Reading novels could replace traditional TPRS storytelling. We should look at the idea, at least.
It is possible that we can do more with less effort when we base our comprehension based instruction on reading instead of on the three steps of TPRS. I am going to start writing a lot about that and may make a hardlink called TPRS Without Stories on this page to go with the planned PLC Gold hardlink. I may make it into a videolink.
We have needed a CI alternative plan to stories for a long time. We have lost a lot of would be CI teachers because of stories.
Consider:
Doing stories is stressful for most teachers with a few exceptions like Blaine and Susie. It always has been stressful for most of us. Few teachers get past the initial workshop level with TPRS.
However, doing R and D with a novel is not stressful, because the novel is always there to keep the class afloat. One can always return to a novel, but if a story is unformed, where do we go for safety? The script is there, but it is not as safe as a novel to return to.
Reading seems to get shortshrift in traditional TPRS. Yes, we have Step 3, but we never seem to spend as much time on reading the written version of the story as we should when we are doing stories. Right? Reading novels as a first and not a third step is something we need to think about.
When small children learn their first language, they hear it for thousands of hours. But we don’t have thousands of hours and we don’t have enough evidence to show that kids hearing the TL in the form of stories for only a few hundred hours in a high school program leads to any sort of mastery.
Is there a quicker way to mastery via reading? We don’t know yet, but I think so. At least, I want to throw that idea out there for group discussion and consideration and possible testing.
R and D is a proven winner, but has lacked the hilarity/fun piece. Until now. Now, as some of us here in January are currently experimenting with Readers’ Theatre as a possible powerful addition to R and D, we are finding that we can create hilarity/fun much more easily using RT than via stories. RT is a fast track to fun. RT engages kids in a way that even the best stories cannot. When we did stories, we had to work so hard for fun. No more.
Writing in the old traditional TPRS model used to be only about the kids producing free writes. I threw in dictée about eight years ago, but dictée takes up so much time out of a class, and doesn’t really result in major gains, although it certainly does shut kids up for long periods of time in class, which is why it is the best bailout move of all time.
Now, with R and D and RT leading to textivating, we have options to freewrites and dictée that can make writing into a kind of third step in this new model, one that has R and D as a first step, RT as a second and writing via Textivate (which covers our need to use of technology in our classrooms!). I’ll be more specific as to how Textivate can be used in writing as we go along.
Ini this new three step model of TPRS Without Stories, we include writing output and technology more. Those familiar with the all out war now going on between districts and TPRS teachers can appreciate how going to a three step system of CI instruction that includes writing and technology know how much stress this would take off teachers who want to use comprehensible input in their classes but don’t want the war with top down district bullshit.
I would rather keep my job than argue that writing shouldn’t begin to emerge, really, ideally in my view, until the third year of instruction. We need to compromise a little to keep from going batshit crazy. So the R and D/RD/Textivate template – TPRS Without Stories – offers us a way to get more writing earlier, in spite of what we know is best for the kids. I want to give my students the best instruction, but without losing my job.
I am not saying that the R and D/RT/Textivate template should actually replace the three steps of TPRS, but I do feel that a lot more teachers would be a lot less nervous about doing comprehension based instruction if they were to consider the point of this article as an option to Blaine’s three steps. One of the most depressing things over the years for many teachers has been to think that there has been one and only one way of applying Krashen’s ideas in a language classroom.
One of the problems over the years, one of the reasons we have been evolving out of traditional Blaine Ray TPRS so slowly, is that we have not had the quality of novels available that would sufficiently support this suggested model based on R and D and RT and writing via Textivate, which is merely one suggested model.
This suggested model that I am calling TPRS Without Stories is merely my own suggestion. There are many other options to traditional TPRS possible. My goal is at least ten strong templates by the fall for CI teachers to choose from, or make their own, with only one of them being TPRS. We could easily each make up our own templates from the Blue Chip ideas here. Now, with Carol Gaab coming out with novels that are superior to any that have come before them, we are in a new ball game – a reading novels ball game.
Of course, we can’t start level 1 classes with reading, but we have the entire CWB/OWI/Wallzoo*/WCTG option (on the TPRS resources link of this site) that many people use to start the year anyway. Then we can figure out what the best book to read for a beginning class and to move from there right into reading a novel in late fall of level one. We can consult with Carol Gaab on this need for the right first novel.
I’m just throwing all this out there. I want to help teachers avoid the burnout of TPRStorytelling. What I am writing here about R and D and RT and textivating is just one option. One thing is certain – TPRS is evolving and there are now many concrete options to stories.
Teaching using Comprehensible Input – what we call TCI in Denver Public Schools – is really a much bigger umbrella. And the bigger the umbrella, the more we are protected from the elements. And so we all need bigger umbrellas, right? I do. I’m tired of the stress of stories. I want something simpler! So I can be safe and warm. And not get fired.
*credit: Charlotte Dincher
