How are you Feeling Today?

We think that the game “How are you Feeling Today?” is suitable for the Primary Six students because we created the game based on the Interactionists’ Hypothesis. As we all know, English is a very important language. In order to master this language, we must start to learn the language at a very young age. It would be more fun and to learn the language implicitly. This can happen in the implementation of language games in the classrooms. Through language games, the group cooperation is very important. Most of the language games incorporated group work. The participation is very important. The game created must be a friendly competition.
According to Michel. D. Gose, “Students need a contest, a match, an event, a test to grow.” Therefore the game we create must play a major role in giving students someone to grapple with so that they can both test and improve their developing strength.
We choose the Interactionists’ Hypothesis because it emphasizes the necessity for learners to have access to meaningful and comprehensible input through conversational interactions with other students. Lightbown & Spada said that, “When learners are given the opportunity to engage in meaningful activities, they are compelled to negotiate for meaning that is to express and clarify their intentions, thought, opinions, etc in a way which permits them to arrive at a mutual understanding. This is especially true when learners are working together to accomplish a particular goal. The negotiation in turn, leads learner to acquire the language forms- the meaning they are attending to.”
A good example of Interactionists’ Hypothesis in our game is, all three of the students in the group play their roles. For example, Student A is supposed to draw and paste the round shaped face after discussion, Student B is supposed to write the sentence on the board and Student C is supposed to read the sentence written on the board. This cannot be done individually because it takes up a longer time and personal feelings or conflicts might be involved in drawing or writing the sentence. We are also allocating an additional mark to the five fastest groups who manage to paste their round shaped face on the board. This mark is a reward to the most cooperative and fastest group.
“With the interaction in the group, students also will learn to compromise, negotiate and motivate as they participate as group members”, Paul E. Eggan. The students can work collaboratively to reach their goals. We hope that this game not only let students learn something new, but at the same time learning how to work and interact with the group members and enjoy the activity.




REFERENCES

Eggen, P.D. and Kauchak, D. P. ( 2001). Strategies for Teachers:Teaching Content and
Critical Thinking Skills. United States of America. Allyn and Bacon.


Gose,M.D. (1999). Creating a Winning Game Plan: The Secondary Teacher’s Playbook. California. Corwin Press, Inc.


Lightbown, P.M. and Spada,N. ( 2000). How Languages are Learned. Hong Kong. Oxford University Press.