Drama + ESL + Puppets = Fun Lesson Idea

I believe that the best way to encourage students to become invested in education is to get to know them, build a relationship, and incorporate their interests into lesson planning.  

As a student who's English is a second language, I know first hand the importance of drama in language acquisition. It is not only a great way to be purposefully silly and build a relationship with students, but also a powerful learning tool. Being able to use one's body to communicate by transcending language barriers was one extremely helpful way that I was able to learn a lot of English...very fast!

This resource provides a lesson plan idea for teachers to use puppets with ESL learners. The resource outlines a powerful point, in that "[...] young children [...] rarely experience performance anxiety and any embarrassment they do have is greatly reduced by the fact that they view the puppet as a being half way between the teacher and themselves." Gibberish sentences is a supportive game to this puppet idea that could also support language acquisition for ESL students.  

Relating this idea back to Dwyer's Learning Theory, encouraging students to do or experience something is exponentially increasing the likelihood that they will remember it. This lesson plan is ideal because it ties together all of these ends and can be used to make learning a lot of fun.