The book and the authors

This is the first book of the Millie series for primary grades. It’s part of the New Millennium English textbook series, which has been designed specifically for secondary schools in Russia. Millie–2 is intended for the second class (first year of study of English), for pupils aged 7–8. These three books have been written by a team of experienced teachers of English working in schools in different regions of Russia (Moscow, Nizhni Novgorod, Omsk, Sochi, St Petersburg and Tula).

Our credo

The book represents an innovative approach to language learning, which is truly child-centred. Our emphasis is on fostering positive attitudes to language learning. This means that the units have been created for children to enjoy English and have fun in the classroom, while participating in a variety of activities and games that engage their imagination and curiosity.

This new approach is success-oriented and caters for all learners of all abilities.

Structure and syllabus

The syllabus is topic-based and allows for a natural introduction of new language arising from topics that have been carefully selected to reflect children’s interests at this age. The book contains ten units. Each unit covers six lessons. The first five lessons aim at developing children’s ability to communicate effectively, by using modern English and developing language skills. The last lesson in every unit is devoted to revision of the unit material, together with an episode of a special story, “The Upside-Down World”. All the units have been developed with careful attention to systematic revision and recycling of key language. An additional lesson after every second unit is devoted to a progress check, where children are encouraged to evaluate their own progress.

Components of the set

1. The Pupil’s Book: contains a variety of activities, together with a record of the language for production (both on the lesson page and in the wordlist at the back of the book).It also contains a page for parents, with useful tips to help children at home, and keys for progress check activities. There’s also a transliteration table which provides Ps with support for writing their names.

2. The Activity Book: contains practice activities following every lesson. These are done individually as homework. The book may also be used by a teacher to provide extra practice in class. The activity book contains special pages to use for crafts. The instructions are in Russian to help parents and children who work on their own.

3. The Audio Cassette: contains native speaker (and where relevant native children’s) recordings of a variety of listening texts such as songs, rhymes, chants, dialogues, cartoon stories and action stories.

4. The Teacher’s Book: contains an introduction and methodology guide, a glossary of terminology, and a description of the procedures in every lesson. It also contains useful tips and cultural notes, information boxes, and some photocopiable materials. There are lists of classroom language for teachers and pupils, and a bank of ideas for extra class activities in the book. There’s a list of tips on individual sound pronunciation. There’s also a story, for extensive listening or reading (“Millie’s story”) in every unit except unit five.

5. The set of Picture and Word Cards: can be used as both visual aids and as support for games in the teaching of initial reading.

Aims and objectives

The book has been designed to meet Federal requirements. There are five sets of global aims that apply to the whole course:

• to develop children's ability to communicate effectively, using English relevant to their age;

• to contribute to the development of thinking skills such as problem solving, memorising, organising and categorising information;

• to contribute to the development of the child’s personality, creativity and imagination, to promote positive attitudes in pupils towards their own and other cultures, and to increase motivation for further FL learning;

• to contribute to the development of pupils’ monitoring skills, such as learning to evaluate their own progress and other learning-to-learn skills;

• to develop the children’s social and interpersonal skills.

Some background:

How do children learn languages?

Children acquire new language without much effort when they are having fun and when there are many opportunities for them to hear the language in familiar contexts. If the context makes sense, they will be able to understand the messages. If the activity is motivating, they will be eager to participate. The more they have the opportunity to hear the language, the more they will be able to say in that language. Children learn meaningful phrases, patterns (or “chunks of meaning”) of language from teacher talk, stories, songs and rhymes.

For example, the teacher may say, “Let’s play a game!” many times during the course and some children will be able to say this phrase as a “chunk” of meaning, even though they do not know what the individual words mean or what the grammatical components are.

Children naturally acquire these phrases if they hear them regularly. But they will have no interest in abstract grammar analysis or translation. In the later stages of learning – in the secondary school – they will be able to begin to discover the grammatical patterns of the language on a systematic basis.

Presenting new language

In this book, we’ve combined lexis and grammar structures in a meaningful way. All new language is derived from the topic areas of each unit. The new language is introduced in meaningful situations, often through chants, songs or stories. We recommend that the teacher uses gestures and body language to support the content of what she is talking about. Picture cards are supplied to help the teacher to convey meanings, without the use of Russian. (E.g. PB: U1, pp 4–5; U5, p. 48.)

For the presentation of the new language we encourage the teacher to use as much English as possible. In the Teacher’s Book we offer useful language samples to help the teacher with what to say and how to make the meaning clear. For example, if a teacher comes to the classroom with a bag of fruit and vegetables and takes out each item one by one, saying, “I bought some milk and I bought some bread in (the name of the local shop or supermarket)”, there will be no need to translate the phrases. The children will have a good understanding of the meaning. They will not need to know that bought is the past tense of buy, but they will be able to use these phrases in a game, a short role play or a survey task. By the end of the lesson they will be ready and eager to use the new language if the teacher creates an opportunity for them to participate.

Listening and speaking

Speaking and listening in this first book are the two skills we emphasise, although we introduce reading and writing too. It is more natural for children to learn the foreign language orally first rather than by reading or writing. This is why we follow a procedure, which means that we present new language through speaking first. Only at a later stage we do it through writing.

We encourage the teacher to ensure that children can hear English around them for most of the lesson. The use of the first language (Russian) should be limited, though sometimes its use is unavoidable, or even more sensible. For example, there might be a discipline problem, a complicated new game or discussion of the information from Do you know? and Did your pupil know that …? boxes. This might cause some misunderstanding, so the teacher can of course use Russian.

When children listen to the teacher or the tape, it’s not important for them to understand every word, because children have a natural ability to focus on meaning. They can get clues from the teacher’s repetition or re-phrasing of messages. Another efficient tool is miming. The Teacher’s Book suggests tips for that. For listening to the tape, illustrations in the book and contextual background noises also help to make meanings clear.

There is a variety of listening texts (such as songs, action stories, rhymes and dialogues). Some of these are original English texts for children of this age. Others have been created by the writers and approved by native speaker specialists. The number of authentic texts will grow in the next books in the series. (E. g. PB: U10, L1, p. 113.) In every unit we try to develop children’s ability to predict, listen for general understanding and specific details.

Of course, children need to hear the new language patterns first. But very quickly they are ready to practise these in teacher-controlled games. After some whole-class practice, the children will start using the language in pairs or in groups. They’ll do this purposefully, to express personally relevant ideas. Often this will be in a game or a dialogue. The Teacher’s Book provides some sample language which describes the expected level of pupils’ speaking in these activities.

For example, a survey in Unit 5 Lesson 5 is used to incorporate new language about Christmas decorations into it. The children go around and ask each other about what they have got in their stockings.

Phonology

Children at this age are very sensitive to the sound system of the new language. They enjoy repetition, clapping the rhythm and experimenting with intonation patterns in chants and songs. The songs and rhymes offer an excellent opportunity to work on individual sounds and sound combinations.

For example, the rhyme from Unit 8 Lesson 4. The suggested Tips On Sounds will help develop pupils’ awareness that words are made of discrete sounds. It will prepare the children for instruction in phonics – knowledge about the relations between specific letters of the alphabet and letter combinations, and specific spoken sounds.

Error correction

When children repeat new phrases after you at the beginning of the lesson, it is important to make sure that they say them correctly, with good pronunciation. However, when they are engaged in a meaningful activity – such as a game or a short conversation in pairs or groups – it is important to listen and take note of any problems, rather than interrupt and interrupt the flow of the activity.