Dr. Louisa Walker over there in the SoCal universe has some good news for us tonite:
Hi Ben,
I want to let you know what happened to me today (from the field). Today was our first day back, inservice day with no students, and 3 Spanish colleagues came to my room to ask me to explain how I was “teaching these days!” They had noticed that my desks were removed and that now I only have 40 chairs. At any rate, I was able to give them an abbreviated version of my potential conference presentation: a little Krashen theory, a little BS blog (Ben Slavic blog), and some BS PLC examples such as 5 minute verb pqa, daily reports…
They had lots of questions and were very open to hearing even more. Then the Principal dropped in on us and I was able to ask her/reconfirm with her that she supports our using TPRS//CI. She absolutely and wholeheartedly agreed!! I quietly reminded her that our students would not be able to pass the district grammar exams at the end of the year and she just shrugged. She then said that she was happy that we are going to be on the forefront of this change in Spanish teaching in our district [of 35,000 students]. She also told the other teachers that she hopes they can get into my classes to observe!
This is quite a turn around for everyone! I am feeling very optimistic and excited about working on my CI craft in a supportive department. It goes to show that a lot of perseverance and a little gentle reminding about Krashen’s theories can go a long way in creating positive change.
Again, thanks for helping me in these efforts to teach in an effective way!
Louisa