Michael shares with us the results of that meeting he had last week. The point he makes is that when discussing the use of comprehensible input with people/colleagues who quite simply don’t want to hear our positions, we should not try to convince them. Instead, we need to learn to play a broken record for them: ACTFL wants us in the TL 90% of the time. It’s a good cautionary tale for those of us who like to engage people in our buildings about CI vs. the textbook. We don’t need to do that any more than we need to go out and argue our position with a drunk.
Michael reports:
I wanted to share with you guys my recent “supervisor” meeting. Like many of our other TPRS comrades I have been involved for many years proving the value of CI-based approach versus skill-building. I started off like most passionate CI teachers and shared my successes but it was initially poorly received. It was viewed as if I was trying to “one up” other teachers. Sharing research was always made fun of behind my back. I came off as the know-it-all, that was never my intention but we all know how this story goes.
In our largish department of 14 teachers I have gone from teaching several sections to 5 classes of 1 section. At first, I welcomed this because I love devoting myself to the experimentation in the classroom. Also, I saw that demonstrating success with level 1 students would be a powerful way to create change. I figured if true beginners can demonstrate so much it would be the most effective way to help others experience the power of TPRS. Anyways…2 years later of teaching the 1 section very successfully I have been wanting to teach other sections. A natural request, right?
This is a battle with my department chair (also school “Academic Coach”). She sees me as a threat to keeping her soldiers in line. She wants teachers to be on the same lesson on the same day all year long or as she says within 3 days of each other (how generous). I have many stories, battles, and conflicts working with her over the years, which makes for good TPRS gossip especially because we used to be extremely close friends. She teaches year 4 and 5 Spanish and utilizes mostly L1 instruction.
Okay to get to the point….
The new principal (old vp) scheduled a meeting because I was being denied a change up in my teaching schedule because of TPRS. I went to her to get it straightened out. The department chair straight up told me that other teachers feel like I share too much and I am always looking to make changes to the scope and sequences. (A threat to their complacency and laziness).
In the meeting, I really did not care much of the outcome because I have interviewed at a more CI friendly school. I probably will accept the position with that school for various reasons but it is with a heavy heart. Nonetheless, I wanted to enlighten the new principal to the nature of things. Also, when and if I do leave, I want to know that I politely and professionally did what I thought was right as an educator.
I found once again that the best way to have these conversations was to avoid the tendency to discuss methodology or pedagogy. The principal and dc kept saying something like, “the way you teach is great but not for everyone in the department” or” the way you teach is not easy for all the teachers to do.”
Each time they said this, I politely corrected what they were saying by stating, “I am referring to the National Standards and the suggestion of our professional teaching organization (ACTFL) which states 90% or better of TL usage.” “This discussion should be on topic of the meeting learning standards not on teaching methods.”
I did this over and over. Each time, when they tried to make it Michael Coxon versus the Department chair or traditional teachers I, in a very TPRS manner corrected the error. At one point, this lead to the Principal saying, “the rest of the department is not ready to implement the National Standards.” (HA I LOVED THIS!). They said that other teachers would be more comfortable if I used less Spanish with my students because it is too much pressure. We have plenty of experienced and native speaking teachers as well.
The meeting ended because I had to run off to class. This, for me, was a HUGE win for deciding to take another job. Definitely is not easy leaving after 5 years of building a teaching legacy and reputation.
It is a HUGE win because the principal had to make a statement against teaching standards in order to support her Department chair and Academic coach.
It is a HUGE win because their statements validate what I strive for in the (large quanitities of CI) and the purpose of CI…which is to provide Comprehensible Immersion/TL usage. They are content with L1 instruction.
This also qualifies the opinion I have about the state of affairs for A grade teachers. If you are B or C grade teacher you can have an easy time operating in Public education nowadays. If you want to be innovative and a passionate as an A grade teachers not so much (at least at this school). My department chair has the principal thinking that TPRS is to much freelancing and not enough planning despite my efforts to share and S and S, lesson plans, teaching videos, student data, student learning reflections, and the like.
My conclusion: Keeping our adversaries on the topic of the 90% TL is a powerful way to manage these talks. There is no need to engage in methodology discussions, research arguments, or acronyms that others have no idea about. They don’t get it anyways!