Most kids can’t even get what it even means to conjugate a verb. You may get them, under duress, to match a certain verb spelling with a certain pronoun, but they still don’t get the overall picture. So why try? It’s pointless. Stop it. You might as well try to teach the kids to bend spoons with their minds.
Rather, instead of bending their minds with useless spoon fed analysis and editing of the language, let’s resolve this year to open our students’ minds with a kind of zeal born of immersion-based interest in the stories that we roll out for them.
Zeal. Where does it come from? That is a mystery, but everytime something funny happens in a story, and I see sad kids smile that smile that sad kids smile, I feel it.
More and more of us are slowly turning the corner on this. We can do it. It’s a new year. And it’s going to be a good one for TPRS. Can’t you just feel it? Let’s all declare war on stupid teaching. It’s time.
{ 3 comments… read them below or add one }
Ignacio 01.01.09 at 12:35 PM
Hi again Ben, and happy New Year.
Excuse-me for the off-topic request.
When we’ll be able to watch you teaching on a DVD?
I’ve bought dvds where I can watch the likes of Blaine, Susan Gross , Beth Skelton, Donna Tatum and Joe Neilson, teaching. But I’ve never seen you in action.
So, are you considering the idea of making any video soon?
Thanks!
Jody 01.01.09 at 12:57 PM
I can feel it. Yes, I can.
Ditto on Ignacio’s question.
Ben Slavic 01.01.09 at 6:52 PM
Ignacio and Jody - my DVDs are ready! I swam uphill on them, starting in June. I didn’t want to just do a video of a conference presentation, because I have heard from a lot of people that many TPRS conference videos of TPRS are confusing to a novice. I made the DVDs with that thought in mind, because I know that the method needs to be broken down into smaller, chewable, pieces to be fully understood.
So last June I asked a handful of kids (rising 9th graders who had just completed French I with me in 8th grade) if they wanted to take a weekly class with me, I got parent releases, and then filmed nine classes on Monday nights. Then I bought an imac and turned two of the classes, the clearest and simplest ones, into over six hours of video footage, with subtitles and comments about how certain things I do connect to my book TPRS in a Year! I deliberately left out any real PQA to keep things as simple as possible, and will have a DVD on PQA ready to go as a support to my book PQA in a Wink! by summer.
For the first two weeks of January only, I am going to offer my third DVD free to those who buy the first two at the regular price. But they would have to come here and read this to know about that deal. Call me promo dude! Anyway, I think that the DVDs accurately convey the method. Just be clear that these three DVDs were designed to go with TPRS in a Year! and not PQA in a Wink!, as discussed above. If you go to my home page you can order them!