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Teach Ninth Graders using Compassionate Input
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7 thoughts on “Teach Ninth Graders using Compassionate Input”
Now you tell me……
What about keeping things pretty simple, about the students, and asking them to go home to tell their parents (aunts/uncles/grannies/pets–whoever will or can listen) about the students they talked about that day? And then write just a bit. (Thanks, Susie, I have been using this)You get visible homework for the parents, kids with a sense of accomplishment and appreciation of the buildup of language they didn’t even know they had in them, and good PR for the program with students who perform on a regular basis. My students said they had no idea that they had so much French in them:) Of course, I have 6-8th grades, so they are trained my way…
Yea….this doesn’t work when you have students who really could care less about learning a language-for whatever the reason. For me, it all boils down to the other thread that started about kids who aren’t able to show up as human. I really think this is the root to all the problems I am having in my classrooms. Unfortunately, I can call home until I’m blue/purple/green (pick your color) in the face and many parents aren’t going to force the kid to put the nose to the grindstone. Let’s face it, parents are busy, over-worked. Kids have little responsibililty placed upon them and many of the students are being improperly placed or scheduled with too many of their friends. How am I supposed to combat this?
I seriously had an inner conflict today. I could hear the voice inside begging my to just sit down and pull something out of my arse that they could do while I tried to think of a new game plan. It was like a painful wound being poked at with a stick today. This was the last sort of thread I needed to read, when I’ve been trying so hard for the last 9wks. (Although I appreciate the help it will inevitably stir up.)
Yeah. November sucks. Your honesty here Jennifer is the ticket to the growth that you know is coming. You kind of have to be honest in those moments of defeat. The one you described above is so right on, so real, and I am sure that Cheryl’s point is valid, but I never did that about having them do stuff at home to show off their French. Susie’s kids, those ideas, came from the richest suburb of military million dollar parents in Colorado Springs, and I would even bet few of those kids bothered much with it. I’m with you. Families are broken, and getting brokener, and you’re deal is about survival. It wouldn’t take too many moments like the one you had today to drive a person right out of this profession with a hard sprint and a click of the heels. I had a similar type of day today. In my worst class, a kid walks in tardy and sits down and calls a guy gay in Spanish, humiliating the target of the abuse, and requiring me to haul his ass into the hallway and find an AP or guard, which we have a lot of so they took care of that. Then, since Monday for me is PQA day, but everybody was feeling very mondayish except me, I had to do the PQA with that flat feeling. I personally had a great time connecting numbers to body parts and the expression “hurts” from Anne’s brilliant story for teaching body parts, King of Pain. But yeah, we don’t talk about those moments of wanting to slam Blaine and Krashen up against the wall for their ideas. We should (talk about those moments, not slam those great men.) It helps us to say there are such moments. Slumping down and grasping, begging for a fix to the broken CI right there in class. Whoever had any idea that this would be so hard? It reminds me of that poem by Dylan Thomas – Nullus – in which he talks about how there are moments in life that are as dark as death itself but it is in those moments that “the creative change takes place”. There must be some truth in that line since I have carried it around with me for almost 40 years, as my heart goes out to you and as I kick myself for posting that thread on a Monday.
Thanks for your post, Ben. And THEN, to top it all off I had to stay at school until 8pm for French/Spanish honor society where I sat and counted (with your voice in my head) exactly how many white females were in the group. You know the answer, I don’t have to tell you.
And I look at my chances of keeping up with the TPRS thing. I say to myself, Self you are in your 3rd year-at just the beginning. You’re dealing with people that are probably not going to give a rat’s fat patooty what you have “discovered” about language-learning. They’ll support your efforts and talk behind your back (maybe??). They’ll nod their heads and roll their eyes when I look away because they’re veterans (maybe??). They’ll say what they already know about the topic and rip it apart because they know more educational jargon then I do.
For how much longer can I be this TPRS person? Ever since I was a kid, I’ve always been ok with being different; with leading the way to something no one else was doing/saying/thinking. But let’s face it, this is a profession where keeping your mouth shut and your gradebook full wins the race-ESPECIALLY in my state, in my opinion.
There must be something going around. I had one of those days today. The Bundesliga didn’t play last weekend, so we looked at the Europe Cup in class today instead. Four of my classes enjoyed talking about the games and discussing whether Portugal would move on or not. (Lot’s of Ronaldo fans out there)
My beginning class, however. . . .
One part of the discussion was to help them understand how the system works, so we talked about moving from group play to the round of sixteen (either directly by winning the group or indirectly by winning the play-offs). Then, I went through the following:
1. The winner in each group goes directly to the round of 16. (Check for understanding, have student state in English what I just said.)
2. The number 2 team in each group goes to the play-off round. (Check of understanding, have student state in English what I just said.)
3. Germany won its group and goes directly to the round of 16. (Check for understanding, have student state in English what I just said.)
4. Question: why isn’t Germany in the play-off round?
Class reaction: total stupefaction
Repeat steps 1-4 for half an hour before the light bulbs begin to go on (except for about 2 people who got it right away).
Then I put up the results of Friday’s play-off round, and a student asked “Why didn’t Germany play?”
On the other hand, in one of my second-year classes, one of my biggest headaches from last year opened up. It was a quiet but significant moment. During the discussion he quietly said that he didn’t get something, so I went back over it, and he gave me thumbs up. I kept looking at him during the discussion. Later we had a chance to talk, and he said he understood everything after I cleared up the one item. I also told him that I would always do what I did – go back and clarify – whenever he tells me he doesn’t understand. I think he will. At another point in the class the student behind him didn’t understand something, and he made a comment. Of course I had to tell him to be nice, and he said, “But even I understood it, so it has to be easy.” Obviously I’m dealing with a fish who has been asked to climb trees in the past. It has only taken a year and a quarter for him to start trusting me enough to say he doesn’t understand.
BTW, I definitely like the term “compassionate input”.
My French 3’s thought they were missing something without grammar worksheets and thought they would be helpful. So I gave them the Dr and Mrs Vandertrampp lesson. One student finally piped up and said “Why are we doing this?” Makes me wonder…