The use of students' L1 in a second language class

Over at Ben Slavic's blog there has been a discussion of using English (L1) in a second language class.  We all know L1 is to be avoided. It says so right in district, state, national standards, research, methodology textbooks, etc.  But, it's that 800 pound gorilla. How do we get rid of it? The students speak it. We speak it. It seems so easy to just slip into English for a few seconds, share a story, explain something, go back to Spanish...

Ben is discovering that, as he experiments with a radical expulsion of English in his French classes, his students are paying more attention, they are using less English themselves, and in fact they are happier and more engaged. We always slip into English thinking we are adressing *their* needs.  But, what if we aren't?  What if English just kills it all?

What if the answer to kids speaking in English is simply for the teacher to speak more in L2? (while maintaining complete transparency, in other words staying always in bounds with the class.)

classroom management

One of the things I have struggled with the most since starting TPRS in my classes has been classroom management in general and specifically the no-negativity rule. The no-negativity rule or the no-put-down rule is that we do not allow students to express any negativity towards each other or the class.  It has been my Achilles Heel.

I have an image in my mind. TPRS is like paddling a boat. If the students are positive and participating, we are paddling with the current and we go amazing places. If the students are being negative and fighting the process, we are paddling against the current.

So, back to my revelation.

Karen Rowan wrote in the "Green Book" that if a student is negative towards one of his/her peers we simply point out that he/she *must* be mistaken. Obviously he/she is thinking about a *different* student in a *different* class because this student is obviously very smart.

I love this approach. It doesn't humiliate the offending student, and yet it allows no room for negotiation. No wiggle room.  Way better than me getting mad and huffing and puffing that I will not tolerate this kind of behavior.

S-L-O-W Down

I have two boys who together are just bad news.

The one kid, I hate to admit, I rarely expend much energy on. At his first parent-teacher conference last year the parents explained to me why my class was completely useless and that he would never pass it. I figure between his parents' attitude, and his it is just way too much energy away from the kids who actually want to be there. So, as long as he behaves and appears to be doing what we're doing, I don't do much with him. I ask that he be polite and that's about it.

The other boy is actually a really great kid (so is the first, but he doesn't let me see it often) as long as he is kept away from his friend. First trimester this year I saw amazing progress with him over last year. But in the last few weeks he has gotten totally attitudinal on me. Every chance he gets, he goes and sits next to his buddy - abandoning his partner. I've been out a bit and he has refused to work with his partner for the sub. He sits with his friend every day until I finish attendance and correct him. The power struggle is draining - really it is. The other day as he left my classroom he shouted loudly, "Spanish sucks!" I spoke with him, and he got that sheepish grin as he denied having done anything wrong. (8th grade is soooo charming :D )

So, yesterday we were reading the class novel as a class. I had just explained that tiene miedo means she is scared. I mean, [i]just[/i] finished speaking. I have a policy of never calling on students who don't volunteer - something about being utterly embarassed and humiliated by a language teacher in college (and dropping the language forever because of it). But, I called on the second child. He gave his trademark sheepish grin and said he hadn't been paying attention. I told him I knew and we would wait. After about a minute of waiting, he started going word by word through the sentence. He didn't get it 100% correct, but I helped him out a little. I called on him again, and he at least knew which sentence we had read.

Then I called on his buddy - again I had [i]just[/i] translated the word in the sentence, and he didn't have a clue. I told him we would wait. His partner tried to rescue him, she helped him find the correct page and sentence. He shrugged and said he didn't know. I said it was ok, there was a glossary. So, we waited. A long time. Finally he was able to tell us what the sentence had said.
I spent the rest of the class calling only on my behavior and barometer students. We went REALLY slowly. By the time the bell rang the first student, the one whose parents tell me it's a waste of time and he won't pass, was volunteering for sentences. He may have been doing that just to get control of when he was called on, but at least I know he was reading with us, paying attention and participating. And he got to see some success.

I try to go slowly in that class. I really do. But apparently I do not go slowly enough. As soon as I slowed down enough to wait for these students, and really let them process the information, as we went through and circled the new words over and over and over I saw lights turn on, and some of that 8th grade "we're too cool for you" attitude started to fade.

I still don't like putting kids on the spot like that. But maybe if all the tools are in front of them, and I'm not asking for grammatical accuracy (I got a case ending wrong in Russian when my professor told me how stupid I was), then maybe it isn't so bad to call on students who don't volunteer. Maybe it is a way of keeping them involved in the class and keeping them and me accountable. By not calling on them I feel like maybe I am giving them permission to check out and not care or try.

classroom management

I implemented one of the strategies from Power Teaching in my classes. That is, the class participation points - I forget what it's actually called, but that's what it really is. I keep a tally on the board for positive and negative points given based on behavior.

I've always used a similar system, but it was given individually. In the past I would assign two participation grades per student per week. The first was active participation - how many times any given child volunteeed to participate. That grade was based on the average number of times students were able to participate that week. Sometimes an A was 3 participation points while other weeks it would be 10 points. This grade never dropped below a C, because some people are naturally more shy and not willing to speak in front of their peers. The second grade was on-task participation. This grade always began at an A and dropped a letter grade every two times I had to remind a student to get back on task.

I kept track of both grades on a seating chart I had printed out each week. It was a great system, the two biggest drawbacks were that I had to be able to keep up with the printing and tallying of points, and I always seem to fall behind on that at this time of the year, and because they are individual grades I depended on getting buy in from each student as an individual - if a student is not grade motivated, this system does not work well for them.

This year I tried the págame system, developed by Blaine Ray. It reduced the number of things I was tracking. With the págame system I was only tracking off-task behavior and absences. With this system a student is able to "buy back" their lost points by doing certain tasks in Spanish. I had the same two problems with the págame system that I had previously. I cannot fall behind on the printing and tallying of points, and it depends on students being grade conscious and motivated.

This class point system is slightly different. The class is "competing" against itself for either fun time at the end of the week, or a more difficult quiz. But the actual consequence doesn't seem to matter as much as seeing the points go up. I am no longer depending on all my students being grade motivated. Now my class is my ally. When one student is off-task (head on table, speaking in English, etc.) his/her peers are actively campaigning to get them back on task.

This system has also finally gotten across the point that asking for clarification is a good thing. I give the class points any time a student stops me and asks for a definition or comes up with a really cool question or connection. Now rather than groaning when somebody stops the class, the students are cheering the slower processors on. I literally had an entire class break into spontaneous applause the other day when a typical class clown first asked me in an appropriate way for clarification on two points and then volunteered to translate a sentence. His smile at that moment was so precious. And on Friday when his class got to play pictionary, he was so proud that he had helped tip those points in their favor. I may just have gotten his buy in (at least for a little while...)

A ticket out of here

I am combating the negative undercurrent in my classes in a number of ways these days. One of them is that I have ended class a few minutes early and had students line up at the door. A lot of teachers do a ticket out or a similar concept - turning in your assignment, etc. Well, my ticket out is a smile and a compliment in Spanish. I know it's corny, but I think it falls into that old psych experiment - if you smile long enough you begin to believe you are happy. If you smile often enough is Spanish you begin thinking Spanish is fun, even if the smile is coerced. If you tell me how wonderful my class is often enough, sooner or later you will begin to believe it. (I hope) In the meantime, it is nice to hear how nice my blouse, hair, my clothing are... and how smart and beautiful I am... and how interesting and fun my class is. I know they are just playing the game but it sure beats the, "this is boring" that we can hear from them. :)

Oh, and one student gave me her compliment in Chinese after asking permission in Spanish. I love it! She is practicing outside of Chinese class, and is using her Chinese because she wants to! And she loves my class too. I wonder if she tells her Chinese teacher anything in Spanish?

the worm on the hook

Since my days as a student teacher I have had a policy that I do not call on students who do not volunteer. It can be too embarassing if they aren't comfortable yet with the material, or if they are by nature shy people.

On the other hand, I can't check in with my barometer students (those who are trying but slower than the class average) if I don't check in with them. So, I've been playing with strategies like teaching to the eyes, and making sure I move through the classroom more often.

Yesterday, as we were reading the class novel, I could see that some of my slower processors were struggling. So I would reread the sentence slowly and ask that student to translate what I had just read. I didn't do it in a mean way, and I was there to help them through it the whole time. I pointed at the words on the board, I repeated the words slowly. And I didn't let their peers call out the answers quickly. Every student responded.

Every student except one. This is a student who has struggled the whole year, not just in my class but in all of his classes. We, his teachers, have brainstormed strategies to help this student engage, to accomodate him, and to provide appropriate interventions for his needs. Yesterday I asked him what a sentence meant and he wuickly shrugged his shoulders and smiled. "I don't know," he said. Perhaps it was his tone of voice, which suggested he couldn't be bothered to care, or perhaps it was the speed of his shoulder shrug. But something inside me told me not to let him off the hook. I gave him the "teacher look" for what felt like five minutes. I refused to let his "I don't know" stand. I repeated the question, pointing at each word slowly. And I stared at him. At the end of that time he finally stammered through a translation. And I praised him for his efforts and went on.

It was painful to me to watch him squirm for so long. It was painful for the other students too, they desperately wanted to call out the answer and just go on already. And I know it was painful for him. He had 24 pairs of eyes on him for a lengthy bit of time.

But what that told me is that I have been letting him slip under the radar and simply choose not to engage. He is capable of engaging if he is required to, and now that he has tasted that, I plan to continue. I hope the next time I ask him a question he doesn't wait five minutes to answer. I hope that the next time I ask him a question he was already thinking that being called on was a possibility so he should be paying attention before hand.

Power Teaching

As part of my reclaiming my classroom and myself, I finally followed up on a reference to Power Teaching. My first impression is that it is a little gimmicky for me. But by the end of the 7 minute video I was seeing possibilities.

I started using the class/yes technique the very next day (Wednesday). I adapted that to clase/profe. I thought about keeping it with the yes response of sí, but I liked the way clase and profe both have similar cadence. Since the idea is to have the class call the response back to you as you say it, the cadence of the words struck me as important.

I also started the scoreboard. Now, this is a lot like the participation systems I have tried in the past, except that it affects the entire class rather than just an individual. And what a difference that has made! Students who have never cared how many points I took from them or how many págames they owed me are suddenly uncomfortable when their peers are pressuring them to behave.

My husband teaches at a detention center that is based on getting the students to change their attitudes and behaviors through implementing a positive peer pressure system. And this is exactly the same thing.

In addition to addressing some of the more egregious behavior, I have also been able to truly encourage the behaviors I have wanted to see all along. Yesterday we were reading the novel Pobre Ana, and we read that Ana's family rarely eats carne (meat.) One of my students who rarely participates actively pointed out that this was just like the word carnivore. Instant extra credit point. I have another student who struggles with academics. He volunteered to translate the paragraph. I coaxed him through the paragraph, breaking it into easily digestible chunks and pointing out the definitions for him. When he finished, I had the class applaud him and I gave the class a point. Yet another student asked me what a word meant, and I was quick to give a point. Up until now students have been conflicted about asking for help. They know they need it, but they are embarassed to voice that in front of their peers. And now, they are helping the class by voicing it so the stigma is gone. Cool!

postcards

One of my goals this year is to do a whole lot more noticing kids or catching them in the act of doing what they're supposed to be doing. I actually got this idea from FLYLady last year and I loved it. I am writing notes home to parents for every child. Actually, I brought it up to my team and as a team we will be sending home at least three for each child over the course of the year. I am keeping track to make sure that every child gets recognized at least three times.

I like the idea that this is a concrete way to recognize each student at different times and to include the parents. So many times the only communication we have with parents is when a child is having problems - even when we are recognizing the kids at school.

absences and making up work

Right now my policy is that students must hand write a 100 word essay in Spanish, which incorporates vocabulary from the class they missed, for each day a student was absent.

I am wondering if perhaps I cannot set up a student blog where I post the stories from class with the highlighted vocabulary so that students have access at least to the written version of class and can get some comprehensible input from their absences.

I don't know how much effort it would take to make audio podcasts of the stories so that students can also hear the stories online. It wouldn't work if they had no computer access, but for the majority of my students the majority of the time this would give them some access to the classroom.

I just don't want to create endless work for myself that will have little educational impact.