I’ve decided to hold back new posts, except bios, until further notice to do some housekeeping, namely: 1. I need to go through and make sure that only paid members are reading here. I do that about once a year. In the next few days I will publish a list of all paid members with […]

All members of this group are asked to send in a bio. Where do you teach? Why are you in this group? What do you hope to get from the group? One short paragraph is enough. Why do I ask for bios? You really don’t want to know. All I can say is that this

We have agreed that we need to produce a primer for those who want to read about TPRS/CI so that they can understand that this work we promote is the new normal in language teaching. I agree. It would be wonderful to just print off something from a hard link here and hand it to

Dear Ben: There is too much background to easily fill in and I am fine after a few uncertain days, but I had the following conversation with the Rector of my school – the man who signs the check!  He is extremely happy with what I am doing in French. Loves everything about it. He

These two jobs make our total available jobs at 57. I don’t think any of us could have predicted the impact on classroom management of letting these jobs emerge organically into the classroom setting. I find it much more powerful than even jGR in that respect. Here are the two new ones: 1. Place Poster

Anne Marie is in one of those situations where she is presenting on comprehensible input at a board meeting and would like our help and suggestions: Hi Ben! I’ve been asked to present 5 minutes of TCI to the Portland School Committee here in Maine for next Tuesday’s board meeting.  It’s to give them an

This from skip Crosby: The 8th Annual TCI Conference in Lewistonn Maine October 10,11 and 12…. The Agenda: Laurie Clarcq will present on: 1. Using Music in a TCI class 2. Assessments (TCI style and standards based) 3. Embedded Readings 4. Using TPRS (the three steps) a DEMO with a lesser known language (Vietnamese) Sabrina

Ian Burke sent this question: What do you suggest to people who have already gone down the road of learning a language through left brain approach, classes etc. and have failed or who have reached an unsatisfactory intermediate level like so many have done. Is it possible to fix? They have mixed jumbled output from

We often return to the theme of Simplicity as we go along and that is a good thing. On his website yesterday James published this idea about how to use a word processor to create personalized readings for step 3 of TPRS that allows us to make that process simple, since preparing readings for five or more

So are we going to give energy to that judging thing going on when adult observers come into our room? Perhaps we should remember that: “Toutes les grandes personnes ont d’abord été des enfants….mais peu d’entre elles s’en souviennent.” (Le Petit Prince, Dédicace) “All grown-ups were once children…but only few of them remember it.” (The

So let us ask a question about being judged. What if we didn’t feel judged when an observer came into our classroom? What if we could see through the false power – I believe it is false – that the observer thinks they have over us? Their power is only the power that we give them. Our job

When people come into our classrooms to “observe” us what are they really doing? I think that they are judging us. They should call their creepy actions what they are – judging. Announced or unannounced, it is still judging. Sure, they say that they are there to help us, but that is a surface truth. The deeper truth, in my