve and develop so that they are playing.
• The game - the freedom of self-discovery, self-development based on the subconscious mind and creativity.
• The game - the main sphere of communication between children, it solved the problem of interpersonal relations, human relations experience is gained. There are several groups of games:
• The subject game, as the manipulation of toys and objects. Through toy - items - children can learn the shape, size, color, material, etc.
• Game creative, role-playing, in which the plot - a form of intellectual activity.
• Didactic game.

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Typically, they require the student's ability to know the subject.

Language games helping to learn the various aspects of language (phonetics, vocabulary, etc.) are divided into phonetic, lexical, grammatical and stylistic.

Thus, the educational game - is focused on the zone of proximal development of the game, combining teaching to appeal to the motive of the child.

The game has to change the style of the relationship between children and the teacher, who can not impose anything: a child can play only when he/she wants and when he/she is interested, and those who cause him/her sympathy.

A teacher can not only be the organizer or leader of the game – he/she has to play with the child, because children have great pleasure in playing with adults, and because game atmosphere collapses under the gaze of the observer.

The main purpose of phonetic games - staged (correction) pronunciation and practice about it. They are used regularly, mostly at the initial stage of learning a foreign language as an illustration and exercises to practice the most difficult to pronounce sounds and intonations. The experience gained in games of this type can be used by students in the classroom in the future in a foreign language.

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Lexical games

They have focused on students' attention only on the lexical material and are designed to assist them in acquiring and expanding vocabulary and to work to illustrate the use of words in communication situations.

Grammar games

They are designed to provide students practical skills to apply knowledge of grammar, increase their mental activities to the use of grammatical structures in natural communication situations.

Among the different types of games, the role-playing game holds a special and important place. Role-playing teaches to be sensitive to the social use of language. A good conversationalist is often not the one who enjoys the best structures, and those who can most clearly recognize the situation in which there are partners, to consider the information that is already known and choose the linguistic resources that will be most effective for communication.

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Success depends on the use of games, primarily from the atmosphere necessary verbal communication, the teacher creates a classroom. Of course, foreign language lesson - it is not just a game. The credibility and ease of communication between a teacher and his/her disciples encountered by the general atmosphere of the game and the actual games. It is necessary to use widely of gaming in the study of forms of learning a foreign language.

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