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Sauk Language Revitalization 2
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26 thoughts on “Sauk Language Revitalization 2”
Thank you for this. I don’t know the word for “this.” It is too deep, beyond mind, thought, idea, intellect. You said in the previous post “this concerns all of us.” Of course it does. And I would dare to say that “this” IS all of us. The energy in your words and your lack of words is palpable. It shows us the essential intangible of this energy exchange among people, the expansive nature of the heart-centered practice of TPRS, and how “language” is so much bigger than words. Thank you 🙂
whenever he said yes to me indicating that I had understood properly, there was a tone in the sound of HAY-HAy that was so approving. It was very approving. I don’t know how else to say it. HAY-MEc! (HIGH FIVE!)
Ben, do you realize how powerful that is? In whatever language, we need to convey that same approval to our students. I can’t help but think that Mosiah’s approval conveyed not just that he was confirming you had understood but that he was affirming both you and your effort to acquire this language he loves so much.
(Unfortunately, in the settings in which most of us work, we need to be prepared for students who don’t know how to handle that kind of communication because it is so foreign to them. I refuse to watch most sit-coms and many other shows, not just because my time is more valuable than that, but also because so many of them base their humor on belittling or embarrassing others.)
Jen and Robert thank you for the approval, as it were. What you both describe about the approval piece has not left my mind for two days now. It shows up in my daily awareness every fifteen minutes. My hands go up in that pushing the hands up by the side of my ears whenever I feel or hear something that is built out of happiness or when someone does something well. If standing I dance my approval as well while saying “HAY-HAy!”. But slowly. I just imitate – put into my body and smile – what I saw Mosiah DO since 93% of human communication is visual. Mosiah’s kindness makes me want to learn more Sauk right now! I kind of thought that I knew about human communication, but the tone/expression/love – the marble ice cream of instruction in this case from Mosiah but also from Katy and Jacob (same feeling from them) show me that I still have a long way to go. I just heard about a book called Mindsight by Daniel Siegel which may connect this approval piece to the neuroscience involved in learning. As per, what happens to a person’s brain chemistry and ability to learn when the person is constantly affirmed as good? My thoughts are that this may be a brand new area to explore in comprehensible input instruction. But I don’t want to read research about this topic, although I will read the Siegel book. I just want to experience it. I want to continue to experience that feeling of being good at Sauk language that I experienced two days ago. I have been going around saying “Good job!” and “Yes!” in Sauk language with the image of Mosiah approving of me many many times a day. It is so wonderful to be told you’re good.
It is so wonderful to be told you’re good.
Even when you think it isn’t fully deserved. Friday was the last day of California Standardized Testing. My students had been dealing with prolonged periods of testing all week. During the week I had been able to get most of my classes outside, but not my two level one classes. So, to celebrate the end of the German soccer season, we went out on the field and played soccer. I gave them the option of 1) playing a game, 2) kicking the ball around, 3) cheering in German, 4) doing laps around the track. In one class a significant portion of the class opted for 2, 3 and 4. Consequently, I decided to join the game to even out the teams. This 61-year-old somewhat out-of-shape teacher was playing with teenagers, some of whom play on the school team. Nonetheless, when we returned to the class, one of the freshmen who played said to me, “Herr Harrell, you are a soccer beast!”
Did we get a lot of CI accomplished? No, but I believe the overall interaction and release of tension was on this particular day more important than being inside the classroom. (Of course, I have also been known to take my classes outside just to look at the snow on the mountains – somewhat less common in Southern California than in Colorado.)
I would add that for the brain to really take in “good job” to the deepest part of our heart–it helps to add what we did that was really effective. You did that for me at the Inter-tribal conference when you said, “your inflection was great on that phrase.” My tongue often gets tied but your encouragement kept me wanting to go for more. That is the very act that keeps our students showing up every day and struggling to move beyond their resistance to not wanting to look stupid.
Dear Ben,
Just this week, my Spanish colleagues at Marcus Whitman and I were discussing this very thing. We haven’t had a way to describe it either, until we borrowed a phrase from a retreat that I recently attended: Palanca. Palanca is the Spanish word for lever and in this context it refers to power that a lever gives. Using just our bodies, we can only lift so much….get so high. Palanca, the lever, gives us strength, power and height. Palanca in the classroom takes many forms: eye contact, going slowly, encouraging responses, saying thank you, personalization, kindness, civility, making language completely comprehensible, listening with complete attention, using student work….it goes on and on. What you experienced was Palanca: lifting with joy. I can’t tell you how excited we were to be able to put a “title” to our philosophy….to be able to say out loud that this is part of our teaching. Language and emotion are inextricably connected. Our natural reasons for speech are directly connected to our needs and wants. TPRS allows us to teach language in a way that is natural to our emotions. A grammar-based approach or a communicative approach that is organized around thematic units that our students have no experience with does not even begin to tap into this power…this Palanca. The things that we do as teachers that show our students that we care and want to interact with them (rather than at them) using the language are part of that. We bring them closer to the language and the language closer to them. The love you felt? That’s Palanca.
with love,
Laurie
Re Ben’s: “It is very hard to express what doesn’t happen in the mind, is not located in thought, what reflects that other part of the role of language as well as the “communicate an idea” part.”
Mind, the home of ideas, but sees, and only in a metaphorical sense; it does not feel, but at best can only vaguely represent feeling, which is a force called emotion that moves us from within our whole body responding to the pressures of exterior matter and energy waves that play upon our eyes, ears, taste buds, skin, sense of smell, heartbeat, and blood pressure.
It reminds me of how Rene Descartes came to his demise. I never knew this but found out only recently that he was asked, “René, are you happy with this idea?” and he responded, “I don’t think I am.” whereupon he disappeared completely.
I am reminded of Ishi, the last survivor of the Yahi tribe. He spent the last five years of his life being studied by and living with anthropologists at U Cal San Fran and Berkeley after coming out of the California hills. The story of a people, language and way of life lost. Very poignant.
The good news is that if you met the people charged with keeping Sauk language alive, you would say that hope is there, certainly and surely. They just need a little practice. Then we will quickly see what we know is possible.
Thank you for the kind comments, Mr. Slavic (It’s me, Katie, if you hadn’t guessed). It makes me so happy that us teaching you made you feel good. I’m glad you can feel our emotions when we teach, that you can tell how much hard work we put into learning the language and all the importance that saturates the words we speak. I’m so glad that you were able to meet our speakers and listen to us interact. For us, the language is so important because it’s more than being able to speak a different language. We are learning culture and we are speaking the language that our great grandparents and ancestors once spoke before it was ripped away from our people. I’m so glad to have met you. I’d like to let you know that we practiced TPRS today at work and I spent 15 minutes on just 1 word! One word alone! I was completely blown away at what I could do with just 1 word.
Oh, and it’s Jacob Manetowa. 🙂
Many blessings!
Menwikenwi!
Ketepi!
-Chakihkwe (Katie)
Katie here is a link to that idea of focusing only on the target structure like you did:
https://benslavic.com/blog/2011/05/16/we-focus-on-the-water/
We try to get the target structure or two or three of them into each question we ask in PQA. I know I said that in the training but I want to repeat it here – it is of vital importance to not get sidetracked by introducing words during the PQA that the students may not yet have heard. We stay with the structures. That is what allows us to move up to the level of what Anne Matava calls “Chit Chat” – when the students forget that they are learning the language because they are so focused on its meaning, precisely because you are controlling the amount of new sounds coming into play consciously and always returning to that same base target structure sound via circling, which gives great confidence to the learner because they can understand.
Another thing Katie and Mosiah and everybody else – please comment here on anything any time. I know that I speak for many that we want to hear more about what you write about, what you bring to us.
Note also that if you wish to have something published not as a comment but as a separate blog entry (something like this):
Sauk Language Revitalization 3
Sauk Language Revitalization 4
Sauk Language Revitalization 5
etc.
Then just send me your thoughts in the form of an email to benslavic@yahoo.com and then I can make them into a real blog entry and not just a comment. That will make it a bit more easy to access the topic via the categories.
“…all the importance that saturates the words we speak…”.
This sentence is something that I will think of now for awhile. Until I can get my next lesson and I can learn more Sauk language. Thank you so much, Katie and please give my best to the group. I learned so much about the craft as a student in our little class – more than I have been able to learn in my regular classroom as a teacher. I was reminded how truly difficult it is for the learner. How the repetitions must be perfectly clear, yet compelling and interesting, how the circling must be clear, and the importance of SLOW. And especially the importance of the kindness flowing from you and Jacob and Mosiah Bluecloud. Can’t wait to see you all again!
Ben
This is wonderful. There are so few places where students are approved of, reminded of their goodness. The implicit curriculum gives the message that only some students are good, good enough. Ben, I’m touched by the power of your experience , the purity of your expression and its importance to me as teacher.
Jacob, Katie, Mosiah and Twiggy are good folk, and crazy committed to their language. I’m so glad that Ben could come down, meet them and see what language revitalization work is all about, on the ground, in the flesh, with the people. We don’t have the millions of speakers and realia available to majority languages – all we have left are the old folks and us young ones crazy enough to give our lives to our languages. For us language isn’t an interest, a hobby, or even a job – it’s an all encompassing fire.
chokma’shki –
Lokosh (Joshua D Hinson)
I am trying to get Josh to present this summer on the topic he alludes to above – it would be a fresh new perspective (ancient perspective). The email has been sent to Blaine, Carol, and Lisa. We will all benefit greatly from the presence of the Sauk (Sac and Fox) Nation at NTPRS.
I thought I went down to Oklahoma to model CI but came away a beginner in the subtle aspect of language that you refer to above Ben and that Katie referred to in her comment – the idea of approving of our kids because they are good.
And Josh you said:
“…we don’t have the millions of speakers and realia available to majority languages…”.
Isn’t that the beauty of comprehension based methods?Realia and all that stuff like Realidades just get in the way. Sharing languages with others just gets easier and easier as we see how simple it can be as long as we turn it all over to the mega-computers that are our unconscious minds.
“AI-MI-KO” = A Kickapoo Phrase used to gently correct someone without implying any sort of disrespect.
My Cousin: I heard you’re leaving tomorrow.
Myself: AI-MI-KO, I’m leaving the day after tomorrow.
“AI-MI-KO” There is so much meaning in this phrase. The definition provided does no justice, but it will have to do.
I’ve been told before that sometimes I’ve a certain “Tone” when I speak. My non-native friends have dubbed it “The Indin Tone” They describe it as peaceful and soothing. Apparently my mother and father have it. I wouldn’t be surprised if my whole family on both sides have it.
This “Indin tone” does not come from some kind of physical abnormality though. At least I hope not. I believe It comes from a way of life that we choose to live. I could write a whole book on it, but I know we all got lives to live and I should make this comment short an to the point.
In a nutshell, the way I was taught to behave towards others is making its way into my teaching. It makes each individual person feel different feelings but each feeling I believe to be positive. I understand that each student has a mother and father and grandparent or SOMEBODY out there that loves and cares for them. I teach them as though the one that loves and cares for them is watching me teach them. Also I teach them as I would want somebody to teach ME. I teach them as I would want somebody to teach MY future children. I teach them as I wish somebody could have taught my Great Grandmother and Great Grandfather. I imagine my mother who I love and respect very much sitting and being taught. I teach how I would want somebody to teach her. With respect, Kindness, and love.
Mr. Slavic, you felt what it feels like to be taught in this fashion. I know what i’m writing looks like a bunch of hippie talk but i’m not afraid to write it because I know you know, And I see that there are others that are interested. There is no secret. There is nothing special. Its all just putting your mind in a different place; in a place where you see more than just the students, but also the people that love those students.
At the conference in Durant a Miamia man stated that classrooms are the most unnatural places to learn. As a Kickapoo, I’ve always been told that the most important knowledge is passed on at home. We Kickapoos do not have a language department because Kickapoos believe that language should be acquired at home. However, I honestly believe that through my teaching, I bring a little of the home back into the classroom environment.
Mr. Slavic, you talked about there being a feeling of love coming from the instruction we demonstrated. That maybe its because of the history of the language; something tied into the language, something you couldnt quite find the words for. Yes, you are totally correct. Language and CULTURE are one and the same to us native peoples. This is what makes language our “all encompassing fire” as Josh so powerfully put it. I teach not only my language but my culture too, because we cannot have one without the other. Its impossible. The culture is embedded in the PHONEMES, MORPHEMES at a cellular level….and now i’m rambling. ok.
I hope that those of you reading this will take something from it. I’m doing my best to put in words a way of thinking that has been passed down through the generations for what I believe to be the beginning of time. I know i’m doing it no justice here but I’m hoping a seed will be planted that will grow into something amazing for you.
AI-MI-KO – you are being very clear, actually. Write the book. Keep sharing this kind of information with us. Our hearts are finally ready. We have perceived things differently and so the distance between our cultures, the isolation between our cultures, has continued. We have been so busy looking for the answers to our own professional questions by searching in the research, everywhere, under rocks, and now, if I may suggest, we have found a big answer, a really big piece of t he answer to our questions about how to give LIFE to our instruction, in your verification above, Kîwêha – Mosiah Bluecloud. Thank you for verifying my experience as real. I thought maybe it was something in the water in Oklahoma. Maybe it is.
Mosiah, Thank you, thank you thank you. The seed has definitly been planted.
Yesterday after reading the blog I thought about what Ben had described all day while I was teaching. I wanted to create it but I didn’t know how. Today you gave me such a powerful image to hold on to. Not just while teaching but in every human relationship. This is where life changing comes in. I want to do this.
Totally amazing….thank you so much. There is so much in this piece that speaks to me.
“…I understand that each student has a mother and father and grandparent or SOMEBODY out there that loves and cares for them. I teach them as though the one that loves and cares for them is watching me teach them. Also I teach them as I would want somebody to teach ME. I teach them as I would want somebody to teach MY future children. I teach them as I wish somebody could have taught my Great Grandmother and Great Grandfather. I imagine my mother who I love and respect very much sitting and being taught. I teach how I would want somebody to teach her. With respect, Kindness, and love…”.
and
“…I teach not only my language but my culture too, because we cannot have one without the other. It’s impossible. The culture is embedded in the PHONEMES, MORPHEMES at a cellular level…”.
Beautiful. Thank you.
with love,
Laurie
:
I am feeling this all so deeply I can’t begin to describe it. This whole discussion has been giving me goosebumps.
When you said:
“I’ve been told before that sometimes I’ve a certain “Tone” when I speak”
I felt this statement. I only speak languages of oppressors, so I would never dare to make a statement about ancient wisdom back to the beginning of time. I hope I will be able to experience this wisdom firsthand. I am so drawn to everything I have been reading on this thread. What I do know is that I definitely have different tones, and there is a specific one that comes out when I am speaking to another Cuban or someone else who has a similar accent that reminds me of my childhood. I let my guard down and speak in the tones that were spoken to me as a child with my grandmother and my Dad, and sometimes my cousins. It just comes out. It’s so different from the Spanish I spoke when I lived in Spain, and also different from the Spanish I speak in a situation in which I feel nervous or judged. I never really thought about this until I read your post, but I definitely speak “generically” unless I feel safe and not judged.
Like Laurie, I was also particularly moved by this paragraph:
“In a nutshell, the way I was taught to behave towards others is making its way into my teaching. It makes each individual person feel different feelings but each feeling I believe to be positive. I understand that each student has a mother and father and grandparent or SOMEBODY out there that loves and cares for them. I teach them as though the one that loves and cares for them is watching me teach them. Also I teach them as I would want somebody to teach ME. I teach them as I would want somebody to teach MY future children. I teach them as I wish somebody could have taught my Great Grandmother and Great Grandfather. I imagine my mother who I love and respect very much sitting and being taught. I teach how I would want somebody to teach her. With respect, Kindness, and love. ”
Would it be ok to copy this and share it with my colleagues? I feel like everyone is in such a frenzy to geth things done that we really do forget what we’re really charged with as teachers.
Thank you so much for these connections.
With much love and respect to all,
Jen
Yes, Please do copy and share Jen! I don’t own this knowledge. It was here before me and with the help of people with open hearts and minds like yours it will be here after me.
“…I feel like everyone is in such a frenzy to get things done that we really do forget what we’re really charged with as teachers…”.
Yes, as per:
https://benslavic.com/blog/2010/11/17/thomas-merton/
I talked to Jacob today and we are working on getting Blaine to allow a session completely on Sauk at NTPRS run by Jacob and his team. Then others can experience what I did in Oklahoma.
I’m with Jen on this. It’s a mind smasher. We’ve tried everything but this. Can we become kind? I can’t stop thinking about it. Rimbaud in his Seconde lettre du Voyant (à Paul Demeny, 15 mai 1871) speaks similarly:
Trouver une langue…
Du reste, toute parole étant idée, le temps d’un langage universel viendra! Il faut être académicien, — plus mort qu’un fossile, — pour parfaire un dictionnaire, de quelque langue que ce soit. Des faibles se mettraient à penser sur la première lettre de l’alphabet, qui pourraient vite ruer dans la folie !
Cette langue sera de l’âme pour l’âme, résumant tout, parfums, sons, couleurs, de la pensée accrochant la pensée et tirant. Le poète définirait la quantité d’inconnu s’éveillant en son temps dans l’âme universelle: il donnerait plus que la formule de sa pensée, que la notation de sa marche au Progrès! Enormité devenant norme, absorbée par tous, il serait vraiment un multiplicateur de progrès!
A language must be found…
Moreover, every word being an idea, the time of a universal language will come! One would have to be an academician – more dead than a fossil – to complete a dictionary in any language whatsoever. Just thinking about the first letter of the alphabet would cause weak people to rush into madness!
This language will be from the soul for the soul, containing everything, smells, sounds, colors, thought holding on to thought and pulling*. The poet would define the amount of the unknown awakening from the universal soul into his experience: he would give more than the expression of his thinking**, than simply describing a worldly Progress! Enormity becoming normal, absorbed by all, he would really be a multiplier of progress***! [translation mine]
*[ed. note] – to me this means mind getting control of itself and pulling itself to the heart.
*[ed. note] – he would give kindness.
*[ed. note] – he would define instruction in a new way and it would affect many more people.
The academician above is the data gatherer in education. The weak people are us, bringers of kindness. The universal language Rimbaud refers to is not a new language but a new way of using language, as per Mosiah. Stopping everything (right Jen?) and practicing kindness with our students. Doing so consciously and purposefully and not from our minds (right Laurie?). Kindness. Awareness of ancestors and imagining beloved family members present when the language is being taught to the younger ones. Kindness. A new quality of comprehension based instruction that is not just about numbers of repetitions of target structures, or SLOW, or Circling, or personalization. Kindness now there, woven into the practice. A way of weaving the heart into the thought and the sound, softening the eye contact, looking into the eyes not just when as adults we toast each other over the top of the wine glass for making it through another week but toasting our students with another kind of wine, kindness, one that makes them feel as if they are good. Language instruction made completely comprehensible to bewildered kids, yes because of the vehicle of comprehensible input, but also now because we are choosing to place something brand new inside the CI vehicle – kindness. A new kindness of language. A double language, of words yes but also of compassion because they don’t understand the language. All being made real for kids who have previously experienced precious little else in their education than flat and false games invented by worksheet paper people following a hopelessly outdated paper paper paper paper model, and then wondering why their kids can’t learn anything….
Sí…..se puede.
with love,
Laurie
The day after my last full time day ever was yesterday. The poetry is that my computer, so loyal all these years, completely and totally crashed. I lost a ton of stuff but that is fine. Some of it was backed up but all that stuff was old karma, old thoughts and the method keeps changing daily anyway. So while I look for another one I’ll be down a bit. I have some stuff from Bryce and Robert to get up here and will asap on my Mac. But I know that my computer knew. Then I went into my cell phone and told the alarm that I won’t be needing its help “Monday – Friday 6:00 a.m.” any more. I’m done with the morning thing for good. It’s a good feeling, y’all. Not to gloat, but it has been knid of a long time, right? I’m interviewing at GW Tuesday, and Joey the department chair told me that if I get the job – two classes – they can start in the afternoon.