Each spring, after teaching massive CI in the form of stories and reading, I am always conflicted (I’m sure we all are) when it comes to thinking about teaching them some grammar. Some of them, after all, are next year heading straight into classes where grammar instruction is the order of the day. I just […]

I got this email from Drew who is over in Germany this week doing some professional training and whose experience there prompts reflection on what we all are doing: Ben, After 5 years of no German in my life I decided to come to Germany to do a German class for German teachers in case

Jen recently had a year end interview with an administrator about her new work with comprehension based methods. She said that her administrator asked this crucial question: “How do you choose which structures you’re going to work with if you don’t have a textbook to give you a road map?” This is an excellent question –

I got this bio description today from David Young which is, in his own words, “ridiculously long”. He offered to edit it. I say why do that? My goal is to keep the group small, the trust high, and get to know each other. So  maybe get a big cup of java and settle back and

Story scripts should be simple and emotional. Students are attracted, as Michele once said, to verbs and emotions. But too many verbs confuse them and stories lacking in emotion bore them. Amy Catania (http://amycatania.tripod.com/cuentosfantsticos/) wrote a story about a waitress who lost her new ring and started jumping up and down on a table screaming,

I’ve been remiss in posting group member bios and apologize. Here is one from Ardythe. Her description of her situation in central Illinois is powerful, and one can hear in her comments in our group so far and in the following words that she is going to be successful in that situation. The lower levels

The wrapping around the gift that Krashen gave us is opaque. It’s hard to see what is inside unless you unwrap it. That takes no small amount of dedication and hard work. Krashen’s work is much easier to dismiss than embrace. Imagine my surprise when I opened the gift and found a way of teaching that actually worked! How lucky I

Susan Gross invented over 200 games and countless other activities that, now in her workshops, she says had no real value because they didn’t deliver the key ingredient of language acquisition: comprehensible input. I have seen teachers bristle at her workshops when she said that. That is because if they accepted the fact that it’s either CI

Our students learn how to write and speak only after hundreds of classes, every minute of each of them precious and best spent reading and listening. The more they do the latter, the more they succeed at the former. But it takes time. The more time (two years, minimum) that they receive input in the

I got this from Jen, who started doing CI only just this past March: On the heart-warming side, I got great honest and insightful feedback from my kids after our 8-week dip into the waters of TPRS/CI. Mostly I see that I just barely dipped my toe into a mere trickle of the class V

Make it clear to them that periods of silence, when the class is trying to come up with cute answers to a question, are welcome. Just sit there in that quiet space. It’s o.k. – sometimes everybody just needs time to think. If the silence really drags out, do a retell right then. Sometimes act like you can’t remember

Jen sent this question. It rings a bell but I can’t find it. Anybody have any ideas? Ben, Sometime last week I was surfing around and I came across a post about “remedial advanced” classes…where you talked about bridging the gap for 3rd/4th year kids who wouldn’t necessarily buy in immediately to stories/PQA. I should have