Review of language learning approaches

[Bassman]

My temptation, forgive me DB , would be to have a system that works using quite a lot of TPR in the beginning. In fact, I’d have it being the main material, but that depends on the book really. I’d then build other key skills on top of that. Why? Because it should be kept really simple in the beginning and the kids should be able to achieve pretty much everything that is expected of them. Not to say that it won’t be a challenge. It should be a challenge. But, how many times do kids get through each level and have poor retention?

My goal would not be to have kids jumping around doing actions, although they can if they want, but to ensure thinking skills and comprehension are developed in a well structured way. Not every part of the curriculum would be TPR based, although it could be used. Many skills need to be developed.

The point about grammar, well, I don’t think that teaching grammar comes down to an either / or approach. It’s both. You should use both methods.

The key thing about any buxiban is that you need students. To keep students you need to get results. By getting results you keep the parents happy and they keep spending money to come to your school.

Therefore, horror of horrors, you need to not only teach things the right way, but also prepare these kids for the horrible way that they will be evaluated - standardizd testing like GEPT.

Sadly, many kids who learn English naturally, the “right” way, could easily be fazed by the nonsensical folly that is involved in some of these tests. Kids not only need to have great English but also do great on these crappy tests.

Any curriculum should use many different approaches to teaching. Have enough variety to keep both student and teacher stimulated and ultimately spit out the best English students in the area that the school is in.

Diversity - well, just look at this thread and you’ll find a great argument that proves that we are all different and learn differently.

[Bassman]

[quote=“Durins Bane”]

I use sign language to get things started.[/quote]

I thought it was a cattle prod

zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzAP!!!

[Durins_Bane]

No worries Bassman…we all have different ways.

If ever saw one of my teachers with a TPR book in their hands I would be forced to slap them. Some TPR is good, but it shouldn’t be the cornerstone of a school or a program.

[jdsmith]

[quote=“Durins Bane”]No worries Bassman…we all have different ways.

If ever saw one of my teachers with a TPR book in their hands I would be forced to slap them. Some TPR is good, but it shouldn’t be the cornerstone of a school or a program.[/quote]

This really depends on the school and age of the chitlins. We’re focusing on the younger ones, so TPR at the beginning is a great way go.

If you are in a set system already, it may be harder to make the necessary room for a solid TPR program.

If I saw a teacher here with grammar book for kiddies…I’d need to borrow that cattle prod.

[ImaniOU]

I teach in an immersion school so the kids are getting English from the teachers, the other children (we have quite a few who are native or near-native English speakers), and from the classroom environment. For the youngest children, they are not forced to speak English, but rather encouraged to if they can. I encourage even those who are not fluent to speak English so they at least can feel that I think they are good enough at it. Some of my lower-level kids do try speaking English with their more fluent classmates even if it’s in broken English. Every year that I have taught the youngest age group, I have had a few children with zero English ability. They definitely go through a silent stage and often suddenly burst out with holophrastic or sometimes telegraphic English. I even had one boy emerge from his silent period talking about what happened to him the day before with something along the lines of “I yesterday go to the park.”

I find my style more closely comes from the Berlitz method for my literate students. Especially when it comes to new vocabulary. I discourage Chinese-English dictionaries and tell them at the beginning of the year to buy English dictionaries so they can practice learning the words in English and learn how to use them correctly rather than trying to translate them directly from or into Chinese and making mistakes. If they want to know how to say a word, rather than telling someone the Chinese to see if they know the English for it, I have pushed them to describe it in English and see if I or another student can help them find the word. Sure, it’s easier for them to just get another student to translate it for them, but that doesn’t encourage them to think in English, but to rather think in Chinese and translate their thoughts into English. At first their parents thought it would be too hard for them, but now I see them asking each other things like “What is it called when you need to sell something that you don’t use anymore?” rather than asking “How do you say ‘xxx’ in English?”. Interesting because I don’t think in the 10 years that I had formally studied French in school, I had ever been taught in a Berlitz manner. I did when I was learning beginning Spanish in university, but I had enough French under my belt that I understood quite a lot of what the grad. ass. said anyway.

[ImaniOU]

[quote=“Bassman”][quote=“Durins Bane”]

I use sign language to get things started.[/quote]

I thought it was a cattle prod

zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzAP!!! [/quote]

For the longest time, I have been planning to do research in using sign language, particularly Signed Exact English to teach ESL, especially inflections, to non-native speakers. AFAIK, there is no published research about it.

[twocs]

@Durins Bane

[quote=“jdsmith”][quote=“Durins Bane”]TPR is okay in small amounts but it is a mistake to rely on it too much or build curriculum around it.

Blasphemy!

Okok…but can ya argue that TPR is not the best way to get things started? Can ya canya??

Our program is heavy on TPR for the first 2-3 months and tapers off out about 6 months, where we then continue to use it to introduce new vocabulary items before reading and in phonics classes to tighten listening skills.[/quote]

I use sign language to get things started.[/quote]

Actually I think sign language is a form of TPR.

[puiwaihin]

No, sign language is non-verbal. TPR is verbal combined with actions. Sign language also has its own grammar. It’s a complete language.

TPR is a methodology.

I think what he meant, though, was using non-verbal cues to communicate meaning. That isn’t exactly TPR, though.

I think a better statement is that TPR is a kind of sign language, but then that still isn’t giving sign language enough credit.

[Dottie]

[quote=“puiwaihin”]RE: Silent Period
There isn’t a “silent period” in TPR in the same sense as some other methods where students aren’t all expected to start speaking for several lessons.[/quote]In “classical” TPR; that is, the methodology outlined by the originator of TPR, James Asher, there is certainly a silent period. Ramiro Garcia writes that after around 12 hours of TPR instruction, students will spontaneously start production in the target language.

I believe that in the early years of TPR, Asher used to recommend an enforced, extended silent period. This proved frustrating for students, though, so he relaxed the rules.

I liked what you wrote in the rest of this post, though, Puiwaihin. I think the key is a degree of flexibility. Certainly, Natural Approach-style single word answers and the like can be very useful for beginners, and I’m sure many people realise that drilled set phrases are of limited benefit.

[puiwaihin]

[quote=“Dottie”][quote=“puiwaihin”]RE: Silent Period
There isn’t a “silent period” in TPR in the same sense as some other methods where students aren’t all expected to start speaking for several lessons.[/quote]In “classical” TPR; that is, the methodology outlined by the originator of TPR, James Asher, there is certainly a silent period. Ramiro Garcia writes that after around 12 hours of TPR instruction, students will spontaneously start production in the target language.

I believe that in the early years of TPR, Asher used to recommend an enforced, extended silent period. This proved frustrating for students, though, so he relaxed the rules.[/quote]
True. I guess I’m coming from the viewpoint of introducing TPR when students are not at level 0. But still, in every demonstration of TPR I’ve seen the kids are always talking in the first lesson. Not forming whole sentences, but repeating the verbal along with the physical cue.

[jdsmith]

[quote=“puiwaihin”][quote=“Dottie”][quote=“puiwaihin”]RE: Silent Period
There isn’t a “silent period” in TPR in the same sense as some other methods where students aren’t all expected to start speaking for several lessons.[/quote]In “classical” TPR; that is, the methodology outlined by the originator of TPR, James Asher, there is certainly a silent period. Ramiro Garcia writes that after around 12 hours of TPR instruction, students will spontaneously start production in the target language.

I believe that in the early years of TPR, Asher used to recommend an enforced, extended silent period. This proved frustrating for students, though, so he relaxed the rules.[/quote]

True. I guess I’m coming from the viewpoint of introducing TPR when students are not at level 0. But still, in every demonstration of TPR I’ve seen the kids are always talking in the first lesson. Not forming whole sentences, but repeating the verbal along with the physical cue.[/quote]

We can get them speaking the TPR command sentences without prompting (aside from the TPR itself).

[bob]

@jdsmith

Grammar is not taught by identification of the grammatical status of a word, “no, Jimmy, fly is a verb and we want a noun, like…uhm, fly.” It is taught at a deeper cognitive level, more mathematically, as in “what works.”

I have never met an ESL student with a clear understanding of the parts of speech who had the slightest doubt about whether that understanding was useful. Of course they need to understand that some words function both as nouns and verbs. That is part of the package. The parts of speech are like personality types. Verbs tend to behave one way, adjectives another. Verbs have four forms which are used to show the time of action and to create nouns and adjectives. Adjectives frequently take er and est endings to mark comparative and superlative aspects etc. When you meet a word and someone tells you that it is a verb or an adjective you can expect that it will have these characteristics. This is absolutely useful information that can be passed along gradually and once acquired will be useful as long as the person is a student of the language. I am not questioning the value of TPR but I highly doubt that you could find many people who achieved second language fluency “as adults” without mastering the basics of grammar. Kids might be different.

[jdsmith]

@bob

[quote=“jdsmith”] Grammar is not taught by identification of the grammatical status of a word, “no, Jimmy, fly is a verb and we want a noun, like…uhm, fly.” It is taught at a deeper cognitive level, more mathematically, as in “what works.”

I have never met an ESL student with a clear understanding of the parts of speech who had the slightest doubt about whether that understanding was useful. Of course they need to understand that some words function both as nouns and verbs. That is part of the package. The parts of speech are like personality types. Verbs tend to behave one way, adjectives another. Verbs have four forms which are used to show the time of action and to create nouns and adjectives. Adjectives frequently take er and est endings to mark comparative and superlative aspects etc. When you meet a word and someone tells you that it is a verb or an adjective you can expect that it will have these characteristics. This is absolutely useful information that can be passed along gradually and once acquired will be useful as long as the person is a student of the language. I am not questioning the value of TPR but I highly doubt that you could find many people who achieved second language fluency “as adults” without mastering the basics of grammar. Kids might be different.[/quote]

The thing about TPR is that it gets you using the language and assimilating the grammar long before you are expected to break down the verifiable pieces.

If you go ahead and try to teach English while simultaneously teaching grammar, good luck in A) maintaining the interest of the students and B) increasing their comprehension levels.

All TPR does is give them a chance to soak up a BUNCH of language before more traditional methods are tried.

Understanding grammar is great and being able to self-correct grammar is one of the best skills any language student can attain…however, teaching grammar from the get go…no. TPR works better. Hands down.

[bob]

There seems to be a real lack of available info on what you TPR guys actually “do”. I bought your books but only the first two and they don’t really seem suitable for anybody I am teaching right now. I have to admit too that I couldn’t figure out how I was actually supposed to use them anyway. Hang on I’ll go dig them out…

OK I found them.

Everything sounds great as far as the teacher’s guide goes (that’s why I bought the books) but then I came to the contents and got a bit confused. The first picture of the guy standing with the apple on his head for example has the caption “Stand up” with the answers “yes” and “no” underneath. The thing that confuses me about this is that stand up is a command but nobody is commanding anybody. And yes and no are answers to yes/ no questions but nobody is asking anything. I don’t get it. Wouldn’t it have been better to say “The man is standing up,” and then have right and wrong as possible answers?

[jdsmith]

[quote=“bob”]There seems to be a real lack of available info on what you TPR guys actually “do”. I bought your books but only the first two and they don’t really seem suitable for anybody I am teaching right now. I have to admit too that I couldn’t figure out how I was actually supposed to use them anyway. Hang on I’ll go dig them out…

OK I found them.

Everything sounds great as far as the teacher’s guide goes (that’s why I bought the books) but then I came to the contents and got a bit confused. The first picture of the guy standing with the apple on his head for example has the caption “Stand up” with the answers “yes” and “no” underneath. The thing that confuses me about this is that stand up is a command but nobody is commanding anybody. And yes and no are answers to yes/ no questions but nobody is asking anything. I don’t get it. Wouldn’t it have been better to say “The man is standing up,” and then have right and wrong as possible answers?[/quote]

Well, the biggest part of Book 1 is that the TPR lesson must be taught before the book is even opened Bob. The book is an evaluation.

For lesson 1, the commands can be like this…very simple:

Stand up. Sit down. Stand up. Go to the door. Go to the chair. Sit down. Stand up. Sit down.

The students watch you do them first, and then they do as you command.

The book uses what they know…ie, “Stand up.” They don’t yet know the meaning of “The man is standing up.”

So the implication is wheteher or not the guy with an apple on his head is standing up or not. Yes or no.

There is some confusion that book 1 is a reading book. It’s not. It’s a prereading book. And if you dont do the TPR activity before doing the evaluation, then you’re picking all the meat out the sub, brother.

I would be more than happy to show you what I mean.

[bob]

“Pre-reading.” I thought it must be something like that. Thanks.