What are you going to do when COVID-19 quarantine ends — and why are those your choices? While daydreaming research abounds, including that which asserts that daydreaming can be associated with positive psychological consequences, I’m not interested in pie-in-the-sky mind wanderings. As we return to school — in whatever ways we return — what do you and your students plan to do when quarantine ends? To what are you looking forward?
In "Make something good happen," we looked at how the BBC series "My Perfect Country" can work in conjunction with project-based learning activities to nurture students' critical analysis and inventiveness in service of ameliorating or eliminating manageable problems that affect them. Now, let’s look at another BBC series, "People Fixing the World," and focus on the episodes "Kids Fixing the World" and "New Uses for Old Solutions" so we can encourage and assist students to do what has to be done.
What kind of world do you want to be a part of? While the answer may seem at once easy to conceptualize and ridiculous in its impossibility to implement, there are public and private institutions and organizations accomplishing what too many others dismiss as too…too expensive, too time-consuming, too difficult…too whatever. We can be overwhelmed considering the Herculean tasks before us. However, we can learn that, as internationally acclaimed scholar, ethologist, and environmentalist Dr. Jane Goodall asserts, "Act locally first, see that you make a difference — then you dare to think globally."
In "Rest your eyes and listen," we examined how using fables or true, personal stories can achieve any number of educational goals. This month, we're going to look at one particular fable, "Devorah and the Gold Coins." I chose this story for a couple of reasons: As I listened, I couldn't figure out where it was going; each time I thought I knew, my expectations were as twisted as the plot. And when it ended, I was left surprised but moreover, stupefied by the lesson it was teaching. I never saw it coming.
Stories designed to teach particular lessons, such as Aesop's Fables or Chassidic tales, can be used to promote cultural awareness and sensitivity; critical and creative thinking; making predictions and inferences; the elements of literature; and story-making and storytelling so students can create their own lessons. Though we often associate fables and tales with children, they transcend age; the best have lessons to teach all of us. There are a number of ways you can design a fable-making project.
In my November article, we saw how interrogative pronouns lend themselves to extensive and inventive study. This month, let’s explore how asking "Who are you?" can work in concert with the previous activities or can be used individually. The identity exploration activities we’ll examine this month can be used for kindergarten through university and arguably for even younger students. The activities introduce or review poetry, figurative language (particularly personification, metaphor, simile, idioms, alliteration, and onomatopoeia), and vocabulary development.
"Memories of Home" was featured this past summer on "Morning Edition," one of NPR's award-winning stalwarts. In the segment, co-host Rachel Martin and NPR "resident poet" Kwame Alexander discuss poetry for "remembering where you’re from in order to move forward." The segment was based on the poem, "Where I’m From" by Kentucky’s 2015 poet laureate, George Ella Lyon. Martin and Alexander asked listeners "to write one of these yourselves. Draw on all five senses and use memories of your own to craft poems that reflect the people and the places that you came from." As fascinated as I was by the project and as much as the request "got my creative juices flowing," I had a quibble.
What day is it? Your answer could be anything from Monday through Sunday. But if you ask me, I could easily say, "It’s National Women’s Equality Day! It’s National Dog Day! It’s National Cherry Popsicle Day!" (August 26, as I write this. Of course, there is a National Cat Day, October 29.) Whatever day it is, it’s a good day to explore an adaptable activity that engages as much integrated content as you choose, including language skills, history, government, and civics, cultures, and physics and math as well as critical and creative thinking and analysis, multiple intelligences, and learning styles.
As I’ve found again and again, regardless of the program, state, or country in which I teach, the lack of comprehension and appreciation of purpose are the fundamental dilemmas students have when presented with a syllabus, or, failing a syllabus, when starting any course at any level. Even the term syllabus can be a mystery. When I studied American Sign Language, I learned a slang sign for syllabus — "silly bus" — and indeed, that certainly seems like an apt description. All students will benefit from a lesson dedicated to the syllabus. For ELLs and nontraditional students, it may be particularly useful for teachers to create a syllabus lesson designed to deconstruct what may be a flabbergasting and often hefty document but one that is elemental and critical.
Too often, especially in higher grades/levels, and definitely in college and university, teachers assign books that students must immediately delve into. What is wrong with this? It overlooks context, and at the expense of sounding like a broken record of the Charlie Brown teacher, I tell my students, "Context is everything." Not examining the books and materials also overlooks schema (prior knowledge), and tapping prior knowledge is essential for authentic learning.
In the early 1990s, I happened upon a small book loaded with invaluable insights far greater than its 0.5 by 6 by 4.5 dimensions. "Live and Learn and Pass It On: People Ages 5 to 95 Share What They’ve Discovered About Life, Love, and Other Good Stuff" is the brainchild of H. Jackson Brown Jr., who compiled and edited it. You may be familiar with Brown’s other books, including "Life’s Little Instruction Book, A Father’s Book of Wisdom" and “Life’s Little Treasure Book On Hope." A few years after the initial release of “Live and Learn," Brown published Vol. 2. Certainly, the title intrigued me, and I was dazzled by the gems of wisdom.
When I was in Russia teaching English language pedagogy, research and writing skills, and American conversational rituals to graduate TESOL students, I adapted 20 Questions by adding a component, 20 Words. While I was pleased with the lesson and students’ engagement, I was eager to develop it. I had the opportunity when I taught university Short Composition students in South Korea. The students, most of whom were Korean but a couple of whom were Mongolian, all had high levels of English language skills and were already keen thinkers, and a number were polyglots; therefore, I wanted to robustly challenge them.
Are you an educator or administrator yearning for anonymous, authentic, non-evaluative, non-threatening professional development opportunities that encourage you to take risks and fail without facing pernicious repercussions? Are you a passionate educator or administrator who knows what best practices are and is committed to infusing your teaching or management with them? Are you an administrator who can admit that your program needs help and that the best way to help your program is to inspire and embolden the faculty who work in your program? If you are, then peer coaching is for you.
"Don't swim alone. Use the buddy system so someone always knows where you are and can get help if needed," warns a standard water safety tip. Educators need buddies, too, because it is dangerous to swim alone in the often deep and treacherous waters of teaching. As we saw previously, mentoring has its specific place in addressing the needs of teachers who are young and new to the profession. There are other approaches to help educators, regardless of their age or their experience, one of which is a buddy system. Unlike mentoring programs, which situate an experienced professional in a hierarchical position above the new and inexperienced teacher, the buddy system relies on buddies as equal partners though with roles different from one another.
In an effort to do the right thing, organizational administrators often hastily create "mentoring" programs that are anything but. Mentoring is a commonly used term, especially in education, but too often it is incorrectly used because its origins and meanings are unknown or misunderstood. Without a solid understanding of the history and evolution of mentoring, programs that cast themselves as mentoring ones, but are not, create more problems than they intend to avert or solve.
For two hours, she writes on the board. We sit and dutifully copy. Occasionally, she turns and points at one of us, says something in Korean, and we are supposed to repeat what she has said. If she has asked a question, we are supposed to answer it. Sometimes, after the board is full, she recognizes a mistake, erases it, and begins again. It is this way three nights each week for two hours each night for a month. Many Koreans have told me that the teacher’s approach is the Korean approach to education, despite what the school’s website promises.
Despite articulating my professional responsibilities in a written and signed commitment to my students and asking them to reciprocate, disinterested and disengaged students did not become interested and engaged, nor did they become responsible, not even in the slightest. To each class, they continued to come unprepared, continued to fall asleep, and continued not to not participate. Surely, I thought, at the very least, they know they are going to fail the course. What else could I do to save them from themselves?
Games, small group work, puzzles, funny videos, my dancing, and goodies, lots and lots of goodies: candies of all sorts, cookies, minicakes. No matter how student-centered and engaging a class I prepare and present, there are always students who are disinterested, some to the point of slumber, with chins touching their chests and occasionally their heads bobbing. Some are disinterested to the point of doing absolutely nothing and feigning a search of their book bag for their text, materials, and homework when they and I know full well that they do not have them.
What’s your story? Kasiva Mutua’s story, which she tells in her TEDTalk, "How I use the drum to tell my story," is of heroic triumph over her culture and society’s gender discrimination. To introduce storytelling — the final major assignment in my conversation course — I chose Mutua’s TEDTalk. TEDTalks are outstanding resources, and one reason I often incorporate them in to my lessons is that they offer closed captioning/subtitles and transcripts in multiple languages, thereby allowing low-to-mid level EFL/ESL users to listen to the English and follow along in their native language.
Making recommendations is the topic of Module 2 of the conversation course I teach now to EFL students in Korea. Students learn how to politely express their opinions, analyze advantages and disadvantages, offer alternatives and negotiate.
What is community? What is your community? Do you have only one? In a recent faculty meeting during which professors examined the successes we had and challenges we encountered teaching a lesson in which community was an incorporated, but not principal theme, some faculty noted that their students had trouble grasping the concept of community.
On the school playground 52 years ago, the new boy and I giggled and laughed as we stretched ourselves from monkey bar to monkey bar, seeing who could skip the most and reach the farthest. I liked him, had a crush on him the way a second-grader can have a crush. I think he liked me, too.
As a proud Jersey Girl born and reared on the very South Jersey shore, I have "sand in my shoes" — a saying about those of us whose hearts remain in our ocean communities no matter how far-flung our travels or for how long we roam. We always return.
For a reading and writing lesson to introduce inference to low-intermediate/intermediate EFL university students, I created these easily adaptable activities.
I love food. I love cooking it for others and myself. I love the joy others receive when eating the food I cook, and I love eating it. I also love football. There is little more I look forward to than football season and watching every NFL and college game. And increasingly — especially the more I travel internationally — I am grateful for whom I am and what I have.
In 2011, when I was living and teaching in the Washington, D.C., area, a trio of Korean university students in the U.S. to study English for a year were in one of my courses. Effervescent, dedicated, wickedly smart and joyful, Mina, Summer and Cellestyn challenged me to be a better teacher, and I wanted more than anything to be better for them.
"Learn. Listen. Talk. Explore the unique history of the people you care about." So encourages "Heart to Heart" conversation cards. Somewhere in my travels — perhaps at a conference, perhaps at a toy store, perhaps as a gift — I acquired a deck.
EFL teachers and students are at once confounded and delighted by phrasal verbs. Students' and teachers' interest in using phrasal verbs inspired me to prepare "Phun with phrasal verbs," a workshop I've presented a number of times to highly interactive and grateful audiences in Russia.
What do George Washington, an Egyptian pyramid and a bald eagle have in common? They all appear on the U.S. one-dollar bill! But they are not the only symbols on the dollar bill, consistently the bill most printed by the U.S. government. How many Americans know the history of and symbols on our money? I admit to being one who knew far less than I should have and far less than I wanted to.
One of the great joys of being an English Language Fellow is working with Access students, "talented 13-20-year-olds from economically disadvantaged sectors" who earn scholarships to study English in "after-school and intensive sessions." The English Access Microscholarship Program "gives participants English skills that may lead to better jobs and educational prospects. Participants also gain the ability to compete for and participate in future exchanges and study in the United States." The Access Program is worldwide; at the recent annual TESOL convention, I met those working with Access programs in India and Nicaragua.
Behaving as UFC contestants, millions of Americans savagely attack and brutalize each other on Black Friday as they make their best efforts to snatch, grab and seize the gifts they demand for themselves and those on their Christmas lists. Along with the daily overdose of violence that envelops us — whether in our home, our neighborhood, our city, our country, or in homes, neighborhoods, cities and countries far away — at the "holidays," we see extra shots of the worst of what we arrogantly call "humanity," by way of 24/7 news and online video sharing sites.
As you learned from my previous article, I’m spending almost a year as an English Language Fellow in Moscow, Russia, where, in late December 2016, I had the great fortune to teach three classes to 10th- and 11th-level students at a distinguished English language school for students from primary through high school. I chose to develop activities whose theme was succeeding in spite of — if not because of — obstacles, and embracing the inevitable challenges that we face.
Community outreach is one of my many responsibilities as an English Language Fellow. As such, I am invited to make presentations and give workshops throughout Moscow and central Russia. In late December, I taught three classes to 10th and 11th graders at Moscow's School #1253, a preeminent English language institution for students from primary grades through high school. The vast majority of students had never met a native English user, and all of them are in some stage of preparing for the high-stakes Unified State Exam (EGE), whose results "are now the only basis by which universities may enroll students."
I don't remember a time when I didn’t know my family originated in Russia. I grew up eating kasha and beet borsch and creamed and pickled herring and honey cake and halvah. My grandfathers were born in Russia. Although I never knew my grandfathers — they died before I was born — I knew my grandmothers. My maternal grandmother, Rose, lived with us. At times, she spoke Yiddish to my mom and dad and Aunt Pearl, and I learned a few words.
As a child, I looked forward to reading the comics. I enjoyed the exploits and escapades of Blondie and Dagwood, Nancy and Sluggo, the savvy prehistoric characters in B.C., the ne'er-do-well Andy Capp, the good-hearted green witch, Broom Hilda, and the curmudgeonly Shoe.
For those who read the poetic epic "Beowulf" in excerpts or in its entirety, you'll remember the many kennings in the text. According to the British Library, a third of "Beowulf" is kennings. Kennings are types of figurative and metaphorical compound terms created using mixed imagery, with etymology in Old English, Old Norse and German. Bone-house (body) and whale-road (ocean) are two of the most famous kennings, both from "Beowulf."
February: African American History Month. March: Women's History Month. May: Asian Pacific Heritage Month. November: American Indian Heritage Month. According to the Law Library of Congress, these are among a number of months during which U.S. schools host activities to enlighten students about the significance of those being commemorated. American teachers are aware of these commemorative months and plan lessons accordingly.
"What's in the box?" is the title of a 1964 "Twilight Zone" episode. It's also the infamous question Brad Pitt's character, David Mills, asks his nemesis in the 1995 movie "Se7en," and the name of a Japanese game show that spurred an American spinoff on YouTube.
Is there a word for the mark made when someone falls backward in snow? Is there a word for the idiom "hanging by a thread"? Is there a word for melted snow? Or a tangled lock of hair? Or the pricking, tingling, or burning sensation on the skin? Yes, yes, yes, yes and yes!
In my previous article, I wrote about the value of Wordsmith.org, a website that offers 22 years (and counting) worth of linguistic goodies in one simple package. Wordsmith.org offers "A Word a Day," a daily email of theme-based words, their definition(s), pronunciation, usage and etymology. A recent theme — "Playing with Words" — inspired me to develop activities based on the words.
Truchman. Yerk. Psittaceous. Florilegium. For years, Wordsmith.org has sent a delicious linguistic nugget from "A Word a Day" in each of my weekday emails. And one of these emails recently gave me a great idea for a word game to use in the ESL classroom.
There is significant research on the efficacy of using games to teach ESL/EFL. Yolageldili and Arikan are among those who encourage game use: "Games have a special role in any foreign language teaching program because they facilitate foreign language learning especially for young learners." Gaudart concurs: "Using simulations and games are two of the most effective techniques for a teacher when he or she wants to allow second or foreign language learner practice in the target language."
Regardless of how hard teachers work to create safe, welcoming environments in which our students can thrive, we cannot escape classroom disruptions that threaten to jeopardize not only our lessons but also the well-being of our students and, in fact, ourselves.
Idioms are the "peculiar character or genius of a language." They are the keys that unlock the doors to a language's vast landscape — a landscape otherwise circumscribed by users' language limitations. Native users take idioms for granted, using them frequently. To non-native users, idioms are fascinating enigmas not easily translated into their own language if they translate at all. Non-native users are eager to learn idioms because idioms are ubiquitous.
From the moment almost 40 years ago when I heard Harry Chapin's "Flowers are Red," I’ve played it at window-rattling volume and sung it as loudly and defiantly as possible. It tells the story of a free-spirited child who draws flowers in a rainbow of colors, only to be admonished by a teacher.
Newly divorced and in my mid-50s, I moved 1,800 miles from the area where I lived and worked for nearly four decades. I took a job in what I quickly found was a deeply dysfunctional Intensive English Program whose administrators — not unlike my ex-husband — had been deceptive and duplicitous.
As an experienced educator new to a decades-old university-based ESL program, I quickly found a curriculum moribund from decades of inattention and lacking best practices. The program, whose primary mission is to prepare students for university matriculation, had lost its CEA accreditation and was trying to regain it.
"It was so boring! I hated learning new words that way!" exclaimed a frustrated student about traditional vocabulary learning strategies. The student was one of a number interviewed by Nguyen Thi Thanh Huyen and Khuat Thi Thu Nga in their action research about how to stimulate Vietnamese students' interest in vocabulary learning.
"Debra is a JAP." As I walk into my classroom, I see the words written neatly in bright orange on the whiteboard, and my colleague (someone I had counted as a friend) who has written them stands by the board, giggling, egging on my students to ask me what it means.
Overwhelming evidence undergirds the need for integrated curriculum based in multiple intelligences and learning styles. However, too often, curricula are not integrated, relying instead on artificially compartmentalized courses — usually categorized as reading-writing and listening-speaking, with grammar awkwardly given its own class based in content disconnected from anything else students are doing.
Lying. Sleeping. Yawning. Stretching. Antagonizing. Talking on the phone. Talking and talking and talking and talking — and not listening. Asking illegal questions. Coming and going. Interviewers have a lot to learn. Throughout my nearly 30-year career in higher education, I've had my share of interviews, I've witnessed open fora in which others were interviewed, and colleagues have shared with me their interview stories.
According to both Immigration and Customs Enforcement and English Language Program requirements, students are supposed to be "active learners." In reality, many come and go at will. There may be all sorts of reasons behind their behavior: Perhaps, because their countries or parents are sponsoring them, the "students" have no vested interest in their education. Perhaps, as is the case where I worked until recently, it is because administrators equate students with customers who are to be served, and as businessman Harry Selfridge asserted, "the customer is always right."
Some whisper, some laugh and guffaw, some argue. They gesture wildly, demonstrate their ideas with their hands or drawings. From the air, from their minds, from their partners, they search for the English words they need. They are furiously engaged in play, and they have forgotten that I — the teacher — am in the room. It is just as education should be.
In previous articles, we have explored best practices in curricula, methods and approaches, multiple instructional approaches, choosing materials and assessment. In this article — the final in the series — we examine the content elements necessary for inclusion in a best practices-based curriculum.
In this part of the best practices series, we will examine assessment and the many manifestations it takes. Assessment is not limited to traditional testing. It includes programmatic and student needs analysis, alternative approaches to evaluating learning and student self-reflection.
In previous articles, we have explored best practices in curricula, methods and approaches, and multiple instructional approaches. In this article, we will examine how to choose materials.
Previously, we examined the elements that comprise a best practices-based curriculum, types of curriculum, and methods and approaches for teaching in a best practices-based curriculum. In this article, we look at content-based instruction, project- and problem-based instruction, and service learning (community-engaged learning) to help teachers and program administrators familiarize themselves with the options available for actively involving students in their learning.
The previous two articles in this series examined the elements that constitute a best practices ESL program and began looking at the components of a best practices curriculum. Today, we look at the differences between methods and approaches and the critical application of multiple intelligence theory, learning styles theory and learning strategies.
In Part 1 of this series on best practices in ESL programs, we looked at the overwhelming research that supports integrated curricula. Today, we will look at two types of integrated curricula: theme-based learning and culture-based curriculum.
If you are part of an ESL program assessing your curriculum through a best practices lens, an institution looking to establish a best practices ESL program, or a teacher looking to work in a best practices program, what should you look for? In a series of articles, we'll examine elements that constitute a best practices program. Today, we begin with curriculum.
Another sleepless night. A few days ago, I read my end-of-term student evaluations. As has become all too familiar to me recently, too many were disparaging, hostile and hateful. I haven't slept much since.