In the last post we suggested that there have been waves of language teachers since about 1970. The first were the traditionalists. ‘Nuff said.
The second were the Blaine Ray disciples who came in with real force in the early 2000s. Unfortunately, they sold out and Krashen and Blaine let them.
So now, their potential to really impact our profession lies in tattered pieces on the floor of what has become a powerful new internet CI marketplace, led by people who “kind of” grasp the depth and breadth of the research, but not really.
Such new “leaders” are remarkably in love with money and fame and have whorishly sold “CI products” that just don’t get the job done because they mix the research with traditional language instruction just enough to sell their activities and strategies to traditional teachers who desperately want to be seen as doing CI.
So the state of CI can be said in these days of COVID to be ineffective, proof being found in the abject failure of CI to cut through the Zoom limitations. The new generation of CI activities and cute ideas are not effective. It’s obvious. The result is a fading of interest in all things CI and, currently, a resurgence of traditional teaching.
The deterioration of CI over the past twenty years can be described as a big downward fading arc. What’s next? What will CI look like over the next ten years leading up to 2030?