I think that we tend to be overcritical of ourselves when stories don’t work. We think we are the master of ceremonies in some kind of circus. But we’re not. In any social setting, the quality of the interaction, the conversation, the art of it, depends on who is in the entire group. Our kids […]
Sharon shares a great analogy made by her principal: Hi, Ben… [My principal] and I have been dealing with a particular student who has had some major attitude issues since August. The boy’s mother has been to the principal’s office where we all met in conference, and I have continued to communicate with her via
Carol sent to Diana – who then sent to her DPS teachers – the slideshow from her presentation Jan. 22 and 23. Diana adds: [The entire thing] is too large to send through email so here is a link: https://www.dropbox.com/s/mr6yjmkh6eqc6bu/DPS-day2.pdf The videos are not there of course but I hope this helps you as you implement some of
I’m happy that my guy from Congo – Gloire Gabell – is getting involved in the class. His entire unspoken message up until this point for the first few weeks with us was that he was not going to get involved. But today, I invited him to do dialogue (it helps when your actors doing dialogue in
I got this from a group member. Please respond if you have a rubric that you like for freewrites: Ben – How do you assess free writes? Do you have a rubric? I would appreciate your help on this. Links in the PLC would be great as well. Thanks!
Re: the mixing of methods, to be clear, we can probably do some of the old grammar stuff and some CI in our classrooms, if we must or are new TPRS and it is freaking us out, but we shouldn’t employ the two at the same time in our classrooms. Do part of class with
Diane reports: Hi Ben – I am sending you the copy, without names, of an email I wrote for a parent who complained about jGR – to my supervisors, not to me – recently. (My administrators are great! They are supportive of me.) I share it in case others would be helped by it. Feel
Today I was informed by two kids on separate occasions that they now listen to French music. They are level 2 kids. My day is made. I think that the reason they are doing that on their own is that they understand. Makes sense – people would tend to listen to music that they can understand.
Mary Beth asked about lodging in San Diego. Here is Diana’s response: …stay in La Quinta or the Holiday Inn because then you won’t necessarily need a car. The Town and Country is more like a resort but staying there means you’ll need a car…
I have been wanting to test some of the Vol. 2 scripts by Anne and haven’t had time with all the reading and writing focus in my classes lately. I know everyone is busy, but if anyone can test any of these five scripts for me and report back for anyone in the group who is
This is from David Maust. Anyone looking for ways to fill up a block, take note: Hi Ben, I had a lot of fun with this “bottom-up” embedded reading activity today. Wanted to share: Today I tried an alternative to the regular “PQA-Ask the Story” routine. Instead I used Laurie Clarq and Michele Whaley’s “Bottom-Up
Diane N. in Chicago shows us another way to “se tirer d’affaire”, as the French say, to get out of a difficult situation in class so that no one notices, which we here in our group call going to a “bail out move”: I needed to bail out on PQA with a class today –
