The unpardonable distortion of the science in order to protect corporate profits is well known in the tobacco, sugar and GMO industries. In the textbook industry, as long as teachers, even TPRS/CI teachers, connect their instruction in some way to the table of contents of a textbook (which – to a hysterically inaccurate degree – […]
In the insightful question below, Dana Miller-Kitch calls out ACTFL. The fact of the matter is that ACTFL’s wording in their web pages, things like the 90% use position statement, much of what they say, is completely inaccurate and unachievable in the real world. We do not prepare our kids for anything in American schools
Without the equity piece, we don’t have community in our classrooms. Without community, the inclusion of ALL of the kids, then we can’t make comprehensible input work in our classroom. it is because of the nature of language as per: https://benslavic.com/blog/lart-de-la-conversation-and-tprs/ I know I link to this post a lot. It is because I am
In the following image, the iceberg mass that is breaking off represents the S/S docs, pacing guides in the world of language instruction. It’s time to deep six them. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bsAqqHQcJyU
A repost from when I was in India: I’m meeting with my curriculum director, who wants to talk about vertical alignment of foreign languages among the 10 teachers in our K-12 program here at the American Embassy School. If anyone is interested I am sharing what I sent her in preparation for our meeting later
For about the past year and a half, Tina and I have been under a lot of fire – since we started talking about the value of non-targeted input in the TPRS/CI community. We have criticized targeting words from word lists, backwards planning of awkwardly written novels, aligning CI instruction with the teaching of grammar/pacing guides/scope and
With the activation of the conscious mind via circling, targeting, gesturing and overly simplistic novels written to satisfy high frequency lists while generating little student interest, teachers miss a golden opportunity to really connect with their students. With the increasing interest in non-targeted input, the teacher can now discover new and exciting ways to reach their
I don’t think that we can manufacture a really high quality language fabric from targeted input. The strongest and most beautiful colors and patterns and the best community building come from non-targeted input. It is because there is more compelling input in non-targeted input, because it is easier to talk directly to kids about their
I want to repeat a point made in the last article here. It is a point that I feel is among the most important points we have every made over the ten years we have been sharing ideas here. The sentence below in bold is one of crucial importance – in my own mind at
Here is where I got the term “language fabric” used in this last series of posts: http://www.cafe.edu/genres/n-conver.html#3 Below is the key phrase from that article, the one that truly makes the case – in my mind at least – for non-targeted input: Function sociale de la conversation. La conversation constitue un tissu langagier grâce auquel les membres
David Ganahl in the Inland Empire is not just a Spanish teacher but also a swim coach. He has told me that in the classroom and at the beautiful outdoor pool they have at his high school there in Los Angeles (Tina and I visited him at his school last summer) his main wish is to
This is from Amy Marshall, who listens to her students when make their own statements about how they want to learn in her classroom: Hi Ben – I just wanted you to know that my students, without prompting, confirmed everything you are telling us about teaching language. Everything you say in your books that would help
