We have no business ruining this great unconscious process of language creation simply because we want to be in the kitchen making the food. I say to all of us, “Get out of the kitchen! We are disturbing the chef, who is really shy and will retire from the kitchen if we barge in and […]

The unconscious mind is a soup kitchen where the language acquisition process takes place. The language acquisition process does not take place in the dining room. The vegetables and broth and other ingredients are what we provide the chef, who in the unconscious minds of our students is master organizer of the meal. The chef

Tina wrote this: It is not important that students comprehend every individual word. It is important  that they can follow the message and not get lost and that they stay engaged.  In fact, we would argue that many teachers’ failures to continue on with CI are partially due to their trying to make every single

Our group can be a gold mine for shared information. The request today is from Jeff in Illinois. If anyone can help with any pre-written verbage for this kind of proposal it might save Jeff some time: I just got approved to submit a proposal for Spanish electives that utilize CI. These classes will be

I am happiest in the midst of a good story with a strong group of kids whose hearts are open. Then it all becomes worthwhile. How many of our colleagues want the special sort of bliss that happens in those good classes? Most of our colleagues just want to use the book – it may

A teacher recently wrote in a private email this about the Invisibles: …the Invisibles have been an incredible masterpiece as far as I’m concerned, freeing me up for fun and lots and LOTS of creative, REAL (and not just targeted) vocabulary in the classroom for my kids. I repeat: FOR MY KIDS!!! ‘Cuz that’s truly

Story Listening works and is easy for both teacher and students, because it aligns with Krashen in these areas: 1) acquisition/learning; 2) natural order; 3) affective filter; 4) compelling comprehensible input; 5) monitor (not output but for input). Tina and Beniko were presenting in Washington state yesterday. Tina reports: …a Spanish teacher who attended the

My feeling these days, in my seventeenth year of the “TPRS Wars”, is that the preoccupation that we have with the research is just a surface thing. If we were aligning fully with the research, we wouldn’t need to be doing all this arguing. It would work. We would have found a way by now

David Ganahl reports from the I.E. – Hey Ben: I was thrilled to find out that two intermediate school Spanish teachers, Lindsey Casper-El Cerrito and Joanne Meza-Ramirez,  were selected, this year, as their schools’ teachers of the year. Besides being amazing teachers, they both just happen to be CI teachers too. Dave

Many in our group are aware that the CI Liftoff conference this summer has the first ever conference strand on equity in foreign language classrooms. But not many may know that we also have a strand on Native American language teaching with Wade Blevins of the Cherokee nation. Tina and I have worked with Wade

This is from Udo: Ben, I just love your attitude towards teaching and the human condition. I believe that even after so short a time with the PLC, I have finally found some soulmates in you and the members of your PLC and I think that there are some people who think like us on

A repost that describes a possible way to choose a curriculum, one based on interest: I met Colonel Sanders in the ’70’s in Venice, Italy. Yup, I did. I was in college, on the Washington University St. Louis year abroad (Strasbourg, France) – I was all over Europe in those years. It’s funny, but few recognized