The youngest pupils at the PlusKids centre learn English through play.
They sang, they coloured and they put hats on penguins, building their vocabulary far more easily through play.
It looks like a simple activity, but it does exactly the right thing at this age. A word learned from a list stays tied to its Romanian translation and has to be translated afresh every time before it can be used. A word heard while putting a red hat on a penguin's head attaches itself directly to the object, the colour and the action, and afterwards surfaces of its own accord, when it is needed.
Colouring also brings the first instructions listened to in English. The child does not translate the request, they carry it out — and if they coloured the right thing, they understood. It is the best possible check, and at the same time the one that looks nothing like a test.
Songs, for their part, fix pronunciation and intonation better than any repetition after the teacher, because rhythm does the work of rules.
Everything seems easier when it is done with affection, and at their age that is not a pleasantry but the basic condition.
About the English course: https://pluskids.ro/en/courses/cambridge-english