All About Me - Promote and Develop Understanding of Self

Children need to acquire good linguistic skills if they are to succeed in education and in life. They need to be able to:

ask for things
give their opinions
express their likes and dislikes
describe what they see around them

There are four sections to the sheets:
My details (10)
My choices (10)
Myself (10)
Other People (10)
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Research has shown that language and memory are inter-related: we need language in order to form memory; we need memory in order to develop our language skills. We can remember objects and events if we can express them verbally; we are unable to participate in conversation unless we can remember what the other person has said.

However, an increasing number of youngsters are starting nursery/school with very poor language skills; not only does this make life difficult for them (and for the teachers), it means that more formal schooling, such as reading and writing, is necessarily delayed. Their difficulty may be in actually annunciating the words clearly or in knowing the vocabulary to use. These worksheets provide opportunities for teachers and helpers to develop conversations with the child by concentrating on the child’s own experiences They are therefore not only able to encourage the child to speak, but also to assess where any problems might lie.

The worksheets also help the child to think about their likes and dislikes and, by comparing and contrasting them with those of their friends, to develop a concept of ‘self’, i.e., ‘Who am I and what makes me special?’ This is useful as children nowadays often have little chance to talk about their hopes and dreams, their likes and dislikes, their developing tastes and preferences. Yet it is through these that we become the individual characters we are.

‘About Me!...’ offers a unique opportunity for children to think about who they really are; what they feel; what they enjoy; what they like; what they hope to be. Children will come from different backgrounds - homes, family size and make-up, social mores, experiences, will all differ - but through sharing, pupils will hear ideas they may not have heard before and this will encourage them to think more widely and expand their horizons.

Teachers can also develop a greater understanding of the individual child, i.e. what ‘makes him tick’. The resource is also ideally suited for use with individual pupils or small groups who have specific needs: issues of low self-esteem; difficulty in identifying ideas of ‘self’.