Polly Fuller has a question for us. It’s the old curriculum map bugaboo: Ben, I need some help.  This year my school is requiring that each level prepare a syllabus and curriculum map to post on the school website.  No one will look at them, but we must put something on paper to make it […]

Summary of ROA Steps: Silent reading Instructor reads aloud Pair work Choral translation using laser pointer Discussion of grammar in L1 Reading from the Back of the Room Reader’s Theatre Jump into the Space! Work on accent 5 minute write Class artist Textivate Sacred reading Translation quiz Content quiz Free Write

Bryan Whitney said (about the fact that typing up stories for Step 3 of TPRS can be time consuming): …it’s often enough to just type up the most important scene of the story. That way there’s less that needs to be typed up, plus it focuses on the most important part. Plus, when you add

When translating the story received from the Story Writer into the TL to prepare for the ROA reading class, as per Laurie’s instructions on the creation of embedded readings, I try to embed about 10-15% new vocabulary. The amount of newly embedded vocabulary depends on the class – some classes can handle more than others. Sometimes I

I am finding that I must write up each story. Generic stories written from a combination of all classes never did really work for me in years past. Now that I am writing up each story it requires extra time, but the ROA classes are just wonderful. Maybe one way to handle it, since we are

This is from Leigh Anne and we are crazy if we don’t do it every single time an observer comes into the room: …I make all of my observers participate. It’s my secret weapon…. How to do it? Just start talking about what the observer does. Weave it into the thread of the class. If

From a PLC member: We’re about 3 weeks into the school year now and things are going pretty well.  I have a really good group of students this year and as long as I can remain consistent in my classroom management, I should have a pretty good year. Last year had me burnt out and

Q. We are having moments of feeling great and moments of frustration when we try to combine our textbooks and CI method. Is this normal? We are determined to keep going, but some days are feeling like the students want the grammar. I know you will say, “Don’t do it”, but any motivational words would be

Linda and I both have big posters just outside our rooms that are the same. They are kind of our manifesto for when people walk down our hallway: When acquiring another language, we learn to LISTEN. We learn to READ what we have heard. We learn to WRITE what we have read and heard. Finally, we

I’m just reposting this because it is so astounding. It’s from Lance: Ben, I consider this post from the ACL jobs website a huge win in the TCI world, and frankly, haven’t seen one like it: “Ability to speak Latin is not required but highly desirable. Current Latin teachers use Comprehensible Input methods in the

In many schools there are all sorts of vertical and horizontal and sideways articulation meetings. Standards are being packed and unpacked and sent to Norway. Scope and Sequence discussions are taking place without any clear definition of what the term means. Confused discussion about assessments of the common, formative and summative kind are added into

Laura specifically addresses one way to keep  the class engaged during the Star of the Day/Week activity: I make it into a guessing game. How well do you know X? So for each question they have to guess asking the Star using 2nd person singular. While the Star answers in 1st person singular. If I