Comprehensible Input Defined – 1

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38 thoughts on “Comprehensible Input Defined – 1”

  1. I would add that any definition of the term should include the subconscious nature of the process . Just about every language teacher does CI as it is defined above…

    “Class, despertarse is a stem-changing reflexive verb in all forms but Nosotros…so, what does ‘Yo me despierto a las cinco de la mañana’ mean? Very good. ¿Cuándo te despiertas tú? See how I changed the pronoun for ‘you’ in this case?”

    The teacher quoted above does include some messages that are understandable to students (i.e. when he/she wakes up), but students are probably more focused on form than on meaning. This is not CI as Krashen envisioned it. When I talk about CI with traditional teachers, they rarely disagree with the importance of providing input. The question is how much and whether grammatical competence is the result or cause of SLA.

  2. Good point Scott. So how do we add that unconscious part in there?

    Perhaps:

    General Definition: Comprehensible input is delivering understandable messages, both heard and read, 90% to 100% of the time in the TL so that the students are focused on the meaning and not on the form of the language. (credit: Dr. Robert Patrick)

    Definition in School Settings: In a language classroom, comprehensible input is the delivery and development of understandable messages with our students. This is done 90% to 100% of the time in the TL so that the students are focused on the meaning and not on the form of the language.

  3. For what it’s worth, I think I got the “understandable messages” insight from Jason Fritze. I use it ALL the time which is why I am being given credit for it. I always say “in the target language” and I think that’s key.

    The example that Scott gives is not, in my opinion, CI nor an understandable message. That’s like wrapping a peanut up in rolls of wet newspaper, handing it to you and wondering why you didn’t enjoy the peanut. All that gobbledy gook around depertarse makes it anything but understandable–and none of it helps me know what it means.

    Even if I say: despertarse means to leave, I’ve just established a basic meaning. I still have not delivered an understandable message. Now, how to do that? Start circling, acting, using in PQA, asking a story–you know, all the stuff we do. Can you see that they understand in their eyes? Now we are delivering understandable messages.

  4. Love the goober analogy Bob. Very Georgia appropriate. By the way, on the peaches front, SC produces more peaches than GA*, but I think you have us beat on the peanuts.

    Now, what’s our definition? It has to be something to prevent those teachers Scott describes from usurping and distorting the term.

    *South Carolina shipped out more than twice as many peaches as Georgia last summer.

  5. Mine was a very extreme example of this distortion, but I think it also comes in more subtle forms. Teachers will deliver “CI” to teach a grammatical concept in an inductive fashion. This is a very fine line, since we (as practitioners of CI/TPRS) often have a grammar concept too that we are planning to point out via pop-ups, but the end goal is not to extract a rule. Instead, the grammar point is a very quick detour from the content (story, video, etc.) we are teaching. The assessment is the give-away on this. Does it ask about content or language form? In the end, VP says, “There are no rules to be learned (in the traditional sense).”

    1. I think we lose sight of just how radical the group in Ben’s PLC is. We have become very open with one another about what does and does not work for us, and we are committed to using language to communicate with students in a real way, not just in a typical “school” way. The vast majority of our colleagues don’t get that it is possible (incredibly difficult because we are working against the ingrained culture of formal education, but possible) to teach and acquire a language in school just by talking to one another. You can see this on the moretprs list as well. Time and again I read posts with a request for stories to teach imperfect vs preterit, ser vs estar, conditional, passé composé, etc. That is also delivering “CI” to teach a grammatical concept in an inductive fashion, as Scott so nicely phrases it. Yet those who are looking for those stories are generally doing the best that they can to help students acquire a second language in a setting that is inimical to what we are trying to do.

      It seems to me that it is impossible to craft a definition of Comprehensible Input that cannot be subverted. We could keep trying to add codicils and addenda and riders to cover the ways that we see the concept of CI being changed, but then our definition will become a description rather than a definition. That may be what we need to do: give a definition but then describe how it works and what it looks like in practice. We are neither “Guardians of the Secret Flame” nor arbiters of perfect practice; we can only say and show what we mean by comprehensible input and then practice it in our classrooms and share with those who are willing to listen to us.

      For me, any understanding of “comprehensible input” or “understanding messages in the target language” must involve negotiation of meaning beyond a simple translation, correlation to a picture, or definition in the same language. While we will never bring our students to the point of understanding fully, we can help them understand truly. Unfortunately, our society substitutes labeling for understanding and comprehending for acquiring. We teachers believe that if we stick a label on something, we have understood it. (Notice that I use the term label rather than name; that’s because I have read enough epic, myth, legend, etc. to have a sense that truly naming something expresses an understanding of it while mere labeling does not.) Our students believe that if they comprehend the words of an utterance that they have acquired the language and can “move on”; we also tend to fall into that trap.

      So, as Bob Patrick says, providing a basic meaning is only the starting point to delivering an understandable message. We still have to do all of the other work until understanding dawns in our students’ eyes and then do some more until is has taken root and is ready to blossom into speech (and writing). Of course, another aspect of this is that we need to have something worth saying if we are going to spend all that time on it. It doesn’t have to profound, but it does have to be engaging.

      Just some random thoughts on the subject.

      1. This seems sound: define, then demonstrate how it looks, or the definition will be co-opted. I think the demonstration is harder to accomplish as it happens in increments, and must get through alternate understandings of CI. How do we do that consistently and effectively? I think those of us talking about ACTFL presenting wanted to do that very thing.

        In addition to this: “Our students believe that if they comprehend the words of an utterance that they have acquired the language…” … I think that teachers have been trained to think that if they hear their students pronounce language, that means they’ve acquired it. Students can mimic or repeat something without even comprehending it, though, much less acquiring it.

        1. Students can mimic or repeat something without even comprehending it, though, much less acquiring it. This is very true, and it isn’t just students. Here are two real-world examples of learning to mimic without comprehension.

          1. Singers often perform in a language they don’t understand. When they do, they learn the text phonetically with the help of a coach and then add inflection, etc. as they are told to do so and with the help of the music. Our students don’t even add inflection when mimicking the language without comprehension.

          2. A former student of mine created the Dothraki language for “Game of Thrones” and coaches the actors on how to speak it. Some of the actors are interested in knowing what they are saying; others simply recite the lines as instructed by my former student and the director. Actors in general do the same thing any time they are faced with “speaking” in a language they don’t know for a role.

          While singers and actors find this ability to mimic useful, they aren’t trying to acquire a language – but then some of our students aren’t either; they just want to get a grade, so being able to mimic well enough to fool the teacher is fine with them. (I sometimes worry that even with Comprehensible Input instruction, students will still come back and say, “I took X years of Y language, and all I can say is Z.”)

          On the moretprs group, Terry Waltz just pointed out that when we teach language for acquisition, the skills are transferable across tasks and “domains” (topics/themes), but task-based learning generally is not. So, CI-taught students can apply their acquired language about flying elephants, singing hamsters, etc. to other topics like school and teachers, but students who have practiced a specific task won’t be able to make the transfer. As Terry put it, “In other words, practicing a task prepares you to do that task. But acquiring language prepares you to do lots of tasks.”

          1. Yessss! I also read that Terry comment and loved it! It highlights how language use does not mean there was language acquisition. I think of task-based language teaching as getting something right: focus on meaning and communication. But seems so output-driven.

          2. …which is PRECISELY the problem with thematic units. Say you use early childhood memories to teach the imparfait/imperfecto/ whatever they call the “hatte” and “war” tense in Kraut. What happens? They learn to use that tense with that vocab. They don’t use that tense for other vocab. The vocab gets “tied” to the tense. So at the end of the year they talk about childhood in the imparfait, their weekend in the preterite, and their shopping experience using pronouns.

  6. This is a totally off-topic comment, but I didn’t see anywhere to put it.

    When I am looking for students to show engagement through choral response, I will keep asking the question until I get everyone responding – and I keep it up for subsequent questions. Of course, what usually happens is that at first the handful of students who are responding simply get louder and the others still say nothing.

    This year I told my students about the difference between a piano and an organ. To get louder on a piano, I hit the keys more forcefully. I don’t have to strike more keys, I just have to strike the same keys harder. That’s like the same students getting louder and louder. To get louder on an organ, I have to add voices. (Yes, that is the technical term, “add voices”.) No individual voice (stop) has to get louder, but as I add voices the volume increases. Same with the class. Now all I have to do is pause and say, “Laut wie eine Orgel, nicht wie ein Klavier*”, and my students know that I am expecting everyone to speak.

    *Loud like an organ, not like a piano.

          1. We “need” (I put that in quotes Ben because I don’t mean for you to go and do it Ben) a list of analogies now. This one is great Robert. I also like the one about speaking English in class, and how it’s like a bunch of people playing basketball (communicating in L2) and then someone comes in and rolls a bowling ball down the middle of the court (speaks English). (credit Diane Neubauer on that one? Did I spell your name right Diane?)

  7. I agree Robert that it is best to “give a definition but then describe how it works and what it looks like in practice” so that, as you said Diane, it then “can’t be co-opted.”

    So I am going to suggest some descriptive elements, including some that Robert offered this morning, and mix them into what we had before. I like that we can therefore have here at least something we can hand to someone who claims to do CI but doesn’t, as Scott made very clear. When it’s done I’ll put it at the top of the Primers list on the hard link above and then when someone needs clarification, we can print it off and hand it to them rather than waste our time.

    General Definition: Comprehensible Input is delivering understandable messages, both heard and read. In a school setting, this involves the delivery and development of understandable messages with students.

    For it to be said that language teachers are indeed are using comprehensible input, the following things should be observable in their classrooms:

    1. The instructor uses the target language at least 90% of available instructional minutes.
    2. The students are primarily focused on the meaning and not on the form of the language.
    3. The instructor and the students are engaged in an observable back and forth negotiation of meaning beyond simple translation, correlation of words to a picture, or the working with lists to define individual words.
    4. The students do not take tests that require memorization. Rather, they demonstrate their knowledge of the language by showing that they understand messages as a result of their having focused on their meaning, and not on any individual words that have been separated from the overall context of a message.
    5. The students know that their speech and writing cannot be forced but must emerge naturally and that this will take some time, in the same that a seed that requires lots of water and good soil (comprehensible input) before it can sprout into a beautiful flower. Thousands of hours of input at a bare minimum are therefore required before authentic speech and writing can emerge, and this must be an accepted part of the classroom culture.

    (Credit: Dr. Robert Patrick. Diane Neubauer, Robert Harrell)

    Feel free to hack away at this, it certainly could use some work, but eventually I want something for the Primers section that we can just print off and hand to people, as I said above.

    1. Beautiful Ben! This is exactly what I can use to define what language teaching should look like in my district in the case that I no longer work here. My principal actually said this to me yesterday, “You are doing great things with our kids and the document you draft will guide us when we are tasked with hiring someone to fill your shoes in the future.”

      I do question this part:

      “Thousands of hours of input at a bare minimum are therefore required before authentic speech and writing can emerge, and this must be an accepted part of the classroom culture.”

      I just had a kid in level one the other day, during our thanksgiving story, string together no shit at least 20 words into a perfectly intelligible and authentic comment about another student not being able to eat another student’s cat because the cat was so big. I hear this happening all the time from many of your here, so I know it happens often. Not perfect speech, not in-depth, but certainly authentic in my view, as he expressed exactly what he wanted to say at that moment. So, Can we amend this statement to reflect the speech and writing that can and does emerge from students spontaneously and in a relatively short amount of time, but that all students will develop this ability at different times and varying degrees of accuracy?

      I’ve said it before I know, but “thousands of hours” is something I do not want to say to my students or their parents. I think it sends a daunting and inaccurate message.

      1. I said “I think it sends a daunting and inaccurate message.”

        Daunting yes, inaccurate depending on the level one is thinking of. I agree that to get to an advanced stage one must have thousands of hours of input. Ben, what are you imagining when you say thousands? I was thinking of the average level that we might see after approx 500 hours of input. That’s a pretty functional level able to authentically communicate about most things, when taught via CI, right? I’ve never been to that amount with a student, but I’ve been to about 200-250 and seen fairly promising progress. I think we should specify expected abilities when we put a number out.

        1. I think thousands is accurate, especially if we’re talking about getting the average kid to advanced proficiency on the ACTFL scale.

          Check out #4: https://casls.uoregon.edu/pages/research/tenquestions.php

          “Our research shows that after 630 to 720 hours of instruction, or about midway through the fourth year of study, approximately 14% of students can read at the Intermediate-Mid level or better. Approximately 16% can write and 6% can speak at this level” (p.2).

          After 4 years only 6% are getting to Int-Mid!!! That research is irrespective to method. TCI can do it better. How many students in a 4-year TCI program get to Int-Mid or beyond? Don’t they say that kids in high school immersion schools all get to the Intermediate level? (they get thousands of hours). If Intermediate is what is expected of immersion programs, then what is expected of a FL program that meets 180 hours per year?

          Is Int-Mid considered “authentic speech & writing”? My understanding is that Int-Mid is being able to function just enough to survive in the FL country. In other words, your communication is still very limited and inaccurate (tense confusion).

          To get 98% coverage of vocabulary in the spoken language, which would give you adequate comprehension, requires a vocabulary of 7,000 word families. To me, that would be authentic. 4 years of high school doesn’t come anywhere close. Even the upper level TPRS reader, La Guerra Sucia, only has a vocabulary of 600 unique words. Is that “authentic”? How many kids can handle those texts independently? And that’s only receptive skills, which will be way beyond productive. How many could speak/write at that level?

          I think it’s thousands.

          1. Good points Eric. I think this goes back to a blurry definition of “authentic”. I agree, flawless and expansive output takes thousands of hours, no doubt. I don’t want to send the message to students though that to communicate authentically in TL you need to devote thousands of hours of your life. Many just want to go travel and get around and eat dinner with locals and maybe date one and so on. This will involve authentic communication/output by the traveler, but certainly not flawless or comprehensive language skills.

      2. Thank you Jim. Even though in my view real output IS about thousands of hours (if we would even all agree on what real output looks/sounds like), the details are all skewed up because of the motivation involved, or lack of it, on the part of the vast majority of our students. Why doesn’t anyone mention that? If they don’t come to class, if they don’t try in class for whatever reason, what can research on those kids tell us? They are literally in a class by themselves, and research and data collected on them – and I know this from seeing it mean nothing year after year in Denver Public Schools – carries very little credibility in my view. Maybe it means something on that small group of genuinely motivated kids in the district, but I personally don’t know how any research on unmotivated learners can carry any true weight. But your point about that phrase is right on and I will replace it (point #5 on the CI Definition – 2 post of today) with what you said here, which is just a better thing to make that point all the way around:

        …speech and writing that can and does emerge from students spontaneously and in a relatively short amount of time, but that all students will develop this ability at different times and varying degrees of accuracy….

        1. “speech and writing that can and does emerge from students spontaneously and in a relatively short amount of time, but that all students will develop this ability at different times and varying degrees of accuracy….”

          edit out “can” (4th word). At risk of a run-on, maybe this sentence should be completed by what Nathaniel wrote yesterday,

          …given that “receptivity of CI is reduced or enhanced by motivation, interest, and the affective state.”

          1. I added Nathaniel’s as a separate bullet. I really wanted to add it in there. It draws the attention of the observer to the behavior of both sides and not just what we are doing.

            If I may be allowed an editorial comment on that, I think that the system has been, for years, heaping all of the responsibility for creating interest on the shoulders of the teacher. And we have accepted it because we have had no choice. But Nathaniel invites the observer to take a good look at the students, which must be done. There is only so much we can do when a certain amount of our students are dullards. Of course, we know that they are not dullards at all, but if they act like a dullard in our classroom in spite of our best efforts to create interest (and CI does that far better than anything else) they are still a dullard. A dullard who is not a dullard is still a dullard if they they act like a dullard. I really like Nathaniel’s point. Could it be worded any more strongly? Here it is now:

            6. Student receptivity of CI is reduced or enhanced by motivation, interest, and the affective state.

          2. I don’t think it should go into the definition, but a strong corollary to this is that the teacher has limited influence on all three and so should strive to have a class that helps motivate, pique interest, and lower the affective filter but cannot be held responsible (by himself or anyone else) for the factors that lie outside his control.

          3. But the model of judging teachers given to administrators, and it is a model of judging, would not allow us to mention factors outside our control, like our dullards. It’s too bad. This job is stressful enough with bright and motivated kids.

    2. I like how VanPatten defines “input” here (p. 408):
      http://isites.harvard.edu/fs/docs/icb.topic667496.files/Wong%20and%20Van%20Patten%20Reading.pdf

      “Input is defined as meaning-based language that learners hear or see in context. When confronted with input, the learner’s primary goal is to comprehend the speaker’s (or writer’s) message. Thus, input is communicative in that it exists because someone is attempting to express meaning to a learner. . . considered input because they are crouched within some kind of communicative context; somebody is speaking in the second language and attempting to communicate something. To be sure, input is not an explanation of rules or forms. Input is not practice in the language. Input is not consulting a rulebook. It is meaning-based language and involves learner comprehension of an intended message.”

      or page 407: “meaningful or communicatively-oriented language that they hear or see and attend to for meaning.”

      This is how he defines “input.”

      We had this conversation on ACTFL where people probably thought we were crazy. Many people probably think comprehensible input is self-explanatory. I like defining our work as Robert did in that thread – as comprehended input.

      1. Nice, nice definition of input, I think. This might clear up any time people would say the example Scott gave was input — by connecting the concept of input to meaningful communication and message sharing.

  8. I was asked at a District meeting yesterday about TPRS from an Intensive French teacher. She said “so when do the kids start talking in a TPRS class?” and I said “when they want to.”

    There were a few moments of silence. She then said “what if they don’t want to?” and I said “that’s probably because they aren’t ready to, and if I forced them to, they would probably feel crappy, or say something they don’t really understand and will soon forget.” Then she said “well what do you do then?” and I said “make sure they are listening and understanding and eventually they will get it.”

  9. Comprehensible Input is delivering understandable messages,
    It seems that CI is understandable messages, where as TCI is delivering understandable messages.

    Also the receptivity of CI is reduced or enhanced by motivation, interest, and the affective state.

  10. I’ve said before, although maybe not here :o), that being involved in CI Teaching means aiming for the bulls-eye…that target area of language delivery that creates CI…only to find out once we are in the bulls-eye that there is yet another bulls-eye, a better target, now in view. What you are aiming for depends on how many ‘levels” of CI you have traveled in your journey.

    with love,
    Laurie

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