Opening Session with Katya Paukova

I opened my 6th NTPRS with a keynote breakfast (something new...) with Katya Paukova.  It was impressive to me that almost half of the attendees are newbies who have never been to an NTPRS before and are learning about the method.  As they go through the journey, I hope they will reach out when they encounter bumps in the road.

Katya spoke for about 45 minutes about her journey and shared some great words of wisdom about language teaching.

• Learning should not be painful.
• If we learn the culture, we will accept the people (because we will see that they are people just like us).  
• Fluency does not rest on grammar knowledge; in fact, the most successful speakers are the ones who speak without fear of making errors.
• We are all learners, just at different stages of this journey.
• You don't need everyone to like it, you just need one (I need to remember this...I have fallen into a terrible habit of allowing a class to fall into chaos in fear of losing one student because they might not like me if I re-direct them)
• Just because it hasn't been done before doesn't mean it can't be done.  (Woah....think about that one for a minute.  I feel so bogged down by fear of failure and fear of the unknown...Big ups to those coaches who encourage me to go for it...  Especially Mira Canion who may have inspired me to write a novel and to Andrea Schweitzer who may have convinced me to try making videos...)
• I think that this should be shouted from the rooftops: TPRS IS USED AT THE US DEPARTMENT OF DEFENSE TO TEACH LANGUAGES TO OFFICERS WORKING IN MILITARY DEFENSE!!!!!!  If it didn't work, would we trust the safety of our country to the method????
• Before, we were not taking students to the desired end of proficiency and we have to change direction (through CI)

Great keynote full of laughs and love and cheering.  I'm so glad that I decided to drink the KoolAid and become part of this family.  And for those I'm missing this year...come visit KC!!

Grading changes for next year

Since learning about Standards-Based Grading from Scott Benedict (Teach for June) so many years ago, I changed my grading style and never looked back.  Since then, I have used the following weighted grades: Listening (15%), Reading (15%), Writing (30%), Speaking (30%), and Culture (10%) because I felt that production is harder, so it should have a higher weight.

After binge listening to Tea with BVP for the last two months, I have changed my mind (at least for levels 1 and 2).  I now feel that we should not be assessing level 1 students on writing and speaking because they probably aren't ready to produce...and especially not in a stressful assessment situation.  So...I thought and I thought and I went around and around.  I listened to Bill talk about communication in the lower levels and I realized that students are communicating with me in a foreign language every day when they are participating in my class.  By giving me a quizzical look when they don't understand.  By answering in one word when I ask a question.  By laughing when something is funny.  We don't think about it, but they are communicating with us.  Even though it seems like the teacher is doing all the communicating, it is a two-way street.  Otherwise, I could just sit at home and tape myself speaking French and take a nap during class...

With all of that in mind, I will be piloting something new next year.  I will be implementing a Communication grade in levels 1 and 2 (3 and up will obviously also communicate...but they will be able to speak and write...so I'll keep my old gradebook).  Most of their grade will be based on their attempts to learn the language.  If they are looking me in the eyes, listening to what I say and processing that information to either answer or ask for help...they will receive a good grade.  The rates of acquisition are such that I HATE dinging a kid who is trying to get it for not getting it....YET.  I know that, given enough time, they will get it, and most of those students, even my SPED kids, make huge gains in language learning, even if they don't end up with an A at the end of the year.

Thoughts on this crazy idea?  Logistically, I'm planning on using a version of Jen's Great Rubric (google it and you'll see lots of blogs posting about it), having students do a quick self-assessment daily, and then I will agree or disagree and the grade goes in.  I'm trying to figure out a way to do it electronically through Schoology so the grade will autopopulate in PowerSchool, but my gradebook isn't live on Schoology yet, so it's all just a thought now.  If any of you have any advice or warnings...let me know!  Less than a month until school starts!

Seating changes for next year

If you follow this blog, you know that I tend to ramble and not be super cohesive.  This blog was created as a way for me to word-vomit on a page in order to synthesize my own thoughts and help me process and reflect upon my own learning.  So, apologies if that makes you crazy...

Next year, I am excited to be trying some new things in my classroom (as always).  Last year, I went deskless and sewed 30 chair pockets to store pencils, white boards, markers, etc.  Students complained that their stuff was never where it was supposed to be and something that was supposed to make life easier ended up taking extra time because class couldn't start until everyone had looked in the other 29 chairs to find their folders.  I tried numbering the chairs, but I really think someone was moving the folders on purpose (or there's a folder fairy....maybe an Elf on the Shelf??).  So this year, we are moving to color-coded folders (each hour has a different color) and each hour will have a box to keep their folders.  If anyone puts their folder in the wrong box, it will be super obvious because the colors won't match.  I am also going to have one of my jobs be the Supply Person who is in charge of handing things out and collecting when needed.

So the sad news is that my chair covers are now outdated, BUT getting rid of them is going to allow me to change up my classroom seating.  Instead of having all 30 chairs out in a horseshoe for every class, we can get out only the chairs we need for each class and the configuration can change each day.  I'm really excited about this!  AND I am going to be able to think outside the box and add a variety of seating options (if my donors choose project gets funded...over halfway there!).  So my kids will have a choice of a bungee chair, a bean bag, a yoga ball, etc...and I can use the seating as an incentive to get to class early and to be on task because you can't sit in a cool chair if you can't meet my classroom expectations.

Other ideas to follow in my next blog post!

Tea with BVP

If you are not listening to this Podcast yet, you MUST!!!  I'm currently binge listening and am on the 11th episode, trying frantically to catch up so I can call live at some point.  For those who might not know, it is hosted by Bill Van Patten, an SLA researcher at Michigan State University.  The hour-long show is an academic discussion of Language Acquisition between researchers, teachers, college professors, and methods students.  Fascinating stuff!

http://www.teawithbvp.com/

Students' evaluations

Almost all of my students completed a quick teacher evaluation after their finals today (I have three more classes on Monday).  There were quite a few common themes that I thought I'd share in case anyone else is curious what kids notice in a TPRS classroom.

Some quotes about how I showed them I care:
"You wanted us to try and kept pushing us."
"You are always very kind and accepting of mistakes." (I want to know which teachers aren't accepting of mistakes)
"You were really involved with me and the class."
"You helped me even when I didn't say I needed help."
"You slowed down and made sure we were following along and seemed to genuinely care when we talked.
"You talked to me"  (again, what teachers aren't talking to their students?!)

About the best thing we did in the classroom:
"Mafia" (thanks Martina Bex!)
"made it a fun environment, easy to make friends, talk to people, learn"
"You made up stories with us in French that were fun and easy."
"You hung up vocabulary posters for us to refer to if necessary.  It was very convenient and aided me a handful of times."
"You always included parts of the real world into class."
"Being repetitive on words and phrases."

How to improve for next year:
"Have desks"
"Kick kids out when they stop us from learning"
"Crack down on kids breaking rules"
"Give more worksheets and vocabulary lists so we can study."
"Teach us more words."

This is my 3rd year with these kids, so I'm not sure why they are still asking for worksheets!  I feel like a do a pretty good job of explaining my teaching philosophy and SLA research, but maybe not...  Thoughts?

End of the year reflections-Negatives

1. Second semester slump: For some reason, every year about February or so, I get super down on myself and lose my love for teaching.  I feel like everything I do is garbage, my kids hate me, and they haven't learned anything.  Plus, my body is physically exhausted and I have a hard time keeping things together.  Next year, I'll try to keep a folder of home run activities that I can rely on during the long dark days.

2. Classroom management: I start every year strong, but then, as I get more comfortable with the students, classroom management goes out the window.  I think this is where being a mom of five is a real disadvantage for me because my tolerance for shenanigans is really high (or else I'd live my life screaming at kids).  So I just ignore ignore ignore until I can't handle it anymore and I get frustrated with my kids because they can't read in my mind where the imaginary line is that they've crossed.  Next year, I will try to focus more on loving redirects.  I've also considered participation points...I'm still very up in the air on this, but I feel like a big part of being successful in my class is participating (being engaged...not necessarily speaking).  So we'll see.  I need to think about whether or not that fits with my SBG philosophy.

3. Lack of vocabulary:  I feel like I could do a much better job of focusing vocabulary and building on existing knowledge.  It's hard when I have new students who come into my French 2 or 3 class because I feel like I need to quickly re-teach them everything we've learned in my class in the past one or two years...but I need to remember that if we recycle vocabulary effectively, we don't need to waste the time doing that.  So....a better vocabulary plan for next year.  Hopefully based on novels and the frequency dictionary.

4.  Distracted by "curriculum":  In my district, we are supposed to teach the same curriculum at about the same time.  Thankfully, we aren't held to this super strongly, but I still feel the need to "cover" the curriculum.  I have no idea why I feel this desire because my students don't learn this extra stuff any better or worse than the students in other classes...  But this year, I at least tried to look at the units and create some sort of plan (for my French 3 classes at least).  So, for example, we looked at the health vocabulary and then we did Bryce Hedstrom's Dr. joke (Patient goes to several doctors complaining that they hurt all over.  3rd doctor figures out that the patient's finger is broken), then we read an article targeted for French children over an 11 year old boy who had a heart transplant, and finally, we discussed health issues like nutrition and exercise, working our way up to questions about whether or not health is a right or a privilege and whether the gov't has the right to tax junk food.  It worked for me!

I've still got a ways to go....I start of the year full of energy and ideas and then teaching 4 preps and having two jobs and 5 kids gets to me and I get lazy and then I feel like a sucky teacher and then I don't want to do anything.  It's a terrible cycle that I HAVE to break next year.

End of the year reflection-Positives

I am almost to the end of my 9th year teaching, which makes it my 7th year teaching almost exclusively with TPRS.  Each year, I try to think about how I can improve next year so that I can focus on that when I am at NTPRS in July.  Otherwise, there are just too many great ideas and my brain gets overwhelmed.

So, here is a meandering reflection of what worked and what can be improved after this year.

1. Special Person: I have always started the year with Circling with Balls, but I used to make up silly details to make the story more interesting.  I realize now that it doesn't have to be crazy to be interesting to the kids.  As long as I am interested, they are interested.  We started off talking forEVER about names, reinforcing the Je vs Tu vs Il/Elle.  Since parking on this one concept for so long was new to me, I checked in with some of the high flyers to see if they were bored (since I was bored repeating myself so slowly for so long).  They said that it was interesting and that it didn't seem that repetitive because we were talking about each kid in the class, so they could each have their turn.  During this "unit", I was able to teach family vocab, including possessive pronouns, careers, numbers, most of the action verbs (play, watch, swim, run, etc), and we had a good time doing it.

2. Using actors and verifying details:  I started doing this last year, but really focused on it a lot more this year.  I found that it is super important to do this when you are telling the story in the past, because it is a natural way to re-tell the story in the present from different points of view.  If you have never seen a master teacher like Blaine do this, let me know so I can try to explain it better.

3.  Mystery Skype:  This is something I did because my neighbor teacher was trying it.  We Skyped a French-speaking person from somewhere in the world and the students each had a role to play in trying to figure out where they were.  Roles included map expert, question asker, question writer, host, and so on.  I found my mystery skypers by asking my French-speaking friends on Facebook if they would be willing to Skype in.  We had a family in Annecy, a college student in Lyon, a former classmate in Copenhagen, and a French elementary teacher in Vermont.  The kids got really excited and it was great for me to see how we could use collaboration and roles in sync with technology in a realistic way for a common goal.

4. Business partner:  In our town, we are lucky enough to have an ice cream company which is expanding to Canada.  I reached out to ask them if we could do some creative marketing for them for their French-Canadian stores.  We started by going to the offices and taking a tour, which was facilitated by their bilingual customer service agent and then we spent a week in class creating our marketing products, which included memes, print advertisements, video advertisements, and Snapchat filters.  We then did a Google Hangout with the marketing team in California and some of the employees here in Missouri to share our plans.  While it wasn't 100% in French, it did give the kids an idea of what a bilingual job could look like in the real world.  The kids had a blast, got a ton of free ice cream, and the company was really happy with what we produced.  I'm trying to think of ways to integrate more real-world tasks like this in the future.

Next post...what I need to improve for next year!