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1.3 
Physical Development 
As already mentioned children need physical activities because they have a lot 
of physical energy. (Seefeldt 1980
;
Dunn 1983 and 1984
; 
Brester, Ellis, Girard 2002) 
Opal Dunn confirms 
Children are creatures of movement. To prevent frequent teachers´ complaint 
that young children have difficulty in sitting still, activities need to give 
children an opportunity to move around the classroom. (1983, 14)
Sarah Phillips adds
The kinds of activities that work well are games and songs with actions, …., 
tasks that involve colouring, cutting, and sticking, simple, repetitive stories, 
and simple, repetitive speaking activities that have an obvious communicative 
value. (1993, 7) 
Eight to ten years old children like using real tools and utensils. The process of doing is 
still more important than perfecting skills and creating products. (Eller and Mulroy 
1996,4) There is one more suggestion supporting the idea of children moving around 
the classroom. In Carol Seefeldt´s view “It is important for a teacher to realise this fact 
– for a child´ s physical activity is also related to social and emotional growth. Learning 
comes only as a child interacts physically with the environment.” (1980, 40) Social and 
Emotional development is discussed more in detail in the following chapter. 
 
1.4 
Social and Emotional Development 
As previously stated, social and emotional development goes hand in hand with 
physical development. What does social and emotional development mean in the school 
practice? On the one hand, Opal Dunn admits, “It is difficult to examine all aspects of a 
child’s emotional development.” (1983, 14) On the other hand, Opal Dunn notes that by 

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understanding the ideas of others, social relationships are facilitated and children grow 
socially. (1983, 40-41) In order to get to know children during school classes or 
individual lessons, Opal Dunn suggests that knowing temperament (for example 
whether a child is aggressive, shy, over-anxious to please, frightened of making a 
mistake, moody) is useful because children should be given opportunities to develop 
their characters by carefully chosen activities. (1983, 14) Carole Eller and Maureen 
Mulroy acknowledge
These children 
[
young children
] 
need to learn about who they are and what 
they can do by interacting with their peers. They need to see that each person 
in their group has important information and experiences to share and that they 
can retain their identity while still being part of a group. (1996, 16) 
Getting to know learners seems to be a base in the process of teaching and 
learning. For the purpose of the research, activities involving pair and group work will 
be incorporated. The choice of appropriate activity type is also influenced by language 
structures the activity involves. This topic is discussed in the following chapter.