TKT: Young Learners study guide
TKT: Young Learners · Work through your exam, one topic at a time.
TKT: Young Learners (TKT YL) is a specialist module within the Teaching Knowledge Test, Cambridge English's series of modular qualifications that test knowledge in specific areas of English language teaching. TKT YL narrows that focus to the primary and lower-secondary classroom: how young learners develop and learn, how lessons for them are planned and resourced, which teaching strategies and classroom management techniques work with younger classes, and how their progress is assessed and fed back. The TKT: Young Learners study guide has 4 sections and about 1,323 words.
01Learning and the young learner
Young learners (roughly 5–12) learn differently from teenagers and adults, and every planning and teaching decision in TKT: Young Learners rests on this. Candidates must know the characteristics of this age group: children learn through doing and through concrete, contextualised language; they need repetition, routines and play; their concentration span depends on the task and on age rather than being uniformly 'short'; they respond strongly to praise, to the teacher's tone and to a secure classroom atmosphere; and their literacy and motor skills are still developing.
356 words, about 2 min02Planning lessons with young learners
Planning for young learners means designing a sequence that fits their attention, energy and need for security, and being able to describe it in the language of aims, stages and procedures. Candidates should understand lesson aims (what learners will be able to do by the end), procedures (what teacher and learners actually do), staging (warmer or routine, presentation or exposure, controlled practice, freer production, review), pace and variety, interaction patterns, materials and resources, transitions, revision and recycling, and anticipating problems.
337 words, about 2 min03Teaching strategies for young learners
This domain is about what the teacher does moment to moment: managing the classroom, giving instructions, presenting and practising language, and giving feedback. Candidates need to know strategies such as demonstration and modelling, Total Physical Response, songs and chants, games, storytelling and puppets, drilling and choral repetition, eliciting, concept checking, monitoring, grouping (whole class, pairs, small groups, individual), and judicious use of L1.
308 words, about 2 min04Assessment of young learners
Assessment is gathering evidence of what children can do in order to help them learn; testing is only one way of doing it. Candidates must understand the difference between formative assessment (assessment for learning: ongoing, informing the next lesson) and summative assessment (a judgement at the end of a unit, term or course).
322 words, about 2 min