A report from Robert:
Hi Ben,
I just wanted to give you an update on what’s happening in my district.
Currently there are three of us who are committed to TCI/TPRS: one in German, one in French, one in Spanish. There are others who are interested and transitioning, but obviously there is a lot of doubt and internal (as well as external) resistance. One of my colleagues in COACH teaches a methods course at Cal State Long Beach and is sending students to me and the other two teachers for observations. My Student Teacher is totally on board with TCI/TPRS and has attended several of our COACH workshops.
The principal at one of the other high schools in my district doesn’t fully “get” TPRS/TCI, but she absolutely gets the results that she sees in my classroom, so she sent her entire World Languages staff to observe one of my first-year sections. Here’s the e-mail their trainer sent to my principal:
Dear Robert, L, and J,
WOW! What a blessing it was to be on your campus today. J, thank you for promptly meeting our needs this morning by getting us into rooms. L, thank you for coming through at “the last hour” and providing a space for us to meet in the student center. Finally, Robert… words cannot express how grateful we were to be able to witness you in action. Your instruction produced high levels of engagement, made the content meaningful, and showed a model of comprehensible input. Thank you for taking the time to pre-brief and post-brief with us. Spending the morning with you allowed our team to launch into meaningful discussion and planning.
Thank you again. Blessings to your weekend.
Humbly,
B and G
Garden Grove Unified School District
TOSA- Program Facilitators
We are, BTW, part of a consortium of eight districts that have gotten a waiver from NCLB and obtained the ability to pursue local initiatives for teacher training and assessment as well as student improvement. They are called the CORE (California Office to Reform Education) districts. I’m not sure of all of the ramifications of this, but they have been working with Michael Fullan on it, and so far I like the training that I see happening.
Robert