Good things are happening out West! Tina reports:
Hey Ben! Chris Stolz told me to email you. So here goes! Today I participated in Teacher for a Day. It was organized by our union. The idea is to get leaders and legislators into the classrooms to see our current reality. I got a last minute placement. They called me two days ago and wanted to see if I’d host. Of course I said yes. I adore visitors. I would like to run a CI zoo exhibit.
It turned out to be Carole Smith, our superintendent. Before class started my colleague came in to say to her you’re going to love watching Tina and I just wish we had more time to collaborate with her so we could learn more about her methods. Then I taught two very solid classes. First year French and Spanish. Then Carole and I went to a luncheon. At the luncheon Carole told everyone that SHE wishes we could collaborate and share this “innovative” and “engaging” method.
So then two teachers from high poverty schools approached me and asked me to transfer! They said the kids there need my teaching more than the west side kids. (Our Beverly Hills). Ha ha!
Short of cloning myself I guess I need to help train more Spanish teachers. There were nine positions left unfilled due to the Spanish teacher shortage.
So there’s my sharing.
Happy New Year!!!
Tina
9 thoughts on “Report from the Field – Tina Hargadan”
Great stuff!
We are at a point with TPRS/TCI that what we do is soooo good that it is easy for others to see.
We have
1) more and better teaching materials than ever,
2) lessons that can check any district, state, national standard box,
3) integrated activities with technology, literacy, culture, individual learning, cooperative learning,
4) years of positive feedback and results from teachers, parents, and students,
5) high quality professional development
6) a variety of SLA experts supporting this approach,
7) and really dedicated and loving teacher!
Probably more than that but a pretty good list to start. I definitely feel like the ACTFL battle of 2014 was the catalyst for where things are now.
A couple of things IMO to keep in mind for continued success:
1) No more talk of teaching cult crap
2) Let the theme of INCLUSION be the theme of any discussion or dispute
3) Be nice to others as to not marginalize and create enemies
Yes inclusion and equity are how I talk about CI and TPRS.
Awesome news, Tina! Plus I really love this: “I would like to run a CI zoo exhibit.”
I’m trying to do that virtually by way of videos on a YouTube channel. (And like a zoo, it’s not edited and not perfect.) Also wrote a blog post with 14 Chinese teachers using TPRS/CI on video. I am very excited to keep watching the number of visits to that post rise… upwards of 750 visits, which for the Chinese language community & the blog is a LOT within a little over a month. I believe attention has been raised, and Chinese teachers are curious. I’m happy. People need to see how this works as a possible first step.
That blog post idea came from seeing Mike’s blog post with videos from iFLT teachers – Mike, I didn’t tell you that and thank you for the example. The post is here if anyone is interested in helping raise the visit count – hahaha: tprsforchinese.blogspot.com/2015/11/chinese-teachers-on-video-how-does.html
Diane I will tell Linda tomorrow about that link. She has told me that she wants to stay on top of all that is happening in the U.S. Chinese teaching scene.
Oh, Linda knows. 🙂 She’s featured.
Diane those are great clips of various teachers…that is what I am talking about!!!
Here is the iFLT clips form 2015.
http://optimizingimmersion.com/iflt-language-learning-labs-2015/
Yeah, it took weeks to get that post ready… worth doing, I believe. Besides tracking down video, some of the trouble was video format (and by some of the best teachers — had to trim and then link to their whole videos). I also allowed everyone to see what I was going to say about them before it posted and made sure we were clear on hiding students unless there was permission to share publicly.
Woo hoo, Tina!
People who can’t see the beauty happening in a TPRS class are BLINDED by ______.
This year I literally have a love & laugh fest with almost all of my classes. You get comments like: “It hurts from laughing so much.” I think that everyone feels safe and can be themselves. Me included! Extra serving of silly. NO where else (no traditional classrooms) are they having this much fun in the target language!!!
That’s so awesome! I feel the same way. I love my classes and we are just hanging out, making jokes, and getting to know each other. I love it! Time flies. Carole said when we left class to go to the luncheon, “was that really an hour?” She said it flew by. That’s a great compliment. I’m about to start a new routine using Bryce’s La Persona Especial materials. We are also going to start reading class novels and only on Tuesdays and Thursdays with Read and discuss on Fridays. I’m excited to bring the kids more to the center. They are already the center but this will make it official. I’m going to give them Bryce’s persona especial quiz where they write facts about their classmates. I was so inspired by Grant’s videos that I want to spruce things up a bit.