 3. Ideas on teaching EFL and a kindergarten When teaching young learners, one must be prepared to face the challenge with an open heart and respect. Children deserve our respect as much as adults do, and if we manage as educators to offer them our respect, and moreover our trust, they will progress beautifully. 1. Possible challenges To fully explain some of the difficulties and the ways of dealing with them, when teaching kindergarteners I will start by taking a look at the most challenging part. In my opinion, sparking their interest in keeping them focused for a longer period, is one of the most difficult tasks. A good teacher has to adapt to every situation, and children will require different skills and a higher level of energy. Even though the attention span in kindergarteners is relatively small compared to that of adults, there are a few methods that prove deficient in the classroom. This century has blessed us with the gift of technology, and wisely used, it can become of great help and therefore ease the teacher's task. A variety of songs, virtual stories, or even cartoons can be incorporated in the lesson. 2. Lesson duration From my own experience teaching English to Japanese kindergarteners, I noticed that the time allocated for the lesson has to be limited. A child cannot have a productive one-hour lesson or more. So where possible, it would be wise to speak with the principal, or the person in charge to reduce the time allocated for English learning. If this is not possible, try to use the last 20 or 30 minutes to play games, and therefore not allow the children to get bored. In my opinion, an ideal lesson for a kindergartener would take around 30 minutes, and would be based on the following plan. 3. Greetings, how's the weather? How are you? Quick review of the previous vocabulary using big flashcards, choral repetition as well as individual practice. Introduce the new vocabulary, three to four words, trying to spark their interest by showing only half of the picture, and letting them guess. The choral repetition can be conducted by the teacher, and to make it interesting, low voice, medium and high voice can be used, asking the same from the students. Hand gestures and funny faces will help a lot. Song based on the new vocabulary. Activity that requires them to move around the classroom. A good example would be touch the card race or motaro, the kids walk in a circle listening to a song. When the song stops, they have to go to the card indicating the word said by the teacher. The cards are displayed on the floor, and the children have to pay attention to them, and memorize them while walking past them. Thank you, goodbye. 3. Shorter attention spans. Another difficulty when teaching young learners, is that they might easily start fighting or refuse to cooperate. Having a teacher assistant who knows their first language would be of great help, and while most of the kindergartens and schools offer this, there might be some situation when the teacher has to deal with the problem by himself. I think that in this situations, it is necessary for the teacher to try and calm down the child. The other children can be kept busy for a couple of minutes with an activity, coloring a picture representing the new word taught, tracing letters, or watching a short cartoon. Another option would be to ask the child to come next to you, while continuing to teach. He will eventually calm down and return to his seat. If this is not the case, asking for help would be the best solution. Are you ready to teach English abroad? Take a Tefal course. My personal opinion is that working with children is the most rewarding experience. Being able to see them grow and help them acquire a new skill, adds meaning to our life as teachers. I think that we learn from them as many things as they learn from us, and being able to help them grow beautifully, to gain confidence in their ability, to keep their curiosity and wonder, and not be afraid of making mistakes, are things that we as adults, should learn once again.