I’m happy that my guy from Congo – Gloire Gabell – is getting involved in the class. His entire unspoken message up until this point for the first few weeks with us was that he was not going to get involved. But today, I invited him to do dialogue (it helps when your actors doing dialogue in stories are fluent in the language you are teaching the class).
Of course it depends on the kid, but, handled properly, making a reticent native speaker who has been plopped down in our classes into an actor starting first with dialogue can completely change the vibe of the class. Gloire now gets the cute answer thing, too. He counts. He is funny. He is being brought into the community. What else is there?
Related:
Que faut-il faire? dit le petit prince.
Il faut être très patient, répondit le renard. Tu t’assoiras d’abord un peu loin de moi, comme ça, dans l’herbe. Je te regarderai du coin de l’oeil et tu ne diras rien. Le langage est source de malentendus. Mais, chaque jour, tu pourras t’asseoir un peu plus près…
“What must I do, to tame you?” asked the little prince.
“You must be very patient,” replied the fox. “First you will sit down at a little distance from me– like that– in the grass. I shall look at you out of the corner of my eye, and you will say nothing. Words are the source of misunderstandings. But you will sit a little closer to me, every day…”