La has the shortest first name and the longest full name in the group, by fa. We are happy to read her bio, which includes the good news about her joining another group member, Lea Ekeberg, next year. Very cool.
Hi Ben,
This is La from Wisconsin. Sorry I have not been very active in the group. But I still read the PLC whenever I have time. My teaching load this school year is ridiculous. Between 2 districts I teach 5 blocks, plus a study hall, plus one stupid online class. I count myself lucky if I have 5 hrs of sleep daily. Anyway…
In my current situation here in Wisconsin I have been quite overwhelmed with the work requirements for second/first year teachers like myself. So, as much as I like serving the public, I will be changing and moving away from public school… I am really sad breaking the news to the students last week. Next year I’ll be teaching middle schoolers at William Penn Charter School in Philadelphia. I’ll be working with Lea Ekeberg, another member here, to build the Chinese program using all TPRS! So I’m super excited. I think we will have the coolest Chinese program ever! LOL
Here’s a bit about myself… I am not a “4%,” in fact I was a brat, one of those students that teachers don’t want to see in their classes. Well, long story short, I was sent to a village in China to learn a lesson, and I did learn a lesson. When I got there, I didn’t speak a word of Mandarin Chinese or the dialect of the region. I was in a “silent mode” no less than three months before I started to say anything more than just saying yes and no. I lived in the village for about 7 months and was learned to communicate fairly well before I decided to leave the village to learn Mandarin Chinese in a city. (People only use dialect so I didn’t really learn any Mandarin then) I had a very positive experience living and learning Mandarin in China. I truly believe that learning/knowing a different language is no less powerful than knowing how to send a robot to Mars or doing brain surgery. It changed my life and made me what I am now. I hope to be more useful by teaching a language…
A few years ago, I heard about TPRS workshop by Katya in Milwaukee, so I attended the one and a half day workshop. Everything just clicked. I decided to use it right away, even though it probably wasn’t the “right way”. The kids loved it though. I don’t think I did what I was supposed to. I noticed they seemed bored sometime, but for the most part the students liked it. Too bad I only had 3 months to explore with the method before the end of the school year. But when I asked them to write a letter to the in-coming students, they mentioned how fun it was when we did the story. This is NOT a success story of me using TPRS, as I’m struggling everyday trying to use the method. However, it confirmed my gut feelings that it worked…somehow. I attended the TPRS conference in St. Louis and still think I NEED to learn more.
Peace.
La