Report from Agen
Yesterday I was walking down the street here in this charming Mediterranean city of Agen, France and ran into Stephen Krashen and Beniko Mason. I immediately thanked them on behalf of all of us for being here. I told them that
Cartoon-Sized Stories
Stories are best when they are “cartoon-sized”. Like a cartoon episode, they start, have a plot, and wrap up within 25-35 minutes. Using the Story Driver job should help us keep our stories short, but what if class ends and
Compelling – 3
Tina Hargaden said: Using emergent targets, for me at least, has invited much more creativity into my work. I am looking forward to starting the year next year with no targets, because I foresee much more engagement and trust from the
Compelling – 2
With emergent targets, the story will be different in every class, so different vocabulary and structures are used. Therefore, a traditional scope and sequence based on lists of vocabulary or grammar points is not needed or even practical. Such guides
Compelling – 1
It may well be that allowing new structures into a story during the story at the very moment when they are needed to drive the story forward will frequently, through the mere inclusion of those student-generated structures, lift the story up to a level that
vPQA Links
Here is a link to the PLC vPQA folder: https://drive.google.com/folderview?id=0B7fIft4pMHUTfjIzUmZuc1hDcDJmQlA0NlAtVEZCcUxobGU3UkswVXpIXzFXR0Zwb1BBUEU&usp=sharing
Report from the Field – Jen Schongalla
We finally have resolution to the tough year that jen had and it is all great news. Those who have been following along since the gnarly early part of last year - gnarly isn't even the word, it was brutal and jen
The Pool Is Deep
A repost from 2013: Intuitive teaching is about trusting the heart/intuition to bring more to the class than just mere intellectual discussion. Mere intellectual discussion does not bring fun, nor does it bring the heart quality, which in turn brings more learning and much bigger
Uninterrupted Flow
This is a repost from some years ago. I feel like I'm swimming upstream on this point in the group. Oh well - I'll keep repeating it. Until we jettison all the L1 explanations in class, which are about ego and
Using Calming Music
We should use calming music when we start our classes with silent reading. How does the it work? Our normal heart rate is around 72 beats per minute, and is much faster in kids who have eaten sugar and drunk those