Teacher in Development

I’ve got a 5 year old and a 1 year old (almost.) Aside from playing with lots of toys, my wife and I are often subjected to TV shows for kids. (The TV shows are a love/hate relationship. as I’m sure any parents out there can identify with.)

One of my favorite shows is called Pinky Dinky Doo.  I like the program for a variety of reasons, but one in particular that I’d like to share with you.

Go ahead and visit the site - if you’re an ESL teacher I think you’ll see some pretty interesting things you can do and model in your classroom from this program. The website (link above) has lots of cool resources, and even some full episodes of the show. Go ahead and watch one.

What to look for: How the program teaches new vocabulary words.

Key things to notice:

1. The show works on one new vocabulary word.

2. That vocabulary word is repeated many times.

3. (and my favorite) The new vocabulary word is linked to the sound of a trumpet just before the characters say it. This helps you pay attention and notice it.

4. There’s regular review.

What ESL Teachers could Learn:

1. Adults could likely handle more than one vocabulary word per class, but we should really be careful to limit the number of new words we introduce. Maybe you’ll feel good…and *gasp* some students will feel good if you dump a truckload of vocabulary on them each class, but you should ask yourself a few things: truckloads are great for stats, but have your students really taken them on board? Are they successfully using those truckloads of words in their everyday conversations in English? (My bet is no.)

If they are not using those new words…I think you’re just wasting your time. (And theirs.)

Instead, ESL teachers should limit the number of words introduced each class/week/month. The smaller the list, the greater opportunity you will have to help students "own" them. (Owning a word is when that word becomes a part of the speaker’s vocabulary. They know what it means, and can and do use that word in everyday conversation.)  

 2. Vocabulary ownership is linked to repetition. When you know what a new word means, repeating it over and over again will help the "ownership" process take place. I often think of how my oldest son learned new words. He’d repeatedly ask me what something was….I mean like ten, fifteen times. (I remember actually getting worried a few times…like am I doing this wrong, he keeps asking me the same thing over and over again.)

I think we need to make sure we have room in our lessons for vocabulary repetition. Reuse and Recycle those words to death! The only way this will work well is if you respect the first point: big long word lists don’t get repeated - except on tests and then they are quickly forgotten after.

3. The trumpet point is what got me thinking about this post in the first place. I have a 40 something adult male in one of my classes. He’s just starting out with English, and well..things move rather umm…slowly with this guy. He tries his best, and is genuinely interested in developing his English skills, but he’s just one of those people who don’t have the gift of languages. (I linked to Steve Martin in the Pink Panther when he was trying to say "I want to buy a hamburger")And well…Steve Martin’s performance makes me almost cry from laughter…and totally reminds me of my student at times.

My student’s worst nightmare is saying (and hearing) the difference between "e" and "i". (Aside:This is one of the most frequent difficulties for Spanish speakers learning English -at least in Mexico.) We’ve been doing the Martin routine around these two letters for the past month or so, with little progress. We review it over and over again, but it just doesn’t seem to stick. Then I pulled a Pinky.

As I was trying to think of a way to help this guy learn what we’ve been working on, I started thinking about how Pinky worked with new words, and I thought…well…I’ve got to try it!

Everytime we’d spell a word that had "e" or "i", I’d do the trumpet sound (of course I explained where it was coming from and everything.) Surprise, surprise! It actually worked! Now the guy even makes the sound himself before he comes to his problem letters.

Yes, he still makes a few mistakes, but they are much fewer. It caught on so well, that the more advanced student in this class (don’t you think mixed level courses are difficult??) started to do it with a word she was finding hard to remember. (All on her own, without help from me.)

What do you think? Have you ever tried to pair a vocab word with a strange event or sound in your classes? It’s great for a laugh, and actually seems to work with adults, as well as kids.  

The Speed Link:
Business English teacher? I just came across a website that you may find of use in your classes.

bnet (The go-to place for management)
Key areas: Management, Strategy, Insight, Business Library, Work Life.
www.bnet.com

Tapping You
I’m working with the Operations Director of a multi-national insurance co. The company is from Europe, but its local team members (in Mexico)are from all over Latin and South America, which is creating a very…shall we say  “interesting” work environment.  Do any of you have any resource links that you’d like to share that speak to managing culturally diverse work teams?

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Power Point is one of the most common business communication tools in use today. 90% of my clients use it at least once a week, and I bet many of your Business English students do too.

If you’re interested in doing some classwork around Power Point, I would like to share some links with you that you may find helpful. (These articles would work best for intermediate to advanced level classes.)

 Cliff Atkinson has a wonderful article bank around developing strong powerpoint presentations. Take special note of the Science of PowerPoint Overload article, it has some very interesting data.

sociable media // articles by Cliff Atkinson

 The 10/20/30 Rule of Poweroint - by Guy Kawasaki

This one has become standard reading material when I do this kind of work - it’s simple, short, and very easy to explain.

Really Bad Power Point - by Seth Godin 

My growing collection of links on delicious:

http://del.icio.us/aaronN/powerpoint  (Feel free to post links to me!)

What you could do with this:

 1. Read the stuff before. Lots! Become familliar with the ideas and concepts. Realize that there could be some flexibility with the "rules"

2. Ask your students to present their stuff to you as they normally would - take mental and paper notes: How do they compare with what you’re seeing from the above links?

3. Print off a few articles, I usually start with Kawasaki because it’s pretty simple, easy to understand…and short. Make enough copies for everyone in your class (make sure you include the link and credit)  and read through it a few times together.

4. If you have access to Youtube, hunt around for some presenters who follow these rules like Steve Jobs or Seth Godin. (Kawasaki has some stuff on his blog  ) Can you show your class some examples of the new style? (My clients have LOVED this.)

5. Do a make over on your student’s presentations - in English of course.

6. Flickr’s creative commons photos can make great visuals - and you should check out this great tool:  flickrstorm   (tip: use the advanced search option to look for creative commons copyrighted stuff)

Hope this helps you do some powerful Power Point work in class. How have you approached this topic?

Photo Credit:

Blogging 101 by Justin Russell

Via Explorations in Learning: Powerpoint and Sage vs. Guide explores some thought provoking research around the use of powerpoint as an education tool…primarily what not to do with Powerpoint.

So if you want to overload your students,  you simply should throw up some slides with lots of text, zero images, and read the slide text - word for word - to your class. I think you’ll be impressed with the effecient speed at which you can throw your student’s brains into flatline.

“…people don’t process the same information as effectively when it’s presented both verbally and in written form. With respect to Powerpoint, then, you don’t want to just read words off a slide.” (Nelson,Powerpoint and Sage vs. Guide )

If you use Powerpoint in your classroom, or in any other environment, you should take a peek at what this article has to say.

Some key points that I took away:

• Don’t read your powerpoint slides. Speak about them.
• Don’t speak and have audience read at the same time. (Maybe this goes against typical ESL classroom practice of having students read text out loud - what do you think? Are we overloading when we do this? very often Students say that they either focus on correct pronunciation to the expense of understanding what they are reading, perhaps this is explained by the overloading idea?? To fix this, we could just ask students to read silently and then talk about what they read?
• Give students the answers - reduces “memory load” and promotes learning. Grammar rules: I wonder if this would mean showing sentences with the grammar rule in action, and invite students to notice it??

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 Distance work via the internet has always been a point of great interest to me. For independent TESOL professionals, it just makes really good sense.

Increased flexibility that "instant" communication and connection offers. You could offer classes at hours when many other schools or teachers simply do not. I have a few students who want classes at times when I am normally in commute, or on my way to take my son to school, which means that they are not teachable - at least not by me, not  yet.

Reduce waiting time. Some students chronically arrive late. Wouldn’t it be a better use of time if you simply signed onto your Skype account, and then went about doing all the other things you needed to do while waiting for yours student to show up?

Reduced Cancelation Frustration. Skype would also reduce that terrible sensation of commuting to class only to have the group cancel as you pull into the company parking lot. With Skype you could feel the frustration in the comfort of your own home.

Skype Adoption = Steps towards a Greener Work Solution.  I don’t see myself as an environmentalist, but I am sure thinking more seriously about how I could be Greener in how I work. One way this could happen is if more of my classes were done over Skype. I think this is more wishful thinking at the moment, for a few reasons that I’ll get into in a moment, but Skyping to class instead of commuting to class….well…that would be a lovely thing. On good days I loose 2 hours in traffic, or in simply waiting for students to arrive. I can sure think of other things I could do with that time. But what about the traffic and pollution I help create by driving my lovely car? Multiply that by the thousands of other ESL teachers in this city…would there be an impact? And what if a culture of telecommuting grew in acceptance throughout the city? Could there actually be some impact on environmental levels?  VOIP technology is on the increase here, and maybe as the years go by, "hotdesking" to class will become a stronger possibility.

I’ve never actually tried a Skype class. I’ve used it lots to stay in touch with my family in Canada, but never for work purposes. I find myself wondering about a few things:

1. Would Skype classes help teacher and student create the needed connections for language development to occur? We learn our first language (L1) from direct, face to face contact time with the people around us. We have eye, facial expression, touch, and emotional
contact with the people who help us learn the language. These contacts, I think, are vital to how well we learn the language. Could Skype, or any other online initiative, ever reach us on these levels in authentic ways? I don’t know.  I have a feeling that real face to face time is something we will never be able to distance ourselves from, and maybe we should never try.

2. There are difficult tech gliches like lag and video crashes. I often experience this when I get into long discussions with my family. I get echos of my own voice (weird…feels like I’m talking with myself through a long pipe sometimes.) but most difficult has been starting video chats. Very often we can only have one video screen open at a time, or we simply crash the conversation.  I’m not the first to mention this: TeacherDude
first got me thinking seriously about the difficulties in Skyping a class back in June 2006.

I think the only way Skype would fly well in the classroom would be if both teacher and student had high speed net connections with the right computer to handle it. These variables are likely the most difficult to balance out.

On Skypecasts
Just today I was reading through a post via Stephen Downes who comments on, and points to a very interesting read around this subject. Oddly enough, one of the major difficulties mentioned by VanDrimmelen, and I’ve heard this on other occasions too, are frequent interruptions by enthusiastic ESL learners wanting to practice their English. Go figure.

What do you think? Do you see telecommuting to English class (or any other class you teach) as a possibility in the days and months to come? Would you ever adopt it? Have you? What have been your experiences?
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Photo Credit
Telephone Boxes by malias
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Traffic by Sarah Jane
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So after reading  Assumptions have a Sell By date over at the Passionate Users blog, I got to wondering about the ideas, practices and assumptions that live inside the world of TESOL. I wonder just how many times we do things in the classroom just because it’s “the way things are done in the classroom.”

Have we, as Sierra so nicely puts it: “sniffed the milk” lately?  When was the last time we really sat down to examine the usefullness and the meaningfulness of our classroom practice? Are we really helping our students/clients with what we do? Is what we do based on updated thought and research, or have we just fallen into the well-worn paths that all other esl instructors have marched on before us?

Think about it a moment. I dare you. I have a sneaky suspicion that there are a lot of path walkers out there, and I include myself on these trails as well. Let me try out an example of a well worn path that I am trying my best to break off of: Non-authentic testing.

Non-authentic. You know: student/client finishes their unit work and we dish out an exam with fill in the blank answers that he/she should have memorized responses to. That could be vocabulary work, grammar exercises, etc. Most books these days offer built-in exams after each unit, making your life oh so easy - but the exams that I have experienced of this nature, have followed the classic memorize, memorize, memorize - then spill out format. Students usually do great on these things, but what do they really prove? How have your student’s english skills been impacted? Has their language use and on the job performance changed? I think we rarely can give a solid, affirmative answer to that.

Sniff-sniff - smells bad.  We need to check our assessment assumptions. Most testing that esl schools offer have gone bad. (Maybe they never were good to start with.)

What about the assumption of English class? Everybody “knows” that when you go to learn English, you have to do it inside the four walls of a classroom. (Meeting room, cafeteria, empty storage closet etc.) I don’t think the whole idea of this has gone bad, but I sure do think it could use a better container. Do 3 hour blocks of English time per week make a difference?  If students/clients are not encouraged to engage OUTSIDE of class, following something similar to an 80/20 ratio where 80% english learning is done by me OUTSIDE, and the other 20% is done in the classroom, then I think we’re dealing with something that has gone bad.

Sniff-sniff - yuck! Are those lumps in there!

We should all know that learning a second, third, fourth  language requires massive exposure to it. 3 hours a week kind of falls short of massive. I think it sorta falls into the “drip” category.  So what needs to change here: the way we work in the classroom. It shouldn’t be “feeding.” It should be equipping and inspiring.  By feeding, I mean WE - the teacher and our wonder books - are the source of language learning. Students are just passive receivers. Maybe we encourage them to talk, read, listen and write in class, but we fail to break out of our classroom walls. We fail to help them to “take it on” outside of class.

An updated learning experience would be helping your students/clients to find meaningful content - stuff that’s actually USEFUL and MEANINGFUL to their work or personal lives. The internet is a bank vault of rich content - podcasts can provide audio content to meet almost any listening requirement. Help your students to connect to it. Teach them how to listen to it - but on their own. Same goes for reading. (Blogs, focused articles etc.) The idea is all about equipping here. Showing and teaching how they can do it on their own, and inspiring them to do it. I love reading AJ’s blog, he’s right in the middle of this sort of work for his own language learning. (http://effortlessacquisition.blogspot.com/)

Those are just a few assumptions that are out there, but if we took the time, I think we could come up with a big bucketfull in need of careful consideration. What do you think? Are we doing “smelly” things just because it’s the way everyone else has done it before us?

Consider this: “It’s not enough to “sniff the milk.” We have to recognize that some of
the things which we believe are part of the fabric of our universe
might just be milk in disguise.”(Assumptions have a sell by date. Sierra)

Before I even begin, to all you experienced Carnival readers out there, I would like to apologize. This is my first time ever writing for a carnival, and I’m not quite sure I’m going to do it right.

 So with that little disclaimer out of the way, I’ll get started.

Perhaps I’m cheating a little bit here, but I would like to move our clocks back to June again. There have been some really interesting posts from last month that I would like to draw your attention to, comment on, and open the floor up to you.

Back in the last week or so of June, and into the first two weeks of July, there was a little "mini-buzz" in my bloglines account around Skype, and it’s possible uses in the ESL classroom.  I took special notice of these posts because of my own growing interest in employing such tools as Skype in my own practice as a freelance ESL teacher.

The first post comes from Teacher Dude’s Grill and BBQ: My first international lesson - First impressions. Teacher Dude does a really nice job of sharing his experience of employing Skype with one of his students. 

Though an avid tech in the classroom advocate and user, Teacher Dude discovers some pretty important obstacles to an effective deployment of Skype in his long distance class: The sound quality is still rather beta. This is ok if you’re talking with another native speaker, but what about students who usually need to hear the big picture in order to communicate effectively?  He also delves very nicely into the whole lag issue, that seems to crop up often when you’re involved in a long distance Skype conference with varied connection speeds and network conditions.

But the observation which Teacher Dude makes at the end of his post is what I really thought to be interesting: Are students in general ready to embrace Skype and other such tools, as a regular part of their English development?

A few days later, thanks to a comment left on my blog, I discovered Barbara over at Language Lab Unleashed.  Her post: Skype calls as assessment tools captured my attention.

There seems to be a great interest in authentic assessment these days, you know, the kind of assessment that requires your students to show understanding of what they learned, not just regurgitate memorized vocabulary lists or grammar rules. Barbara does an amazing job of deploying Skype and student blogs for this purpose.

What I learned from her, and what I hope to put into my own practice, is her focus on reflection. In most assessment, the test is given, it’s graded, and the results are returned to the student. But what happens then? Is it ever revisited? Barbara suggests that by posting their recorded Skype calls, "snapshots" (I really like that concept) on their blogs, "the brave ones" can return later to guage progress.  They can HEAR how they have grown over time. What do you think, isn’t this more valuable than a simple number on a feedback report?

I also really enjoyed her thinking around mistakes and perfection.

A few days later, Graham Stanley joined in the Skype in the Classroom conversation, and adds some valuable extras.  

Next Stop: AJ, of Effortless Language Acquisition, sounds off on Pain and Enjoyment in the ESL classroom. I whole heartedly agree with AJ: distance running has a lot of similarites with language learning. At least it should. I know plenty of students and teachers who are out there running full blast. They’re going for speed. They devour the course books. They cram the vocabulary lists. They immerse themselves in the grammar, attempting rapid language acquisition. Around Mexico City, some language schools boldly proclaim that you can be bilingual in a year - "Bam!" You can almost hear the starting gun firing somewhere in the distance, and thousands of eager language learners, victims of a marketing ploy, take off from their starting positions. But, as AJ asks, will they make it to the end?

Learning another language is not about speed. It’s not about quantity. It’s about QUALITY. How are you transforming your classrooms today by embracing this truth?  

To end today, I’d like to mention a post that I came across back near the end of June. Charles Nelson, and as far as I know we’re not related, writes about what to do when your students just don’t seem to "get it."  If it’d had been a snake, it would’ve bit me.  I enjoy reading Nelson’s blog, and this post offers something interesting to poder as we seek to transform our classrooms and teaching practices.

So often we are seeing things that our students or coworkers are not. Or sometimes the converse is true.  But Nelson asks an important question: How well are we "seeing what they see?" How well do we come along side in order to build bridges with the people we work with, or do we just stand on our side of perception and what is understood, simply shouting across the divide, trying to convice the other that they need to jump across.

You’ve likely experienced this. It’s frustrating for both you and your students, and it’s not very effective either.

So in this brave new 2.0, 3.0, 4.0 world of ours, I think it’s really important to be aware of the tools. I think it’s important to learn how to use them in our classrooms. But most of all, I think we need to learn, and practice the skill of getting on the same page as our students or coworkers. It’s pretty easy to find our spot on the "cutting edge" of what’s happening out there, but what good does it do anyone if we don’t learn how to share the view in a meaningful way?

So one of the big life changes I’ve been trying to deal with lately has been that I’m no longer working full time in an office. I’m now partly a freelance teacher who is trying his best to start up an English consulting business.  

I’ve been thinking about many things as I prepare myself for this venture. I’m working a business plan. I’m thinking about who I’m after, what sort of classes I’d offer, what that would look like, and where they should happen. I’m thinking about brochures and websites to help promote my services, and I’m talking with graphic designers who will help get a "look" for these services - business cards, website, brochures etc.

All this thinking has been leading me to reflect on exactly what I’m trying to offer a prospective client. What is my service, and how will I offer it? What is my USP? (Unique Selling Point.)

Ever since I started blogging, about a year ago now, my whole philosophy about teaching English has undergone, and is still undergoing, a very slow, but steady transformation.

If you talked to me in my pre-blogging days, I would have told you that my objective as a teacher of English was to form a strong relationship with my clients, and keep it that way. Success would be to keep your students for as long as you possibly can, ensuring your regular income and economic stability. Yes, student success mattered to me, but more than anything, my monthly paycheck was king. I think most English teaching companies subscribe to similar thinking: I get you to be my client for as long as I possibly can.

But all that has started to change for me, and I can link that change to this post by Will Richardson way back in September of 2005. This post got me thinking about what successful English teaching really is, and what it isn’t. Are you a successful teacher if you form a student/teacher relationship with the same person for years? Are you a successful English teaching company if you have the same clients, and the same students filling your classrooms for years?

 Economically, this is good. It’s safe. It’s predictable. You know that student "x" or company "y" will be with you for the long haul. That means regular money, and saftey.

But is this sort of practice really successful? Does the present, and very classic structure of ESL classrooms actually help its students succeed? Can fluency be achieved taking 1.5 hour blocks of English class month in and month out,  or are we wasting teacher and student time? (Not to mention money.)

Going back to Richardson’s post, and the discussion about what makes a successful English teacher, If  it’s not about building long-term relationships with students and clients, what is success as a teacher about?

The new thought that is slowly working its way into my life as a teacher: Teaching should be about equipping students so well that after a while you’re not needed that much anymore. One aspect of teaching success should be putting myself out of a job.  

I’m a regular reader and fan of AJ’s Effortless Acquisition blog. A few days ago he posted something that just resonated with me, and all that I’ve been pondering as I prepare to launch out more on my own: Small Is Oh So Beautiful

I really like his ideas:

"Students too fall into a kind of hypnosis when they enter a class. Its like they walk through the door and automatically surrender their autonomy and responsibility to the authority figure." (Small Is Oh So Beautiful. AJ.)

Autonomy and responsibility. That’s pretty important isn’t it? Teachers, in general, are well versed in their responsibilities as teachers. We know that we need to plan our lessons. We know we need to be responsible to come prepared for our classes. We know we can’t depend on anyone else to do our teaching for us. But how much do students take on this type of thinking? How often do they, through years of "school training," come into class thinking as empty vessels that need to be filled by the teacher? How often do they expect their teacher to teach them English?

Sure there is a major role for the teacher to play here, that is obvious. But I think we may have swung too far in this direction. I think I need to change the way I teach. Instead of the usual focus on vocabulary, grammar, conversation etc, I should be spending more time teaching my students HOW THEY can and should be working on their English outside the class, and on their own.

"Small is beautiful. And the smallest possible learning unit is ONE. That’s you- the learner. No one else. No teacher. No school. No authority figures to surrender to. No one else responsible for learning but YOU." (Small Is Oh So Beautiful, AJ)

 I think we need interaction to help process and refine what we learn. Teachers shouldn’t strive to create isolated language learners, but what does need to happen, and happen on a very deep level, is the spirit behind this quote from AJ; a spirit that burns with the idea that my success as a language student largely depends on me taking responsibility for what I learn.

And as I consider how my freelance practice will be, I find myself in 100% agreement with AJ’s closing  reflection about his own teaching in light of his self-study discoveries as he learns Spanish. "At this point, I can’t imagine returning to a traditional classroom– stuck in a desk listening to somebody give obtuse explanations about textbook grammar points. Ugh! Such a brain-antagonistic way to learn! So damn borin {…}In learning, small is indeed beautiful.

(This experience, by the way, is profoundly changing my thoughts about my role as a "teacher". I now think the best service I can perform for "my students" is to wean them off me until they are autonomous leaners. In other words, my job is to teach my student-customers how to fire me "(Small Is Oh So Beautiful, AJ)

That’s what I want to be about. Not creating life-long student-customers. Not creating dependent relationships. I want my freelance work to be risky in that I help the people I work with to not need me anymore.

And that ideal is now in my business plan: Success Condition: Student Fires me. Fired not because of bad service or poor teaching. Fired me because I did my job correctly, and effectivly equipped my student-customer with the skills they need to develop their English apart from me.

Perhaps we’ll still work together, but I see the relationship as something very different. It’s not about me feeding them everything they need. It’s not about me coming up with content and vocabulary words to dump in their laps. Now I think it’s about me coming along side as a true trajectory coach. Their journey is already in progress. They may just need some encouragement. They may just need some direction to keep moving in the right direction. They may just need to test out ideas about what they’re learning. The point is this: The interaction I’m seeing here, and I’d love to hear what you have to say about this, is no longer a long-term thing. It’s momentary and it’s empowering.

Shouldn’t this be how we describe our success as ESL teachers?  

In preparation for a Pro D session next week around the differences between L1(first language) and L2 (second language)learning, I’ve been reading a really interesting chapter from the Cambridge University TKT Course book.
 
The chapter dives into a discussion which highlights the major differences and similarities between how we learn our first language, and how we learn additional ones. In the end, it suggests the importance of recreating L1 conditions for L2 learners.

One of those conditions is that of motivation. L1 learners are usually very strongly motivated to learn. They "want and need to communicate." (Spratt, Pulverness, & Williams 48)

It’s about survival. It’s about interacting with my family, my friends, my world. It’s something that I must do, or I simply won’t survive very well.

But as I was reading this, I began to wonder about something: L1 motivation doesn’t seem to be a state of being that the learner switches on or off. He/she is just naturally in the "on" position.

I’m thinking here about my 3 year old son. We don’t need to pump him up to take in Spanish, which is his first language. He just soaks it in, or at least seems to, without any artificial goading or encouragement to be "turned on" to learning. He just does it. The motivation is internal…and seems to be quite automatic.

Is this because of his learning environment? Is it because the world around him is almost 100% Spanish? Is it because of survival that he is strongly motivated to learn and produce Spanish?  

On the other hand, English, which is his second language, does not come so easily. My wife and I try to speak English as much as we can with him at home, and he understands most everything we say to him. However, compared to L1, the L2 process has not been the same.

His motivation to learn English is much different, and doesn’t seem to regularly come from within. Most of the time, my wife and I need to strongly encourage him to speak in English. It doesn’t seem to just come naturally.

In fact, at times there is even active resistance to producing and exposing himself to the language. He usually wants to watch his movies in Spanish. He specifically asks us to stop speaking in English, and speak Spanish with instead. He listens and understands you speaking to him in English, but responds in Spanish. (That happens a lot, and causes quite a stir when we’re in public.)

So what’s going on with the motivation? The times when he has willingly used English has been during play.

The other day, we were sitting on the stairs outside our apartment. In fact, we were locked out, and were waiting for Mommy to return with the keys. To fight boredom we started a game of "I spy with my little eye."

He already knew the game in Spanish, so when I started it in English, he was instantly engaged with the activity. He recognized the tune of "I spy with my little eye, something that is…" and became a willing participant. We played this game for a good 45 minutes, all in English. He even learned how to say the whole "I spy" bit, and with nearly perfect pronunciation.

I have also tried to insert English into playing with his toys. Sometimes I sit down and play along with him. Cars, horses, dinosaurs, Spiderman, and Batman. Instead of interacting with him in Spanish, I try to use the toy to talk with him in English. Most of the time he naturally responds in Spanish, to which I reply: "What did you say? I don’t understand Spanish Mr. Horse!"  It’s quite funny. He thinks for a moment, then tries to use his English to interact with my toy.

But it’s only for a small block of time. The motivation quickly vanishes, and Spanish is back in force.  

Perhaps this is what the TKT book refers to as the "silent period." (p.48) A period of many months where the L2 learner simply soaks in the language, but rarely produces it.

 Then, and again I’m happily shocked with how timely the blogshere seems to be, I came across this post by Christopher Sessums:Notes on Learning and Motivation

He voices some ideas that I had rolling around my head as I read through the TKT course book.

1. A teacher can only do so much to motivate their students. In the end, true and lasting motivation comes from within the learner. Sessums says it best: "Since learning is a self-regulated process, educators can only influence student learning, they are not the cause of it." (Notes on Learning and Motivation Sessums)

I would say this is true of motivation as well. Teachers can influence learner motivation, but we are not the sustaining cause. That, I think, must come largely from the student. We must inspire, and fan into flame, but I don’t think we can sustain the motivation to learn.

Sessums goes one to detail five main areas of influence where the teacher can organize a learning environment, and I think draw out student motivation:

"Educators thus are responsible for five major aspects of the learning environment’s organization: level of participation by the actors (in this case, the educator(s) and students), the context within which learning and interaction takes place externally (which can have internal consequences), the content and intended outcomes (goals), and the strategies used to direct learning."(Notes on Learning and Motivation, Sessums)

 Participation:
Many classrooms treat students as passive. They "sit and get" to borrow from Wes Fryer. Effective classrooms are just the opposite. There are moments for "sit and get", but we all know that moments don’t last forever.

I think this is true in the ESL classroom too. Students must actively use the language, and not be stuck listening to the teacher. It’s about meaningful interaction.

Context: Maybe I misunderstand Sessums here, but I’m taking that to mean the classroom. What’s the learning environment like? Does it welcome experimentation with the language? One thing I noted from the TKT prep book, was a comparison between the context and the L1 and L2 learner.

L1 learners are usually inside a family context when they are learning the language. Under most circumstances, this environment is safe. It welcomes language play and interaction. The child feels secure to experiment with their first language.

L2 acquisition usually takes place in a much different context. It happens at work, in a meeting room or classroom. It happens, sometimes, with coworkers who you may or may not be close friends with. It happens with many others, who may or may not be supportive of your language experimentation.  

How well the teacher crafts the context will have a big influence on how well the student engages with L2. 

Content:

I wonder how much attention ESL teachers pay to this. Content can kill classroom motivation. Sadly, I think we tend to stick to the book, no matter how well it matches with our students. The content becomes the king. The great firehose that we soak our students with. Sometimes it fits perfectly, but most of the time I think students find themselves having to fit into content spaces that simply are not interesting and meaningful to them. And teachers wonder at the rampant lack of interest in English class.

So this has gone on longer than I had expected, but the issue of motivation is an important one. 

The TKT course book states that "Motivation is very important in language learning, so we (teachers) should do all we can to motivate learners." (p. 49)

But I think there is something more here: We need to also craft experiences, context, and content that allow for student motivation to bubble up from within. What do you think? 

Reference:

Spratt, Pulverness & Williams. The Teaching Knowledge Test Course. UK: Cambridge University Press, 2005.

Interesting questions raised over at the Becoming a Better EFL Teacher blog: Do EFL English Schools Really Need Native English Speaking Teachers?

My opinion: Nope, they sure don’t. Speaking as a teacher trainer, without reservation I’d hire a well trained non-native speaker any day. In most cases, Non-natives have mastered the grammar, and know how to explain it far better than their Native counterparts.

They also have first hand experience at learning English as a second language. They know the pain. They know the frustration. They know the pitfalls, and the common errors that can be fallen into.

Most of the non-native English teachers that I work with are way more patient and understanding of their students, and have the ability to effortlessly jump back and forth between Spanish (mother tongue here in Mexico) and English in order to explain a concept on a deeper level.

While our company is very careful about who we select in that we only recruit those with previous training, and strong fluency with the language, we do have an active "We hire native and non-native English teachers" policy.