Songs for Young Learners

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Teaching Listening Skills to
Young Learners through
“Listen and Do” Songs

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f it’s true that listening skills are the most important outcomes of early language teaching (Demirel
2004), that explains the constant demand for methods that successfully improve listening skills of learners.
Songs can be one of the most enjoyable ways to practice and develop listening skills. Any syllabus designed for teaching English as a Second/Foreign
Language (ESL/EFL) to young learners (YLs) typically contains songs, chants, and rhymes (Bourke 2006).
Musical expression is an essential part of the human experience, and children respond enthusiastically to songs and welcome them.
Klein (2005) argues that teaching YLs is different from teaching adults. YLs tend to change their mood every other minute, and they find it extremely difficult to sit still. On the other hand, children show greater motivation than adults to do things that appeal to them. It therefore helps if the teacher is inventive and selects a wide variety of interesting activities, especially with songs.
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The purpose of this article is twofold: I will first provide a theoretical discussion about listening skills and
YLs, and about songs and YLs in general; second, I will provide a sample lesson for what can be called “Listen and
Do” songs for YLs at the beginning level. These are the songs to which students physically respond by performing an action (e.g., a song contains the words “wake up,” and whenever students hear “wake up” they perform an action, such as raising their hands).
Teachers around the world can apply this lesson to songs of their own choice to make students active participants in the listening activity from start to finish. Following the lesson plan is a short list of online song resources for teaching young ESL/EFL learners.
Listening skills and young learners Listening is the receptive use of

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