How to teach primary school students with effective interactive games? by Elyanora Menglieva

2025-03-21 16:31:49 UTC

Why do I think that I used the games did not work well in my lesson?
Why don't school children want to play games together?
What kinds of games are engaging for children?

About me

2025-03-21 16:43:15 UTC

•My Name: Xusanova Munisakhon

•Institution: Namangan State Institute of Foreign Languages.

• Level: Undergraduate degree

•Group: MBX-BU-22.

My teaching and research context:

elyamenglieva — 2025-03-24 15:54:40 UTC

•Practicum Place: Turakurgan District, Namangan Region, Uzbekistan.

•School: Number 7.

•Type of School: State

•Grade: from 1 to 6 classes.

•Number of students: 21.

Data collection tools for exploratory stage

elyamenglieva — 2025-03-26 13:41:47 UTC

1.For 1st research question; I will use my own teacher reflections.

2.For 2nd question; I will have an interview with a school teacher.

3.For 3rd research question; I will have an informal conversation with student colleagues.

Data collection tools for the action stage

elyamenglieva — 2025-03-26 13:43:52 UTC

1) Conduct a survey with students to learn whether new games are effective

2) Classroom observation by a critical friend

My reflections

elyamenglieva — 2025-03-26 13:49:26 UTC

First of all, I should use my own teacher reflection because I may not be able to observe all the children during the lesson. During my own reflection , I collected some information related to this.

Teaching during my practicum was indeed tough for me to attract pupils' attention and also at that time, suddenly one thing came to my mind, it was about "How I manage to attract children's attention to these games.

Now I think of some games that I can use. They are:

1) Personal Story Games.

#My day: Children talk about their daily routines using simple sentences like "I brush my teeth" or "I eat breakfast".

#Show and Tell: Each child brings an item from home that is important to them and talks about it in English.

2)Mirror Games.

#Mirror, Mirror; Children look in a mirror and describe what they see use simple sentences like "I have brown eyes" or " My hair is curly".

#Copy Cat; One child performs an action in front of a mirror and the others have to describe it in English and them mimic it.

3) Sensory Games.

#Touch and Tell: Children touch different parts of their body or face and describe the sensation or the part in English.

#Reflection Exploration; use reflective surfaces (mirrors, shiny objects) to explore and describe reflection and objects around the room.

Next year I want to play these games with the children which I mentioned above.

Findings from the interview

elyamenglieva — 2025-03-26 13:51:07 UTC

Last week, I asked my English teacher. "Why don't school children want to play games together?" My English teacher told me: "There are many different kinds of reasons related to this. But among them, one of main reasons is during play games, they often fight each other because some students are very cheaters as a result they lose interest in the game such as: during word puzzle games some kind of arguments while they are finding words.Hence I always use warm-up activity because it is the best way to get rid of their daily tiredness as well as studying hard.

#Question of my interview with a school teacher.

1.Why don't preschool students like playing games together at all?

2. What kinds of activities are useful for students in lesson?

3.What games do you recommend for students to play?

Findings from informal conversation with colleagues

elyamenglieva — 2025-03-26 13:52:05 UTC

********Last Monday I got informal conversation with my student colleagues.They told me that Games that involve active participation,creativity,and repetition tend to be effective for teaching English to children.

Here are some examples;

Student; Flash Card Games; Use flashcard to play memory matching games or ask children to find objects that match the vocabulary on the cards
Student;Board games;Use board games like Snakes and Ladders or scrabble to practice vocabulary and spelling in a fun way
Student; Story chain; Start a story with simple sentence,then have each child add a sentence to continue the story this encourages creativity and language production.After that they told me that Using these games you cab create and immersive and enjoyable English learning environment for preschool children and also these games not only make learning English enjoyable for children but also orovide opportunities for them to practise speaking, listening, reading and writing skills.

Action plan

elyamenglieva — 2025-03-26 17:37:15 UTC

First of all, I found useful resources and ideas related to the new games from my exploratory findings findings.

I decided to use the following interesting games in my next teaching practicum

Story Chain,
Flash Card games,
Personal Story games,
Mirror games.

Action level findings

elyamenglieva — 2025-03-26 17:40:56 UTC

In my teaching practicum, I decided to use only two games:
Flash Card games,
Story Chain.

I chose them because these games seemed more interesting and attractive than other games to me at that time, and I thought they would be equally enjoyable for school students.

While playing games, pupils talked about their daily routines. For example: "I brush my teeth" or "I wake up early", and so on.

When it comes to the results, I think I was satisfied with the use of these games. Children particularly enjoyed playing these games.

elyamenglieva — 2025-03-27 12:35:50 UTC

I should admit that Exploratory Action Research is very useful for all of us. It can bring about methods, new profits, and research. Honestly, I did not understand it at first and had some challenging situations choosing data tools and a research question. But one day Elyanora Menglieva explained the lesson about research and data, and after the lesson, I could comprehend very well. Before this research, I did not have any methods or games, and I felt much insecurity at that time. Through my reflections and practicum, I have learned "How to play games together with children?" After that, I talked to my teacher, who helped me during my internship, about this topic. I might not be able to observe all the children. But now I have some kind of games which consist of 3 games, but among them, I prefer " Minecraft" more because it is an incredibly popular game where children can build their own worlds. It can encourage creativity and problem-solving skills.
Next year I want to play these games together with children which I mentioned above...