I had hoped that in this, my tenth year, I would not have to remake myself as I had done for every preceding year. I was hoping to make life a little less complicated, to give myself time to refine what I was already doing and do it all better. But it looks like it is time to evolve again.
I've been mulling it over all summer, gradually bringing myself around to the idea of a great remake. Some of my students through the years have been quite satisfied with my work, but it really hit me last year that there was nowhere near enough student learning or satisfaction in my classroom to continue on the same path. I could feel resistance and frustration growing throughout the year, so I'm focusing on changing myself.
Foreign languages seem to be a world of their own, but I see more than ever that they are not. Linguists use the term comprehensible input to make mean "it has to make sense," and it has to make sense over and over again in lots of ways until it goes to long-term memory and really becomes learning. I think it's safe to say that this idea applies to all classes and I suspect that most of us go too fast and give too much information when we teach. So it's comprehension, variation and pacing. If the pacing is not right, most students become overwhelmed and give up, as do most adults. If there isn't enough variation, something called adaptation sets in, which is just the brain adjusting to a familiar routine, turning off the sense of wonder and heading to boredom, and the end of learning.
So it's true that I've been away all summer, relearning a method of teaching languages called TPRS which should have me speaking in Spanish, French, German or Italian most of the time in my classes this year. I did try this nine years ago and burned out, lacking the calm, steady creativity to make the method work. I think I know what went wrong and if I can make the right changes, I will have students speaking so much foreign language that getting them to shut up will become the issue, and may I be so blessed.
Not that this is all I've been up to; it's just the part that is on my mind the most two weeks before this classroom comes alive. And you my friends, have you been evolving in any particular direction?
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Comments: 17
I have a feeling, Gerry, you should be teacher of the year!
I truly loved all my teachers and felt school was the ultimate
experience in learning, wishing I could do it all again, even make
colored paper chains.
So what else have you been up to? Oh, I bet that is another article?
What I have been up to: Organizing my ESTUARY, Poetry of Barbary Chaapel,
celebrating Bill's 85th birthday with children and grandchildren at the old swimming hole, learning I have asthma, and, as usual, thinking (called, in some circles, daydreaming).
But Gerry, this tough path you follow is renewal, growth, life. You don't fancy turning to wood, and letting your students become chips off the old blockhead. Good luck, it's a good path, however hard, and about the effort, well, "nothing is lost," as a poet named Judith Johnson Sherwin wrote, "nothing is lost, I say."
Oh my God--is ESTUARY really to be the title of the next book? Most of my readers won't know what that means to me! I don't think it would be hard to come up with ten articles for this summer. The hard part for me is figuring out how to split the weave into separate fabrics, but the big pieces are the vortex hunt, my declaration of scientific independence, two concerts given on the road, recycling and Toltec wisdom.
Who is Bill? I should know but don't remember. As for asthma, the old idea that one can get it from inhaling too much poetry has been thoroughly disproven.
If you follow, you step in no one's footsteps, my friend. I adore the line you have crafted for me about not becoming an old blockhead and I agree, appreciatively, with the quote. It's all part of a blessed journey, and it's good to be back in touch with my Gather friends again!
If those tapes encourage repitition and memorization, they will be an exercise in frustration that will not lead you to confident speaking. TPRS stands for Teaching Proficiency with Reading and Speaking, It avoids teaching grammar explicitly, choosing to embed it in the method, as most people are turned off and overwhelmed by grammar. The method was developed by Blaine Ray and has become quite a national movement. If you are linguistically inclined like me, you want the grammar explanations, but they should really come after you have absorbed the language. You can Google Blaine Ray and find all sorts of stuff, or go to fluencyfast.com for the 8 DVD series. I've been studying the French series and it really does work better than Rosetta Stone or any of the other language methods I've seen out there. Please let me know if I can help!
Anyway, it's good to see you, and wonderful to hear about your teaching.
When I first started teaching (this is my 5th year) I figured that after one or two years I'd have the classes figured out and it would get a lot easier. LOL.
Y tu eres el maestro, ¿no?
!Adelante, Gerry!