Yesterday we graded our writing assessments. In DPS that means getting together all the district language teachers in one big room and, using a super cool assessment rubric that has taken us five years to create

Here is a text taken from an addition I just made to the content of the cRD – 7 article. I thought some explanation of the term “snowplow reading” was in order: The snowplow should

In this last post in the cRD thread, James asks a few questions with my responses below: Two questions: 1) By “snowplowing through the boring parts” do you mean “translate the text into English out

This is another exchange that represents a follow-up to the cRD discussion, Jennifer in NJ asked: I’d also like to know how this fits into the new weekly schedule as of 2013. Ben is saying

This addition to the cRD discussion is in the form of an exchange between Robert and me. I add it to the thread for general interest and clarification: Robert: If the stories are based on

So the process is that the kids read the paragraph quickly, we translate it, all that in five minutes, and then off to the CI races with TPR as long as it goes, then some

Here is an example of cRD. On page 48 of Le Voyage de Sa Vie, the protagonist Jean-Luc is grabbed by the villain La Femme Insecte. The scene I would focus on lasts only three

I have mentioned RT and TPR and PSA and how they will occur much more often as teaching strategies in this new version of R & D. PSA will be a big player in it

Clearly, Sabrina’s Great Insight has prompted a need for some of us now to go over much of what we have done with TPRS/CI and re-evaluate all of it in terms of the need for

So, in this new version of R & D I just snowplow* the boring parts of a chapter (Susie) and isolate and go crazy with the one or two paragraphs that lend themselves to RT

So let me restate this change in what I consider R & D to be in its most effective form: 1. We address much less text to start class, just one short paragraph that has

Still reading about cRD? Then you are a marine. A CI Commando. Let’s make hats for San Diego. With CI Commando on them. So, among other things, in this more compact version of R &

Keep in mind while reading this that there have been two dominant schools of thought on how to read a novel in TPRS/CI circles over the past fifteen years – one has been to plow

So, in this new different way to do R & D, in simple terms, I just go nuts with two or three verbs from the novel, using TPR and RT and PSA to a ridiculous

I have been going too fast in an effort to get through the novels. Maybe some can relate. Narrow and deep – good. Shallow and wide – bad. I have therefore decided to redefine and

We have had three breakthrough ideas over the past week here, strategies that can be considered in the same discussin as the most bad ass teaching idea of all time, jGR, which in my opinion