Check out Jason and Jamie presenting weather and seasons vocabulary here
Converting all of my old (but still awesome, in my opinion) print-based flashcard material into a more digitally friendly audio-visual format has long been on my agenda. Tonight, English Raven Junior helped me to take the first step in superb style.
Forget the publisher-produced stuff with some lady paid to sound happy and bubbly as she reads aloud items of lexis to go with glossy pictures. Step up six-year-old James Renshaw, who talks his way through a set of weather and seasons pics in a performance that couldn't have been better even if you'd scripted it.
In fact, the whisper of "did I speak clearly?" and the sneeze that took place right when the winter cards were up on the screen were definitely not scripted (I swear by my sable feathers). And the little exchange at the end... priceless.
In all seriousness, though, I'm very keen to do a lot more of this with Jamie, because (1) he really loves doing it and (2) I think it is a much better way to present vocabulary and concepts to other children. The core vocabulary is there, but the richness of the totally natural peripheral conversation is precious. Jamie himself, who has only been around other English-speaking children for a little over 18 months, is still very much a lad with an ESL background. What better way to present vocabulary and language to young learners of English than via a similar aged peer interacting conversationally with an adult with pictures on the screen?
Oh, and (3) I don't have to pay him... much.
And (4) he sounds sooooo much better than that lady the publishers hire to do this sort of thing. No offence intended, of course.
:-)
