TPRS vs. Georgia 8

3 thoughts on “TPRS vs. Georgia 8”

1. Jeff Klamka

   March 27, 2009 at 7:24 am

   “cultural themes emerge into the class from the content of the class…” Thank you Ben, for giving me permission to not feel guilty about not having cultural lessons and projects. I look at the teachers who have their kids do a power point presentation in English about some aspect of a country where the language is spoken, or some week-long art project which decorates their classrooms, and I always felt that my students were somehow shortchanged.

   Culture in my class is usually a discussion in English about how something from a story reminds me of everybody going on strike in France, or how amazing the bread is because they get it fresh from the bakery every day, or how Nutella crepes are just the best thing in the world, or…ok food tends to dominate.

   So, despite eliminating the projects for all the wrong reasons (I HATE them, the chaos that they bring and the management and grading issues), I don’t have to feel guilty. Yay!

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2. Bernie Schlafke

   March 27, 2009 at 9:19 am

   Ben, your post today reminds me of three things, which are worth re-minding!
   Somewhere in Colorado while on a motorcycle trip, I actually did have a fly get into my helmet and start buzzing around…Talk about an easy way to run off the road ,or at the least temporarily ruin, a “flatlander’s” joy on a mountain ride!
   And,
   I have banned the word “unit” from my practice since I really started using TPRS to teach my students. Anything to prevent me at some point in the future from saying something (nasally), like “Class, please quietly take out your work packets for our unit on reflexives, and find worksheet 5.2…”
   And,
   Swedish. In Janice and Barb’s TPRS demo in Kansas City, I learned so much Swedish and an amazing amount of culture for one lesson: Pippi Longstocking, Astrid Lindgrin, Dalarna, Dalarna horses. Right then, it became a model for my stories. Embedding a bit of culture in stories can go a long way toward enriching our content. Prior to seeing their Swedish demo, I was really questioning not only the silliness of the LICT stories, but the value of replacing the content of the textbook with stories such as the “boy-cutting-off-a girl’s-hair-and-eating-it”. It FLOPPED in the one Spanish class I tried it in, but then again back then I was teaching vocab. with gestures, and steering the story-asking in the direction of Blaine’s story. No personalization, too little and too predictable circling, very rigid…looking back, I’m amazed I actually “got through” that one short story with that class! Even the mention of a minor cultural tidbit can do a lot to spring into a good discussion about life abroad.
   Oh, and also Piedad, who said once in one of her culture workshops “Students in my stories NEVER eat hamburguesas…they eat arepas!”

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3. Profe Loca

   April 4, 2009 at 12:33 pm

   This is one of the reasons I am loving reading the novels so much. The culture is such an integral part of each book. Every time we talk about geography it’s culture. Every time we use an idomatic expression it is culture. Really, since we are using language in a culturally authentic way, everything we say is incorporating culture in our lessons.

   Culture is more than memorizing discrete facts (duh, so is learning a language). It is all the little things that make up who we are. I have a list I used to post in my classroom called Culture Categories. These are the things that make up culture and may be discussed from time to time in the class (before TPRS, but they still come up now) Some of them are: geography, history, warfare and weapons, roles of men, women and children, ceremonies for weddings, funerals, coming of age, architecture, fashion, literature… and these things make it into our stories, and the songs we bring in…

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