Ruth and I had a side conversation in the comment fields earlier tonight about question words in relation to the overall discussion about Linda Li’s recent Two Truths and a Lie classes here in our school, where her kids were knocking it out of the park with speech output (because of the super high – what I saw was compelling in the sense that Krashen uses that term – nature of those classes).
I think we may have to contact Krashen or Eric Herman about this. It’s somewhat convoluted to follow but may be important. If Herman can’t figure it out we’ll go to Krashen. If he can’t figure it out we’ll go to Donald Trump.
I had written how hard it was for me to believe that Linda’s kids were just beginning and second year kids (6th and 7th grades, years 1 and 2 – that’ right – year 1 in September!) and were producing excellent speech at a high rate in class! It was silly how good they were in speaking Chinese.
I asked Linda about it at least three times last week because I wasn’t seeing anything like that in my French kids of the same age. Then I thought it was just because it was Linda Li. After I saw that level 2 7th grade class I was blown away with the speech output but whenever I said that to her Linda kept telling me that the period before them that day was a level 1 6th grade class (!) that was also rocking it with speech output. Now I was curious!
So I kept bringing it up and each time she told me the same thing. She said that the reason for the output I saw was the question words in Chinese above the board. She acted like it was the most natural thing in the world because those question words were there. But they were in Chinese characters. I know because I was sitting there looking up at them the whole (85 min.) class.
Ruth, who is a very careful reader here, responded:
“But I have the question words above my board too! Not too high. I can touch them. I do all the time. They are there and clear and just as unpronounceable as ever.
“In fact yesterday, in one class, I had the kids repeat after me. I was so sick of hearing “quand” said like kwande. Grrrrr….
“So what about output in different languages?”
I responded to Ruth:
Ruth my kids do that when the question words are up there as well. Maybe on an intuition, maybe because I took a break from stories, I erased them all, two weeks ago. I was taking a break from stories and working with numbers, acting like Johnny Carson, and so I was using the question words a lot less.
Ruth with the question words do you remember that I was putting them down as they occurred this year on one board and leaving them there and that I wasn’t using question words in the same way this year? Well I was getting the same kwande thing going on after a few weeks like you. The question words were still visible in class.
So I erased the board and started glossing the question words more if they came up in class. I’ve been doing that for two weeks now. I don’t know if that is a factor in this discussion or not but I thought I’d just mention it. The thing I am trying to figure out is how Linda’s kids did that output so well and she said it is her questions words in Chinese above her board that make that happen.
Ruth I sense that there is something really important in your point about kwande and maybe we need to study it this year. Maybe glossing, which Eric and I think Sean were big on last year if you remember that thread, is much more important than we think for us in French but not for Linda in Chinese – her kids weren’t mispronouncing the words as she told me several times last week but they were in Chinese characters.
In French it is easy to mispronounce (est, even kwee, nord, etc.) when they are seen written out (I hate that too – it’s grating and makes me want to fall down right there on the floor when they do that and have a fit). Maybe the thing is to stop writing them down and not do anything but gloss them and not even do any reading until the danger period of mispronunciation is over (how long is it is for Eric to figure out – it‘s probably different for every language and really long for French.)
So to restate: Linda has her question up in Chinese, not pidjin or however you spell that word. I find this most significant. The kids can’t mispronounce the question words because they can’t read them. Hmmm. Maybe we really do need to drop the question words in French. All I know is that Linda is getting visible results that I saw in terms of output last week that we never get. Maybe it’s not just us. Maybe it’s because it’s French.
Dropping writing down the question words. Maybe we should try it. Wanna try it? Like, starting Monday? I really don’t want to hear another quand/kwande ever. It makes me want to run out of the room and fall down on the floor in the hallway and flail my arms when they do that. The French would never understand them. So how could we then call ourselves French teachers?