Unlock with PatreonThe Problem with CI
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CI and the Research (cont.)
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Research Question
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We Have the Research
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8 thoughts on “Question”
Megan,
The short answer to the first person question is to compare students’ answers with yourself.
Oh you like Mint Chip? I don’t like Mint Chip (to me it tastes like mouthwash). I like Rocky Road… But my husband likes Mint Chip.
I 120% agree with everything Ben said above. The fear of not covering what the next (bad, un-aligned, not supported by SLA) receiving teacher/school is doing or expects can be a huge weight on teachers’ shoulders. Who is putting it there? If you’ve been told explicitly that your Ss will be sorted and winnowed based on their ability to recognize, build and manipulate certain grammatical features – then I get it – you have to make sure… But if not, then part of the CI package and esp NTCI is eschewing that stuff in favor of a more compelling and less constricted flow of communication.
After a story you can do any number of extensions – Ben has excellent ones in his ROA that he mentioned above. Basically (to my mind) they are fresh and novel ways to recycle the story or its language in use through reading, re-creating parallel stories/characters, drawing, writing, listening, playing ‘games,’ etc…
Kudos to you for diving into CI and dedicating your practice to your students interests and linguistic needs! Keep up the great work, continue to experiment and tinker, and of course ask questions on this fabulous PLC!
We need a “like” and/or “love” button on this site. Alisa, I love your answer. It speaks to my own fears about what will happen next year to my level 2 students going onto level 3. One question: What does “ROA” stand for?
Thanks.
Ditto to Ben and Alisa. With one of our characters this year, the artists wrote “Je m’appelle Danny”. So I went with it. I started writing the description around each character à la Cameron Taylor and it’s awesome. So I wrote that whole description in first person. I can see the benefit of writing in both but I wouldn’t do it in a foundational class. I did it in an Intermediate class where students have had at least one year of French.
One point to consider. Even with IB Diploma students, the IB does not expect students to not make mistakes. They know there will be mistakes. They want students to be able to use different verb tenses and explain their ideas well. NTCI provides a robust base to students; they see different verb tenses and structures so much that once they do need to learn the how and when do conjugating, they’ll have had exposure to it all.
ROA – Reading Option A. Searchable in the search bar and in the categories as “Reading Options”.
21 wonderful options to follow up a story with. I heavily incorporated #s 4 through 7 in the new books. In my view they (#s 4-7) are the best options to follow up a completed story with to move into reading, which (reading) we want to provide at least 50% of the input in a CI classroom.
Merci!
I’ll write quickly about the 1st person. I use when doing the special chair interviews (volunteers only). I ask “you” and I say to the students “Clase. ______ says, “I like waffles.” Another way is to have the students interview you. Also when I have these interviews typed up, I use the 1st person just like a real interview would be published in a magazine.
I have also done a SL activity with some of my favorite personal stories– Like when I went to the movies and the projector overheated and I got to watch free movies and have free popcorn for the next 2 hours. Or when my brother had his car accident at 16 years old.
Having to bend a discussion to include first person is artificial and lame. Steven is saying how he chooses activities (the ones he mentions are excellent) that “go there” naturally and that is good because then he doesn’t have to embrace lame.
But when we try to bend the outcome of an activity toward correct verb endings with the goal of speech output, then we go against the very nature of what language acquisition is, and we start “teaching” instead of doing the only thing we have to do – give them understandable messages.
I’ve said it for so many years here. What don’t people get about the process being unconscious, dependent on the Din, magical and far more complex than the analytical brain could EVER duplicate? Why are we still trying to figure out ways to teach first person forms? I don’t get that.
I chalk it up to a profound lack of trust in the process, along with a fear that the Assessment Police will get us. But the process works and there are no assessment police. We don’t have to target first person forms. That’s what the research says.
See next comment.
Here’s the way I see it. If the kids know/can recognize the stem, then when they start speaking years later, the ending will naturally be correct. Why rush that process? Where is the fire?