Last Wednesday, we did our first MovieTalk (yes, still calling it this because I have no intentions or expectations of students acquiring specific vocab, and that’s peachy according to Dr. Ashley Hastings’ 2018 note to teachers who were misinterpreting the method). Believe it or not, but Wednesday’s MovieTalk has been the *ONLY* story so far. Yep. Other than that, no stories. With student interviews (i.e. Discipulus Illustris/Special Person), discussions based on a simple prompt (i.e. Card Talk), and questions about the weekend and upcoming week (i.e. Weekend & Week Chat), class has been compelling enough without any narrative. But stories are awesome, and we have a ton of other MovieTalk texts already prepared for every other week, so I’m thinking now is a good time to get into collaborative storytelling…
Continue readingteaching proficiency through reading and storytelling
Collaborative Storytelling: Embedded Readings
At iFLT 2019, Michele Whaley shared a way to write bottom-up embedded readings together as a class. While many fun collaborative storytelling methods and strategies involve dramatic participation, I’m always searching for new ways to ask a story that doesn’t involve acting. Michele certainly delivered with this new take on an already very familiar process…
Continue readingReading LLPSI, Teaching NONE of it!
I first adopted more realistic expectations of students after understanding how languages are acquired. This was within the first few months of teaching in my first job, so I was lucky; some have never had that opportunity. However, I was still trying to apply what I learned to a textbook program still focused on grammar, so it was a rocky start to any comprehension-based and communicative approach, to say the least. Despite what some might claim, CI and grammar just don’t mix. That is, whenever we decide to teach grammar, even for legit reasons, students are likely not receiving CI.
Continue readingCompelling Diversion Vocab Packs!
Would you believe that fūr, Latin for “thief,” is among the most compelling words used in class? The moment a student spontaneously yells out that word, there’s an immediate conflict—a problem to solve. This is gold for comprehension-based and communicative language teaching (CCLT), especially for collaborative storytelling/storyasking!
Continue readingCollaborative Storytelling Strategies
Mike Peto is so great at painting a picture of his teaching through writing. Here’s a collection of strategies inspired by his post on One Word Images (OWI) that come in handy during any collaborative storytelling (e.g. TPRS, OWI, and other activities without names):
Storyasking Templates & Workflows: Some Structure
I’ve been experimenting with more structure to storyasking. No doubt, I’m a bit rusty after a year teaching classes just 1x/wk, and for which I asked the first and only story on the final day of classes! Prior to that, it had been over a year and a half since I regularly asked stories, which itself wasn’t frequent given the oppressive teaching environment—ēheu! Here are supports that have proved quite useful in helping me get back into the swing of things. But first, what makes good storyasking?
Choice, not Chaos!
A lot of teachers try asking too many open-ended questions that leave students at a loss. The easiest stories to ask include some choice, but not so much that everything feels off the rails. Teachers who attempt the latter, bail quickly. The key is finding the right balance between personalization and control. Experienced storyaskers can release a lot of control over to students, mostly because they have a higher chance of being comprehensible, and the students are more mature, knowing what to expect. Less-experienced storyaskers, or those in particular creativity-resistant contexts, like mine, would benefit from having more structure. The following supports have been helpful in reawakening imagination, something all great stories benefit from, and which most grade students have forgotten about/lost by the time they get to high school, sadly. Give them a try…
Diversity-Positive Quālitātēs, Word Wall, Super Clear Classroom Cognates, TPR Wall & Chair Stations
My new room down the hall is just about set up. I’ve kept things from last year that really helped, ditched things that didn’t, and introduced some new things I felt I was missing.
Taking a cue from the diversity-positive practices Anna Gilcher and Rachelle Adams shared at NTPRS a couple years ago, I now have a bunch of qualities at the ready. I’m looking forward to having deeper characteristics other than the baaaaaasic small animal that’s smart and pretty. We can do better than that, right? So, the next time we ask develop a character, either by itself during One Word Image (OWI), or in a story via Teaching Proficiency through Reading and Storytelling (TPRS), I’ll ask if they’re sociable, or quiet…honest, or curious…observant, or courageous, etc. Here are my quālitātēs:
The Problem with Non-Targeted, Targeting 1, and Targeting 2
In 2013, Stephen Krashen wrote an article, The Case for Non-Targeted, Comprehensible Input, about the problems of the traditional “rule of the day” grammar syllabus. Krashen not only wrote how this “targeted” grammar and vocabulary has disadvantages, but also how TPRS reduces such problems, even ending the section with:
“Although TPRS probably succeeds in reducing the problems of the grammatical syllabus, there is another possibility: Non-targeted comprehensible input.”
At this point, it appears that the “targeted” nature of TPRS and non-targeted are—probably—on par, and that it’s really just an option of what appeals to you…
CI Sects
If conventional language teaching is grammar-translation, then we’re all somewhat a group of heretics! Still, there are so many sub groups of CI that it warrants a bit of elucidation. At some point, John Bracey and I were talking about if either of us just started discovering CI right now, we’d have NO IDEA what to do or where to begin. Here are descriptions of all the different CI groups I’ve observed over the past 5 years already in existence, or just emerging:
Comprehensible Online 2018 Takeaways
In its debut year, Comprehensible Online offered a different kind of PD, allowing participants to watch as many presentations over three weeks as they could from their computers and phones. #pdinpajamas was trending for many teachers sneaking in loads of PD from the comfort of their own home. In fact, I was able to watch most videos during my part-time job (shhh)!
Like other conference takeaways, I’ll consult this post over the years, and the info will be here to share with all. I have a code system to help me spot new things to try, and others to update. High-leverage strategies I consider “non-negotiable” for my own teaching are “NN.” Strategies to update or re-implement are “Update!,” and those I’d like to try for the first time are “New!” I encourage you to give them all a try. Here are the takeaways from some of the presentations I got to, organized by presenter:
Magister P. 