* Eyes, ears and brain on where the teacher has directed attention (the teacher, actors, a picture, a phrase, a reading)
* A signal when the student does not understand what is being communicated.
* A response when and how the teacher has indicated. This may be verbal or physical.
Required of the teacher:
* A clear explanation of the above and repeated reminders as necessary in a clear but kind manner.
* Honoring and celebrating when individuals or classes do the above.
* Clear, comprehensible TL during the lesson.
* Clear preparation of what responses are required and when.
* Consistent use of the gestures/indicators that have been taught as the lesson is orchestrated. (yes..pun intended)
A number of folks have great rules posted in their classrooms for students.These teachers teach the rules and use the rules. These work best when the teachers think about the needs of their own students and adjust/add rules as necessary. Some of these include (wording may vary):
Clear eyes on the teacher.
Listen and respond.
No language that isn’t part of the interaction.
Try to stay in (insert TL here)
The expectations are simple to state ….but involve scaffolded training and practice to use. The behavior of students according to these rules will also DIFFER from class to class, level to level and teacher to teacher.
Dialogue with teachers will help each of us to create the best wording and usage with our own students.
Now…these are the rules/expectations for the LESSON.
Rules/expectations for other classroom activities may differ.
(see the next post…if you’ve made it this far…)
What we, as teachers, need to think about, and add, bit by bit, step by step as we continue on down the road as CI teachers is what responses are needed from the class, how to teach them, how to elicit them and how to celebrate them. So much to think about…
What you see here is a compilation of comments from the MORETPRS listserv, TPRStalks, Ben Slavic’s blog, observations of other teachers and my own thoughts. I cannot stress enough how timely and important Sara’s question is for us as individual teachers this time of year AND in this season of language education as more and more teachers become interested in using
Comprehensible Input with their students. Teri has mentioned that we are getting closer to a critical mass of CI teachers and she is right. This issue of rules/expectations is crucial if we are to help teachers become CI teachers.
It is crucial if we are to convince departments to become CI departments.
Several of you expressed this so well: We need rules and we need expectations for our students in order to create an atmosphere that does the following:
a. allows and encourages each student to feel physically and emotionally safe, as a student and as a person.
b. allows the teacher to conduct the class and accomplish whatever leadership duties are important to the running of a safe school.
c. provides the maximum possible amount of Comprehensible Input each time the class meets.
d. facilitates both spontaneous and controlled interaction as often as possible.
When a teacher is first exploring the use of TPRS in the classroom, the conditions above are extremely beneficial, in fact nearly requisite, in order for successful CI based lessons to occur. The problem is that presenters are so often naturally gifted or extraordinarily experienced at creating these conditions. Not to mention the fact that the class during a presentation is made up of attentive language teachers!! (well…not always, but that is another story!)
There is also so much to see and take in, that when we first are starting out that we often only focus on what we the teachers should do in order to make a CI lesson happen. We have to figure out what story-asking looks like, how to make circling really happen, how to elicit responses, what to do with them when we get them, how to PQA, what to do with reading, how to work it in with what we already do…etc. etc. etc.
A piece has been missing and Sara has just pointed it out quite clearly.
Question #1: HOW DO WE TRAIN OUR STUDENTS TO BE TPRS STUDENTS?
a. They need to understand that a CI lesson is an INTERACTIVE lesson.
Many of them have never seen one…or haven’t since kindergarten….Here is a sample script:
“I am going to do or say something that will encourage your brain to acquire (insert L2 here). I will make it clear if one or all of you will respond, and what you should do in response.”
And then we have to live up to that promise. It will take a little time, but when it is clearly outlined, and clearly executed, with love and patience, it is nearly flawless.
Many of you know that I use the analogy of an orchestra with my students. The class is the orchestra. I am the Maestro. I will indicate if the entire orchestra is responding, one section, or if there is a soloist. If I don’t, there will be mess of noise. The students will attempt to play with insufficient guidance until one by one the give up drift into their own little conversations and activities.
You can follow Carol Gaab’s model on this. She clearly gestures exactly when she wants the response to happen so that wait/think time occurs. She may use a prop or a hand signal. Her entire body is poised and alert and frozen signalling “Wait for it, wait for it…NOW!” and the class responds.
You can follow Blaine’s model on this as well. Blaine’s signal is verbal…”Clase”….precedes the question and the entire class responds. “Princesa”…precedes the question and the class knows that Princesa will be responding. He inserts one individual response in sea of class responses and they know that they need to pay attention. If he doesn’t get the response that he wants, he lovingly chides them by saying, “Claaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaase” with the occasional “Es obvio” and the class/orchestra is brought back in to play.
Teach.
Practice.
Reteach as necessary.
Not language: expectations and behavior.
In a CI classroom, language is acquired and behavior is learned.
The good news is that many of us have had years of experience in how to get kids to learn. All of the skills that we thought we helping them w/ language we can now use in order to help them learn the behaviors that they need in our rooms in order to be able to interact with us and with the language in order to acquire it.
So, for a CI-based lesson, whether it centers around PQA,discussion, story-asking or reading, our students must learn how to interact. We must teach them what is required, require what is required, and reteach when they are not giving us what is required.
This was written in response to request from a teacher who had written her with classroom management struggles. The teacher felt that her best day had been when she brought in candy as a reward. She didn’t want to continue that practice, but was desperate to find something that works.
My heart goes out to anyone struggling with classroom management. At one time we have all had a group or groups that made us want to tear our hair out…..and praying for the magic formula to make a group ‘work”….or at least not be the stuff our nightmares are made of. We try any number of approaches…..including attempts to win them, or at least their behavior, with rewards like candy. If you haven’t been there, at least once, you’ve lived a blessed teaching life.
There is no magic bullet, no simple answer, but this teacher and I can tell you that candy is not the answer. Candy works only when it makes a rare occurrence…..and it is presented as a gift. “I thought about you today and brought this to show you my appreciation of your spirit and willingness to be a part of this class.” This is love. This has nothing to do with classroom management.
When candy is a reward it can lead to an ever-escalating “Me me !!” situation. What happens when a teacher can not afford candy, when the principal says no candy, when students start to get angry because it isn’t their favorite candy, etc.? In my case it turned into bitter and angry and resentful feelings IN ME!!! because they were ungrateful….when in reality I had set them, and myself, up for it by bribing.
Classroom management is so hard. It once was governed by clear rules and boundaries, parental and administrative support, and a general respect for the institution and adults.
None of those things are guaranteed today and it truly is about the relationships in the classroom.
THE most influential relationship is the relationship that each student has with him/herself. If the student values himself enough to want to have self-control (even if it is hard to attain) the student has the most valuable tool in the toolbox.
The most important relationship in our classroom is our relationship with our students. Whenever possible treat them with love, with love, with love. When we do that, and make our decisions because of that, everything else comes much more easily. When students know that a teacher cares about them, more than anything else, they are willing to collect and use tools in the toolbox. Caring about our students will not, however, eliminate our challenges.
The next most powerful relationship is between the student and the language. When that is strong and positive, discipline problems virtually disappear. But that takes time, and the erasing, for many students, of many years of negative conditioning about school and language “study.” That is why, as Susie so often says, “Success is the best motivator.” They need to know, and to see, that their tools, and skills work!
The next most powerful is the relationship between the students themselves.
Again, they come to us with their own histories and we must handle what already exists. We could try to make them “behave” a certain way because they like us as teachers, but in middle school and high school, the opinion of peers FAR FAR FAR outweighs the opinion of any adult. What we can do is to establish very clear boundaries about the language, facial expressions, gestures and interactions that we believe will help to create a positive relationship among our students.
The least important relationship is the one between the teacher and the language. Sadly, in many rooms around the world this is the strongest relationship in the classroom. Our passion for the languages and cultures so dear to our hearts is a lovely thing….but it is OURS. Not our students’.
It should be our tool that we use to help strengthen the relationships above.
How does this help with classroom management? Make a list of what you do as a teacher to “manage” your classes. Which category do they fall into? The most energy and effort should go into the first two categories….finding ways to connect students with the language (using CI +P) and helping students to be safe with each other. By conducting ourselves in the most caring, professional way possible in the relationship with have with our students, and by not letting our own interests in a topic erase our efforts to connect kids with language, with each other and with us …we can really improve our classes.
In time. In our own way. In small steps. In a way that allows for dignity.
With patience. With optimism. With appropriate boundaries. With consequences.
By being honest. By being appreciative. By being kind. By being responsive.
The final piece of the puzzle is to continually focus on my students as people who are acquiring language, not students fulfilling requirements under my watch. I do not need to know all of the personal details of their lives, but I do try to remember that they have lives. In a few short years, they will be out in the world working with my future grandchildren, helping my generation to pay for retirement, defending our country, earning a living and each of them already affects a world of folks around them.
I try to remember to ….
Treat each student as if he or she has the potential to change the world.
Because they all do.
I’m not sure that that answers all of Laura’s questions, or yours…so keep in touch.
In the last 5 years I have required less and less homework…and instead grade all in-class assigments.
Inspired by research and exhausted by the battles which always seem to accompany homework, I have chosen to actively and clearly offer as little as possible. When I give homework (usually one day per week if it is a 5 day week) I make sure that it is accessible from the Internet and easy to do without help.
My students have NOT learned nor acquired any less. In fact, they spend MORE time outside of class using Spanish. They actively listen to music and watch programs in Spanish or read online in Spanish because it interests them. Yes…even in my little rural district. Parents often report siblings speaking to each other in Spanish at home.
By de-emphasizing homework I have eliminated several things:
a) an ENORMOUS battleground where no one ever won a battle nor a war.
b) frustration over who did it and who didn’t.
d) students entering class a failure before class even starts.
I can also frequently remind students that when we use class time well, I can continue to keep homework to a minimum.
Now, before TPRS, this really didn’t seem possible. What progress students made, they made because of the ‘memorization’ that took place via those assignments. Homework really appeared to make the biggest difference in gains.
With TPRS, those output activities are just a little decorative icing on the cake. A little goes a long way. It may go “against’ the “traditional” approach….but it has been working for my students for over a decade, so I’m sticking with it!
A reader asked a number of great questions on a post where I wrote about NOT using participation points. I will try to address some of them here.
How do you get there?
Which system do you have that replaces participation points that works?
How do you deal with discipline (attitude, absences, English)?
Which is the social contract you have with your students and parents?
How did you reach this social contract?
How do you enforce the rules that make daily living (la convivencia) possible?
Below is the contract that I created to address these issues. When I have an administration that requires a signature, I’ll collect that. Our Dean of Students and Principal have a copy. A copy is on my website and a copy is sent home to parents.
The key to this, however, is taking time the first week of school to address each point below:
Your Rights and Responsibilities
1. You have a right to be treated as an individual who interesting, capable, and important.
You have a responsibility to treat others the same way.
2. You have the right to a positive learning environment every day.
You have the responsibility to learn and accomplish something positive every day.
3. You have the right to be informed about the academic and personal goals of this course and your progress towards
those goals.
You have the responsibility to complete the class work and homework designed to help you achieve these goals and to monitor your progress.
4. You have the right to communicate with me in a respectful and appropriate manner about issues that affect you in class or in this building.
You have the responsibility to communicate with me whenever you have a problem, question, or concern about issues in this class, or your achievement in this class.
You have the responsibility to communicate if you, or anyone else, is in danger of physical or emotional harm.
These are posted in the room and referred to as necessary. We address them as “new information”, one per day the first week…IN ENGLISH…along with any number of team-building and get-to-know-you activities in Spanish.
I address infractions to the above immediately and directly…although not always publicly. A one-to-one conversation often goes a long way. The first two are the most important. As the teacher,
I have the final say if there is disagreement on what kind of behavior falls “outside of the lines”. I briefly mention and discuss “boundaries” so that students understand that there is a need to have lines drawn for appropriate/inappropriate behavior.
What we allow, we encourage.
The first few weeks with a new teacher, it is the students’ job to find out exactly what that teacher will allow. For example: talking when the teacher is talking, writing on other students and/or their belongings/desks etc., arriving late to class, not engaging in class activities, pretending to not know anything, sarcasm, mean remarks, making fun of others, inappropriate clothing, not doing homework, passing notes, texting, eating and drinking in class………………………………………..
I don’t take it personally when students test the boundaries. As adolescents, that is what they are wired to do. They want to know how I will handle trouble when it comes. They need to know that they can trust me to keep the classroom a safe place. Ironically, it is the “troublemakers” that need to know this the most. Many of them are extremely bright and knowing where the boundaries are is how they function. Many of them have learned survival skills outside of the classroom and want to know from the beginning which of those skills they will need to survive this venue. Some of them have a reputation to uphold. If I am consistent about the rules, their classmates will not look to them to act up. If I am NOT consistent, then it becomes their role to see what I’ll be like today. They learn by watching adults….and each other. Adults who are inconsistent become playthings and entertainment. I let them know up front that we have other things to do.
So…Step 1: The Rules and Responsibilities
Step 2: Identify the Boundaries and Stand Firm
Step 3: Offer the Better Option….Calmly.
Step 4: “Conduct” the Class
I tell students that this class is much like a band/chorus/orchestra and I’m the Maestro. I literally “conduct” the class. They need to follow my words, facial expressions, gesture etc. and respond appropriately. The first piece we learn is the “Signal” (check out the post below)
I take my job as Maestro seriously and choose my activities (pieces) carefully based upon the strengths, interests and abilities of the students. From Day 1, I make it clear that I have chosen everything for THEM. Not because it is next in the book, what the other classes are doing, I think it’s cool, it makes me look good or another group liked it. For THEM. I choose activities which I know that my students will enjoy and will be successful at.
Every day for the rest of the year, I keep those rules and responsibilities in mind. I know that we will need to review them regularly.
Here is a key element in our program: Creating readings/stories/conversations around THINK/FEEL/SAY/DO.
In a story characters will THINK, FEEL, SAY AND DO things. The first structure is something that Earl SAYS, “I need to tell you something.” The beauty of it is that it immediately implies a feeling. Earl NEEDS to. AND a future action: TELL. This is a seriously powerful structure.Not all structures are this powerful…especially in the lower levels. For example, I choose the structure “wants to eat”. That is what Earl FEELS. It will help things flow if my next structure is not about feeling. So I could choose….
Earl wants to eat.
If I need to park on “wants to” I can stay there for a long long time…but if I want to move on (for any number of reasons) I need to pick another structure.
THINK Earl thinks about his favorite food………….or
FEEL Earl is really hungry………..or
DO Earl goes to SuperWalmart……….
ALL of which are now connected to the first structure and make sense. Truthfully, teaching beginning students is such a challenge. Their language pool is pretty shallow…it’s hard to dive in deep!! Using the THINK, FEEL, SAY, DO model really helps.
Darn good question. I look for/try to create activities. I’ll base them on previous successes, find them on other people’s blogs and posts, borrow from a colleague’s brilliance, get an idea in the shower and I a constantly utilizing the Internet for interesting tidbits of stories, songs, headlines etc. I try to keep the majority of the activities geared toward the focus topic (like food for next marking period), but I’m not married to that. I keep this checklist in my head and review it to verify four things:
a) Is this activity GOOD CI or unavoidable output?
b) Is this activity going to connect with my students?
c) Is this activity connected to a function or too powerful to ignore?
d) Is this activity helping my students to develop/work on a variety of these functions/skills?
If so, then it is probably a worthwhile way to spend classroom time. Then I get feedback from the students. Sometimes it is feedback that I just observe; although I have learned to give an activity two or three tries before abandoning it. Some ideas just need to catch on. :o) However many times, because the students have gotten used to how I work, they speak right up. How long are we going to do this? Can we do more tomorrow? We’re not done with this are we? Can we do this again? And yes…I do get constructive criticism as well!!Is it standards-based? Yes….look at the functions…they hit all of the standards. But the functions work better for the way my mind works.
How do I plan long-term? Well…the same way anyone does. I put my plans on the computer.
Then I have the privilege of deciding whether what I planned five months ago has any bearing on where my students are now and what they need. If it does…proceed! If not…adapt!! Planning long-term gets my goals in order. Teaching short-term gets my students connected to the language. I need a little of the former and a lot of the latter.
How do I evaluate? Like I’ve always evaluated. By skills. Listening, Reading, Writing, Speaking.
How do I fit in all of the topical vocabulary? I don’t. No one does. If they say that they do ,then they are doing one of more of the following:
a) Providing lists and asking students to work with them outside of class in some way.
b) Using too many of them too quickly for any significant long-term retention to occur.
Hence the never-ending frustration of “teaching” students who never remember anything that you have “taught”.
So I choose a core list of words that will help them to be understood and focus on those as production tools first. (another post….)
The truth is (I seem to be writing that phrase a lot this week!!) that IN REAL LIFE a variety of vocabulary occurs. So believe it or not, the organic nature of language provides what they need.
It really does. I am beginning to see this more and more. I am also able, in the level 2/3 to play a little bit with language. For example in this last marking period we did several activities using a huge list of cognates that end in -ion. Short activities that affirmed their ability to recognize and use cognates. It really was a confidence booster for them and I have seen these words appear over and over again in the students’ work.
(Originally posted 11/15/10)
This is a response I posted on moretprs about my own personal journey with assigning homework.
Several people asked if I could put it here so….here it is. ;o)
1st year teaching: I thought that students loved me and loved my class so much that they would do the homework before class ended!
5th year teaching: I thought that although not everyone loved me or my class, at least they all wanted good grades so they would do the homework by the due date.
10th year teaching: I thought that although they might not like me nor my class, nor care about their grades, that their parents did and would MAKE THEM do the homework and hand it in on time.
15th year teaching: I thought that although they might not like me nor my class, nor care about grades that their parents might and COULD make them do the homework and hand it in if they wanted to.
20th year teaching: My own children were getting so much (ludicrous and unnecessary) homework that a) I didn’t have time to correct my students’ homework and b) I began to wonder if it accomplished anything anyway….
25th year teaching: My own children didn’t like some teachers, saw little purpose in homework assignments and I had already tried (and failed) to get them to do homework by grounding, punishing and several other measures. I saw that they did do homework under two different scenarios: a) the teacher publicly taunted them or humiliated them when work was not done b) the work was interesting, engaging and actually helped them to learn/understand something about the topic. I stopped giving work that was only done at home. Instead I began to collect the work that students did IN CLASS.
28th year teaching: Both sons are in very good colleges and receiving scholarships. I continue to give assignments that are done in class. NOTHING I EVER GAVE FOR HOMEWORK INCREASED LONG-TERM MEMORY OF TERMS OR STRUCTURES. It also never taught one single student to be more accountable or responsible….that was a myth that I attempted to perpetuate for two decades.
(yes…Alfie Kohn uses the term “myth” and I think he has it right…I’ve kept data on my students to “prove” it for administrators)
Are my students responsible? I think so…although you can ask the folks who have come in to observe me in the past five years if you would like a less-biased approach. They show up, get to work, work for as long as I ask them to and work well. They don’t bad-mouth each other, keep the room cleaner than I do and I rarely ever have a student skip class.
Are they scoring well on state tests? So far…very well. I have shifted levels this year so I can give you a better idea of that at the end of June.
Are they “life-long” learners? Are they staying in the program? Without a doubt. Since beginning with TPRS and stopping routine daily homework assignments we have maintained a 20 -25 % retention rate through level 4 (which would be higher if we could get scheduling issues worked out…) and have launched a half dozen Peace Corp participants and an equal number of language teachers…surprising considering our size. More importantly..to me anyway…is the number of students who have gone on to study language in college and participate in study abroad programs.
Even without homework.
Now..having said all of that…each of us should feel free to run our classrooms as we deem appropriate given the knowledge and experience that we have. We should be free to challenge our OWN policies at any time. The world is changing nanosecond by nanosecond. It’s hard to keep up.
We are all doing our best.
So it’s Day 5 in my room. This year I am teaching Levels 2,3 and 4. (The nomenclature is a bit deceiving; Level 2 students are in HS Level 2, which is actually their 3rd full year of study) My student teacher and I feel like we should be “going somewhere.” You see, we had a weekly plan.
Then that weekly plan was broken down into daily plans.
Every single day we have had to move things (that didn’t get done) to another day. The “things we haven’t gotten to yet” list seems to be getting longer …and longer…and longer…. So I really had to sit down this afternoon to see where we are…and where we ARE going. Normally this doesn’t bother me much. But this is a new curriculum for me (Levels 2/3) so I don’t have my bearings yet.
Besides, my student teacher has a supervisor to report to who does not have a lot of experience with CI-based classes…so I want to be able to “translate” our curriculum to him.
It’s a bit ironic…only 5 days in and it feels like we should have gone farther. :o) At best we’ve only had 3 1⁄2 hours of contact time. From that we can deduct time for attendance, transitions, setting up the seating chart, discussion the course expectations, a fire drill, phone calls from the office, morning announcements etc. etc. etc. An optimistic estimate would be that we’ve had 2 1⁄2 hours of instructional time. From that we can deduct time to give directions, pass out and return papers, give a short “quiz”, clarify answers, check for materials, etc. etc. etc. Now we are down to about 2 hours of interaction in the TL. Total.
When I went back over our weekly plan, I looked carefully at what we have been doing. In that time we have discussed the situation of the miners in Chile, explored what students did over the weekend, read an “email’ from a “former student” who went to the VMAs in LA, sang a goofy song with IR in the past tense, started to dig deeply into the song Aqui Estoy Yo (Luis Fonsi, David Bisbal, Neil Sedaris and Alex Syntek), revisited a few of our favorites from Sr. Wooly, and spent some time getting to know each other via introduction letters and conversation.
Wow.
Why on earth then does it feel like we haven’t “gone” anywhere!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
I think, and I could be wrong, so I’ll be paying attention to this as the year goes on……that it doesn’t “feel” like a lot because we have worked hard to connect all of the activities. The structures used to discuss the weekend were the same ones that we used to understand and talk about the Video Music Awards. Several of them came from the song, and we used other phrases from the song to take attendance (Aqui estoy yo..es obvio!) Structures connect activities to each other and allow students to connect their thoughts and emotions to the activities themselves. When the students connect with the activities, they begin to connect with each other. Time flies. It “feels” like we haven’t “done” anything.
We have physical evidence that a lot has been done: papers, powerpoints, stories, letters, even a couple of grades in the gradebook. Yet, apparently, none of it felt like “work.” If it did, we’d feel more productive. I’m glad I sat down to take a look at it. I feel much better now.