I was just reading a thread in an online group. It said, “Challenge them by introducing more vocabulary.” I don’t agree with this. “Challenging” kids is code for “make them think harder,” or “make them aware that the class is something they have to gird their minds up for”, or “I’m going to control what you learn and then give you a test on it”. But we don’t have to think or worry or try to handle a battery of new words thrown at us by our teacher in order to learn a foreign language. That’s not the design.
Why would we ever challenge our kids when the research, 40 years of it in countless studies, tells us clearly that unless the affective filter level is low and stays low, and the child is relaxed and emotionally involved only with happily trying to understand the message instead of intellectually involved with the vehicle being used to deliver it, then true acquisition cannot happen.
That’s just the science.