THE VERB ‘TO BE’ IN JUNIOR CLASSES

For decades we, teachers of English, have been starting our junior classes by introducing the verb “to be” in the first units of any course book we might be using without questioning the principle behind this choice. And though I have been in the profession for decades and repeatedly frustrated by my inability to successfully teach the verb “to be” to my pupils, it was only recently that the idea solidified in my mind.

Even when we assume that learners have put all kinds of difficulties behind them and can now use the verb properly and therefore move on to more “sophisticated” concepts, forms such as I “was be” or “he be” rear their ugly head challenging any certainty about having got the verb “to be” out of the way.

In my effort to account for such an insistence on an item which seems to elude most beginners, it crossed my mind that we people in the West are possibly obsessed with existential issues to such an extent that we ignore common sense.

One may ask what common sense would dictate in this case. For one thing, we could leave the verb at “I am……… (name)” rather than insisting on both singular and plural or affirmative, interrogative and negative form. The plural is a concept which in many junior books is not introduced before the verb “to be” anyhow.  

Besides there are so many action verbs that young children would find much more straightforward and memorable. I suggest that the imperative form of the verb is a smooth way into the verb system of the English language. It allows the teacher to introduce a wealth of lexical items which perhaps cannot be easily learnt later on. For instance, teaching advanced students “pop”, “hop”, “wobble”, “tiptoe”, “wiggle”, “rumble”, “howl”, “roar”, “pitter patter” etc often feels such a strain when with juniors it is fun non-stop and cashes in on their kinesthetic intelligence.

Concrete nouns along with action verbs could still provide great learning opportunities and motivate young learners by the immediacy of the sentences that could be built as well as their effectiveness and relevance. Prepositions are also easy to present either by using children’s objects or bodies or by making simple drawings.

Without any pretensions to completeness or thoroughness, this is along the lines of what I had in mind:

run                                                                               ball

sit                                                                              chair    

sleep                                                                          floor              

throw                                                                         boat

catch                                                                            hat

train                                                                               pencil

Prepositions could be presented one by one so that each new item is consolidated and the following image could provide a visual aid for use.

Therefore, the pupils would be able to understand and produce sentences along these lines:

 Throw the ball.

Catch the ball.

Sit on the floor.

Don’t sleep.

Wake up.

Introducing “and” could lead to more complex sentences and provide children with great joy at being given the opportunity to jump and clap or skip and touch their nose or whatever combination they could come up with.

In any case, what could follow is a matter of acting on the pupils’ feedback and abilities.