What Have You Got Planned for the New Year?
Certainly, 2020 needed to go. The big world was a disaster, and our small world of language teaching took a major hit as well, with most of the damage being done by the new online Zoom settings, for which we
Chris Roberts
Chris checks in with more good news: Hi Ben, I have some more good news. I was observed by my principal on Monday, Oct 31 - first day of the 9 weeks. In four of my five classes, I get new kids
Card Stories
Card Stories are very simple stories based on the Circling with Balls activity cards that some of us did to start the year. Card stories represent an intermediate zone of CI instruction that is more complex than the simple sentences that characterize
The Case for Stories Early On
I know I just posted this a few days ago but I want to post it here again. I think it is important: Energetic classes with high talent of about 25 kids (less is too few and more - above 30
Level I Beginning of the Year, #2
Ben, Here is the survey I handed out to the kids. Spanish I, First Days Get-to-Know La Clase This is some of the contextualized, interesting Spanish that we are doing "on the side" the first few days of class. We are spending about 10-15
Level I Beginning of the Year, #1
Ben, Here is a beginning of the year activity for level one classes. It is my adaptation of your Circling with Balls activity. In the first few weeks of class we are getting to know one another. I ask a few simple
Time to Bail Out on the Balls? #2
I thought of something else for when the Circling with Balls loses energy. Go from the facts you are talking about to the topic of love! That will wake them up. Here is a very simple example: Class, Jenna likes to watch
TPR
I'm not a big TPR guy but I got an email from a colleague today that is definitely worth sharing if you are in fact doing any TPR to start the year. This description of TPR is excellent and I
Norming the Class 4 – We Send Strong Messages About Discipline Via Our Seating Charts
So we know from the first blog post in this series on norming the class that the first day Big Circle, indeed the first few days of class, ferretts out friends who try to sit together, and then we, as
Norming the Class 3 – Emotional Barometer Students
The biggest drawback to being so nice to the kids (we have to in order for comprehensible input to work) is that we are setting ourselves up to be used by kids who lack empathy. This is a serious problem