This can happen in impoverished schools as well as any other as long as we tap into the needs of the children to express themselves using words in the L2. We didn’t have a way to do this in the old model of PQA because the input was not supported by images and captions. And […]

To restate and clarify. In my current view we will get much more verbal L2 output from our kids than we ever thought possible if we do three things: 1. Put really extreme limits on how much L1 they can use. 2. Use Power Point images with captions (stories can’t do this) so that they

Q. Does Julie ever ask, “What did I just say?” or do quick translations for clarification? A. Yes, BUT both are very limited in how many times they get used. This is the fascinating part to me. The less English used by the teacher, I have noticed in DPS, the more L2 output by the kids there

Here are the Star of the Week questions in French that Sabrina is currently using. I could only get permission to use them in French, but all you need to do is some quick translation work to have them in other languages. Thanks to Sabrina for allowing us to use these questions: Star of the

Throughout the week the teacher can share with the class a Power Point presentation of the child with his or her photo taken when the student came up to be the star. On each slide is the photo of the student, along with the question, as well as a picture of what the questions represents.

This is from Angie and Angie I apologize I should have posted this early with only one week left in the window: There is a full-time job opening for a French teacher here in Brattleboro, VT.  The position is for all levels of French and the candidate needs a masters degree so they can teach

A repost: Why should we transmit mere information to our students when we can transmit so much more: interest, meaning, fun? Maybe we could even transmit to them a reason to believe in life. Why teach merely to their minds? Why not teach to their bodies and hearts as well? Maybe, if more of our

The next step in the process is that the teacher asks, on Monday, for volunteers to be the star of the week for that week. As soon as that person is chosen, he/she comes up to sit in the special chair for the interview process. Anyone who has done the Special Chair activity can see

Talking about the blurting L1/L2 thing, I even take an entire class, or more, each fall to get to know my kids using this learning styles inventory. It creates excellent discussion, and when I learn from it that a child is left brain dominant (not great for a CI class which requires whole brain response

Once the students have answered all the questions, they turn in their sheet and the teacher keeps those in the classroom at all times. As happens with the Circling with Balls activity and the Anne Matava Questionnaires, most students, when they understand that this is not a joke assignment and that people are really going

Jody’s Special Chair technique has recently taken form in Denver Public Schools as a highly successful CI strategy called Star of the Week (“Etoile de la Semaine” or ” Estrella de la Semana”). Credit for this goes to Bryce and Sabrina and Nina. Here is Step 1 the process: 1. Give a handout with about

An excellent question, a repost from a year ago, about the pacing of PQA and kids’ ages from Jason Bond over in Scotland: Hey Ben: I have a wee question that maybe you and the PLC could shed some light on: I’ve noticed that when I do PQA with my S1s (12-13 years old), it