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Report from the Field – Liam O’Neill
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18 thoughts on “Report from the Field – Liam O’Neill”
Great report, Liam. I was wondering when the NJ/NYC area was going to start popping. It’s not like nobody lives in that area!
Re: the labels TPRS and TCI (which we use in Denver Public Schools) and CI, I have been loathe to just drop the term TPRS and have preferred to use TPRS/CI but that doesn’t solve the problem that you mentioned – people don’t want to hear that term. I don’t like just dumping it because Blaine is responsible for a ton of what we do in TCI or CI, and it seems disrespectful. It wasn’t his fault that a bunch of people basically botched/distorted it while still claiming it was TPRS, which it wasn’t. So the name got tainted. Who could have known? But I think the writing is on the wall. The term we’ll be using in the future is CI or TCI or, my favorite, comprehension based instruction.
Your experience at FLENJ with Curtain is not surprising. My take on it is that the powers that be, and yes, they are connected to corporations and big money, had another party with their own rules, a mutual admiration society and you weren’t included. They rule by a kind of discreet intimidation and bullying, and nobody thus far, for decades, has even doubted any of what they said. It fit their image of using a book and of being in touch with research (watering down Krashen is what I call it) and, bless their hearts, they don’t really get what we do – I am convinced of that. The warning to not use any English is proof of that. They may never get it. But the new plants (you, Scott, James, all the other young talent out there) will surely push out the old. That’s the way it works in nature. As you say, the truth will out.
Things are moving out here in terms of CI, at least in my circle.
There is a very good chance that my CI colleague, Scott Grapin (Spanish), and I will be asked to be on the FLENJ board either this coming year or the next. It’s quite exciting that a third CI teacher is joining us next year.
In the meantime, certainly among the NY/NJ Chinese teaching community, word of CI is spreading. A bunch of teachers and/or teachers-to-be came to observe my classes after our FLENJ conference, in fact. (More already want to come next year.) And, it’s worth noting, some of them largely came at the suggestion of a very good friend of Helena Curtain’s, and another big name with ACTFL and Startalk – Janice Dowd, a really kind and dedicated educator, now retired.
It is obvious to me that partly why the CI/TPRS presentation was recognized at FLENJ, why teachers have come to observe my instruction, why other districts have taken note of the success of my students … is because I teach Chinese.
Chinese continues to be a hot language in many districts, especially affluent ones, and effective Chinese teachers are still quite difficult to find. When there’s a good one, word spreads far and wide and quickly. These conditions have made it more easy for my CI work to be recognized.
It seems that Chinese teachers using CI-based methods might stick out just a little more, playing a unique role in spreading CI to other schools and districts. Helping the truth out.
This is a great point Liam. You all also have Piedad Gutierrez in NJ who has been doing TPRS for a number of years along with Jeff Forney. These two have been training teachers in NJ for a decade. I think it takes that long to get to a tipping point. Really. And Liam….you are the perfect person to push things over the edge. TPRS also offers a community at a time when teachers need a community more than ever. We’re not going away. People are starting to figure that out. :o) Thanks for being part of the “new wave”!!!
with love,
Laurie
Thanks Laurie! I’m not familiar with Piedad Gutierrez. Can you make an introduction? loneill@pascack.k12.nj.us
The thing that kind of pisses me off after all these years of the Helena Curtain and Mimi Met era of power politics and university/corporate collaboration and the creation of mammoth but ineffective textbooks and software is knowing, feeling really, that CI cannot be mixed with other stuff.
When I talked to Mim Met about TPRS once I could tell she doesn’t get it. She doesn’t get Krashen. She acts like she does, but she doesn’t. She thinks, as she told me, that what we do with CI is “just another tool in the toolbox”. It’s not. Empty out the toolbox and put in the Krashen hammer, which is Mr. Fixit’s golden hammer, if you saw the movie “Wreck It, Ralph!”
Why are we private here? Because the above kind of statement above would quickly brand me and anyone who does pure CI as something of a whacko maverick renegade fool. We are not. We are far from foolish. We have our heads screwed on right. We align with standards in ways undreamed of by most teachers. We don’t back down.
The era of Met and Curtain? Time to close the curtain on that act. Let’s do some real teaching! It’s not about those books and software. It’s not. It’s about loving kids and making them feel safe in this world by giving them a chance at success, a kind of success that is effortless.
When you know you are correct, it feels right. You know it in your heart. We are often faced with situations that require a choice. Do we listen to that voice ins used CV that tells us what the right thing to do is or do we ignore it.
These words is one of those moments:
Remember I had my DH come to the Maine TCI conference last October? Well, he loved it and told me that it makes SO much sense, and is very similar to how he teaches. He loves the kids first, connects with them, makes learning FUN – the kids LOVE him!!!!
We have another teacher of that same language, who is very concerned about what rigor should like, that we should have common assessments, that kids need to start speaking right away (or else they will never speak) etc.
Well, we are having budget cutbacks, and the DH is moving down to the middle school (because of where he stands on the RIF list) But, now the kids have found out and several have gone to guidance to drop that language because they won’t have him anymore!!!!
What does THAT tell you about loving the kids and making learning FUN? (and understanding how the kids acquire a language.) I am happy for him and his move – he’ll accomplish great things with those kids and make them LOVE studying a foreign language!!
Hi Liam! This is great news. Thank you for bringing CI instruction into the forefront for more Chinese teachers.
Are you a part of the CI CHinese teachers Yahoo! group? I am really hoping to get some clarity and insights about CHinese literacy, too, and that’s been something discussed there. Lea Ekeberg (also in this group) began the group.
Hi Diane:
Yeah, let’s keep on sharing about Chinese literacy. There is a lot of progress to be made.
For starters…no Chinese person has ever learned a single character without first hearing and/or using that character about 10,000 times in meaningful contexts. (ie, kids are completely fluent before beginning literacy work) And yet, the model out there for non-Chinese is that we have to learn characters right from the get-go.
We’ve delayed character for two full years at my high school. We start introducing them junior year but only for honors kids. And they only have to read them in context, like in a novel or a class story.
The result? My juniors this year can understand 85%+ of The Lady in the Painting, a classic from Yale-publishing. In contrast, speaking from my own experience, after two VERY rigorous years of Chinese at my intense liberal arts college, 2+ volumes of Integrated Chinese,) I could barely make sense out of 1 chapter, much less talk about it.
Will you be in SD?
I know Lea and I tried to join the Yahoo! group but I guess it didn’t take? Or is it just not active? Please let me know how I can join. Of course, we can always discuss it here, too!
Hi Liam,
I would have to ask Lea for help with the sign-up so can only suggest contacting her.
I tell my students who get frustrated with characters the same thing – that Chinese people already know all the meaning of the language and just add literacy. So we need to know the meaning really well before we read. Terry Waltz has an approach that, in some ways, sounds like a compartmentalized version of what you’ve done. Massive aural input followed by simple readings based only on what has been heard a lot. She introduces new words using only pinyin and then shows readings only in characters (if I understood correctly) but because of the massive oral input, the kids read quickly. It sounds like you’ve taken a longer-term approach, mastering more language first. Do you end up with a lot of reading time in that third year? I’d like to hear more. I love characters and I know some of my students do as well — is there push to see them earlier? I’m inclined to think that use of pinyin with the characters causes some to read only pinyin, ever. If there’s both, some kids will not stop looking at pinyin ever. (I thought it was giving them time to read characters “with support” of pinyin, and for many over the years, that worked. But now I have the challenge of 5 or 6 functionally illiterate 7th graders this time because they are actively resisting reading characters. I have one more year with them before high school… where every Chinese teacher seems to think they should be able not only to read, but to hand-write, every character they’ve seen.)
I love The Lady in the Painting. I’m thinking of creating some embedded readings that lead up to it for my (awesome) just-finished-6th grade class — as something they could use at the end of 8th grade. I think some of them would be able to read the book itself (by then) and some would need a simpler version of it, but would understand well, given their current ability.
Diane:
Please send me your email. I can share some “Lady” resources I’ve created. They could go a long way in making embedded readings, something I’ve also wanted to do. Perhaps we can collaborate.
Yeah, I’ve wanted to get in touch with Terry again because I understand that she’s had similar experiences with characters.
I understand the “love of the characters.” There is something quite magical about learning characters that I experience and that some of my students have seen, too. Because of this I initially resisted the delaying of characters. But for the vast majority of students, I think delaying is the way to go. (There might be some corollary between character learning and grammar-based instruction: 90-96% of the population can’t learn language with grammar instruction/characters with full-on character instruction.)
My students are quite fortunate that they all have laptops. They use a powerful add-on in Chrome (Zhongwen Chinese-English Dictionary; the equivalent for Firefox is Pera-pera kun) to read, for example, Lady in the Painting in html. They simply hover over a character and the pinyin and English pops up.
I like this a lot more than pinyin and characters side by side, because, as you have observed, students naturally go to the pinyin. In using Chrome, there is some incentive for the students to read the just the characters, which they eventually do. Their confidence grows exponentially in this process, which is at least half the battle for students who don’t have that “love of characters.”
I still give them weekly character quizzes based on 12-18 characters. I’ll give them traditional character sheets. I also give them Quizlet sets. But all of these characters are from “Lady” so that they can read them in context.
I’d love to have another novel to choose from, however! Anna Mei Banfa gets too many groans. Other readers I’ve come across have characters even more obscure than those found in “Lady.” I’ve been thinking of trying to write a novel myself, using the 800 HSK characters as a guide.
Just quickly jotting some things down here as my students perfect their final stories.
Will you be in SD? I wonder if anyone from the WI, MN crowd will be there?
Hi Liam, my email is questyn@hotmail.com. Thank you very much for the offer of resources! I would be happy to work on embedded readings for Lady in the Painting… it’s a longer-term project for me but I hope to take a look this summer — more next summer. Anything more than Lady and I’ll have to switch to teaching older students, I think. That or using a novel a lot more than I am currently anticipating. Teaching middle schoolers is different.
Terry is also involved in the Chinese CI Yahoo group. She said recently she is working on shorter readings (based on fairy tales, mostly not Chinese ones) and a sort of teacher’s guide for CI Chinese.
Lea and La, I read somewhere on this blog, will be in San Diego. I won’t – bummer. My school wasn’t covering such a large cost this time and I have other projects to fund personally this year.
I’ve used Susan you mafan a little this school year… it’s about right for my 7th graders in the second semester & it was mostly easy reading for the 8th graders. This year I just tested it out a bit with a few minutes of required reading time about once a week.
I have considered using it next year with some more-lively-than-just-reading activities, which I did very little of this school year, and introducing new phrases with Step 1 before reading that section of the book. My kids have liked making Powerpoints from essential sentences which would work well for summarizing a chapter or two. They can put their goofiness into the pictures they choose and take out their dislike for Susan that way. Reader’s Theater is something I want to get better at coaching them in. Some are yet unconvinced that it can be fun to read.
My students all have laptops, too — but I will have to look up the add-ons for Chrome and Firefox. I didn’t know how cool they were. Using an online dictionary is more hassle.
Liam we should invite Helena to San Diego, put her on a panel with Krashen and Diana and Carol and a few other experts like our own Robert and Jody, and see what happens.
Probably a little late for that. But she did give me a card. She even invited me to look her up when I next visited Milwaukee, my hometown, and her city of residence. I might just be able to make it happen some day!
Liam, there is a group of CI Chinese teachers in the Milwaukee-ish area. Well, there used to be! Now one is in MN and another (La, in this group) is going to PA.
In the Chicago area things are not CI for Chinese, but when I’ve shared a bit about Word Walls and how to use the target language more in class while keeping it understandable to the kids (slow, pause and point), I had some very strong interest from teachers. I think you’re right that Chinese draws attention. Michele in Alaska says the same thing about Russian. If it’s a language people don’t know and think is hard to learn, and you have students who are showing all kinds of progress, then people want to know what you’re doing.
The talented and dedicated Haiyun Lu is in Milwaukee. :o)
with love,
Laurie
Yes! She has hosted every workshop I’ve attended to learn about TPRS!
that would be a beautiful thing!