Author: Ben Fisher-Rodriguez

Carol Dweck’s Mindset – Mr. Fisher Gets Growing Pains

I set a goal of reading 24 books in 2019 (about 2 a month), and it’s going very well so far! I have read 18 so far this year, so I’m a little bit ahead of “schedule.” (Granted, I have read 5 since school let out on June 19th, but whatever. I will take that as a success, as it means I adequately re-appropriated time I would have spent playing video games or drooling on myself or whatever. Mindset!)

Carol Dweck’s Mindset is a book I think many educators have heard of, and no doubt we’ve all been to at least one conference presentation or PD where someone was like “we want to do [this and this strategy/activity] to help students build a growth mindset!” (And then of course, we all nod sagely because mmm yes mindset.)

As evidenced by that last bit of snark, I had developed a bit of an eye-rolling reaction when growth mindset was brought up in those settings. Growth mindset sounds like a DUH sort of teaching thing, like DUH we should set high standards and believe that all students can reach them, and DUH our own potential as teachers can also grow despite challenges. It also has that flavor-of-the-month feel, sounding like a nebulous platitude that doesn’t necessarily change your day-to-day or give you ideas of what to do when things actually go sideways (kid cusses you out, a lesson is just bombing, your admin is laying the pressure on during an eval and you’re not sure what to do, etc.) “Have a growth mindset!” Ok!!! I did it!!! …now what?

I discovered something that maybe I had learned before, but apparently not well enough: it is so much more powerful to go directly to the source material, rather than hear (often diluted) secondary interpretations. And I am glad for having done this, because I think my processing of this book will help me become a better educator and a better person.

The gist of the book (my German irony senses are tingling) is that people face the many challenges and contexts of life with one of two mindsets: the Fixed Mindset, which says that peoples’ abilities and intelligence are innate and, well, fixed, and the Growth Mindset, which says that intelligence and ability can be developed through a commitment to teaching, learning, and appropriate challenge. Dweck illustrates how these mindsets play out in the realms of business, teaching, parenting, coaching, and even relationships to illustrate how they permeate every aspect of our lives, though mostly unevenly. For instance, a person in business may know they are lacking certain skills and recognize their need to gain experience from hard work and mentorship by others as they learn their trade. They then grow, and can be fabulously successful! That same person can be fixed in their romantic relationship, deciding that their partner and the relationship will always go the way it is currently going, and if it’s going badly, then the relationship was ALWAYS bad and should be allowed to self-destruct. (Two things: if a relationship has ALWAYS been bad after reviewing all the moments together, you should probably get out. But sometimes, all it takes is just telling your partner what you’re thinking and feeling. Mind-reading is not a thing, y’all.)

This all sounds great! Be growth-minded in every arena of life! Believe in change! Try hard! WOO!

But reading this text was actually a little painful for me, and I imagine it could be that way for others. Because in reading about people who typified the Fixed Mindset in their professional and personal lives, I sometimes saw myself. Not in an “oh god I have had a fixed mindset this entire time!” unmasked Scooby Doo villain sort of way, but in recognizing that there are situations and contexts in my professional and personal lives where I am triggered to a Fixed Mindset, and it holds me back from seeing and realizing my true self and true potential.

I’m realizing as I write this how wishy-washy I’m sounding in trying to let you know that I actually had an intense experience with a book/concept that I had perceived to be fairly wishy-washy. Ah! But I want to continue reflecting on how these mindsets have played out for me: now, and as the school year progresses. Here are three quick reflections I had while reading:

  1. “That Class.” This past year I had two classes that regularly drove me up the wall. There were certain characters in these classes that I had subconsciously given up on – in my mind, they were never going to participate in the way that I wanted, and their challenges that existed outside of the school building were going to persist in making school hard for them no matter what I did. We, as educators, don’t want to admit that we think that about any kid, but it’s easy to write off a class with something like “oh, that’s my High Blood Pressure Class.” I know we’ve all had those classes, and that I have to be patient and forgiving of myself. But I want to engage in active, constant reflection this coming school year to avoid falling into the thinking traps that caught me last year. What skills are my students lacking, and how can I bring them to practice and master those skills? Have I made clear to them why these skills are worth mastering? How can I engage my class in problem solving when things aren’t going to plan, so that they get a say in how they learn and I don’t have to generate every solution? This also plays into an idea I grappled with in Radical Candor by Kim Scott – how can I open the doors for honest feedback on my performance so that we all get better, every day? If I catch myself having a “That Class” next year, I want to do a thorough, honest assessment with myself of what is happening, so I can teach.
  2. Classroom Management Leader / Nervous Wreck. I took on a role this year that allowed me and a colleague to give a classroom management workshop over the summer, with the expectation that there would be follow up one-hour meetings during the school year to check in and practice skills. I take on leadership roles because I like being helpful and sharing – and things were going well management-wise in my classes the previous year. But I think having the role almost made me stop learning more about classroom management. I found myself saying “I’ve got this, I’ve got the skills to work with my classes,” but also running into moments where I, uh, didn’t “have” it. I felt like a fraud, because I had been given a neat title, but if anyone had come into my room, I may or may not have been compelled to lay blame wherever to overcome my feeling that things weren’t going as well as I wanted them to, and I wasn’t adapting. I’m a little bit more wary of taking on leadership roles as I transition to a new district and new school, because I end up letting them be a time suck, and if I do end up taking on any roles in the years to come, I want to enter with a boatload more humility. I want to maintain that learner’s stance, always.
  3. Singing and Writing – In my personal life, two of my greatest self-care outlets are singing and writing. I sang in choirs for 6 years, and have been writing poetry since I was 11 years old. (I’m also published, it’s fine.) But asked to present these “talents,” I freeze. I am so afraid of being judged – finding that my voice is unpleasant to listen to, that I don’t sound good singing songs that I like, that my writing is trite garbage. But at the end of the day, truly, truly, they are for me. Only me. I sing and write because it feels good. Now, if I decide that I want to be a pro at either, or even just perform either in public for fun, I will have to accept that people will offer their opinions on my performance whether I want them to or not. And I can either take those as value judgments, or search for nuggets of wisdom and constructive criticism, and grow.

I recommend reading this book for yourself, and pausing whenever you find yourself reflected in a description of a fixed mindset. It is hard to be honest with ourselves about these things sometimes, but I think that this specific hard pain can help us grow. And maybe at the end of the day, you’re very content with your life and will find it to be self-help-y junk. But the other possibility is that you grow.

Have you read Carol Dweck’s Mindset? Let me know what you thought!

Students Want YOU to Write a CI Novel

List of potential novel topics generated by the Comprehensible Cascadia 2019 Pre-Conference Reading Workshop

Reading is an essential component of any TCI classroom. Written input provides different data for the brain than oral input (think literary language, more passive constructions, sight cognates may be easier than when heard), and Stephen Krashen has compiled numerous studies that show that reading improves learners’ vocabulary, spelling, grammatical accuracy, fluency…you know, ALL THE STUFF. Students need to be reading in the L2 every day, because the benefits are too good to pass up.

Many programs have implemented Free Choice Reading (FCR), empowering students to choose whatever book from the classroom library they like, and read for a predetermined amount of minutes to get some great written input. Of course, the “C” in “CI” stands for “comprehensible,” so we need for reading materials to be leveled so that students’ brains don’t implode when we set them to reading. They need to understand their texts for the input to do its job!

We are lucky to live in a time where there has been a surge in “CI Readers” – compelling stories written in simplified language to help students both enjoy a story and get great input. Companies like Fluency Matters produce beautiful books that are meticulously edited and often have stories that students get hooked on. There are also other authors that sell through vendors like Amazon or Teacher’s Discovery. If you teach Spanish, you are especially blessed, as there are soooo many Spanish CI Readers when compared with other languages.

But what makes a student into a reader is the book that just “fits” them, the “Home Run” book, the transformative reading experience that makes kids unable to put books down. If you are a reader as an adult, chances are you can remember a book or two that was this experience for you. When the Harry Potter books were still being published, my parents took me to a couple of the “midnight premiere” events where you could get the book as soon as it was out, and kids my age were rushing to be the first to finish the newest book and know all the dramatic plot points. I remember powering through The Goblet of Fire at all hours (well past bedtime, with a tiny reading lamp) because it was a wonderful, gripping story. I was a reader!

We want these same experiences for our own students, to make them literate people who can use their reading to build empathy, as well as skill in the L2. And the texts need to both compelling stories, AND written in language students can understand with only a year or two (or maybe even a semester!) of language class behind them. But since comprehension-based readers are a relatively recent discovery for many language teachers, there aren’t a TON of authors or titles available. (Again, more for Spanish than any other language.) Additionally, “authentic” children’s books in the L2 may be more simplified when compared with the literary canon of the culture, but they often contain low-frequency vocabulary, and might not exactly be compelling for a reading-avoidant secondary school student.

This is where you come in. Yes, you! See those topics above? They were generated through observation of student reading habits and by directly asking what students would be interested in reading. Students want to read these books in the L2, but they don’t quite exist yet in large variety.

You – yes, you! – could write a simple, 10-chapter reader that could spark that love of reading in a child, a love that will push them to higher levels of L2 proficiency. A chapter could be like two pages, with lots of illustrations to support comprehension! Not feeling extra creative? Pick one of the Seven Basic Plots and map one of the above themes onto it. JUST WRITE THE BOOK!! WRITE A BOOK! WRITE ANY BOOK!

Your students want to read in the L2, and the benefits are undeniable. So lets put the magic into their hands with some new, exciting readers.

Want to learn more?

If you’re feeling like this might be something you could do (because duh you can) then reach out to Mike Peto. This post was inspired by him, and he is an excellent resource when it comes to all things reading in a TCI classroom. WRITE THE BOOK. WRITE IT!!

Quick Quizzes – Daily Assessments that Build Confidence and Success

I had so many light bulb moments at Comprehensible Cascadia this year, and one of them was about WHY Quick Quizzes are so useful and powerful for you and students. Now I’m convinced that I should be doing one every day for the WHOLE school year – I’ve been spotty in this, but now I’ve seen the light!

Why should you do it? One: You, as the teacher, get quick data on who is struggling with what. If students were alive and paying attention during class, it is reasonable to expect that every student can get 100% on these Quick Quizzes. If someone doesn’t, it is easy to see where their comprehension is faltering, and adjust your instruction towards increasing their comprehension starting the next class period. (Hello, admins! #UsingFormativeAssessmentData) Two: It puts a nice bow on the end of the class period, rounding out the class experience while also sneaking in more input. Score! Three: It can help students see that the work of language acquisition is listening with the intent to understand, every day. “Being fluent in a language” (whatever that means for you/them) is not a goal that is far off in the future – it is a daily effort towards understanding more and more so that you can use more and more. If you can ace the quick quiz just about every day (again, an attainable goal for students with a teacher like you who goes slow, keeps it comprehensible, and keeps it at least mildly interesting!), then you can learn to speak the language. I think this is one of the most compelling reasons to administer daily Quick Quizzes. Four: Unfortunately for our students’ intrinsic motivations, we exist in a society that demands grades be attached to learning. Similar to point 3 above, we can show students that a grade in a CI classroom is something that is built through listening and reading to understand daily, instead of thinking that there is some far-off test to cram for. (I wonder if increasing the frequency of theses Quick Quizzes will help de-center the grade in the students’ experience of the class, moving them from seeing grades as “gotchas!” to seeing them as ways to build their own learning and assess their progress towards goals. “Quizzes” can be scary just because we call them “Quizzes,” but if they’re every day, they can lose that scary edge!)

When do I use Quick Quizzes?

Quick Quizzes are part of point 5, the “Extend/Assess” portion of the Star Sequence of lesson planning

I use Quick Quizzes at the end of a lesson sequence that has included opportunities to engage with both aural and written input. I usually go from Create (oral/aural class language experience), to Review, to Write (co-create class text, modeling strong writing habits), to Read, to Extending the learning through the Quick Quiz. Again, it kind of puts a nice bow on the day’s learning experiences and provides a nice summary moment of what was “covered” that day.

If it’s springtime and your classes have turned especially…er…zesty…you can maybe throw an additional Quick Quiz into the middle of the class period. This can help reset the class and re-emphasize the importance of listening and participating in the creation of the class experiences in the L2.

How do I do it? – Logistics

At this point in class, you and your students have had a common class experience with input about something you and your students (hopefully) found interesting! Depending on how much time you have, you can choose to do either an Oral Quick Quiz or a Written Quick Quiz. I tend to use Written Quick Quizzes more for reasons I outline below.

An Oral Quick Quiz is great if you’re running short on time, and just want to get a temperature check on your class. It’s harder to get data on individual students this way, but it can be a great way to practice choral responses and keep class light and not too…quizz-y. You don’t need any materials for this one.

A Written Quick Quiz gets you data on paper for every student in your class, and quick. This helps you identify students for intervention, and you can even put grades in the gradebook with this information! Each student will need a piece of paper and something to write with. For paper, I suggest having a student job being Paper Passer – and train them how to do it quickly. (Aka count out how many are needed in a row, and pass them to the person on the aisle, NOT handing individual sheets to each student.) You can use scrap paper cut up into quarter sheets, or 3×5 index cards. Students don’t really need a ton of space because the quiz is so quick, and this helps save paper! #recycling #GermansAreGoodAtIt ANOTHER IDEA I just had was maybe the act of getting the paper for the quiz is a brain break! It can be a quick game, or you could leave the paper at strategic points in the classroom so students can just quickly go to retrieve it, allowing them 30ish seconds of movement to revitalize their brains for even more input.

How do I do it? – Oral Quick Quiz Procedure

  1. Tell students (probably in L1) how this Quick Quiz is going to play out: we are going to have a (4-8) question quiz that won’t require any paper and everyone is probably going to get 100% on because they were paying attention in class and have been doing a great job acquiring the new language! (A little encouragement goes a long way! You want students to know you have so much faith in them because they can do this, and this will take the edge off of it being a “quiz.”)
  2. Let students know that you will be making a statement in the L2 about the information covered in class TWO times. They should be silent, and shouldn’t say anything between the first and second time you make the statement. After saying the statement the second time, students should all respond with either a “yes!” or a “no!” (Or True/False!) It sounds a little something like this:
    Teacher: “(in L2) Ok, number 1! Ben…plays… a lot of video games…on his Playstation. [Holding out hand like a stop sign] Ben…plays a lot of video games on his Playstation.” [Makes invitational gesture]
    Class: “YES!”
  3. If the correct answer was yes/true, positively restate the information for the class to hear that input again, maybe even adding a quick question that extends the information. (“Yes, class! Ben plays lots of video games on his Playstation. What games does he play?”) If the correct answer is no/false, ask students to help correct you. (“No, class. Ben doesn’t play video games on his Playstation. What system does he play on?” “Nintendo!”) Then, repeat the corrected statement. This whole process is just about getting more input!!
  4. As students get more comfortable with this process (maybe some class periods down the line), you can change from yes/no/true/false questions to this/that questions (“Does Ben play video games on his Playstation, or does Ben play video games on his Nintendo?”) or open-ended questions (“What system does Ben play video games on?”)
  5. Continue on making statements about the information covered/created in class that day. Celebrate all correct, confident answers from the class, and gently correct any incorrect answers. Go for your predetermined number of “questions,” or just go until you run out of steam.
  6. Celebrate! Your students are doing the work of language acquisition by listening and reading to understand! I usually say something like “(in L2) WOW you are all so smart and so good at (L2)!!!”

How do I do it? – Written Quick Quiz Procedure

  1. Tell students how this flavor of Quick Quiz is going to play out: we are going to have a (4-10) question quiz that everyone is going to get 100% on because they were paying attention in class and have been doing a great job acquiring the new language! (Theme: Success!)
  2. Let students know that you will be making (4-10) statements in the L2 about the information covered in class, TWO times each. They should be silent throughout. For each statement, students write yes or no. (Or True/False!) It sounds and looks a little something like this:
    Teacher: “Ok, number 1! Ben…plays… a lot of video games…on his Playstation. Ben…plays a lot of video games on his Playstation.”
    Class: “(writing on their papers) Yes.”
    Teacher: “Number 2!” etc etc
    I do all of my questions in one go, repeating each one two times (once super slowly, once at more conversational speed (but still slightly slower than that)). ALSO don’t forget to write down your sentences for your own sake so y’all can grade them. I make up my statements on the spot based on what happened in class, so writing down what you said is essential if you’re doing anything involving healthy personalization and frequent questioning.
  3. [As students get more comfortable with this process (maybe some class periods down the line), you can change from yes/no/true/false questions to this/that questions (“Does Ben play video games on his Playstation, or does Ben play video games on his Nintendo?”) or open-ended questions (“What system does Ben play video games on?”) Use a healthy mix of question types, but yes/no/true/false is tried and true and works great for this purpose.]
  4. Make as many statements as you told students you would (and honestly what makes sense for your gradebook…I was on an 8-point grading scale last year so 4- or 8-question quizzes were best for me.).
  5. I like to have students trade and grade right after we get through all the statements! I have them write “Corrected By: Soandso” at the bottom so I know they didn’t correct their own. (I tell them that if their grading partner doesn’t do this, THEY get the zero, so they check in with each other to make sure their partner has done it. I’m not that militant about it but, ya know, Teacher Lies!)
  6. Read the statements you made during the quiz again in order, prompting students to chorally respond yes/no/true/false to each question. [This is like the process for the Oral Quick Quizzes above.] If the correct answer was yes/true, positively restate the information for the class to hear that input again, maybe even adding a quick question that extends the information. (“Yes, class! Ben plays lots of video games on his Playstation. What games does he play?”) If the correct answer is no/false, ask students to help correct you. (“No, class. Ben doesn’t play video games on his Playstation. What system does he play on?” “Nintendo!”) Then, repeat the corrected statement. INPUT. INPUT!
  7. If you let students trade and grade, here’s an organizational hack: have them hand you the quizzes as they walk out the door, and then (once they’re gone) literally throw all the quizzes that got 100% in the recycling immediately. Good for them, they did it, but you’re more interested in students that got less that 100%, and on what. Ideally, this will not be many students, and you can make sure to use more comprehension checks and comprehensibility supports for these students in future lessons. If it’s a lot of students, reflect on why that might be, and consider filming yourself to see if you’re going too fast, introducing too much new vocabulary, only focusing on one area of the classroom, etc. I keep track of grades on a class roster in addition to in the online gradebook, and by only marking the students with less than 100% on the quizzes on the roster, it is easier for me to identify patterns and struggling students.

What do I do with it now that we’ve finished?

Hopefully you’ve corrected that sucker! Save yourself the time and effort, and the process of correcting it in the L2 is actually just an opportunity to provide more input.

These quizzes provide you with great data to work with in future class periods. If most students are getting 100%, then they are doing the work of language acquisition by listening and reading to understand! Bam! The ones who get less than 100% can get some extra love and support during future classes so they, too, can continue succeeding in their language acquisition journey. If during an Oral Quick Quiz you get lukewarm choral answers, this lets you know that students could be needing some more training on how to provide choral responses, they could be not feeling confident in their understanding of the language of the day, or they could use some additional love in the direction of taking risks and participating in class.

In order to acquire a language, learners just need access to level-appropriate input and interaction. The quizzes let you know if the input was able to do its job of being comprehended and processed in learners’ brains, and (did I mention??) are just another opportunity to provide more input!

Pro Tips!

  1. Cue student silence and responses! Every class has enthusiastic students who just love to respond. I literally make a “I am a police officer, stop right here” gesture with my hand when students are not supposed to respond, and then gesture towards students with an open hand when I’m ready for them to respond. Students are processing a lot – rules of the activity and class, new language, the magical roller coaster of puberty – help them be more successful by using clear, cuing body language.
  2. Let students know what to expect! Explaining the format and expectations of the quizzes helps students relax, as well as assuring them that they will do well. You also might have to let them know that this is how you gather data to report to their home adults how they’re doing, so their appropriate participation is essential. (Besides, they’re going to kick butt on these quizzes anyways, so if they just do their part, you get to send home the happiest reports!)
  3. Practice and insist on choral responses! I think choral responses are a very important element of a TCI classroom. If you’re getting weak responses during an Oral Quick Quiz, verify that students understood the question first, and then retrain them to offer appropriately full-voiced responses so you can make sure you’re doing your job as best you can. Most of the time, students just need a reminder that this is your only way of knowing what’s going on in their brains, besides the dreaded Boring Paper Test. Celebrate solid responses, too!
  4. Do them all the time! Doing Quick Quizzes frequently (multiple times per week) will take the edge off the “Quiz” part of them, and will reinforce in students’ minds that the work of language acquisition (and by extension, the grades they earn) (ugh I hate grades) is an everyday effort that builds and builds their abilities in super manageable chunks. Bam!

What if I want to learn more?

Here’s a great video of Tina Hargaden doing an Oral Quick Quiz with a French 1 class. This is in March, so Tina is asking students to respond to “Who?” questions that are actually fairly lengthy. At the end, she even has a “Why?” question! She makes sure to cue when students are to respond, which stops kids from blurting. ALSO she does a fun teacher trick – she stands on a table so that students think that she can see everyone, and whether or not they’re responding. Trickery! But it might help your Escape Artists respond more consistently.

What do you think? Do you feel ready to use Quick Quizzes? Comment below and send me any questions you might have!

Write and Discuss – An Essential Literacy Activity for Communicative Language Teaching

I have used Write and Discuss ever since I began teaching with CCLT strategies, but it was my experience with it at Comprehensible Cascadia last week in Portland that finally brought it all together for me. This is an ESSENTIAL strategy for classes centered on providing engaging CI, as it makes concrete the beautiful aural experience that students have just had with the language. If the Create phase of the lesson is playing a jazz ensemble piece with your students (structured with some improv), the Write and Discuss is putting that composition on sheet music so you can enjoy those moments and that exciting language again and again.

Why should you do it? To show students the written form of the language they’re able to understand aurally, and introduce how to be a strong writer in the L2 by modeling writing moves that push students towards higher levels of proficiency. Plus, the texts you create can be used for literacy activities and extension in the future!

When do I use Write and Discuss?

Use Write and Discuss after having any sort of language experience with your students, what we might call the Create or “Guided Oral Input” phase of the lesson. These Create experiences could be Card Talk, Calendar Talk, co-creating a story using an OWI or Invisibles, Scripted Stories a la TPRS, Picture Talk, Movie Talk, Special Person Interviews – whatever provides rich, compelling aural input in the L2 to learners. Move from the Create phase to a Review phase (any sort of activity that orally reviews the information learned/discovered/created in the Create phase of your lesson), and then to Write and Discuss.

How do I do it? – Logistics

There are a couple different ways to do this, but they have the same underlying principles. You can 1) write directly up on the whiteboard, 2) write by hand on your doc cam, or 3) use a keyboard (maybe a wireless one!) to type up the information into a word processing document. With any of these formats, you’ll want to save the texts you create somehow because they can become the basis for great literacy work the next day, the next week, or even much later in the year. If you write by hand on the board, take a picture of the completed W+D at the end of class so you have it for later. If you have a hand-written version or a pic of your board, you can type it up, or use Voice Typing in Google Docs to dictate it into a document. (Click “Tools” and then “Voice Typing”! LIFE-CHANGING – make sure you change the document language in the “File” tab as well to ensure maximum awesomeness / self-editing.) Some teachers also assign a student job of typing up what you are hand writing, to save you time and to give a special job to a fast processor.

Once the W+D is in digital form, you can share it with students in a format that allows them to “review” (aka just reread) it whenever they like. I usually create a class Google Slide that has all of the texts we have created as a class over the year, one on each slide, and I share a link to it on our learning management system. Whatever works for you and your students!

How do I do it? – Procedure

  1. The first time I do it, I say (in L1 or L2) that we are going to write a summary text about our class conversation/experience. Also, something to the effect of “Please help me, my memory is terrible!” (Not a Teacher Lie for me…)
  2. I find it helpful to begin every Write and Discuss by writing a good starter word in the L2 (e.g. “Today…” or “There is…” or “Once upon a time…”), and then saying it expectantly while slowly panning out across the class. This says “hey, this is the first word, keep it going!”
  3. Give students a bit of nonverbal encouragement to help finish the sentence, especially at first. Students might be silent for a long while, but then you might get one who says some stuff in the L1. That’s okay – see if giving them an encouraging smile pushes them to try some L2. Or! You’ll get a random string of L2 words from a student. CELEBRATE! This is a chance for students to tentatively try some L2 production in a low-stakes setting. If a student tries to finish your sentence with literally anything, love on them!!
  4. …And then take the language they provide and formulate a (probably more correct) sentence. Say the sentence slowly and thoughtfully – this may cause more students to shout out more details that you can use to enhance the sentence. For German at least, this may trigger some fun adjective endings or some subordinated clauses – fantastic! The students are aware of the language you’re using (because it came up in class and they’re able to provide it now), so you’re just reformulating it in a more natural, flowing way. This will serve as good input that will result in good output – in the future!
  5. Ride the wave of the details you can elicit to make the sentence fuller until you reach a good stopping point. To use Card Talk as an example, this might be repeating the information you learned about a student until students have filled in all the details. (“Ben plays soccer…oh! On a team. Ben plays soccer on a team…is it a school team?” etc etc) At the beginning, you don’t want to go all Thomas Mann (#DegreeInGermanLit) and have a 3-page sentence, but you can safely integrate all familiar language into a nice-sounding sentence that flows naturally. This is the Discuss part of Write and Discuss – if you just take what students say initially and write it right away, you might get shorter, choppier material like, “Ben plays soccer. He plays soccer on a school team. He likes it a lot.” Why not something more like “Ben plays soccer on a school team, and he likes it a lot.” This conveys the same information, but flows more like the language we would want our students to eventually produce. If you have established all this info with those shorter sentences during the Create phase, students will get to enjoy the natural melody of your language as they polish up what they’ve heard with you. Make a nicely flowing sentence, then write it up! Boom! (You might have an opportunity to show students language/conventions that are hard to hear…very fun/natural time to make comparisons between languages or marvel at the majesty of Umlauts.)
  6. After every few sentences, pause to reread the sentences you have already created to the class. More input! And they can appreciate the fruit of their brain labors.
  7. Keep going – discuss, and then write! You don’t want to go too long on this, because it can certainly lose its luster after a while. Some teachers choose to set certain limits: they only write for 6 minutes, or they write until one of their board spaces is filled, or they only write until they have like 5-6 solid sentences. Try not to let the energy die as you get some more good input in, and then choose a stopping point and be satisfied with that.
  8. After the text is completed, many teachers have their students copy the Write and Discuss into their own class notebooks. Do not have them do this while the text is being created – they will be distracted from the conversation if they are simultaneously attempting to hand copy information in the L2, whose writing conventions may need their undivided attention (especially at first). This copying time can give the teacher a break, too! And a notebook full of Write and Discuss can show families and other school community members all the text that your students are able to read and comprehend – what a lovely PR piece…

What do I do with it now that we’ve finished?

What’s fabulous about Write and Discuss is that you’ve just created a level-appropriate text for students that captures the energy of what class was about that day. It makes concrete what was previously a mostly oral/aural experience.

“House Pets,” an award-winning text by the Comprehensible Cascadia 2019 German Track (made comprehensible by my lovely orange Mr. Sketch marker)

The first thing I tend to do is reread the text aloud, so students can hear their creation in all its flowing glory. Then, I tell students that they are going to read the text to me, but in the L1. I go along pointing word by word, in the L2 word order, to make sure that students really understand word meanings, and also to illustrate specific characteristics of the written L2. (German word order, y’all…so funky. So fresh!) I stop to clarify any words/constructs that trip up students, marking the text in a different color to support more comprehension, and then reread to allow students to try it more confidently.

I also allow students to notice things about the L2 after they have seen it written. Some recent noticings have been “Oh hey, these two sounds are very similar! Can you re-pronounce them for us?” or “Oh wow, German capitalizes all nouns!” Let students take the lead and you will get lots of neat grammar noticings…without having to shove grammar down their throats. Win!

After this re-establishment of meaning, there are so. many. things (!) that you can do with the text. You can have students illustrate the text, you can give a Quick Quiz, you can dramatize it with a bit of Reader’s Theater – again, it’s a level-appropriate text that students co-created! The sky is the limit!

One thing to keep in mind is that this text you’ve created can serve as a base text that you can enhance during your planning. Maybe it’s the lowest level of an Embedded Reading that you flesh out to build in more transitions or written language conventions. Maybe you have some thematic vocab that your department wants you to target, and you find ways to slip it in to the text. Maybe you rewrite the text from a different perspective, or have students do that to get more input in different forms! (E.g. taking a story written in the third person, and rewriting it from a character’s perspective. With this, you could include more information about how the character is feeling, or what they are thinking!) This text you’ve created with your class can really be the jumping off point for any language or content goals you have for your classes.

Pro Tips!

  1. Keep it going! Like I said above, short, choppy sentences don’t sound great. (My early Write and Discusses were guilty of this awkwardness…character descriptions would read like “There was an elf. He was short. He was mean. He was blue. He was 12 years old.” Ugh.) Why not make the L2 flow more naturally with some transition words? In the lower levels, it might just be suggesting words like “and” or “but” to keep the expression of ideas going. (It might literally just be inserting a comma that provokes students to add more life to a sentence.) For higher levels, you might use constructs like “On the one hand… On the other hand…” or “Nonetheless…” Again, don’t get all classic-German-literature with the sentence length, but allow sentences to be more natural, longer, and more connected.
  2. Let students drive it! Early on, I tended to just use Write and Discuss to essentially circle information into text form, and I was truly leading the charge on what was written, where, and how. Now, I see it as more of an opportunity for students to try out some L2 and have you be like “AW YEAHHHH” while writing their awesome ideas on the board. Let awkward silence reign – with enough calm slowness in the Create phase, they’ll definitely have language in their heads to play with during the Write phase. (During Cascadia this year, some students – in their first week of German! – were putting the verb at the end in subordinate clauses. German swoooooon!)
  3. Use your boards as a scaffold! Chances are, you will have L2 words or images on your board that supported your conversation during the Create phase. Use these during W+D to help remind you and the class what might get included in the summary. You can indicate an image or word when writing stalls out to inspire students, or just erase information that has already been “covered” by the writing.
  4. Don’t forget dialogue! I often forget to include dialogue when using Write and Discuss, which is a bummer! Dialogue can be a great place to get reps on stuff in the first and second persons (third person often reigns supreme because we’re always talking about someone or something like that). Make sure to ask students “What did Soandso say?” or “What might Soandso be thinking in this moment?” Or maybe even, “What WOULD Soandso say about this?”
  5. Teach some punctuation! While you’re writing, use the L2 words for “comma,” “period,” “quotation marks,” etc. This is easy and natural, and can also help if you are doing a Dictation in the future.
  6. It doesn’t have to be perfect! Whatever text you create might be missing some things you talked about as a class, or the sentences may have come out in a less-than-smoothly-flowing order, despite your best efforts. You, as the teacher, can make pedagogical choices about how to enhance and change the text later, so don’t worry about it being ab.so.lute.ly perfect.

What if I want to learn more?

Many people have written glorious posts about Write and Discuss, and posted videos of them doing it with real students – check these out for more info, and to see if something in how they describe helps it “click” even better!

  • Mike Peto has an example of doing a Write and Discuss in class here! He also has great posts about what do with W+D after it’s done.
  • Annemarie Chase has examples here of doing it at different levels. She loves it because the students are quiet…I feel that feel…
  • Brett Chonko has a couple different posts (here, here, and here) that talk about they whys and hows, and improvements he has made to his W+D systems.
  • Here’s a video of Tina Hargaden moving from Small Talk, to Card Talk, to Write and Discuss.
Look at all this text! From three days of class and a commitment to Write and Discuss! German Track ROCKED. Also, spot Herr Fisher II

What do you think? Do you feel ready to use Write and Discuss? Comment below and send me any questions you might have!

On Silence

My last post here was in December of last year, and the last post was a month before that. In the meantime, I was still teaching, still giving conference presentations, still going to PD, still trying to be a fierce advocate for communicative language teaching.

But I was also experiencing a darkness in my professional life that I hadn’t anticipated, a life-consuming shadow. My start in teaching had been great! I was making lots of teacher friends, kids seemed to like my class, and my teacher evaluations didn’t make me feel like a total failure. Why, then, did I feel like I was drowning? Why, then, did I silence myself when the rush of learning in my early career was still there, and my growth felt day by day, week by week? Why, then, was I thinking about quitting?

I was finding myself in the middle of the age-old problem: the more I learned, the more I realized I didn’t know. The more I found myself doing, the more I realized there was to do. The more I tried, the more I thought that it would never be enough. And this mode, this mindset was doing damage to my mental, emotional, and physical health.

Around semester (the end of January), I saw the need for change in the way I was living my teaching, but I was stuck in bad habits. Then suddenly, we had five snow days in February, and I had nothing to do. The scared part of me thought I should be creating or perfecting or learning something for school, but for the first time…I just didn’t. I rested and relaxed, and came back ready to go once school got mostly back to normal. (I played a ton of video games and ate a lot of vegetarian chicken nuggets, for transparency’s sake.)

I deleted the Twitter and Facebook apps off my phone during that time. This, paired with committing to spending less time on my phone in general, changed the things I was actually doing with my time. I was enjoying my relationship and my friendships more, and I suddenly had time to read for pleasure. I had justified my insane use of both apps for a long time by insisting that the professional development I got through both was helping me grow as a teacher and be better at it. That was true to an extent, but the drive to compare myself with other teachers on the internet was also causing me to reduce myself in my own eyes, minimize my own accomplishments, and constantly be on the search for something new. There was no joy and gratitude for what I had inside me and around me.

I left any books related to teaching at school. I was in a weird place of having teaching both as my job and as my hobby – I was always reading something about teaching, always trying to find new ideas and research, always trying to be “in the know” about everything in CI world. But no one can do everything, and you certainly can’t learn to do things well if you’re not focused. So school was for school, home was for home.

And I started leaving school earlier. I’d have days where I’d be getting home close to 6pm, having arrived around 7am, and scrambling to get dinner ready and try to have some time for myself before Brent got home. When I looked back, the time at school was spent socializing to avoid work, searching the internet for resources I wouldn’t end up using, and getting lost clicking around my computer. I started thinking: What did we do today, and how can it grow into more proficiency tomorrow? A lot of times, the answer was simpler than I had imagined.

I went back to basics. I found that everything I knew I wanted to do with my teaching was inside of me already. Realizing this helped me slow down, see my students where they were, and actually teach them something. Classes and students I had started feeling despondent about suddenly turned around and created interesting stories and moments for everyone (instead of just for the overachieving do-gooders and the overachieving distractors). And then suddenly, I was able to go to work on time every day, do my work with smiles in most periods, and go home and enjoy my life. MY life.

Sometimes, you need a period of radio silence, the silence going both directions. When you go silent, you often find that you can see and hear things so much more clearly. This was true for me, and I know I am a better teacher to my students for that.

There are lots of blogs, websites, videos, trainings, ideas out there. Forgive yourself for not being able to do them all. My plea is for teachers – thoughtful, hard-working, innovative, passionate, self-sacrificing beings that you are – to just focus on being with and loving your students. Silence the voices (from without, from within) that drive you to scuttle parts of yourself in the never-ending pursuit of more. It’s enough. You are enough.

Inspired Proficiency Podcast

Y’all, I’m so thrilled to have been included in the Inspired Proficiency Podcast episode about Takeaways from #ACTFL18.  Ashley is such a gem for putting this podcast together – teachers need to hear from diverse perspectives to better know themselves and more deeply know their work.  Also…she is so sweet to talk to.  Her laugh is #iconic and listening back to our conversation, I am proud to have elicited a very deep laugh from her.  Hee hee!!

Take a listen, and let me know what you think!

I name drop like a total dweeb, but here are some of the people I mentioned and where you can find their resources:

Brett Chonko – Brett is such a great guy and does cool stuff with nontargeted CI that can align with district-mandated thematic units.  His blog is on point, too.

Sarah Breckley – I am OBSESSED with Sarah Breckley.  Shh just don’t tell her or she’ll take away my potato!  But also like…watch her videos and be inspired to film some of your own teaching for your benefit and the benefit of others.

Tina Hargaden – Opened my life up to the world of CI.  Check out CI Liftoff and her books – A Natural Approach to the Year being the guiding source of inspiration for many teachers this year.

BVP – Bill Van Patten’s book While We’re On the Topic is a super thought-provoking look into principles of communicative language teaching.  Easy to read and full of food for thought – I wanna book club it in my district!!

Did you go to ACTFL 18?  What were your takeaways?  Let me know below!

Reviewing Body Parts and Reenergizing with a Brain Break – Peluche / Kuscheltier

Brain breaks as an idea has been showing up a lot in the Facebook groups that I follow, as well as the conferences I have been attending lately.  People are starting to catch on to how much our students sit every day!  TOO MUCH

I’m finding that it’s helpful for me to build them into the lessons at natural in-between points.  These are the gear-shifting moments of a lesson – when you’re moving from input to a Write and Discuss, or between segments of input on different subjects.  This guarantees that we do them, and I can experiment with specific brain breaks to see if the kids like particular ones.

Here’s one that’s been a hit recently in class!  Kids love competing with friends, and I get to review body parts with them.  I heard about this one while I was at the WAFLT-COFLT Bi-State Conference in Portland this October.

Peluche

I bought 10 stuffed animals the other day (at the dollar store, hollaaaaa) and have a little basket I keep them in.  Children LOVE stuffed animals, no matter the age.

In this game, pairs of students get a stuffed animal and place it between them.  The teacher then says some body parts, rapid-fire. The kids are listening and touching the body parts the teacher names with both hands.  (“Head! Nose! Arms! Knees! Shoulders!”)

When the teacher says “Peluche!” (or “stuffed animal” in your language!), the students try to be the first to grab the stuffed animal between them.  Having students use both hands prevents them from hovering over the stuffed animal…you know how we all get when competition is involved. After there are winners…you keep going with the body parts!  I imagine you could keep score or something, but my kids were content to just compete and play multiple rounds without too much extra.

Easy, quick, and the kids have fun!  A winner in my book – I hope you and your students enjoy it.

What brain breaks have really worked for you?  Let me know below!

3 Takeaways from the 2018 WAFLT-COFLT Bi-State Conference

Teachers are wild.  “Let’s get a sub so that we can…do more school stuff.”  But seriously y’all I love conferences.

It has fully been like a week and a half since the WAFLT-COFLT Bi-State Conference in Portland, OR but I still have so many thoughts bouncing around in my enormous head!  My practice has actually shifted in the past few days as I’ve taken more time to work through my notes and reflect on the changes I want to make to increase student enjoyment and learning!  (Well…acquisition. Whatever.)

Let’s keep it short(ish) – three thoughts I’ve been playing around with:

  1. 90% Target Language Usage is Scarier for Teachers Than for Their Students
    Paul Sandrock, the Director of Education for ACTFL, reported during his session on Facilitating Target Language Comprehensibility that teachers have FAR MORE anxiety about using 90% TL in class than their students do!  This blew my mind. Kids are actually pretty chill if we’re like, “yeah, let’s just drop the English and DO THIS THING, MUCHACHOS!”
    Maybe they actually expect it.  Like, they go into a language class thinking that the teacher just WILL use the language most of the time. Because as a young person, YEAH THAT SEEMS LOGICAL. It’s us adults that come up with reasons not to use the language in class.  This is probably because we’ve tragically developed the ability to overthink things.  (How…wonderful.) J. Marvin Brown talked in his book From the Outside In about how adults struggle so hard in language classes because they, unlike children, let their thinking and their brains get in the way of just experiencing the language and enjoying it (and being able to subconsciously acquire the language).  He posits that we don’t lose the ability to learn languages as we age, but rather gain the ability to overthink things and ruin it for ourselves. I can see this same thing happening with target language usage. Of course it seems natural to use the language all the time in class because…duh.  But!!! But what if they don’t understand! But what about management! But what will I say! But what if I don’t feel strong enough in the L2 to fill awkward silences! But!!!
    Y’all, we can do this.  Our kids want this. They want the input, they want the language, they want to be good at this.  So let’s stop holding ourselves back and make it happen! I’ve started having little interactions (before class, in transitions, giving directions) in Spanish and surprise…everything is going fine.  Just more opportunities for me to work on my skills for comprehensibility! (That thing I present on…gulp.)
  2. You Are Putting On a Silent Film (+TL)
    In presenting with Tina Hargaden (of CI Liftoff and The CI Posse) about body and voice skills for comprehensibility, I learned something seemingly small that has made a big impact on my class flow.  Any time I do a gesture, point to something on the board, or do any of the other magical tricks to make language comprehensible (#futureblogpost) (#magicaltricks), I have to do that thing, then give a beat, then say the word in L2, then give a beat, let students process, then move the interaction along.  I see them anticipating what I’m talking about, hearing the word in the L2, linking the meaning, and having greater chances for success in interacting with whatever we’re talking about because they for sure GOT IT.  Silent film actors had to show EVERYTHING and know that it was going to sink in. I have to do the same! I’m working my silence more to watch their eyes and know that the connection is there instead of breezing through comprehensibility links and later thinking “but I showed them everything!”  They just need that bit of processing time. And the eye contact I’m able to make in that slower way is helping students know that I’m there with them.
  3. Think (Don’t Speak!)
    Laura Terrill gave a keynote on Friday that was great for so many reasons.  But the killer quote from this one was “think (don’t speak!).” Often we employ a turn and talk as a way for students to process some new information.  Buuuuut if they turn and talk with someone who maybe is a faster speaker or faster processor, the “slower” student may lose the opportunity to synthesize their thoughts, and/or make them into something they can express.  If we really demand that students think, but don’t speak just yet!, we are giving room for 100% of our students to do some processing and have some more success once the turning and talking actually begins. (I tried this during a PD with teachers the following week and lo and behold…everyone had something very interesting and thoughtful to express.)

I LOVE CONFERENCES LA LA LA.  But dang, it takes time to process all the great info you get and put it into practice.  I’m trying to take my own suggestion of just picking a few things and working them in. More than that feels like way too much for my poor brain.

(Also every conference reminds me that I should be doing more brain breaks.  Every conference! Goodness. This will surely be a lifelong quest. #futureblogposts)

What is your most recent learning from a conference, and how is it growing your practice?  Have a fantastic day, you pedagogical flower of excellence!!

Changing to CI-Centered Instruction Saved Me As a Teacher

I graduated my teacher training program at the end of 2016, and started looking for my first job as a world language teacher in the spring and summer of 2017.  I was so excited – I thought I had done very well in my student teaching and was on my way to having an exhausting, but productive first year!

I got a call from a middle school in a Seattle suburb, and one awesome Skype interview later, I was a real teacher!  Finally – all my years of experience in working with children were going to put me in a position to inspire and educate our youth!  Bam!

Well, the nerves crept in.  The position was a Spanish teaching position and I had majored in…German.  And done a summer travel-study program in Germany. And been the president of the German Club.  And lived in Germany for a year as an English Teaching Assistant.

I had been to a Spanish-speaking country for a total of…six days.  And though I had minored in Spanish in college…I was the German guy. Ok – I can do this! I am a creative, hard-working individual. There are MANY resources out there for Spanish teachers, more than for German, for sure!  If I flop, it’ll really be my own fault!  (What a dangerous sentiment for someone plunging into the great unknown of teaching…this, I must unpack in a future post.)

Mister Señor Fisher having a low-grade heart attack before leaving home for his first day as a Real Adult Human™ (September 2017)

The first day is a blur now, but I remember my first class coming and wondering, “will I be able to speak to them in Spanish the whole time slash at all?”  (I did it, phew. What did I even talk about? I can’t recall.) The students went home and there I was, alone in a little room that was now dubbed “mine,” with little idea of what to do next.  Okay…I’ll just follow what comes next in the textbook! And try to throw in some of those fun, interactive activities I learned about in my program! And browse Pinterest for MORE new ideas!

There are so many ideas out there.  Blogs, Pinterest boards, well-meaning colleagues, negative colleagues, district coordinators, other teachers who don’t even teach language who took a language class one time twenty years ago, Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, books, instructional video series, YouTube…there are just a million ways to do any one thing.  Teach a language? Goodness gracious. Not to mention, if you shop on Teachers Pay Teachers, everyone else’s materials are BEAUTIFUL and look like they were hand-crafted in a giant marble library by angels and the ghost of Socrates.

Before I started teaching, I thought to myself, “I’ll never show a movie in class as a stalling technique!  I want to be up there, teaching, every day! No cop outs!” But the heads going down onto desks, the figuring out differentiation for six classes a day, the four preps, the days where I spent 12+ hours at the school looking for materials online, the wondering if it was fair or right for me to be a Spanish teacher when I felt I knew so relatively little….it all began to wear on me.  The beginning of November seemed like the perfect time to drag out The Book of Life over a couple days…in all my classes. I thought to myself…is this it?  Is this all there is?

A conference presenter turned me on to the CI Liftoff Facebook page, and through it, I started learning a lot about how teachers were delivering comprehensible input in their classrooms, every day!  What? My level 1 students only know some weather phrases (sometimes…well, some of them), some greetings, the numbers (sometimes), me gusta phrases…how do these language magic witch people just make these kids understand day in, day out, without planning every single word?  Devilry, I say!

So I read some more, watched YouTube videos of teachers working their classes like Vegas MCs, took tons of notes, thought aloud with wild enthusiasm (usually to myself), until one day I said, okay!  This is it! LET’S DO THIS!  [Imaginary enthusiastic table flipping]

Again, I don’t know what exactly I even talked about the day I “decided to go CI,” but I knew there was a hunger there.  I could not, would not stop. And, magically, I started learning things about my students that made me feel like I was connected to them, and actually knew their lives.  

And it reminded me: though I had not lived in a Spanish-dominant country, I had learned my Spanish and practiced it in a country with a huge population of Spanish speakers.  To me, learning Spanish represented building closer relationships with my Spanish-speaking neighbors, colleagues, strangers I ran into when they needed help, when I needed help.  It was about speaking to the hearts of people in my community. And that connection was sparked again when I started to speak slowly and comprehensibly to my students, making their lives and interests into our curriculum.  It felt like a loving tribute to all the times I or my conversation partner had made the attempt to connect in a tongue not our own, and we both smiled and understood, even if we didn’t say all the words right.

So I kept learning, I keep learning.  And the more that I learn, the more that I see that it is not about building a huge repertoire of “activities” that expands every time I log onto Pinterest.  It is really only about speaking slowly and using my body and voice so that students understand and can be understood. I look into my students’ eyes, and I feel connected, joyful.

I sense now that my career will not be an endless drudgery of activities and exercises, but an endless expansion of my ability to communicate and connect with other people.  I will get better at literacy activities, I will get better at speaking comprehensibly, I will get better at classroom management specific to this discipline. But – how wonderful – doing this will mean meeting tons of really cool young people and learning about their unique, beautiful lives.

I’m rolling into an October very much unlike the October I witnessed my first year.  There is so much space before me, space to get to know my students and myself so deeply.  And so, so many stories to tell.