Our purpose in this game of teaching comprehensible input is to teach the structures. We focus more on them than on the content of the story or the PQA. Content is merely secondary to the CI process – the structures are everything. The content of the PQA or the story is merely a delivery device […]

Every few months or so I get wigged out about how  Krashen has pretty much shown that the acquisition of a language is an unconcious process but we set much of it up to be a conscious process in class. Even people who claim to be CI teachers do that. But they are not honest with the research.

What is unique is that Steven Krashen used empirical studies to arrive at conclusions that are largely intuitive. This odd phenomenon in research can be likened to the work of Carl Jung, a researcher whose conclusions went far beyond the merely observable and were therefore subject to (silly) questioning by the more rational but far more boring,

A colleague recently wrote in response to my comment that people who focus on output instruction would be better off to quit the teaching of languages and go find another profession: …so apparently that makes me someone who has no place in this community and should find another profession…. I have been thinking about this comment. It’s

I keep the PQA going on three structures for an entire class on Monday to set up the story on Tuesday. I need to do that. The success of the story rests on as many reps of each target structure as I can possibly get. I like to get over 100 on each before starting a story.

The plan in WL in my district is to use stories to set up the reading of novels. This puts pressure, however, in my view unnecessary pressure, on the teacher to create those stories. On the DPS website we have targeted a number of structures per chapter in Pobre Ana. We are to write stories

Bryce and Lavinia from NJ are coming to my classroom today. I used to get nervous. All the time, I got nervous. I just can’t do that this time. I doubt if I’ll ever be able to get nervous in that deleterious way anymore when being observed. I’ve come that far. When I teach kids,

After all these years of trying to get better at comprehension based instruction, I have come to realize that the best kind of reading is not novels. It is the readings we create from the stories we build in class with the kids. Step 3 readings are far superior to novels in many ways: They have much more direct interest

I do feel that the following three things, all new this year to this PLC, add what we could call a wonderful Triangle of Classroom Discipline to our work.  jGR (keeps students engaged and respectful). Classroom Rules poster (works with jGR to keep behavior at its best). Jobs for Kids (they make the classroom environment instantly positive, as all people need

I am getting ever closer to the desired point where we as a group know everyone bc we can read their bio. I’m getting that email blast out right away, I decided, to get this thing wrapped up. Our goal is a complete list of every name with a bio. Someone expressed the fear that

Here’s Yvonne from the Big Apple: Dear Ben, My name is Yvonne Villa.  I teach Spanish II, III, and “Native” Spanish in a public high school in NYC.  I came to this site because I am interested in comprehension based teaching after attending a few TPRS workshops and doing lots of reading. I must confess

Here’s Karla who has been using TPRS for a long time: Hi Ben, I regret that I haven’t been on your site lately but want to continue. Karla Reed Teacher of Spanish Damonte Ranch High School, Reno, NV I’ve been teaching using TPRS since the mid 1990s.