what's the point?

In analyzing my student survey last week, I realized that I never explained to the kids why we were doing all these new activities in the beginning of class. I had set up a routine. On Monday and Friday we have Free reading, on Tuesday we have Free writing, and on Thursday we have Dictation. (We don't have normal classes on Wednesdays.) The students were doing the activities, and they had learned our new routines, but because they didn't understand the purpose behind them they were not getting the full benefit of the activities.

So, here's what I boiled down for them:

Free reading: We do this to improve our vocabulary in the language. We learn most of our vocabulary in our native tongue through reading. We also learn words much quicker through reading than through hearing them used. Another reason to read in the target language is because students begin to absorb the correct syntax and grammar as they see it in use. By reading for a set time without stopping to look words up or write anything down, we allow the brain to start absorbing the new language, without relying on the first language as that permanent crutch.

Free writing: Mostly, my purpose behind the free writes is to reduce anxiety and to get students in the habit of writing. There are several graded essays I have to give throughout the year. These are graded on length, grammar & conventions, verb conjugations, vocabulary usage, Organization (including using introducitons, transitions, conclusions and proper paragraphing), and content. If students are already used to writing in Spanish for a specific length of time, that is one less hurdle to jump when it comes time for these essays. Now they can focus specifically on the task at hand. Another minor point is that Free writes also give students something concrete to look at and measure their own growth. A student who began the year writing barely 13 words can look back at his or her portfolio and see that now he/she is writing 50 words in the same time frame.

Dictation: This is mostly to practice spelling, grammar and punctuation. The affective filter is low because students are not graded on what they do not know - they are graded on being able to correctly copy from the board. But because they have to first listen and write what they hear, it focuses their attention on the specifics of what they do know and what they need to learn in a very non-threatening way. I find that it is working much better than me trying to lecture students, or constantly correcting their spelling in an essay. Some of my lower students are now spelling words like "hay" correctly, even though a few months/weeks ago they may have spelled it "I."

I am taking away two points for me to learn from this activity: first I am reminded to explain my logic to the students - they need to know why we are doing something in order to fully buy into it and get the most benefit from it. Second I was forced to really look at my logic and why I was doing these activities. Yes, I had read about them on the TPRS listserv, or heard about them from colleagues, but that isn't why I was incorporating them into my class.

Visual Learners

I teach a lot of right-brained visual thinkers. One of the things that was most attractive about TPR and TPRS to me initially was how right-brained friendly they are.

Currently I am reading Right-brained Children in a Left-brained World by Jeffrey Freed. I 've had a lot of thoughts about how his ideas mesh with TPRS, but haven't spent much time considering it in detail, mostly because I am reading the book in bed as I fall asleep. (I'm alternating that with El Hobbit - there's nothing quite like right-brained, Spanish speaking trolls running through your dreams, let me tell you!)

Anyway, Jeffrey Freed has a lot of tips on how to teach things that tend to be difficult to these students, like math facts or accurate spelling. One particular strategy jumped out at me as being very foreign language classroom friendly. The teacher and the student both have the same two words. They are competing to write the shortest sentence with those two words in it, and they must write their sentence correctly. I was thinking we could adapt that to having two teams in the class and relay race style have them come to the board, get their slips of paper with their two words, and write them on the board. A similar strategy I just ran across was a verb ladder game - there are two "ladders" drawn on the board and teams have to compete to fill in the conjugations of the verb until they have climbed the ladder.

one of the greatest inventions ever

I couldn't figure out how to keep my little color coded garage sale stickers on the spines of my books, but I took a hint from the school library. There are clear stickers that are designed specifically to hold the bar codes and other library stickers onto the books. I begged a roll from my friend, and my stickers have stayed ever since.

Now if only I could figure out a way to neatly redact the English out of all those really great, but bilingual books!