Hello teachers, 👋🏻😄
I teach Italian and English in Tokyo. Currently I’m teaching English to two Japanese children of 8 and 12 years old. Their parents are friends so they’d like them to take lessons together. Despite their age difference, they’re about the same level of English and get along well, so no problem there.
The issue is that they’re used to very different teaching methods. The younger one has been using “Everybody up 1”, and the older has just started “Gateway A1”, but finds it too difficult. Basically, one is used to children books with little songs, lots of pictures and words/phrases repetition, while the other would like to use something less flashy and more for teens, but not too hard.
Unfortunately all the textbooks I know are either thought for young children, or for teenagers a bit more mature in age and English level. Is there something more “in between”? Of course I can create materials for them (I’ve been doing so for a while and they seem to be having fun), but they’re a bit tired of all the files and would like something a bit more stable. Their parents would appreciate a textbook that they both could use.
I’m not sure it’s possibile to teach them together. Do you have any recommendation for an ESL textbook that could close the gap between their learning needs?
2 comments
I like the Everybody UP series for that age range. I have some 12 year olds using it and none of them think it is too childish for them.
I use let’s go. I think that’s also oxford like everybody up. It has songs, but they’re ignorable. It has plenty of content without doing the songs.
If a drum track is okay, they have that to help with sentences. Not quite a song but gives you a beat to remember the root sentences.
Again, you can skip over those and have plenty of content.