R-A Chpt. 9: Communicative Practices

This chapter explains the Natural Approach to language learning and its four basic principles. Later the author gives various activities that can be done in the classroom according to the level of speech production the students are at, including activities for TPR, roleplaying, activities that include reading and writing such as a penpal station and many more. I especially liked the section where they layed out different thematic units and included coordinating topics and situations. That part sort of goes along with what we were doing last week on the board, when we were trying to think of broad thematic units that would allow for the creating of "bigger idea" questions to guide the unit. I was also glad that they addressed the issue of when students should focus on form and high level thinking skills within the natural approach, because I was thinking that this approach wouldn't go very far a higher level language courses as I feel the content would be limited. Now I see that the content can be expanded on, so that the student's progress in the language can move beyond basic survival skills.

R-A Chpt 4: Participatory Language Teaching

This chapter discussed how classrooms and learning can be set up so that it is more participatory and collaborative between the teacher and students. Teachers and students share each others roles, however that doesn't mean that the teacher isn't the one in charge of the class and its attainment of their goals. I think that it is smart to empower the students to take control of their own learning, and especially teach them strategies(which this chapter listed quite a few) that they can use to do so. I however do disagree with what the author said about Theme Cycles, or where the students and teachers create the curriculum together, and from the previous theme chosen, they can pick the following theme together as well. I feel that it is the teachers job to have already planned the main objectives and big ideas for the course and shouldn't be decided on a whim. That being said, I think that as long as the teacher has the objectives in place, I don't see why the students can't take part in creating activities, or choosing their own projects as long as they meet the objectives. I could be wrong, but at this point in time, that is my opinion :)

Brooks, Donato & McGlone: "When are they going to say it right?"

This journal article discussed a study that was done to look at the types of discourse that take place during collaborative tasks. The four features that were studied were: metatalk, metacognition, use of english, and wispering to oneself. They found that by the fifth time around students' use of english and other talk had decreased. This is significant because most teachers would argue that any use of the native language in a foreign language classroom would be detrimental, but this study shows that it was only used when neccesary to figure out the task, and once students were familiar with what they needed to do, it's use declined. The authors also believe in a sociocultural perspective on language theory and conclude that classrooms rich in interaction are vital to second language acquisistion. In regards to the actual experiement conducted, I felt that the authors made it sound like a large number of students participated in their introduction, when in fact it was only 6 students I believe.

C&D Chpt 5

This chapter talked about literacy in the language classroom. The authors stress the importance of building literacy as reading and writing skills are important to to both the interpretive and presentational modes of language. They also say that teaching reading and writing skills to second language learners can begin as soon as possible as long as the basic skills are there in their first language and students either have the background knowledge needed to understand the text, or the teacher provides sufficient scaffolding. I liked the idea of having students keep some sort of word bank for learning new words. I actually do this myself, although in a much less organized way, but I'll scribble down words that I am unfamiliar with while reading so that I can look them up and try to use them in other contexts. I was also surprised to learn that having students take turns reading allowed wasn't a good activity to use. I always thought that it would help students practice pronounciation, but I suppose it is a waste of time if the students aren't paying attention to the meaning of the words they are reading, but rather just the sounds the letters make.

C&D Chpt 6

In this chapter the authors talk about cooperative learning and its place in the language classroom. They talk about the benefits of group and partner activities as being that they not only provide more opportunities for interpersonal interaction, but at the same time they foster the development of social skills. I had already read the Johnson and Johnson and Kagan articles so I was already familiar with some of the information about cooperative skills in this chapter. The second part provides sample activities which I found to be quite interesting. One activity in particular called my attention (the "find someone who..." activity) as I have actually done that activity in a college level Spanish class. We did it as a sort of icebreaker during the first class, but I think it could be adapted to fit many different lesson topics.

C&D Chpt 4

This chapter discusses Foreign Language Standards 1.2(interpretive mode) and 1.3(presentational mode) The interpretive mode includes activities such as reading and listening and the authors give various examples of how this can be achieved in the classroom through storytelling and listening and reading authentic materials. They stress the importance of these activities having a purpose and making sure they are the same linguistic level as the students. Presentational mode includes speaking and writing. They suggest many activities for this standard such as creating travel brochures, performing skits, and creating storybooks that can then be read to younger language students. While I liked many of the suggested activities, a lot of them probably would not be engaging for high school students, however I really liked the fantasy animal creation and I think that maybe older students would like it as well. I think a lot of fun could be had with the partner activity especially, where one student describes their creature and the other has to try and draw it.

R-A Chpt 3: The Role of Interaction

This chapter dealt with the importance of interaction and negociated meaning in language learning citing Vygotsky's ZPD theory. It also talked about how to deal with student errors, and that often direct correction is not helpful and that teachers should only worry about errors when they are habitual. The second half of the chapter addressed the role of grammar instruction and output in second language acquisition. While the information they offered on grammar instruction and how it is helpful when students are ready to learn specific grammatical forms, I felt that it would be very difficult to actually apply in the classroom, primarily because it sounds like it would be incredibly hard to know when students are ready, and I don't think its plausible to have an individual grammar syllabus for 30 different students. I also agree that output is a vital part to language acquisition and is what really stretches a student's target language development.

Kagan: 17 Pros & Cons

I probably should have read this article before the Johnson article. This one definitely does a much better job of showing both sides to cooperative learning. They discussed some of the pros to coop. learning such as building diversity skills and strengthening social skills while at the same time increasing student learning. Then they describe what can go wrong if cooperative learning is not implemented correctly. When I was reading the "Pro" of individual accountability and increased participation, I know on the teacher's side its a pro, but from the students' point of view its probably a con.... while reading it I immediately thought of one of my Spanish classes where the teacher stands up at the front with his stack of index cards with our names and photos pulling out names to answer his questions. In my opinion it makes for an incredibly stressful class, and I don't want my students to be stressed out. Thankfully I don't think this is what cooperative learning is about.

Johnson & Johnson: Cooperative Learning Overview

This article talked about the basic elements of cooperative learning and how there has been quite a bit of research done that shows cooperative groups (when structured and monitored by the teacher) increase learning among all students, more so than competitive or individual work. I agree with the authors in that individual accountability is key for the success of cooperative learning, as I can remember dreading group work as a child, because that meant I would be doing all the work while the rest of the group goofed off. I also felt that the authors sounded a little idealistic, in the fact that it is true that children working together will make them become more community instead of individually minded, however it certainly doesn't always work out. There are a lot of instances where instead of giving extra help to the less capable member of the group, they whine and complain and don't want that person in their group because they slow them down.

C&D: Chpt. 3 p.54-end

The second half of chapter three continues with activities/tips that can be used when addressing Standard 1.1, or person to person communication. It spoke mostly about how to invite students to move from listening to actually speaking. I thought that the "Answer precedes question" technique definitely makes sense, and I am also now proud to say I know what a dialogue journal is.