There is an interchange between the pilot/narrator and the Little Prince in Chapter 2 of Le Petit Prince by Antoine de Saint- Exupéry. When he first meets the Little Prince, he says:
Narrator: Mais…qu’est-ce que tu fais là?/What are you doing there?
Narrator: Et il me répéta alors, tout doucement, comme une chose très sérieuse/And he repeated to me, quite softly, as if it were a very serious thing…
Petit Prince: S’il vous plaît…dessine-moi un mouton…/Please…draw me a sheep…
Note that the Little Prince asked the pilot to draw him something. The relationship didn’t start out with words, as most do. It started out with the child wanting something from the adult.
Perhaps working with images and drawings might be a way for us to gain greater access as language teachers into the world of children by getting shoulder to shoulder with them about what is interesting to them. Maybe that is what being an adult in a classroom means, and not imposing our will on them to bring gains on tests.
The fact is that we have available to us a fraction of the time we need (about 1/20th in my estimation) to bring noticeable and authentic gains. Then shouldn’t we be focusing more on making kids feel confident that they could one day master the language in what we all know is a lifelong process?
After the dismal failure of centuries to find those elusive goals through the analysis of grammar and textbooks, it seems worth a try. Images are more effective than words in engaging children in foreign language classes.