[Eric]

Quote KathrynBrooks1

I'm new at teaching young kids as well, but what I've found to be the most successful is to praise, praise, praise the positive behavior that kids display and quickly and quietly correct those that are off track.

I couldn't agree more! I've had great results praising the rowdy, attention seeking students when they do something good. In one case, one rowdy student turned into an angel student. The transformation was amazing!

[Ster]

Thank you for your ideas. I've noticed the naughtiest kids in my classes are actually the smartest. They're just bored because the books are way too easy. The school gives me one page with about three words on it (ie. apple, banana, orange) and expects me to make a 2 hour class out of it. I've found the flashcards on this site very helpful. Thank you so much!

[ghazala aftab]

Hi!
Try playing 'Simon say.....' & silence game .

Take care.
ghazala

[Dawn Andersen-Lux]

Playing "Loud or quiet" is a good way to grab the attention of younger children, teach behaviour-related vocabulary and, at the same time get them to let off steam.
Get the children to shout "loud", as loud as they can. Ask them to shout it louder, then louder. Then get them to whisper "quiet" a few times, as quietly as they can.
Each time tell them to say it more quietly, until it is barely audible, then get them to shout "loud" again.
You can usually repeat this excercise quite a few times without them getting bored. It helps pad out a lesson when you run out of ideas, the little ones have picked up on that and getting restless.
You can also teach quite a lot of different words around the "quiet" & "loud" theme with this game.

[mesmark]

Quote Dawn Andersen-Lux

Playing "Loud or quiet" is a good way to grab the attention of younger children, teach behaviour-related vocabulary and, at the same time get them to let off steam.

That's always a great focusing activity

Here is a podcast on teaching children and there's some info in there on crowd control
ESL Teacher Talk » Blog Archive » Teaching Children vs. Teaching Adults

Here's another one and the guest Richard discusses some of his methods for handling large groups and the game of the week is a 'game' to get students into groups.
ESL Teacher Talk » Blog Archive » Getting ‘Genki’ With It