Day 13

Ok just noticed that I trailed off in my Day 9 post. I'm going to paste the analogy again so you don't have to go back.

When learning a language I am an advocate for the deep-end approach. The language should hit you like a brick all at the same time. While you are flailing about in the vast ocean of confusion, you see a small boat with a light coming towards you. Just as you feel you are going to drown you feel a hand plunge down into the water and grasp the back of your shirt firmly. You are lifted up at once out of the churning waters and dragged onto the little boat. You gasp and cough. You rub the salt out of your eyes, as you vision clears you finally see the person who saved you. But- what is she doing now? She’s trying to put a vest on you. She puts a bright orange vest on and ties a rope around it. You are relieved, then whooop you notice you are soaring through the air. But wait! You exclaim, I am not a bird! You are met once again by the jolting splash of the water. You flail as before, but this time, you feel a steady tug on the rope and the light buoyancy of the vest. You are no longer sinking, but you still must work to keep afloat in the storm. “Today you will learn how to swim!” comes a voice above the roaring. 

What I mean by this is that language classes should ideally keep you almost constantly face-to-face with  the full, living entity that is language, even though it will sound like a rapid-fire garble for a while. What ends up happening a lot in language classes is that being understood becomes the most important thing. Teachers end up talking slowly and not using slang. They will cater their speaking to the students ability to understand. While on the other hand, I understand that when I'm sitting in class and I have no idea what the teacher is saying I would tune out.

I think the solution to this, as to most things, lies somewhere in the middle. I think that it is imperative that no matter what, the teacher talks in a way that sounds natural and ordinary. Even if they talk slower,


------Digression: The Importance of Context Explained--------

There are different 'vocabularies' for different contexts in every language. For example: A mechanic might not use the words "placenta" or "breast-feed" on a usual basis, but a OB/GYN would. A nurse in an ICU might say "sever" while a normal person might say "cut". Part of comedy is using words in the wrong contexts.

Therefore one of the most commen difficulties for language learners is using words in the wrong context, or even being aware of the different contexts. Few, if any language classes teach different contexts. It is a big reason that people feel uncomfortable using a language. Sometimes it will be funny, sometimes it will be offensive, and sometimes it will be really embarrasing. The contextual 'sub-language' operates constantly sub-consciously and automatically.When a non-native and a native speaker are communicating, it is very difficult for the non-native to know exactly what he/she is communicating. Thus the native speaker cannot know which of the 'sub-meanings' are intentional, and which are purely accidental.

http://thefurtheradventuresofbennett.com/

I'm going to do what should never be done to things that are funny, I'm going to spend way too much time analyzing this.

What makes it funny?

Aside from the apparent grammar mistake "fruit of labour" instead of "the fruits of labour" or at least "the fruit of labour", two abnormalities stand out. The first one is "cherish", and the second one that I didn't see right away is "crops".

"Cherish" has 3 meanings in the dictionary

to hold or treat as dear; feel love for

to care for tenderly; nurture

to cling fondly or inveterately to

There is nothing technically wrong with using the word "cherish". Looking at the dictionary definition, its pretty obvious that what they are trying to say is "please respect and appreciate the amount of effort that was put into these plants by not stepping on them". That in itself is not funny. But the word "cherish" means more than that. When you hear 'cherish' what images jump to your mind? I think of:

- evangelist preachers

- a church group of people having a passionate, emotional, spiritual moment with crying and rocking back and forth and humming

- a small alter memorial of someone who has died

- a newlywed couple giving wedding vows

- "I will cherish you forever"

- people overwhelmed with emotion crying and hugging

- an old couple that has built up an incredible enduring love and caring through decades of mutual experiences and commitment

- a word used in an exaggerattedly sappy way to express sarcastic dislike or unenthusiam *someone hands her friend a ball of lint from the ground and says "here, I made this for you". Her friend, exaggerattedly fighting back tears says "I-I don't know what to say, I will cherish this forever"

What does "cherish" really mean then?

'To cherish' is to feel a mixture of unconditional love, appreciation, respect, admiration, loyalty and spirituality. The type of deep emotion and longing that one only feels for someone/something that is very close to oneself - someone/something that one "has" or "holds". You wouldn't cherish a piece of paper, but you would cherish a beautiful poem written by someone you love.

In the last item, however, appears another understanding about the word: If this word is used outside of a few particular contexts, it has the opposite effect - it sounds like sarcasm or inappropriate sappiness, it shows an abnormally intense and inappropriate emotional reaction to something.

A crop just implies vegetables or food stuff being grown on a farm.

There, folks, we have the reason that that sign is funny. It's sub-meaning is communicating something along the lines of "Love this grass. Adore it with every ounce of passion that is in your heart. Love it so much that you wouldn't even think to walk on it". The fact that the sign says this with 100% conviction and a straight face only serves to make it more funny. You know that the sign isn't being sarcastic, it honestly wants you to cherish the grass and not step on it.

HHA. HA. HHHAAAA.

Through this butchering, what we can see is that it sucks to be the guy that wrote that sign - or this sign.

All these guys want is for people to not trample the grass nor push over the tables - unfortunately neither of them will be taken that seriously. The worst part is that they will have no idea why. Its like an inside joke about them that everyone gets but them.

If you ever learned another language you will definitely relate to being in that situation.

"I live ensam, I've been going into the city and stuff, but most of the time I'm ensam"
*get pitying looks*
*awkward silence*

3 days later...

"Yeah, so I was ensam most of today"
"you do know that ensam means 'lonely' not 'alone' right?"
"...WHAT!??"

--------------------------------------------------


This is the reason that speaking casually in class is important. "Casual talk" needs to be in the TL and it must be authentic. Furthermore, the switch from "casual" to "official" talk should
be very clear, the students should be aware of it. A possibility is that "official talk" is used in certain discussions only, while casual is used in others - and the teacher announces which type will be used. If teaching the two different types of speech is too much in one class (especially at lower levels) then casual should be taught first.

Casual -> official is the way that you learned your first language. You were already very fluent in your language by the time your language arts teacher told you that you were doing it all wrong in 3rd grade.

Watching (most) television and movies, reading (a lot of) contemporary fiction, and listening to (a good amount of) music and radio will most definitely expose you to real everyday language.


Ideas for exercises:

1) There are various audio clips from native speakers with different accents casually telling a story. Students have to guess what region the speakers are from.

Day 12

Today I started getting into consolidating my data. I ended up only getting survey responses from two schools, and visiting four. Now I'm trying to make sense of the data I have, which is extremely limited.

I'm also trying to get the website figured out. I've put some entries in already, but the formatting is really rough and unpolished. I guess its just good for it to have the information, but hopefully I can spiffy it up before I turn it in.

So on to some thoughts...

I was reading over the survey results for UHS and trying to get some meaning out of them.

When I went to UHS it looked very structured, academically intense, and grammar-focused.

What some of the students said did not agree. Two people mentioned how unstructured the class is, although the majority simply said they liked the energy of the teacher. There was also this sort of strange response on the question asking about relationship with teacher that just said "Sexual learning and tension". I'll be honest I have noo idea what to do with that so I'm just going to ignore it. A lot of students said that she was open and friendly and willing to work outside of class to help students. Several also said that her personality makes the material interesting.

On the question of teaching methods, the responses were all over the place. This is pretty much the range I got for that question (paraphrasing mostly):

"[plk;"
"sure"
'good balance between reading writing and grammar'
'good teacher, but doesn't understand/accommodate the particular needs of our class'
'great/good'
'i like the readings for becoming more cultured'
'its fun, i like that the class is discussion-based'
'boring'
'need more grammar'
'need more grammar and reading/analyzing stories'

I'm not sure what to do with this information. There's also the issue of self-reporting and bias.

Day 11

Aaahhhh, only one week left. Crapcrapcrapcrap.

My data is so limited but I don't have enough time left to do more visits. A bunch of the schools weren't comfortable with me giving them the survey.

Day 10

Day 10:

Today I created the outline of the profiles for all of the schools on my website. I’m going to figure out how to fill them in next, I think. I think the way I’m going to do it is take the information from the observations and combine it with the information from the surveys. I might do a little comparison between the two, but mostly I’ll just put them together.

I had work today, so I got slightly less done than I should have gotten done. I think what I’ll do is work next Saturday in order to make up for it.

Day 9

The university teachers seem to understand something that a lot of classes do not do. University knows that what is important is letting the language grow naturally.

I’m going to make some names, because I don’t know what they’re called.

“Official talk” is when teachers are describing something relevant to the lesson

“Casual talk” is when teachers go into that more candid mode of talking, where it becomes more important to be understood.

 What sets the really strong classes apart is that TL is used for both official and casual talk. There is a lot of big talk about the importance of making the language real but many forget that casual talk is inherently real. It doesn’t have to be simulated or artificially created, it’s already there. Casual talk, filler words, figures of speech, and language mannerisms are the very foundation of a language – they are often the cause for much of the jolting awkwardness when being immersed in a new language. “Official talk” is valuable, but “casual talk” is imperative.

When learning a language I am an advocate for the deep-end approach. The language should hit you like a brick all at the same time. While you are flailing about in the vast ocean of confusion, you see a small boat with a light coming towards you. Just as you feel you are going to drown you feel a hand plunge down into the water and grasp the back of your shirt firmly. You are lifted up at once out of the churning waters and dragged onto the little boat. You gasp and cough. You rub the salt out of your eyes, as you vision clears you finally see the person who saved you. But- what is she doing now? She’s trying to put a vest on you. She puts a bright orange vest on and ties a rope around it. You are relieved, then whooop you notice you are soaring through the air. But wait! You exclaim, I am not a bird! You are met once again by the jolting splash of the water. You flail as before, but this time, you feel a steady tug on the rope and the light buoyancy of the vest. You are no longer sinking, but you still must work to keep afloat in the storm. “Today you will learn how to swim!” comes a voice above the roaring. 

Ok, wow that got really long. I hope that made sense... 

Day 8

Today I visited UHS. I should have thought ahead and left 15 minutes earlier because I got to the school at 7:55 for a class at 8:00 and I had no idea where it was. Turns out I was in the wrong building. I ended up being like 15 minutes late. D#%@ it! Well, now I know. I should have known before, but I'm like "oh noo, it'll be fine" this is why I have so many detentions.

I woke up at 6 this morning. It doesn't matter if I'd woken up at 4, I'd still be late.

Okayy, so annnyway. The class I observed had 4 people in it because a bunch of the students were doing AP history exams. Its strange how every class I've visited has had 4 people. Oooohhh magic.

They were watching the orphanage. My lord! That. Movie. Was. Rediculous.

Here are some things I really liked about the class:

- The teacher spoke in Spanish the entire time. Even to explain words people didn't understand.

- The movie had Spanish subtitles. This is definitely something I've noticed in a lot of language classes, when teachers play movies they almost always have english subtitles because they first-and-foremost want students to understand. The problem with this is that because they can understand, they don't need to make the extra effort to listen to the language being spoken, and because they can't see the TL (target language) words written down, its a lot harder to pick up what people are saying. If both english and TL subtitles could go at the same time, thats better than just english but still not as good, especially at higher levels.

- The teacher paused the movie and asked questions and explained things, all in Spanish. She also used the emotional moments in the movie (a lot, since it was The Orphanage) as a way to teach vocabulary.
The room got really intense as a lady on the screen just recognized the mother of the killer on the street. She craned her neck and opened her mouth to call to her, just as she was beginning to utter the word-WHAM!- the mother was slammed by a bus. The class jerked in their seats and some screamed. *click!* the teacher paused the movie and looked around at us, giving us a moment to let it sink it. "There is a verb for that" she said (in Spanish) "Atropear. It means to be hit by a car."

Day 7

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Day 6

Today I spent most of my time working on the website and scheduling some school visits. I sent out a bunch of emails and heard back from two of them.

I'm finally getting a hang of google sites, but I need to figure out what I'm going to do with the information.

In all honesty, at the same time as this senior project stuff I have fundraising and preparation for my gap year program and its kind of sapping my senior project motivation. The close I get to the deadline the more I see that I chose an extra ambitious project while having somewhat poor organizational skills. 

Day 5

I just remembered that I forgot to do a Day 3 post. I think I'll do that one tomorrow to make up for it.

Today I spent a long time trying to figure out the website. I ended making two, because the first one I wasn't happy with. The thing is that you pick a template and then are stuck with it. It's not like you can change it afterwards. I figure using a template is better than starting from scratch, but the whole system is a lot more complicated than I gave it credit for. I've never made a website before so I'm fumbling through it really slowly.

I also heard from several of the teachers my Spanish teacher emailed. I'm working on replying to them - I wrote up a draft of what to say but I want to get it checked before I send it, so that should hopefully happen soon.

This first week has helped me realize some areas that I need to focus on and improve. The biggest of all is organization: My mind, and consequently my project, is all over the place. I need to reasses what I'm doing and lay it out so I can get out of this brain fog. The second area is the rules of formality. I'm having trouble knowing when to use what level of formality. Come to think of it, I rarely have to act professional, and I'm really not sure how to do it.

With my project right now, it looks like what I'm doing is making profiles for all the schools I visit and comparing them to the ideal. The trouble is that I don't know what the ideal would be. I've read a bunch of stuff, and heard a lot of opinions - but all this information I have is very scattered and incomplete. I know stuff thats good when learning a language, but I don't know how that stuff could be put to use in a classroom. There are so many subtleties of teaching and students and classroom dynamics coming into play, that I was originally hoping to avoid.

EDIT: Ok, crisis averted. I'm just going to make a disclaimer and ignore the details. I've finished and finalized the survey and contacted 2 schools. Tomorrow and Monday I'm going to work on the website. I have a very rough sketch of what the "ideal" in my eyes will look like. Please disregard the other two paragraphs of worrying.

Day 4

Ok so there were some organizational mishaps today. I went in to school and met with my advisors to help me with the survey. Later at the concert I talked to my Spanish teacher who helped me connect to the teachers she knows at the schools. I had to go so she sent them an email for me. 

Beyond that I realized that the off-brand battery I bought for my laptop was a bad investment. My computer died and lost the notes I took about the survey from the meeting. I made a new survey and will put it on the website soon.

This picture represents where I am currently with my project. 

 (picture from MalinSama at deviantart via google images)

I hope to improve this over the next couple days. I think I need to work less from home. Maybe I'll start going to cafes.

Day 2

Today I went into school and shadowed a French IV class. I also had to go to the assembly and my period 1 band class to prep for the performance, so I got less done today. I did make progress on ironing out some tweaks. Plus I got some good info from Mr Anonymous. From interviewing him I've come to the conclusion that I missed out by not taking French at Drew.

Theres not too much to post today because I'm not done compiling my information. There are a few things I'll take note of, however.

The importance of the classroom dynamic, and managing that dynamic. Two classes with identical curriculems and the same teacher can be vastly different simply due to the dynamic of the students.

The degree of liberty given to the teachers concerning curriculem design and how they run their classes.  There is a collaborative environment when it comes to telling teachers how to do things. While I definitely see the importance and benefit of this, I wonder if it may be short-changing some students.

I'm going to preface this next part by saying that I have very little experience and no right nor desire nor sufficient amount of information to make judgements on any individual teachers - I really like all of the teachers and I am not going to do that. But, be that as it may, I'm still going to be as candid as possible on this blog so I can follow my actual train of thought instead of a censored version. So, I'm going to be talking in generalities here, because what are assumptions if not good starting points.

Ok then, candid me definitely thinks that I have never experienced or even seen an approach to language classes like I saw today. Never seen a class of students so interested and engaged in language learning. If candid me had, candid me would never have done this senior project.

This approach pretty much aligns perfectly with what my research has shown to be effective. Its content-based, its conversational, its culturally relevant, its true to the real world. It works backwards from real life to vocabulary and grammar. The students I talked to all said that they are much more confident speakers and they felt they learned a lot. They also said that they really enjoy the subject and the class and they loved the teacher.

It looks like my work is cut out for me. Well, at least one portion is - pretty much the system that I would consider ideal already exists. My question becomes: If it exists, why has it not spread? What is preventing the method from going to all of the language classes? What other factors contribute to its failure or success in different classes?

I'm hoping to see some more classes at Drew. I'd like to get as wide a scope as possible. I'm also waiting for a response from Waldorf and I'm going to contact the other schools over the next few days. I think my plan going forward is to iron out all the kinks in the visiting this week and then do the more serious visits next week. My project is finally starting to take shape and I think the way its going is going to work out well.

Day 1

Today I'm mostly doing set up for my visits later this week. So far I've:

- Made a template to bring with me to the visits
- Made a draft version of the Survey Monkey (I'm going to work on it more before I send it to my advisor, though)
- Done more reasearch and written down things I want to ask about/explore
- Listened to non-stop lounge jazz

I've been doing some more reading about language teaching strategies and coming up with my opinions on them. For example:

One thing that seems to be a big deal in the language teaching community is "hands-on, experiential learning". The way that most (read: all that I've had) teachers approach this is by coming up with an activity and breaking up the class into groups or partnerships for them to converse and work on whatever it is.

A good example of this is "speed-dating" where people are randomly given cards describing a person that they are supposed to "be" while speed dating. Then the teacher runs a "speed-date"session and the students are supposed to ask questions about each other.

Another example is when students are given time to work on projects, like a presentation about a country.

Regardless of how well-intentioned the assignment is, this is how it ALWAYS works out in a high-school classroom (especially at lower levels):

There is an unspoken understanding that the assignment is kind of pointless/useless and rediculous - they roll their eyes to communicate that even though they're doing it, they don't want to do it and therefore it doesn't conflict with their coolness. Then, they proceed to do the bare minimum to make sure that the other person understands that they don't care. They will often go off into tangents in english, and would probably talk the entire time in english unless the teacher is looking at them. If one of the students is into it and wants to practice, the other student might engage a little bit more than they would, but more often than not its the motivated student who ends up conceding - as they don't want to be the "righteous" nerd.

Another thing is the faux realism that is common in this type of approach. Its not like you are actually speed-dating, and in all honesty you probably don't care that much what the Venezuelan flag colors symbolize. You might be a bit more engaged talking about what type of clothes people wear in the different seasons than you are talking about "Juan goes to the store" and "Marie eats lunch". But in both cases, its not very memorable. At the same time, its not like you can do actual mandatory speed-dating in a Spanish class. Unless you really don't like your job.

I felt like I should dedicate a whole thing to this because it's pretty much the 'go-to' strategy in most language classes I've been in. Maybe in a situation with mature adults who are in class voluntarily it would be good, but in a high school class its almost always an inefficient way to spend time. I think in 95% of situations its not the teachers fault that they do this in the way they do. They are working in a seriously limited environment with a bunch of rules and standards to meet.

Nonetheless, I think the active-learning approach is (at least in theory) a very promising approach to language learning. I'm hoping to observe how active learning is carried out in different schools/classes to see if it is possible to utilize it in an efficient and engaging way. Part of my project is thinking about different ways that the standards and requirements can be met and the limitations worked with in the most efficient way possible. Tomorrow I'm going to talk to a couple teachers in Drew about how much freedom they are given in the classroom and what they base their classes upon. Hopefully I'll be able to get a syllabus or two.