Sound Effects Theatre

27 Jun 20182 Comments

Today I tried one of the many idea’s I’ve read about on Keith Toda’s blog that I’d really love to share because it was so successful and so engaging.

Firstly I asked the class to ‘cari teman’ (find a partner/friend) and then gave each pair a copy of the current class created story. Here is the class co-created story that I used with the year 3/4 class in the video below:

Anak Nakal di Kelas 3/4 Turley

Kelas 3/4 ke Bahasa Indonesia.
Ada satu laki-laki di kelas 3/4.
Nama laki-laki Bob.
Bob nakal.
Bu Cathy berkata, “Kelas 3/4 duduk.”
Kelas 3/4 pandai dengar dan duduk.
Bob nakal. Bob tidak duduk. Bob berdansa chicken dance.
Bu Cathy heran.
Bu Cathy berkata, “Astaga!” dan menangis.

Bu Cathy berkata, “Kelas 3/4 ambil kertas dan melipat.”
Kelas 3/4 pandai. Kelas 3/4 duduk dan ambil kertas dan melipat.
Bob nakal.
Bob tidak ambil kertas dan melipat.
Bob ambil bola dan melempar ke Bu Cathy.
Bu Cathy heran.
Bu Cathy berkata, “Astaga!” dan menangis.

Bu Cathy berkata, “Kelas 3/4 diam dan dengar Bu Cathy.”
Kelas pandai. Kelas diam dan dengar Bu Cathy.
Bob nakal.
Bob tidak diam. Bob tidak dengar Bu Cathy.
Bob berdiri di kursi dan menyanyi, “Let it Go!”
Bu Cathy heran.
Bu Cathy berkata, “Astaga!” dan menangis.

Bu Turley ke kelas Bahasa Indonesia.
Bu Turley lihat Bu Cathy menangis!
Bu Turley lihat kelas duduk dan diam.
Bu Turley lihat Bob berdiri di kursi dan menyanyi,“Let it Go!”
Bu Turley heran!
Bu Turley berkata, “Astaga! Bob nakal. Ayo Bob!”
Bu Turley ambil noodle.
Bu Turley pukul Bob lima kali!

Kelas menghitung satu, dua, tiga, empat, lima bersama-sama!

With their partner, they read through the story and together agreed on a word that they both felt comfortable doing a sound effect and or an O.T.T. short, 3 second action. I next asked the pairs to ‘duduk di lingkaran’ (sit in a circle) and I went around the circle inviting each pair to tell us the word they had chosen and the action/gesture they had planned to do. This worked out well for several reasons. Firstly it gave me a heads-up on the words I would need to pause after (to allow the pair to do their sound effect/action) and to my amazement, there was only one double up on a word, which actually was not a problem! Just seemed to ramp it up even further!! Secondly it gave me an opportunity to coach the pairs if their sound effect/action was either inappropriate or based on an incorrect understanding of the meaning. The words chosen by this class were Bob, menangis, berdansa, menyanyi, pukul, nakal, Astaga, kelas 3/4 and Bu Cathy; all terrific words.

The variety of sound effects was brilliant. The ‘berdansa’ (dance) pair jumped up and each danced through the circle, one waltzed alone and the other disco danced. The ‘menangis’ (cry) pair jumped up and cried loudly. The ‘duduk’ (sit) pair jumped up and then flopped down crossed legged. The diam (quiet) pair stood up and loudly shushed. The Astaga (OMG) team jumped up with hands on cheeks loudly saying Astaga! The Bu Cathy pair, jumped up together, grabbed my arm and swung me around in a circle This one was hilarious because it was obvious at one point during the retelling of the story that I became quite dizzy!

I began by reading the story out aloud, pausing after each of the selected words to allow time for each pair to jump up and do their sound effect.

It went brilliantly and I can’t recommend this activity enough. It was so much fun and we all just laughed and laughed.

For the first time doing this activity, it worked very well having the students in pairs, because this gave the quieter students a greater level of confidence in performing in front of their peers. With all the classes, this activity was equally popular and I had one class pleading to do it again even though there were just 10 minutes left in the lesson!

Upon reflection, there are several ways in which this could be modified further to both increase it’s value to language learning and also to increase the engagement (is that even possible??). Next time I will give students the option to work in pairs or individually and I will also request that students say their word before doing the sound effect.

This game is a perfect activity for the end of the term when we are all tired and it is also perfect because it requires little more preparation than providing students with a copy of the story.

Here is just a tiny snippet of one of the lessons to give you an idea of how it ran:

Compelling Pet Videos

25 May 201825 May 20182 Comments

I have had so much fun since Ibu Anne introduced me to the My Talking Pet app. Firstly I created a video using the orangutan and the tiger picture provided within the app and showed it to my junior primary classes. It became such a hit that other classes asked to see it as well.

I then followed Ibu Anne’s lead and invited students to email me a photo of their pet and from the steady incoming emails, I have created many more videos. I love creating these videos because I can get repetitions of a variety of language structures including those covered in Kursi Luar Biasa (special person interviews). My scripts include a selection of the following language:
-a hello to both the students and a special hello to the owner of the pet,
– I am a (rabbit, dog, cat etc)
-My name is
-I am (students name)’s (rabbit, cat, dog etc)
-(Students name) is in year 1,2,3,4 etc
-I like to eat (cognate e.g. hotdog, hamburger – something really crazy)
-I am clever at singing, dancing.
-Goodbye

The videos are extremely compelling for all year levels. I even showed one to a year 9 student who dropped in to see me yesterday and she too was absorbed. You just can’t help smiling while watching animals singing or talking in Indonesian!!

I began by purely creating speaking videos and have slowly ramped them up so they don’t become boring and repetitive. The ways in which the videos can be ramped up include adding headwear, facial hair or eyewear. Unfortunately beards, moustaches, glasses, eye patches, monocles and necklaces are not cognates. However the variety of hats has been perfect for reps of ‘pakai topi’ (wears a hat) & noun adjective word order e.g. topi besar/kecil (large/small hat).

I then began investigating other talking photo apps to add another dimension and discovered one more that also include singing and dancing options. Morfo provides the option of 3 dances – rock, disco & toon as well as various costume options. Generally the costume options have not been that successful with the pet owners as they tend to obscure the majority of the animal and are quite dark/gothic looking. However the dancing has been a huge hit. Here is my dancing cat video.

Yesterday I did some more research and trialled every talking photo app I could find on iTunes. The next best one that I have discovered and can recommend is called Talking Photos. I love that this app also includes 2 singing options that are simply hilarious. So the latest photos sent to me by students, have been made into a video incorporating the sentence; “Saya pandai menyanyi.” (I am clever at singing). It is sure to be a hit also. Here is a clip I created yesterday with the la, la, la option!

Because the free version of the Talking Photos app has a time limitation, for the cat video above, I created two videos and then combined them into one using iMovie!

This idea then lead to creating a talking video using a hand drawn character and his biodata presented to me on Wednesday by Mani, a year 3/4 student. This is what he presented me with:

and here is what I created from the above information! I hope Mani likes it!

If you like this idea and would like to see more of my pet videos, subscribe to my YouTube channel and you will get a notification each time I upload a new video!

Meeting our State Education Minister – Susan Close!

27 Apr 201827 Apr 20186 Comments

I have just returned home after a very exciting meeting and half an hour later, I am still grinning like a Cheshire Cat. I am on such a high that I want to share it with you!!

Last Friday, Annie added our 3 names to the invitation list of the Country Cabinet State Government visit to the Fleurieu.

The aim of the Country Cabinet visits is to provide regional residents with a community forum so they can speak directly to the premier and his ministers about issues directly relevant to their region. We were thrilled that this would provide us with an opportunity to speak with the SA education minister, Susan Close.

Last year we heard her speak at the MLTASA conference about the importance of language learning. All the language teachers were delighted to discover that we had such a powerful ally in our state government.

During our car trip home after the conference, we decided that it was a priority to speak directly to the minister about TPRS but could not find a time that suited us all. It was a gift to hear that she was visiting our region and schools this week.

Tonight the 3 of us joined the throng at the Victor Rec Centre enjoying a BBQ dinner cooked by the brilliant Lions Club. It was lovely seeing such a huge cross section of people representing the Fleurieu. We caught up with friends while munching on sausage sandwiches (or in my case, a veggie patty) while waiting for the cabinet to arrive.

We had deliberately chosen seats at the back of the room to give us an excellent vantage point from which to peruse all who entered. Annie immediately spotted Susan Close as she arrived. We allowed her time to grab a sausage sandwich before making a beeline for her and totally monopolising her until she had to make her way to the front.

Susan was very gracious and listened intently to us as we explained to her about TPRS and all that we have achieved down here on the Fleurieu for language teachers. She asked many questions (when she could get a word in!) and was delighted to hear that she will get the opportunity to observe TPRS in the classroom tomorrow during her school visit.

It was so exciting to have the opportunity to speak directly to the minister of education about TPRS, a largely unfamiliar methodology in Australia, that has the potential to reverse the decreasing numbers of students choosing to study languages across secondary and tertiary sectors in Australia. We took great delight in sharing Ian Perry’s amazing 2016 student retention numbers as evidence of this!!

Let’s hope our chat and the brief observation opportunity tomorrow will tweak her curiosity enough to investigate TPRS further. It would be awesome to have her support!!

Observing Ibu Anne’s Circus

28 Mar 201813 Apr 20184 Comments

I am here in Victoria this Easter enjoying a well earned break with Ibu Anne. Today was the last day of term here (SA has 2 more weeks) and I’ve taken heaps of notes while observing her lessons. If ever you are in Victoria and want to see TCI in a junior primary setting, I highly recommend a visit to her school. Her students impressed me constantly with their confident comprehension of Indonesian and at times it was hard to believe that her students are Prep’s – Year 3!

Here are my notes for each year level:

Prep Classes:-

With her Prep classes, Anne is trialling a system whereby each step of her lesson is prompted via a powerpoint page. I really liked how this worked. The first page incorporates an app Anne has discovered that allows you to add voice to a photo of a dog. Anne began her Prep classes with either a photo of her dog Kasper or a student’s dog singing her welcome song! The classes absolutely loved singing along with the dogs!

The second page was calling the roll and with this year level, Anne simply encouraged them to answer with ‘ada’ & ‘tidak ada’ (here/not here). No wonder the students at her school have acquired ‘ada/ tidak ada’ so solidly! She calls the roll using class dojo, marking the absences immediately and at the end, asks, “Berapa tidak ada?” (how many students are away?) which provided her with an excellent opportunity for students to count together with her!!

After the roll, Anne turned off the smart board to focus on the retelling the harimau (tiger) & Elsa story. She began this with ‘mata-mata’ (spy), using the 2 pandai (clever) students (1 laki-laki/boy & 1 perempuan/girl) selected during the previous lesson and invited them out to the front with her to choose two new pandai students while Ibu Anne revisited all the structures from the current story. I love using ‘mata-mata’ with preliterate students as it is a terrific brain break on one hand and a useful way to observe & assess levels of acquisition. Once or twice I have assumed a class was familiar with a structure only to discover during mata-mata, they definitely hadn’t!

After mata-mata, Anne then used colourful magnetic pictures attached to the smart board to retell the story, Elsa dan Harimau that the students found highly engaging. I don’t think we utilise puppetry enough anymore! It is novel for youngsters today! She then retold the story using the magnetic pictures, encouraging the students to gesture and speak with her. Next, Ibu Anne asked for two actors to come out and help her retell the story once more. The tiger mask was a huge hit and enabled her to have several pairs act out the story, one after the other! I love the “Aduh” (Oh no!) at the end of the story because it allow the entire class to join in the finale. Ibu Anne finished by showing her video of this story on her Youtube channel which again was the same story presented slightly differently which maintained student interest! Wow – how many reps of the story did Ibu Anne manage? Amazing.

As the class had been sitting for quite a while by this time, Ibu Anne did the following brain break: she played a familiar Indonesian children’s song and asked the students to walk around the room while it played. When the music stopped, she asked her students to freeze and listen to her say one of the following words from the story: harimau, pohon or rumah. If she said rumah (house), students had to stand and make a triangle roof over their heads with their arms, if Anne said harimau (tiger), they had to drop to their hands and knees and if she said pohon (tree), they had to stand up tall with their arms out, hanging like branches. I really enjoyed the added bonus of having an Indonesian song incorporated into this brain break because it allowed a break between the actions!

The target structure Anne revisited next with her Prep classes was “Ada apa?” (What is there?) She had a calico bag full of objects (all cognates). She pulled each one out, one by one, stating ada truk (there is a truck), ada burger (there is a burger), ada es krim(there is an ice cream) etc, before setting each down on a table where the students could see the display. Each item provided a perfect opportunity for reps of ‘ada’ (there is)! Once the bag was empty, the class and Ibu Anne counted the total number of props together – altogether there were 15. Ibu Anne then put the items back in the bag and asked the class again, “Ada apa?” to see if they could remember them all. Each time, a student correctly remembered an item, she drew a picture of their answer up on the board, circling each while incorporating ‘ada’, counting the total after each correct suggestion. The students thoroughly enjoyed counting the drawings together.

Ibu Anne then handed out a worksheet with pictures of a variety of cognates and students had to listen and circle only the ones that Ibu Anne pulled out of the bag. Students then coloured all the pictures that were circled. Ibu Anne recommends using pulling out exactly the same objects for each class to make marking easier.

Kelas 1

All year one classes are held in the Indonesian room. Class teachers bring their students to the room where Ibu Anne greets each student as they enter her room. Students then walk to the front of the room and sit quietly waiting for her to finish. Ibu Anne follows the last student into the room and with this class, she picked up her ukulele and began playing it. This immediately and beautifully focused the students however as the ukulele was out of tune, Ibu Anne quickly and surreptitiously tried to tune it but the students collapsed about with laughter. Even to their ears, the ukulele sounded strange. Once tuned, the ‘duduk diam dengar’ (sit down, be quiet, listen) song sounded gorgeous on the ukulele. It was a highly compelling way to begin a class.

Roll
I loved how Ibu Anne sings the Selamat siang song (see kelas 2 observations for details) with her older students. It begins with the usual Selamat siang, Apa kabar, baik, baik saja, lumayan, kurang baik and then included lapar sekali, sedih sekali, marah sekali. The success of this song was evident during the roll call as many students used this language.

After mata mata, Ibu Anne worked on the song, Aku Seorang Kapiten, for an upcoming competition for Victorian students. This competition isn’t compulsory for her students, but hopefully many will bravely try out and blow everyone away with their proficiency. I can’t remember what else students have to do, but if you are interested in learning more about it, ask on one of the Facebook pages!

Kursi luar biasa
Ibu Anne has created a Kursi Luar Biasa powerpoint for each year level, each one building on the language they have acquired from the previous year level. All slides provide many opportunities for the student being interviewed to shine. Students can either tell the truth when answering questions such as:
Tinggal dimana? (Where do you live?)
suka makan apa? (What do you like to eat?)
Mau apa? (What do you want?)
Siapa nama? (What is your name?)
Apa kabar? (How are you feeling?)
Punya binatang apa? (What animals {pets} do you own?)
On each page, Anne has pictures that incorporate everything a student of that age would relate to. I learned about LOL dolls, magnetic slime, 3D pens just to name a few! Also on the pages were a few quirky pictures to keep it compelling.

Brainbreak
This year level also enjoyed writing their names with their right and left hand, left/right siku (elbow), hidung (nose) & (pusar) belly button. Lots of laughter.

StoryTelling
Ibu Anne showed a PowerPoint that she had made called, “Buaya Suka Makan Donut” (The Crocodile Likes to Eat Donuts). The ingenious part of this powerpoint were the video clips embedded into each page of the naughty buaya snatching donuts from various staff members including the principal. The students loved watching the expressions on the faces of the principal & their teachers and requested watching it again and again! I highly recommend copying her idea!!

Assessment
Anne had planned an assessment task based on this great story, but with a school wide subway lunch delivery, the class had to return to their room early. This is the task Ibu Anne had planned to do: Anne had drawn up a grid and in each box was a different pic from the Buaya (crocodile) story. Students would need to look at each one of the pics which were in no order. To demonstrate that students could retell the story in the correct order, they needed to write a number in the box by each drawing.

Kelas 2:-
Anne began her lesson with the Selamat Siang song that included panas sekali, capai sekali, dingin sekali, marah sekali, sakit sekali before finishing with sampai jumpa.

Here is the song – (sing to the tune of Frere Jacques)
Selamat siang
Apa Kabar
baik baik saja
lumayan
kurang baik
senang sekali
marah sekali
sakit sekali
dingin sekali
panas sekali
terima kasih/sampai jumpa

English translation:
Good day
How are you?
Just fine
ok
not so good
very happy
very cross
very unwell/sick
very hot
thank you/goodbye

Then when Anne called the roll, the students confidently answered with a variety of answers fluently. When discovering that a student was absent, she would ask the class, “kenapa?” (Why?) If students said, family holiday, she would ask, “Liburan?” (Holiday?) If they again answered “Yes/Ya”, she would walk over to the dimana poster and point and pause before asking ‘Di mana?” (Where?) I loved this as it provided the perfect opportunity to get reps on ‘dimana’ as well as saying the names of various countries in Indonesian. It was interesting to hear the number of students who were currently holidaying in India, Queensland, Malaysia and Japan. Totally represents the multicultural population at Annes school!

Mata-Mata
It was great to see Sharon’s ‘mata-mata’ happening in Victoria slightly differently to the way Sharon and I do it (and we both do it slightly differently as well!) My students enjoy mata-mata (spy – along the lines of the Indonesian police) and it was great to see a way to keep doing it yet with a twist. Anne uses the 2 winners from the previous lesson to be the next mata-mata; a boy and a girl. The girl must choose a boy and the boy must choose a girl. I am definitely going to incorporate this into my next lesson plan. Currently my students choose their friends which are generally the same gender – so this idea would encourage them be more selective! I also loved the way Anne asked the mata-mata, “Ada laki laki/perempuan pandai? Siapa nama?” (Was there a clever boy/girl? What is their name?) Great way to sneak in a “siapa nama” rep!

Anne did a brilliant brain break with this class which she acquired from a colleague, Jodie Underwood. All the students stood up and followed Anne’s instructions:
Tulis nama pakai tangan kanan (Write your name with your right hand)
Tulis nama pakai tangan kiri (Write your name with your left hand)
Tulis nama pakai siku kanan (Write your name with your right elbow)
Tulis nama pakai siku kiri (Write your name with your left elbow)
Tulis nama pakai hidung (Write your name with your nose)
Tulis nama pakai pusar (belly button) (Write your name with your belly button)
By the end of it, everyone was in fits of giggles and totally relaxed. It was so lovely.

Kursi Luar Biasa (The Awesome Chair)
Anne has made up power-points for each year level; each incorporating the language she needs reps with. The questions circle suka (like), nama (name), apa kabar (how are you), mau (want) and have really significantly helped her students to acquire this vocabulary. Anne has painted a chair in brilliant eye catching colours and patterns which a student sits on to answer Anne’s personalised questions.
After asking the person in the kursi luar biasa the questions, Anne then invites the other students to say one thing that they heard about that person. This is such a great opportunity for the 4%ers to shine and also to measure student acquisition. Anne accepts answers both in Indonesian and English, praising both with the English restated in Indonesian. She then adds tallies to the kurang pandai/pandai (clever/not so clever) points; 2 points for Indonesian and one for English. Separately she notes who spoke in Indonesian correctly and after the lesson, takes a photo of her notes to add to her assessment checklists.

StoryTelling
After Kursi Luar Biasa, Anne showed the class a powerpoint she’d made about Pak Eh-Eh (Mr Pooh). The story itself was very short – perfect for this age group – and had them 100% engaged! In Anne’s story, Pak Eh-Eh went to the Western Treatment Plant (local) searching for a friend. I loved how Anne explained simply what happens at the plant while getting heaps of reps of eh-eh! It was a great story to introduce the structures teman (friend) & banyak (many)!

Anne finished this lesson by showing the class her YouTube channel (Indonesian Fun For Juniors) and encouraging students to watch the Pak Eh-Eh video and others over the holidays.

Kelas 3 –

Ibu Anne started her year 3’s with a powerpoint that had her dog, Kasper, singing her welcome song (see kelas 2 for lyrics) to the class. Her students went into raptures, but not as much as Ibu Anne did when one student shared that she too has a schnauzer – a mini salt & pepper schnauzer named Abbie. Ibu Anne then dug deep to re-channel her thoughts away from Abbie and back to the lesson! (If you ever want to see this – just casually drop the word schnauzer into your conversation with Ibu Anne and watch the dreamy transformation appear on her face!)
Ibu Anne’s roll calling procedure differs slightly for her year 3 students. Whereas with her younger students, Ibu Anne calls the roll; her year 3 students take it in turns to call the roll. I love how they use a long pointer with a pointy finger on the end to point to the names as they work through the names on class dojo. I also loved how when the student reached his/her name, the class together asked the student, ‘Apa kabar’!

The brain break Anne then did was the “buka tutup” (open/close) song. It’s super awesome observing students in another school having fun with songs my students also enjoy!

Free Write Assessment Task
I was really pleased Ibu Anne included a demo of how she does free writes with her students. My students struggle with free writes and I also struggle with presenting them in ways that don’t instantly raise up their affective filters.
Ibu Anne began by having the class watch the Buaya Makan Banyak Donut video. She then asked the students to brainstorm for words from the story and wrote them up on the board with cute pics to support comprehension. The students found this incredibly helpful for many reasons. A student I stood behind was not a risk taker with her spelling and while happy to write, baulked at writing words if she wasn’t 100% confident with the spelling! Other students appreciated it because the words became writing prompts for parts of the story they had overlooked!
Anne next showed the class her free write master sheet and explained how to use it; write one word per line and not to miss any lines as this helps when counting the total number of words.
She further added that students were to use only the words that are in their brain; they were not allowed to ask for the translations of any unknown words and that everyone will start writing at the same time and to keep writing until the timer goes off. If students finish the retelling, they could start writing a new story or make up their own sentences using the words in the board.
Ibu Anne next explained that there are different ways to write free writes:
Level 1 – put the brainstormed words into sentences.
Level 2- retell the story.
Level 3 – retell the story with added original ideas.

Sharing
After 10 minutes of quiet writing, Ibu Anne stopped the class and invited them all to “Duduk di lingkaran’ (sit in a circle). Students brought their writing to the floor where they sat in a sharing circle and Ibu Anne explained the ‘Ripple Effect’ ( Robyn Cotter). She invited students to each read one of their sentences out aloud into the silence. She further clarified that if it’s quiet, just start reading. Do not speak if someone else is talking and finally, you can only read once.
This was absolutely beautiful. Students took it in turns to read and listened respectfully to each other. They stopped if they heard someone speaking at the same time and waited for the next silence. Next Ibu Anne encouraged those people who hadn’t had a go yet. She explained to the others who were keen to read a 2nd sentence, that there were still people in the class who had yet to read and then encouraged the others who had not read yet to have a go. It was unbelievable the number of quiet ones who were empowered to share into the respectful silence. One of the last sentences shared was about their class teacher made us all laugh! Buaya makan Bu Kip (The crocodile ate Mrs Kip)!

As the free writes were collected, students got quite restless so Ibu Anne silently held up a sign that said: ‘please show me that you are ready to listen’. Students were instantly intrigued and focused on reading the message. They then re-settled very quickly. A terrific quiet way from ( Robyn Cotter) to engage and refocus literate students! I highly recommend it!

Thank you so much Ibu Anne for encouraging me to visit your school so that I could observe you once again. I’m especially grateful considering that it was the last day of term 1 for you and that you were dead on your feet. Considering all of this, I was blown away with the high level of student engagement in all year levels! Not bad (actually it was impressive) for the last day of term 1. I love how you have incorporated student interests into Kursi Luar Biasa e.g. current popular toys, running competitions and popular hobbies e.g. naik skuter! The slide in your kursi luar biasa PowerPoint asking the awesome student if they can run fast (bisa berlari cepat?) and then challenging them to a race at the front of the classroom in front of their classmates – (allowing them to win) is ingenious!!
I learned so much from this brief visit; from both the teaching observations and from our many conversations where we shared and built on our ideas. I enjoyed implementing many of the above ideas into my teaching and it gave me the energy to get through the last 2 weeks of our term 1.

Terima kasih dan salam hangat,

Bu Cathy

PS; Acknowledgement to Ibu Anne for the title of this post!!

Erin Gotwal Part 1 & 2

9 Feb 20189 Feb 20186 Comments

Here I sit, planning my 2nd week of lessons for my junior primary classes. I must keep in mind that many students are preliterate, especially the brand new reception students (5 year olds)! I have been searching online for activities suitable for preliterate students and stumbled across these 2 inspiring videos.

While Erin’s students are definitely not new reception students, I love how she supports everything she says with text and/or illustrations. This reduces the cognitive load for her very young students by supporting comprehension. Ingenious.

Erin uses so many techniques that are perfect for R-2 students. Watch and enjoy!

https://app.schooltube.com/video/2a8bccee1acf1ede4018/Erin%20Gotwals%20Part%201

http://bit.ly/oZbYDO

PS. If the links don’t work for you, google Erin Gotwals part 1 & Erin Gotwals part 2.

Week One Brain Breaks

27 Jan 201827 Jan 20184 Comments

At our school, specialist teachers combine to present a week one program. You can read more about it here. This will be the third year that we have done this program together and it’s such a great fun way to begin the year. The specialist areas at our school this year are Indonesian, Performing Arts & PE and also joining us next week will be our amazing counsellor, Karen, and librarian, Ruth.

The program runs over 3 days and each day is based around one of our 3 school values of confidence, respect & community. Again we will be based in the gym and in each lesson time, we will have between 3 – 5 classes to work with. Most lessons are singles, but we also have a few doubles and over the 3 days, most classes will join us for 3 lessons. Consequently we have to have a few ideas up our sleeves each day that both fit the overriding theme for the day & are suitable for a mixed R-7 group of students.

I have been scouring YouTube this morning searching for activities that tick all the boxes and in doing so discovered the Ultimate Camp Resource. What an amazing collection of fun activities! I have created a week one folder on my YouTube channel for activities that I think will be great for our week one specialist teachers program but they will also be super brilliant for tweaking to become awesome brain breaks too! Here are a few to show you what I mean!

I particularly love the Whoosh Game because the language could be tweaked so easily to:
Whoosh = kasih (give)
Whoa = tidak mau
Boing = melompat
Zap = zap (I believe strongly that only familiar words should be used & some fun words still incorporated!)
Freak out = Gila
Super freak out = Gila sekali

2018 Melbourne TCI Conference

20 Jan 201823 Jan 20181 Comment

I have just realised that this conference was my 3rd TCI conference in 12 months; Laurie is right; it IS very easy getting hooked on TCI conferences!! So as I reflect on this conference, I am also super excited about my trip to Cincinnati for iFLT 2018 in less than 6 months!

The presenters, Anny Ewing, Laurie Clarcq and Terry Waltz were brilliant. Anny contributed her knowledge & experience of TPRS in the primary sector, Terry contributed her prodigious passion for pure TPRS as well as her techniques for teaching a non-roman alphabetic language while Laurie’s upbeat thoughtfulness, joy and compassion together with her trademark embedded reading rounded off the team perfectly.

If I had only time to write about just one thing I loved about this conference (thankfully there is no limit), it would be the constant repetition of the following:
1. Make it comprehensible – establish meaning, support meaning, comprehension checks etc
2. Provide repeated exposure – ask questions, confirm answers etc
3. Keep it interesting – adding details, eliciting student answers, personalisation etc
4. Teach for success – go slowly, differentiate questions, pause and point etc
This was woven into each day, each session, each workshop. If participants take nothing else home with them from the 3 days but this, it will not matter at all because it underpins successful TCI practise.

Overall, this conference helped to clarify and consolidate my understanding to date of TPRS/TCI both from a student’s perspective as well as from the teachers perspective. The very first thing I discovered was that I could not listen to Terry’s Hawaiian story and count structures! It interfered with my processing! What a light bulb moment that was! No wonder students have strong opinions about the jobs they want or don’t want to do!

Laurie Clarq shared with us the following mantra which resonated with all participants:

This is really important to keep in mind during your TPRS/TCI journey. Every teacher is working on a different milestone and each one is vital to that person. We acquire TPRS/TCI at different rates – just as our students acquire language at different rates. Wherever you are on your journey, it is where you should be. Comparing yourself with others is pointless. They are not in your shoes and visa versa. TPRS/TCI is not about the destination, it is entirely about the journey! However take note; the TCI road is rarely smooth and usually begins with an enormously steep learning curve.
Terry and Laurie also added the following gems over the three days:
– (TPRS) won’t get easier but it will get better.
– Build up your skills gradually. Start small. Choose one TPRS skill, try it and then keep doing it. Don’t give up!
– Don’t let details derail your TPRS.
– Progress not perfection.
– Anything worth doing well is best done poorly at first.
– Students will only remember how you made them feel and quickly forget all else.

I can’t believe how many notes I took over the three days. I took the notebook I bought in Agen and followed straight on from my Agen notes to keep all my TPRS conference notes together. Unfortunately my notes from the Port Elliot conference are not in one place! Convening & attending a conference simultaneously is challenging! Hopefully I remember to take it with me to Cincinnati in July.

Terry began her Hawaiian demo by reviewing the RULES which although I remember from last year, I had forgotten the explanation that goes along with each! I love them!
1. Naked desks – student learning habits need to be adjusted for language classes. They are used to taking notes but with TPRS, they just have to listen!
2. Listen – because that is how language comes into your mind.
3. Answer Questions – Everyone responds to questions. If your mouth is not moving, the teacher will assume that you don’t understand and therefore you will receive special attention to fix that! Also, do not answer on behalf of others. Answer in the TL unless I am looking for an idea.
4. Stop – If you don’t understand, stop the teacher. (Establish gesture: Terry used the windscreen wiper action) If you see someone gesturing that they don’t understand, join in to support the team. Think of an iceberg with only a fraction visible above the surface of the water. For each person who stops the teacher, there will be another 10 sitting silently/ motionlessly. Stop the teacher immediately you stop understanding. Don’t let the teacher continue because the teacher won’t know at which point you were lost. (Terry then demoed this with us to illustrate how disruptive this is)
5. 2 Words – Magic fairy dust means we don’t know the answer yet. Answers must be no more than 2 words of English!
6. Ohh/Ahh – Class stories and answers are fascinating. Encourage students to respond to demonstrate appropriate responses which reinforce that all story details are fact! (Ohh/Ahh exclamations could eventually be swapped for culturally appropriate words. e.g. Astaga {OMG})
7. Grandma – Grandma is joining us in our room. She loves interesting stories, she will fall asleep if the stories are boring however she will get very cross if she hears anything inappropriate. So keep Grandma happy!

Terry then began her Hawaiian story which followed the typical beginners story formula. Character has a problem, character visits 3 locations to solve problem & the problem is solved at the 3rd location. While I used this formula often in my first year of TPRS, I haven’t lately because I found it too repetitive (sounds like an oxymoron – how can repetition in TPRS be a negative??) but while listening to Terry’s story I learned how to keep this formulaic story compelling. The secret is to use the i+1 principle. For example, if the character wants a large computer, (I’ve tweaked Terry’s story to avoid spoilers!) there are no computers at the first location, while at the second location there are only small computers. However at the 3rd location, there are large computers. The other technique Terry used to keep the story compelling was to invent quirky locations based on well known popular culture. e.g. Computers ‘R Us.
After the story, Terry recommended encouraging students to celebrate and acknowledge the amount of language they’d covered in the story. Due to the many repetitions through circling, fishing and the use of an actor, we (the class) found it easy to translate sentences from the story into Hawaiian! It was a blast! Terry did remind us that students are not expected to retell the story yet because they haven’t read it yet!
Terry next opened a PowerPoint which contained a parallel story. (A parallel story is an almost identical story incorporating exactly the same vocabulary (structures) but the who and the what are different. It is vital that the who and the what are words that are identical or almost identical in both L1 & L2. For example, if you want your character to be at the beach, use the name of a familiar beach rather than the L2 word for beach! Ensure 100% comprehensibility. Less is more.) The class read the story together with many comprehension checks & humorous brain breaks along the way.
What totally blew me away was how much Terry covered in a short amount of time, yet at no time did I feel lost or rushed. There is no way I could have achieved that pace with either my primary classes or my adult class! It was so impressive. Terry explained afterwards that the pace was too fast however as the demo is so powerful (experiencing TPRS as a student is the only way to fully understand how a student thinks during our classes) and sooo important that it just had to be done that way. I noticed there were many more interruptions (comments/questions) this year compared with last year and no doubt they ate into her allotted time. We referred back to aspects of this demo over and over throughout the conference.

After the demo, the group was divided into 2 groups – those who have attended a TCI conference previously (Tier 2) and those who haven’t (Tier 1). It was heartening to see not only the numbers of people returning for their 2nd Australian TCI conference but also so exciting to see the large group of teachers who were at their first ever TCI conference. Fingers crossed we see them all again in 2019.

On Day 2, Laurie invited those of us seeking experience coaching Tier 1 colleagues to remain with Tier 1. Terry began this workshop reviewing the basic TPRS skills and then explaining the difference between circling questions and fishing questions.
The basic TPRS skills are:
– circling
– 3 for
– comprehension check
– SLOW
– short/tall (restating student answers as complete answers)
– machine gun No’s – Parking on the No
– Point & Pause
Fishing – Adding interest, detail to create a new sentence.

This session provided participants with the opportunity to trial circling and fishing. Annie & I sat with a couple of Chinese teachers and were totally amazed with how well Joseph circled his structure (buys a coffee) and then how he fished for a detail (9 o’clock in the morning).

In the afternoon, the participants were divided into teachers of primary and teachers of non-primary. I followed Heidi into the non-primary group looking for tips to help me with my proposed 2018 adults class. We were paired off to create a parallel story based on a fairytale. I worked with Luci on our Indonesian ‘Cinderella’ story. Boy – was this a challenging and thought provoking exercise. We had to assume our students only knew the super 7, a few joining words (because, if, with, therefore etc), numbers 1 – 10, yes/no, pronouns & good/not good. In our stories, we had to limit our new vocabulary to 5; no more than 5 unknown words in the entire story! I got bogged down with this exercise and in hindsight realised we should have simplified the story hugely. Other pairs rewrote this story using only 8 – 10 lines, whereas I filled in a page and a half! As I said before; an excellent writing exercise.

Day three focused on reading; the 3rd step of TPRS. We began by understanding the importance of 100% comprehensible reading texts to enable students to see the story unfolding in their heads. See here for the slideshow.
While authentic texts are rarely 100% comprehensible, they still have value. However always remember to ensure that the task based on the text is of benefit to the student. It could be as simple has locating familiar words, translating using context cues or simply checking student’s proficiency level (although this focuses on what students can’t do; not what they can do).
A good CI text has connected ideas, is highly comprehensible, demonstrates a solid understanding of second language acquisition theory and is written by a highly fluent speaker. These texts enable students to enhance reading skills,
including:
– developing reading comprehension strategies
– tracking/skimming text
– visualisation
– stamina and concentration
– prediction/ infer to check meaning
– summarise i.e. draw own conclusions
Texts also provide opportunities to extend student understandings by applying vocabulary in new contexts. For example, with the structure Kevin’s ‘house’, in an Indonesian text, classes could be encourage to infer how to say 1) my house 2) Mr Jones’ house or 3) hospital (assuming students have already acquired the word ‘sakit’!
During text readings, incorporate TCI skills e.g. SLOW, pop up grammar, comprehension checks, English summaries.

Reading activities I want to try with my students:
1. Jumbled sentences
Take 5 main sentences from a paragraph in the text and write them up on the board, in jumbled order, one underneath the other and each line beginning with a letter of the alphabet, starting with A. Together the class choral read the sentences with the teacher. The class then echo reads the sentences; the teacher reading in the TL and the class echoing in English. Students then gestured the meaning (keeping their voices in their head) for each sentence while the teacher read in the TL. Students then turn to a partner and together decide on the order of the 5 sentences so that it makes sense. After a given amount of time, ask for a pair to read out their order of the sentences (accept lettering if given) and then as a class choral read the sentence order as given. Ask for opinions from the class (does this makes sense?), ask if anyone had anything similar/different. Repeat and compare! I loved that Anny gestured while we were choral reading as this really supported my comprehension. I thoroughly enjoyed this reading activity.
We talked about the huge difference between partner work (as above) & partner practise (dialogues). Anny also encouraged us to ask questions such as What was tough but you worked it out? What did you notice in this text that was different?
2. Popcorn Reading/ Volleyball Reading/ Train Reading
Students in pairs take it in turns to say a sentence in either TL or L1. We began side by side working with a partner and then turned our chairs sidewards so that we were sitting side by side with a different person in 2 long rows of chairs to form train carriages. I’ve always expected my students to read the text sentences in both Indonesian & English however I loved how we could either read the sentences in English or Hawaiian. Such a cool idea to give students the choice!
3. Listen & Draw
Students folds a page into quarters and then numbers the quarters 1 – 4. They then illustrate the sentences read out by the teacher. I loved how Anny read us 3 sentences together and we drew one illustration to represent all of the information. So cool. Usually I read one sentence per quarter which is great for junior primary, but for older students, this encourages closer listening! Afterwards, the teacher can show the class a students work and discuss it OR the teacher could reread 1-3 of the sentences from one of the quarters randomly and students hold up the number of fingers to represent which quarter the sentence or sentences were from.
4. Movie Strips
Hand students a strip of paper. Fold three times (makes 8) and then unfold. Students illustrate one sentence from the story in each segment and then roll up when finished. The paper then becomes a film strip which could be narrated either by the teacher or by the student should the latter have had enough input beforehand.
5. Express Acting
Have props representing each sentence of the story; either a location prop or an actor prop. With each sentence, students take it in turns to stand up, grab the appropriate prop and act out the next line as it is read out by the teacher. Should the actor need to speak, the teacher can help if the actor is not confident to do so. The teacher merely stands behind the actor giving the actor a voice. Beforehand though, explain quietly to the actor that “When I touch your shoulder, that means you have to pretend to speak.” This allows the teacher to use many students from the class, which for junior primary classes is sooo important. Something Anny did which I truly loved was that she circled the action in the story by talking to the actors. She asked the house, “Do you have…..”, She asked the actor, “What do you want?”, “Was there ….. at the house?”, “Do you want a big or small ……?”

To finish up this overlong post, I am going to write random take homes I picked up over the 3 days that I’m looking forward to trialling with my students ….
* Menurut Saya (in my opinion) – Student states an opinion and all those who agree stand up. Here is Señor Wooly explaining a fun activity to introduce this language.
* Beginner language learners must focus on the super 7 (Top 10 + sudah/ belum for Indonesian)
*Ipad vs Paper is a great clip to movie talk.
*weighing the pig doesn’t make it fatter – if an assessment activity does not help the student learn, it is a waste of time.
*classroom management idea – raise your hand when you can’t hear the sound anymore.
*picture talk for an end of lesson filler should it be needed.
*Senor Wooly Tres Acciones – a great target structure activity for verbs
*Have 2 different gestures for words that have 2 different meanings. e.g. pakai – have a gesture representing ‘to use’ & another gesture to represent ‘wear’.
*Teachers must use strategies to restrict language (stay in bounds) & keep instructions short and simple.
*While fishing or circling, incorporate basic everyday language that supports conversation and communication into questions. Its also an awesome way of incorporating required curriculum vocabulary that doesn’t seem to fit in elsewhere naturally.
* If fishing and no one is biting, pair students off to come up with some suggestions. They keep a hand each in the air until they have a suggestion!
*When circling, incorporate the suggestions (whitebait) that were discarded during the fishing. This demonstrates that all responses are values and appreciated.
*Look at the teacher and smile if you could have answered the questions too!
*Wait time honours thinking time and encourages students to check their answer.
* tieing knot = ‘sudah’ gesture
* Student job suggestion – the parrot who repeats what the teacher has just said but only when appropriate!
*No point correcting student output in the first 3 years of their language learning – they are not ready for it.
* Develop a few strategies for rejecting fishing suggestions that didn’t make the grade e.g. impossible because he is in Bali today, I looked on Facebook and he is sick, Not Bronwyn at Victor Harbor Primary? etc

Year 1/2 Retells – Belle Mau Punya Teman

26 Oct 20176 Comments

This week Vicki, one of my awesome colleagues and the one who owns beautiful Belle, decided to show her class my video about her animals. Soooo clever. Vicki has spoken constantly about her animals to her students throughout this year and therefore was delighted when I created a video about them.

Before Vicki began playing the video to her class, she explained where the video was shot and then said added that there was just one problem; the video is all in Indonesian and Vicki doesn’t speak enough Indonesian to understand it! Vicki then played the video and afterwards asked her students to write a retell to explain to her what the video was about.

Most wrote in English but a few chose to write their retells in Indonesian!! For most students, this was the first time they had seen the video and their retells demonstrate high levels of comprehension. Those who chose to write in Indonesian also did an excellent job. One of Vicki’s students, Taylah, follows my channel and had watched the Belle video several times during the holidays. I bet you can pick which of the following is hers without even needing to read her name!

Making TCI Videos

26 Oct 201726 Oct 20172 Comments

I have had so much fun making i+1 (at my students level with just 1-2 unfamiliar words) videos for my students. I was inspired to do this after watching Bu Anne’s videos on her YouTube channel Indonesian Fun For Juniors. Most of my videos on my YouTube channel were created pre-TCI and the language used is either English or incomprehensible (for my students) Indonesian. The final catalyst that resulted in me creating TCI videos was my 2017 trip to Agen when I backed myself into a corner by telling my TRT (substitute) that I would be posting videos for students to watch and Listen & Draw while I was away.

Before I left Australia, I asked a couple of classes what they’d like me to include in my videos and that really helped me include topics of student interest. Student requests ranged from pigeons to the Eiffel Tower! Taking the video was the easy part surprisingly; the most time consuming and challenging aspect is the narration. Sometimes I really needed a word yet to be acquired by students, so I added it as a subtitle with its English translation.

I’ve since returned to Australia and have had fun exploring how to make videos from PowerPoints which are considerably easier to narrate but harder to locate appropriate visuals. My latest idea (which I will work on soon) is to use student illustrations instead, however this can only be done towards the end of a story. Then the next challenge will be to take a ‘leaf’ (cut?) from Alice Ayel’s YouTube videos and draw the pictures myself! For some reason, this is extremely challenging for me because I am the world’s worst drawer. In Indonesia, on our way home from the 2017 Agen conference, Annie & I spent a day with Ibu Mia at her school. In one class, I drew a camel – we were talking about speed humps (polisi tidur) – and my camel picture had the entire class in puzzled laughter! I had to ask for a volunteer to draw one for me!!

My latest video is called Belle Mau Punya Teman (Belle Wants a Friend). Belle is a gorgeous pup who belongs to a colleague and the idea of creating this video came to me while I was house sitting during the last holidays. Vicki lives in such a beautiful spot and has a variety of animals that it was a no brainer to collect video on my phone while I was there. Once I had the footage, I opened iMovie and started making the project. I had no idea of the video title while videoing; that came to me when going through the footage. When I make videos this way, I don’t have a script; I simply reduce the volume of the footage and narrate straight into the project and the storyline develops as I go. Consequently, the dialogue takes a lot of editing in order to keep inbounds (using only language my students know), staying SLOW and fitting the dialogue to the footage clip. Quite a tricky balance.

Have a watch and see how it turned out:

Intercultural Understanding & TCI/TPRS

23 Sep 201713 Jun 20184 Comments

After writing the post about the South Australian Education Minister’s visit to my Indonesian language classroom, I sent both the minister, Susan Close, and the Premier, Jay Weatherill, a link to the post. Last month we received the following email from the DECD Chief Executive, Rick Persse, in a reply on behalf of Jay Weatherill.

Isn’t it wonderful that as a direct result of us attending the Country Cabinet, all levels of DECD are now familiar with TPRS pedagogy! How exciting is that?

We decided to concentrate on his concern that TPRS does not completely address the intercultural understanding aspect of the Understanding strand within the Australian Curriculum: Indonesian. We began by taking up his offer to contact Maribel Coffey, which we did both by phone and email. She promptly replied to our email with a kind offer to put us in contact with Gianna DeLeo and Rosa Garcia, 2 Languages Project Officers from her team.

Gianna and Rosa readily agreed to come out and spend a day with us to help us identify the intercultural learning gaps we may have and then provide practical strategies that will help us improve our teaching practise in this regard.

In preparation for their visit, both Gianna and Rosa researched TPRS which we truly appreciated. They were familiar with Stephen Krashen; every TCI teacher’s hero. Having an understanding of Krashen’s hypotheses and TCI meant that Gianna & Rosa could focus specifically on intercultural understanding in a TCI context without needing a TCI 101 along the way.

We arranged that Gianna & Rosa would visit us each in turn to observe us teaching a lesson, finishing up at Victor R-7 where we would all gather to discuss their observations and feedback.

For my lesson, I demonstrated ‘Kursi Luar Biasa’ (KLB) – largely because Annie & Sharon encouraged me to do so – but also because it is one of the most engaging ways I know to cover many of the curriculum content descriptors. Because KLB involves asking students personal questions, it provides students with a platform to talk about themselves, either truthfully or not! I actually prefer it when students lie (suggest bizarre answers) because it ramps up the engagement a hundred percent and makes it totally compelling!

Thanks to the wonderful sharing community that TCI is, I have now incorporated a PowerPoint into my KLB lessons due to Ibu Anne‘s generosity. Last term I visited her in Victoria to observe her teaching (and co-present at the Victorian Language Teachers Association Conference) and was blown away with how much more compelling her KLB lessons were with the written and pictorial visuals. Here is a page from my powerpoint to give you an idea:

Overall I was satisfied with the way in which I demonstrated how I incorporate intercultural understandings into my teaching. For example, the snake and dog pic in the above slide are included because they are 2 animals most of our Indonesian visitors have been significantly frightened of!

After the last lesson, I packed up my room quickly and raced over to Victor R-7 where everyone was already waiting for the conversation to begin.

Firstly Gianna & Rosa began by stating how impressed they are with the teaching that they had observed in our classrooms. They used adjectives like ‘exemplary’!! They both too commented on the high levels of student engagement in our rooms and the large amount of spontaneous Indonesian spoken by our students in class!

We then began to deconstruct ‘intercultural understanding’ using examples that Rosa & Gianna had observed in our classrooms throughout the day. They firstly congratulated us on how well we already integrate intercultural understanding into our TCI lessons and then offered us advice on an additional aspect that if incorporated, would elevate our practise to an even higher level.

Rosa handed us each a copy of the Investigating Pedagogies for Language-and-Culture Learning (see link below) which aims to outline the relationship between the TeFL Framework, ACARA: Languages & The Shape document and “in doing so highlights the intercultural orientation to language learning” (page 1).

This paper outlines the characteristics of language learning incorporating Intercultural Understanding – referred throughout as intercultural orientation.

Intercultural language learning is an orientation to language learning that represents a change in both the stance (the way we conceptualise language learning and the thinking that informs practice) and practice in the teaching and learning of languages and the pedagogy that supports such a change.

This intercultural orientation:

 respects the diversity of learners, teachers, contexts, languages

 focuses on the act of learning: student learning, teacher learning, community learning

 recognises teaching and learning as social (both intrapersonal and interpersonal), cultural (both intracultural and intercultural) and cognitive

 highlights both participation/action and reflection on the part of students as participants in communicating in the context of diversity

 recognises the powerful role of language and culture in learning; in fact, as the foundations of all learning

 sees both the process of communication (as the major goal of language learning) and the process of learning as interactive processes that entail the reciprocal interpretation of meaning

 recognises the integral relationship between teaching, learning and assessment

 understands learning, teaching and pedagogy to support language learning as including processes of inquiry for both learners and teachers.This intercultural orientation shapes the three key concepts that inform Languages education: language, culture, learning, and focuses on developing capabilities that are essential in the 21st century.

page 2

The specific skill that Rosa & Gianna recommend we hone centres around providing students with opportunities for intercultural and intracultural reflection. Rather than providing explanations to students about differing cultural practises, throw it back at the students and encourage them to consider the reasons themselves. An example of this could be around Indonesian etiquette which requires objects to be received and passed with your right hand, never your left hand. My students have often commented on this and previously I simply explained the reasons. Rosa recommends that instead, teachers could ask deeper questions to encourage students to look beyond the difference and instead consider it objectively and rationally. Questions could include asking why Singaporeans use their left and right hands but Indonesians don’t. Is this practise practical and when would it be sensible in Australia? Is the use of toilet paper or water better for the environment? Why do Australians use a water based toilet system when we are the driest continent in the world?

In other words, asking rich and thought provoking questions that encourage students to develop self awareness and self understanding through honest reflections around not only the comparisons between different cultures but also the differences within cultures.

…reflection is not a simple process of commenting on things such as the enjoyment or not of an activity. Specifically, it involves reflection on such matters as:

 the processes of interpretation – how we interpret/understand things as we do

 the assumptions that provide the basis for interpretation – why we interpret/understand things as we do

 our perspectives in relation to those of others

 our positioning in relation to that of others

 our expectations in relation to those of others

 our judgments in relation to those of others.

This kind of reflection is a necessary part of stretching students’ intellectual thinking and of ‘fostering deep understanding’ and exploring the construction of knowledge (3.2 and 3.3 of Domain 3 of the TfEL Framework).

Thus the teacher helps students navigate through multiple conceptions, assumptions, perspectives and personal understandings to help them arrive at new understandings that take into account the perspective of others in a productive way. This document acknowledges that this is an intricate process because student reflections happen spontaneously in the moment and requires engaging with specific student responses and ideas. as such it can’t be planned in advance but needs to be managed as it arises. (page 46)

Rosa explained too about flipping information to help students look at a cultural practise from another perspective. The example she gave was the western tradition of birthday cakes. Imagine a culture that puts fire on decorated food and then gives it to a child who then has to extinguish the fire by putting it out themselves by blowing on it before it can be eaten by anyone! Sounds quite bizarre when stated like that!

We were assured that these classroom conversations do not necessarily need to be long and detailed but more like a grammar pop-up and in doing so would become an engaging brain break. I really like the idea of prompting students with ‘why’ questions to encourage them to consider the reasons underlying different cultural practises. It truly resonates with me and I look forward to impromptu opportunities whereby I can ask deep and meaningful questions to encourage rich reflective and reflexive student thought. It is definitely an expertise I intend to develop! Surely this is how schools create open minded and respectful global citizens.

Thank you so much Maribel Coffey, Rosa Garcia & Gianna DeLeo. We really appreciate the support and encouragement we received from you all. Rosa and Gianna are both wonderful ambassadors of the Languages team. The entire experience was invaluable and we are so grateful that both Rosa & Gianna could spend time with us to work on addressing intercultural understanding in a TPRS classroom context. The conversations we had were thought provoking because developing cultural respect and empathy in students is of a critical importance in relation to global relationships. We are all excited to implement the advice given to us and develop our expertise in asking reflective questions.
We also really hope that early next term, Rosa & Gianna can visit us again to provide us with feedback on our updated practise and understandings to double check we are on the right path. We will also be scrutinising our school calendars to ascertain when our next Partnership Closure day is before inviting Rosa to again share her impressive expertise about intercultural understanding with the Fleurieu TCI PLN.

To finish up, I just had to share this quote from page 4 f the Investigating Pedagogies for Language-and-Culture Learning! If we could just tweak it slightly though so that the first ‘learn’ is changed to ‘acquire’……

Indonesian Teacher Reflections

Belajar Mengajar

Category: TPRS/CI