Using improv in the language classroom: Defining Drama

Your language-teaching mission, should you choose to accept it, is to incorporate improv games and activities into your language classroom.

Drama is “a wide range of oral activities that have an element of creativity present” (Thorton & Wheeler, 1986, p. 317)

This is part III of a series of posts on using improv in the language classroom.

Just because a teacher uses “drama” in their language classroom does not necessarily mean that everyone is on the same page as to what that means, or the philosophies behind their choices. Dr. Kathleen McGovern, (author of the book on improv in the L2 classroom I can’t stop recommending) notes, for example, that a teacher that subscribes to the Audio Lingual Method, who believes that the repetition of scripts is integral to language learning, will have a different approach that a teacher who subscribes to Communicative Language Teaching (CLT), who would forgo scripts for role plays and improvised games to enhance communicative competence. Moreover, a teacher who teaches using the Total Physical Response approach would have students embodying words and phrases, while Total Physical Response Storytelling (while similar in name, not similar in philosophy) would have teachers use comprehensible input and aspects of students’ lives while acting out a story. All of these are technically drama-based teaching, but all are very different! The only thing they have in common is the fact that drama is not the primary focus of L2 instruction, but as a tool to be used to enhance learning.

Therefore, Dr. McGovern, after synthesizing the literature that emerged in the field of drama and L2 instruction over several years in her 2017 article, suggested a system of classifications of common approaches that teachers can use when discussing drama:

Classification 1: Theatrical Performance

  • Definition: Students study and then perform a play in the target language.

  • Pros: Introduces students to the target language’s culture.

  • Cons: The plays chosen will often reinforce the norms of the dominant culture.

Classification 2: Process Drama

  • Definition: Involves improvised scenes, does not require an audience, and emphasizes learner reflection.

  • Pros: It has been shown to increase student engagement and participation, reduce anxiety, and result in multi-modal learning.

  • Cons: The benefits to students’ language learning is correlated to their teachers’ drama experience.

Classification 3: Games and Improvisation

  • Definition: Teachers use a wide repertoire of theatrical games and improvisation techniques.

  • Pros: While not specifically tied to a conceptual framework, this approach fits well within CLT’s goals.

  • Cons: Is a short-term method that relies solely on isolated exercises and is teacher orientated.

Drama is “the literature that walks and talks before our eyes” (Boulton, 1968, p. 3)

McGovern emphasizes that a difficulty in studying drama in L2 education is that drama is not static but constantly evolving. She suggests the following distinctions be made in order to limit confusion:

  • “Drama” v. “Theater”: Drama should be used to describe students engaging with theatrical activities, while theater should refer to students enacting a performance for an audience.

  • “Product-based” v. “Process-based”:  Product-based drama should be used to refer to an approach in which students study and rehearse a text that they then perform to an audience. In contrast, a process-based approach is one in which students participate in improvisation and theater games and is limited to the classroom.

  • “Small-scale” v. “Large-scale” forms: Small-scale forms should refer to activities that last only one class or unit and do not result in a final product. Thus, large-scale forms should refer to activities that are script-based and require more time.

Accordingly, in the spirit of Dr. McGovern’s desire to have clear definitions when talking about using drama in the L2 classroom, I want to clarify that when I talk about improv on this blog, I am talking about something that can be described as:

  1. Games and Improvisations. While Process Drama uses improv games, it is part of a much deeper philosophy of continuous, embodied learning that emphasizes learner identity. Games and Improvisation is the use of one-off activities that are incorporated into a teacher’s existing curriculum, and is not considered the curriculum itself. For more information on Process Drama I recommend Erika Piazzoli’s 2018 book “Embodying Language in Action: The Artistry of Process Drama in Second Language Education”.

  2. Drama. While sometimes my students perform for an audience of their classmates, that is not the goal of the activities we do.

  3. Process-based. There is no product. As Margaret Piccoli notes, one of the best parts of improv is that it forces us to be in the moment because it disappears as soon as it is complete!

  4. Small-scale. Any language teacher that takes on the task of staging a complete theatrical performance that takes months to rehearse, build, and promote gets all my admiration. However, that is the opposite of what I’m talking about!

While I was able to teach with no problems before coming across these classifications, I think there is a lot of value in being able to specify what we do.  For one, it allows us to reflect on the choices we make. For example, if I subscribe to CLT, and I have my students memorizing scripts, then there is clearly a conflict between my philosophical framework and the activities I use, and I need to make some changes. Furthermore, specificity gives us better understanding. If another teacher and I are both using “drama” in our French classes, we might have very different assumptions about what is happening in each others’ classrooms. Additionally, for research purposes, once everyone gets on the same page with definitions, it’ll make finding articles that are actually relevant that much easier!

Also, I think there is tremendous value in all areas being discussed! Galante (2011) notes that “while drama offers opportunities for learners to use prior knowledge of the L2 in a creative manner, theatre focuses on accuracy and aspects integral to the performance such as vocal projection and comprehensible speech” (p. 276). While my interests have leaned towards the process-orientated drama side of things, if I had a class that wanted to do a theatrical production, or needed to focus on accuracy, vocal projection, and comprehensible speech, I would love to do a big end-of-year presentation.

Source: McGovern, K. R. (2017). Conceptualizing drama in the second language classroom. Scenario (Cork), XI(1), 4-16.

Do you think definitions are helpful when discussing drama? How would you categorize your own use of drama in your language classroom? Share in the comments!

Leapfrog Reading

Your language-teaching mission, should you choose to accept it, is to use the leapfrog reading technique to emphasize L2 reading comprehension in small-group settings.

 When having students read difficult texts, but wanting to give them a sense of autonomy and encourage group work, I like to use leapfrog reading. Unlike popcorn reading, which has a lot of legitimate criticisms, leapfrog reading emphasizes comprehension and doesn’t subject students to whole class scrutiny.

The term comes from a physical game where children jump over each other’s backs. Fun linguistic fact, there are a lot of cultures that have a version of leapfrog, but depending on the language, the animal being leaped changes: saute-mouton (French, “leap-sheep”), haasje-over (Dutch, “over-hare”), 跳山羊 (Chinese, “leap goat”), うまとび (Japanese, "horse leap"), etc.

 Like the physical game, the reading activity involves students jumping over a text, and pausing in the same place within the text, in the L2. The way it works is:

  1. Student A reads one sentence aloud in the target language

  2. Student B translates aloud what Student A has read

  3. Student B reads the next sentence aloud in the target language

  4. Student C translates aloud what Student B has read

  5. Student C reads the next sentence aloud in the target language etc.

This can work in groups of two (going back and forth between Student A and Student B), groups of three (Student A would translate what student C said aloud, and start the cycle over again) or larger (for bigger groups, I like to involve the element of tossing a koosh ball to the next student to read & translate). The important thing is that each student has the opportunity to both read in the L2 and translate into the shared L1, but not for the same sentence.

The first time you do this with a class, it may be helpful to model what it looks like in front of the class. To do this, I recommend you choose a student (or two) to model with you that you know are strong readers. To lessen the anxiety further, you could even give those students the text ahead of time (just a sentence or two) so they could feel confident in both their translation and their pronunciation.

This is, in my opinion, the most valuable for texts that are deliberately difficult, but still within the zone of proximal development. For example, if there is an authentic resource such as a news article or short story, with supports in place for difficult vocabulary or grammatical structures. I would also use leapfrog reading for a French fairy tale that I wrote for students to understand idioms. Within the text, there are idioms incorporated, and footnotes below translate the idiom for students. Since this is a multi-step thinking process, reading it aloud (and maybe hearing the idiom for the first time) and then stopping to think about a) what was read and b) what it actually means, is helpful. Furthermore, rather than reading alone, by doing this in a group, students can support each other.

A criticism that I have of this technique is that it does not help improve pronunciation unless a group-member corrects their peers or the teacher walks around correcting students, jarring them out of their rhythm. One thing I try to do is spy on groups and if I’m overhearing a mispronunciation that is common, I’ll collect a list to go over when the activity is done. Then, when I do this activity with the same text again with a different class, I’ll go over the pronunciations before we begin the activity, assuming they will have similar issues. Ultimately, however, I recognize that you can’t do all the things all of the time, and it’s good practice to have students just read aloud, even if small mistakes are being made.

If leapfrog reading isn’t your jam, or you’re looking for other replacements for popcorn or round-robin reading in addition to leapfrogging, there’s a great list here from Edutopia.

How do you practice reading in your class? Feel free to share below in the comments!

What are you doing? Improv Grammar Game

Your language teaching mission, should you choose to accept it, is to use the “What are you doing” improv game to reinforce present tense verb use. 

“What are you doing?” is a classic improv warm-up game. By that, it’s a game that’s designed to exercise your creativity, not be presented to an audience for laughs (though those usually occur!). More importantly, for our purposes, it’s a great exercise to practice the present tense of verbs!

 The way that the game works is that Person A starts miming an action, let’s say fishing. Person B walks up and asks, in the target language, “What are you doing?”. Person A responds by saying what they are doing using the present tense, but it can’t be the thing they are miming. So maybe Person A says “I’m playing hockey”. Then Person B begins miming playing hockey. Person C walks up, asking “What are you doing?”. Person B responds with anything but playing hockey, so maybe they say “I’m watching TV”. And so the game continues.

Stock image sites are great for brain-storming ideas for possible actions or for printing out pictures to help scaffold students into playing the game.

There are a few ways that this can be played. One is having a small group circle, and the person to the left always asks what the person to the right is doing. A more challenging variation is doing this in pairs, which keeps students on their toes, as they don’t have any time to preplan their answers. More advanced students might be able to do this game without any scaffolding, but novices might need a brainstorm of verbs, or even just conjugations, before playing.

This a great game for introducing students to improv, as typically there’s no audience and they only need to produce one sentence at a time. If you’re worried about students freezing up, the first time you play you can pass out slips of paper with either the sentence students should say or a picture of the action they should describe, so that they can get used to the format of the game (miming the action but saying something different). Then, in the second round, they need to generate their own verbs.

 You can also encourage students to go beyond the subject+verb structure, asking for further information. For example, maybe it’s subject+verb+adverb (or however your TL structures it) so that the student has to mime playing hockey excitedly, fishing unenthusiastically, or watching TV sadly. This can make for more challenging grammar, but also more fun for the students doing the miming! You can also encourage students to stick to themes, such as unit vocabulary or types of verbs (for example, only irregular verbs or reflexive verbs).

The beauty of the game is that there is an infinite number of responses (as many as there are verbs and qualifiers): the only wrong ones are if you describe what you’re currently doing or you assign an inappropriate action to your partner! Students can get really creative with both their answers (walking on the moon, feeding an elephant, eating a cake as big as me) and their mimes (I’m smiling just thinking about someone miming trying to eat a cake that’s the size of themselves!)

RESOURCE: Video describing how to play the game

RESOURCE: Video that goes into variations of the game and tips/tricks

RESOURCE: Florea (2011) breaks down this game into six easy-to-follow steps (presentation / practice / production / preparation / modeling / play) to add more scaffolding into playing this game, which you can read on pages 50-51 of her article.

 

Have you played this game before? Feel free to share any variations, lessons learned, or thoughts in the comments!

Using improv in the language classroom: Core Values

Your language-teaching mission, should you choose to accept it, is to incorporate improv games and activities into your language classroom.

What some view as the only rule in improv: “Yes, and…”

Image source: https://www.amindapart.org.uk/blog/the-real-meaning-of-the-improv-rule-yes-and/

This is part II of a series of posts on using improv in the language classroom. 

As I mentioned in part I, there really are no supplies needed for most improv. However, there is something that the teacher needs to do when incorporating these kinds of activities, or any activities that involve students taking risks with language: create an environment of physical and emotional safety. Once that is in place, really anything can happen!

Some teachers recommend discussing the ‘rules of improv’ with students. If you’re only planning on incorporating small games here and there, I don’t think that the rules need to be explicitly discussed. However, if you’re wanting to do more free scenes, this is a must.

Everyone has their own opinion on what the ‘rules of improv’ are. Depending on who you ask, there might just be one (usually ‘yes and’) or ten. When working with students, I like the ‘rules’ proposed by Melisa Cahnmann-Taylor and Kathleen McGovern in their fantastic (and highly recommended) book, Enlivening instruction with drama and improv: A guide for second language and world language teachers. Their four rules are:

  1. Be Present & Pay Attention

  2. Say “Yes, And”

  3. R&R (take risks and be ridiculous)

  4. Endow Scenes with Meaning

Personally, I think talking about the values of improv, especially in the context of education, is equally as important. Anja Keränen outlines what she believes to be the four main values of improvisational theatre:

  1. The first value is that improvisation is suitable for everyone, and that lack of talent is not a barrier to participation.

  2. The second value is that mistakes are not errors, but opportunities to learn and increase confidence. Trying and failing is encouraged in improv, as students are expected to learn by doing. Moreover, errors can be liberating as they are possibilities to learn new words or strategies while still staying within the frame of mind of communication.

  3. The third value is that participants must say ‘yes’ to all ideas presented.  Both teachers and students must let go to their own ideas and accept the other participants’ ideas as better than their own.

  4. Finally, the fourth value is that the improvised scene disappears and is forevermore unattainable. This puts the focus on the communicative skills being demonstrated and the learning happening within the scene, forcing teachers and learners to be in the moment. Moreover, this can be perceived as a rebellion against traditional education systems that focus on creating error-free, concrete products.

 Some claim that the rules and values of improv will make you a better person, or a better leader, or a better school. While I can’t speak to all of that, I can say that improv makes for better lessons, which I can’t wait to share with you!

Using improv in the language classroom: What is improv?

Your language-teaching mission, should you choose to accept it, is to incorporate improv games and activities into your language classroom.

Image source: https://outschool.com/classes/improv-for-beginners-zF5ESyMY

This is part I of a series of posts on using improv in the language classroom.

Did you know? Improv was invented in the 1930s when Viola Spolin, inspired by Neva Boyd’s play-based progressive educational philosophy, needed a way to engage children and immigrants in theatre. Improv, she found, was able to bridge gaps in language and culture. Despite these educationally based origins, almost a 100 years later, improv is not a major presence in most language classes.

I think that improv games and activities can be one of the most valuable tools in a teacher’s repertoire. The beauty of improv is that most activities take no time to prep, need no supplies, and involve a lot of laughter and joy. You can use improv to enhance the lesson plans you already use as a way to reinforce grammatical concepts or practice communicative strategies, or you can transition to an entirely improv-based curriculum. It’s your choice! I’m going to assume that most readers want to enhance their existing lessons, so will be basing most of my posts on simple games to add some fun to your day. However, I will eventually share some of the ways that I’ve successfully used improv as the basis for entire units.

What is improv? Improv, which is short for “improvised theater”, is when participants use language or movement in an unrehearsed manner. Improv falls into various categories: free scenes, role plays, scenarios, and games. Some improv is just playing around with language, such as playing the “What are you doing?” warm-up game.  Some improv, like asking students to present an original story that incorporates four idioms they’ve pulled from a hat, is meant to be presented and entertain others. Traditionally, improv means no preparation, but when working with language learners, I don’t always follow that rule. I discuss more about that in my post about free scenes. All in all, improv can mean a lot of things, but there are some things that I think are the most important:

Why is improv so powerful? Margaret Piccoli notes that:

  • Both language skills and creativity must be practiced often and with different degrees of difficulty, and that improv is a way to accomplish success in both areas.

  • The fundamentals of improv, such as ‘yes, and’, ‘no mistakes, only opportunities’, and ‘make everyone look good’, create collaborative and supportive environments for students to develop their L2.

  • Improv builds students’ confidence by letting them focus on the natural desire to play rather than on the possibility of embarrassment, as well as letting them focus on the process of using the L2 rather than the mechanics.

  • The “process-focused, not product-focused” nature of improv also allows students to explore an infinite number of possible scenarios, giving them the confidence to use the target language in situations not previously studied in the classroom, i.e., authentic language use.

  • The need for collaboration for improv to be successful not only creates an environment of positive feedback and an opportunity to celebrate peers’ achievements, but a chance for students from various backgrounds to work together on common ground.

  • Improv accesses multiple intelligences, allows students to explore themes that are relevant to their lives, and gives them a sense of control over their own learning.

Who ‘owns’ improv? Everybody! Although the seeds of improv can be seen in commedia dell’arte, vaudeville, and burlesque, it is Viola Spolin who is widely considered the founder of modern improv.  Viola would invent new games every time she came across a barrier in communication or understanding with the children and immigrants she was working with. She went on to found Second City Improv, and in 1986 wrote the ‘bible’ of improv in education: Theater Games for the Classroom: A Teacher's Handbook. However, Viola Spolin, or more modern improv names such as Ryan Styles and Amy Poehler, are not seen as the authority on improv. Instead, improv games, like many folk ideas, vary from person to person in regard to how they are played, what name they go by, and the purpose for which they are used.

Citation needed? Due to the elastic nature of improv, while there have been many wonderful educational article and books published outlining how one can use improv in the classroom, it is very difficult to determine who has intellectual ownership of any of them, if such a thing is possible. Like many educational techniques, such as doing a jigsaw, reading aloud, or think-pair-share, it can be difficult to determine who originated these ideas. When sharing games on my blog, I try to attribute where I can, particularly if a certain permutation is new to me in an educational context and I can share in which book or article I found it. However, I have come across many of these games in my own experience as an improv performer, which began long before I became a teacher.

For more on improv, check out:



Alphabet Game

Your language-teaching mission, should you choose to accept it, is to expand students’ vocabulary and encourage linguistic teamwork by playing the alphabet game.

This one is a twist on a classic car-ride game! I like to use it for the first or second day of the semester as it’s a great way to “warm up” students’ brains if they haven’t been thinking about the target language for a while, and it can also be a fun creativity starter for any day of the year.

Step One: Divide students into groups. This can be done individually, but it won’t be as much fun!

Step Two: Give students a large piece of paper/chart paper with the letters of the alphabet. When a signal is given, they can start writing. They should work fast, as it’s a race to the finish!

Example of an alphabet themed by food with illustrations. Source: https://www.jenniferhines.design/food-alphabet-illustration-series

Step Three: Students write a word that starts with each letter of the alphabet in the target language. This can be general for lower levels (literally any word except for proper nouns) or more specific for more advanced learners (adjectives, words within a theme, words longer than 5 letters, etc.)

You might feel like this might be too easy for your students, but I promise you, it’s actually not. That’s for the same reason that I know I love books, and have read literally thousands of them. However, ask me to write a title of a book I’ve read for each letter of the alphabet, and my mind goes blank, as if I’ve never seen a book in my life! It’s the same with students and vocabulary, especially at the beginning of a semester.

 Step Four: Once one of the groups finishes their entire alphabet, they call “Time!” and then everyone has to put their pens down. Then the scoring begins as each group shares their words with the class. The group gets a point for a word IF NO ONE ELSE WROTE IT AS WELL. For example, say there are six groups in an ELL class, and Group A wrote “Apple”, Group B wrote “Anaconda”, Group C wrote “Advil”, Group D wrote “Adoort”, Group E wrote “Apple” and Group F left their space blank. Only Group B would get a point: Group A and E had the same word, Group C used a proper noun, Group D didn’t write an English word, and Group F didn’t provide a word in time.

Step Five: Continue going through the alphabet as a class and groups self-score as they go. This can be a great opportunity for impromptu vocabulary and grammar lessons. For example, when I do this exercise with my French students they struggle with thinking of words that begin with ‘k’ or ‘z’ that their classmates may not know. I like to share what I think is one of the cruelest words in French: ‘zozoter’, which means ‘to lisp’ but is impossible for someone with a lisp to actually say!  It’s also interesting to see what words your students bring to the table; maybe they love reading about animals and have a bunch of French animal vocabulary. I find that students enjoy the game because it’s low stakes, involves group work, and does challenge them to think beyond the basic vocabulary.

This can be a good game to have up your sleeve for substitutes, since once they’ve played it, students don’t need further instructions. As the teacher, you can also play on your own paper, and students can try and ‘beat the teacher’. I also like to keep the papers from the beginning of the year, and then play the alphabet game at the end of the year as a fun wrap-up. Then I put up their sheets from the beginning of the year, compare them to our most recent version, and we all admire how much more expansive our vocabulary has become!

Image: https://improvgames.com/alphabet-2/ (Note: I’d change “Darlene” to “Darling” in the fourth speech bubble, since the scene already established the name Betsy)

IMPROV ADAPTATION: There is a popular improv game also called the ‘Alphabet Game’ which is based on similar principles. This, in contrast to the written “Alphabet Game” above, is quite difficult because you need to stick to the context of the scene, react to the previous sentence, and have it all make sense! I’d say this is for advanced learners, but worth a try with eager (and willing to fail and start again) intermediate learners!

My favorite descriptor of the game is from Improvgames.com because eagle eyes will notice that they do the whole post in a meta-style, starting each sentence with the first letter of the alphabet. (Note: You could do a similar adaptation as a written game for students, using it for a quickwrite prompt, for example!) There is also an elimination version of this game, which allows more than two people to play the game at the same time (as demonstrated in this video by Splash Games).

UPDATE: I saw this great visual brain teaser about all the letters of the alphabet, which could make a fun starter to this starter! Answers can be found at the thinkaboutmaps Instagram page.

Have you played this before? Are there any variations that you recommend to make this easier, harder, or more interesting? Share in the comments!

Inclusive Textbooks

Your language teaching lesson, should you choose to accept it, is to critically examine the texts you use in your language classroom through the lens of Moore’s Taxonomy of Representational Heteronormativity.

“Part of our job as [language] teachers will always be to help our students find the language to describe the world around them” (Moore, 2020, p. 123)

Sometimes I come across academic articles that I want to share in detail, and this is one of them! Ashley Moore, a doctoral candidate at the University of British Columbia, created a taxonomy so that language teachers can examine our textbooks and figure out what kind of LGBTQ+ representation is present. Why does this matter? Well, the reality is that heterosexuality is represented as the default in all language textbooks. In a 2013 study, a review of 10 ELT textbooks found that seven made no reference to any non-heterosexual relationships or identities, and the three that did fell into the “good gays” trope (see below). While this is also true of a majority of the media that we consume (though that’s changing more and more!) heteronormativity (the assumption that the heterosexual experience is the human experience) is not healthy for our students. Once we have more inclusive resources we are not only better reflecting the real world that our students live in, but we’re sending the message to our LGBTQ+ students that their full selves are welcome in our classrooms.  

Moore’s taxonomy (which I’ve posted below with the permission of the author) looks at queer representation in language textbooks from the most to least damaging perspectives:

Basically, what he has done is given us the language to use to best describe what we find inside our textbooks in regard to inclusion of different sexualities. The way I see it, this taxonomy is a tool to pull out at department meetings when discussing old resources or new purchases, or to have on your wall to evaluate a film/reading/graphic novel that you’re about to use with your class. Most of us know to avoid anything blatantly homophobic, but how often are we pushing ourselves to go beyond that?

My challenge to you is to join me in examining your texts using Moore’s taxonomy. If you pull out your books, I’ll pull out mine and we can do it together! I’ll wait… and for those who already have your textbooks beside you, while we wait for the others, I encourage you to watch Moore’s fantastic video (21 minutes) where he explains his taxonomy in a very clear and detailed way!

Everybody’s here? Great! Let’s get started.

I’m going to be using the textbook series “Entre Nous”, which is for French learners. It has four volumes (for levels A1, A2, B1, B2), is suitable for teens and adults, and my editions say they are published in France by the Centre de Recherche et de Publications de Langues.

We’re going to run through the taxonomy from most damaging to students to least damaging:

“Entre Nous” - Example of heteronormative erasure

Explicit heterosexism: this is when heterosexuality is explicitly valorized in contrast to any other identities, which are presented as abnormal. Fortunately, I was unable to find any examples of this in my textbooks. However, Moore uses the example of an episode from Friends, a commonly used series for English-language learners, where Joey and Ross are mocked for taking naps together.

Heteronormative erasure: this is when heterosexuality is the assumed norm, which then sends the message to students that discussion of non-heterosexual identities is not appropriate in the classroom. I definitely found examples of this in the “Entre Nous” textbook family: in fact, this was (other than one example in the next category) the only category that I found. All photos of couples were heterosexual… and white (another big issue!).

“Entre Nous” - Example of heteronormative marginalization

Heteronormative marginalization: this is when non-heterosexual people are only included when talking about social justice issues (i.e., talking about HIV/AIDS or discrimination). This is well-intentioned, but actually marginalizes LGBTQ+ people further. This is the one example I found that didn’t fit into the above category.  

Heteronormative mainstreaming: this is when only the “good gays” (gay people that imitate Western heterosexual norms) are accessible. While having representation is important, Nelson (1999) notes that “Solidifying fluid sexualities into fixed sexual identities… [has] more to do with social control than with empowerment” (as cited in Moore, 2020, p. 122). While “Entre Nous” doesn’t have any examples of this, Moore points to another popular show used for teaching English, Modern Family, and the two “good gay” characters of Cam and Mitch.

Queer inclusion: this last category is when queer people are included in textbooks and are viewed not just through the lens of their sexuality, but are presented as complete people with intersectional identities. Additionally, those featured do not always fit into Western heterosexual norms. The textbooks I was looking through definitely did not do this, but Moore recommends a text made by Taylor Made English. Personally, I found a Guardian article about the “new American family” that I thought would make a good text to use with students that would fall in this category.

So, in conclusion, my textbooks don’t reflect the reality my students live in. Why is that? If your first guess is money, then you are completely correct. Textbook companies want to be able to sell their textbooks in as many markets as possible, and that means playing it safe (i.e., sticking to the hetero norm) for fear of alienating more conservative districts.  However, if we start asking questions of textbook representatives or directing our textbook budget towards more diverse resources, we can start sending the message that if they want our money, they need to be more inclusive. Moore also notes that most teachers will need to find “hacks” for our curriculum, which means supplementing what we have with resources we find elsewhere (check out the list below).

Also, more and more (or should I say “Moore and Moore”?... I’ll show myself out) I’ve been thinking about the author-text connection. For example, do I encourage my students to read Harry Potter in the target language? The texts themselves are not “explicit heterosexism” (though they would be “heteronormative mainstreaming”) but the author has said really damaging things about trans people. Should I instead redirect them to other great YA books that feature magical schools, but are more inclusive, like Naomi Novik’s fabulous Scholomance Trilogy or other sci-fi/fantasy trans-inclusive books? Should I also let them know about the amazing queer fandom that has grown alongside the books? Or should I just let them enjoy reading something in their L2 and make sure I’m peppering their language education with other LGBTQ+ inclusive resources? I’m sure my opinion on this will continue to evolve, but I’d love if you shared your own perspectives in the comments.

Lastly, when I reached out to Ashley Moore for permission to use his taxonomy in this post, he very generously invited any readers who want to learn more to reach out to him. You can also follow him on Twitter @AshleyRMoore.

 Some supplemental resources:

 ELL:

French:

  • Coucou French Classes’ “The Best French LGBTQ+ French movies” (not all films would be classroom appropriate)

  • French Today’s short text “Being LGBTQ+ in France” (this falls into heteronormative erasure, but is an interesting read, and frankly the only text I found that is written for language-learners)

  • I have a ton of links about using inclusive language in your French class here

Spanish:

 

What resources do you use in your classroom? Share below in the comments!

A.I. in Education

Your language-teaching mission, should you choose to accept it, is to explore the potential positive and negative outcomes of the increased use of artificial intelligence (AI) in education.

I follow a lot of great language teachers on Twitter and Instagram. And I also follow a robot who teaches French. Nao, a humanoid robot from Sligo, Ireland, and the Masters project of Debbie Woodward, inspired an article I wrote for schoolrubric.org. In the post, entitled “Artificial Intelligence in Education: Robots are coming for our jobs… and I’m only slightly worried”, I explore the good, the bad, and the weird of AI in education while I also ponder whether or not I’m worried about Nao taking my job.

Nao the French-teaching social robot, screenshot from Twitter twitter.com/NAORobotIRL

While that article wasn’t written specifically with language teachers in mind, it applies to any educator who is working in education today. I also think there is a fascinating tangent to explore about how AI is impacting language education specifically. If you are interested, a great article is intellias’ “Essentials of Artificial Intelligence for Language Learning” (2021). There’s also this informative article by Marcel Pikhart (2020) about how language learning apps employ AI technology. Also of note is Edwin, the AI-powered English tutor who was featured in Chatbots Magazine (isn’t the future amazing!?!) Interestingly, Edwin and his ilk have also caused some serious debate in the realm of language testing. Finally, the article “Preparing teachers for the application of AI-powered technologies in foreign language education” (2019) has an overview of all the major language-learning AI technologies. Additionally, it includes a summary of previous research findings about why language teachers are reluctant to incorporate AI into classrooms, including lack of information, experience, or motivation; struggle to integrate this technology into existing teaching practices; and fear of losing a dominant position in the classroom (p. 145). What it doesn’t include is “vague unease about technology based on watching too many Terminator movies”, which is how I’d probably have described my thoughts before writing the piece for School Rubric!

UPDATE 01/19/22: Former Lesson: Impossible podcast guest Orly Klaphotz has a really interesting Twitter thread about the use of AI in language education when it’s built on biased data.

How about you? Do you look forward to more AI in your language classrooms and/or are you slightly worried about it as well? Let me know in the comments!

Six Shapes Creativity Starter Activity

Your language teaching mission, should you choose to accept it, is to unleash students’ creativity, encourage class bonding, and facilitate L2 conversations with the Six Shapes Creativity Starter Activity.

This was introduced to me in Quebec in 2013, and I’m very sorry that I don’t remember by whom. It was called “le jeu de six cases”/”the six boxes game”, but it can be used for any language because it’s all about interpreting shapes and then talking about them. This is a perfect activity to start a class as a “creativity starter” but it’s also great for:

  • Taking a quick brain break

  • Introducing a genius hour project to encourage students to start thinking « outside the box »

  • Discussing that there is no right answer if you have a class that is super concerned with perfection

  • Getting-to-know-you conversations

Note: these steps are completely optional! You know your class, you know what they would benefit from! I’m sharing how I do this activity but feel free to pick and choose any part, adapt any part, or completely transform the activity. Just please share your ideas in the comments below!

Step One: I hand out the sheet with the shapes, but have students keep it blank side up. This is not necessary, but I think it adds a dramatic flair when they finally flip it over and start drawing!

Step Two: We watch this 2 minute video (it is in English) where students were asked to “complete the painting the right way” or just asked to “complete the painting”. We then talk about creativity and freeing your mind, or the fact that there is no “right answer”.

Step Three: Students dramatically flip over their page (see step one) and start drawing. I play classical music (again, not necessary, just sets the tone). Students can draw with color, pencil, marker, whatever they want. The only instructions given are that they have to transform the shapes into something, anything.

Step Four: Students put down all their drawing utensils. I then give the big reveal: each box reveals something about themselves as a person! They’ve actually taken a personality test! I also make sure to let them know that this is not scientifically supported, just a fun activity. (Sometimes I share my story of how I used to have a gig as a fortune teller at parties, and that I can confirm that with chutzpah and cold-reading skills, you can make meaning out of anything and make someone believe you. I’m not denying those who believe they have an actual gift for this, just my experience about lying about having a gift to make events interesting for party-goers.)

The ‘meaning’ for each box is:

  • Box 1: how you perceive your home

  • Box 2: how you perceive yourself

  • Box 3: how you feel about friendships/relationships

  • Box 4: how you feel about your work/studies

  • Box 5: how you feel about your ambitions

  • Box 6: how you think other people perceive you

Step Five: Students need to write at least one word in the target language to describe what they’ve drawn in each box, which is informed by the new information they’ve been given. For example, when I first did this activity, for the line I had drawn a unicorn walking up the hill, which I then labelled “La liberté” (liberty).

 Step Six: At this point there’s a lot of giggling and exclamation! Students are curious and can’t wait to check out what other people drew. Therefore, we do a quick walk-around where students can check out what other students drew and the words they wrote. If students are uncomfortable with others seeing their paper they have the option of turning their page over to the blank side.

Step Seven: Students are then paired up and given the instructions to turn and talk to a partner. They are to choose one box at a time to discuss their interpretations of what they’ve drawn and what it means. For example, I would share my fourth box with the unicorn and say that I think it means that I feel liberated by my work because I get so much creative freedom. I encourage partners to help expand their partner’s interpretation. For example, my partner might add that I drew a unicorn, which represent gentleness, and that I am a caring person in my work (my imaginary partner sure is flattering!) Then my partner would choose to share one of their boxes and their interpretation. We go back and forth until we’re done, or the time limit given is completed. You could also use clock partners or other ways to get students to talk to new people and have them switch to new people for each couple of boxes.

Step Eight: You can have a full class discussion to wrap up or have students reflect in their journals, or write an exit strip. Some guiding questions might be: How are your drawings similar or different to your partner? Did anything surprise you about what you saw? Considering how well you know your partner, do you think any of the answers fit them well?

RESOURCE: Six Shapes Activity Page (no particular language)

 

IMPROV ADAPTATION: Collect the sheets, photo copy them, and then cut the copies into six squares. Put all the squares in a hat and now you have [6 x number of students in your class] new scene prompts based on who they are!

Let me know in the comments if you used the activity and how it went!

Listening Project

Your language-teaching mission, should you choose to accept it, is to encourage students to explore a variety of listening sources, create a database of reviews, and/or have students reflect metacognitively on their listening skills.

Image source: https://www.nytimes.com/guides/smarterliving/be-a-better-listener

Feel free to scroll to the bottom to get right to downloading this resource available in English or English/French.

There are plenty of reasons why giving students free choice in their reading is best for having them (gasp) actually enjoy reading! There are also some great ideas out there for building up reading programs that make students love reading again (my interview with Agent Kari Pitstick about reaching reluctant readers was very inspiring in this regard!) However, it got me thinking… we do a lot to encourage students to explore written resources for pleasure, why aren’t we doing the same for listening resources?

When looking at the learning outcomes for my second language courses, I found that students should be able to ‘independently locate, explore and think critically about a wide variety of texts’ and ‘recognize different purposes, degrees of formality, and cultural points of view in these texts’.  Often, we view ‘texts’ as being only written, but they can be listened to as well!  Therefore, this project is designed to encourage students to explore and evaluate a variety of listening resources.  Additionally, it is designed to dovetail with the research component of their Genius Hour projects. However, if you aren’t doing a Genius Hour project, I also have a version where they explore a topic of interest to them (i.e., sports, celebrities, fairy tales, cars, video games, etc.) 

After listening to Kari, I have to admit I’m a convert for not making students do a lot of onerous work around what they are reading (or in this case, listening to). HOWEVER, this project is designed more around metacognition and sharing, rather than deep analysis of the actual text.

Part one of the assignment is a Listening Resource Portfolio that can be shared with other classes.  The idea is that, as a department or group of classes, you can build up a list of resources on a variety of subjects with which students can use to practice their listening skills.  So, if you are doing some free listening practice and students say “but I don’t know what I want to listen to” you can point them to the resource collection, and they can browse for a topic or type of resource that interests them. This would be perfect for building up a giant google slide deck or other similar online resource that students could access at home!

I’ve created a chart of possibilities for students to choose from for exploring resources to encourage them to go outside of their confort zones (below - English on the right, French on the left). In the project I have students choose from these categories, and I also think it’s a great way to demonstrate the global nature of language!

If all you’re looking to do is get students to gather resources to share, then you can stop here! The evaluation for part one is pass/fail: did the student fulfill the criteria or not?

Part two of the assignment is a Personal Reflection, which I tell my students will not be shared. It is designed so that students can demonstrate their ability to reflect metacognitively (thinking about their thinking) about their listening experiences. There is a part for reflecting on the content itself (in a general way) and a part for reflecting on their listening skills. Because I speak the same L1 as my students, I have them do this part in our shared language of English because I want to emphasize that it’s about the thinking that they are expressing, not about language proficiency. However, I understand that not everyone follows this line of thinking, or shares the same languages as their students.

I think it’s important to note that being a good listener is not an innate skill. Like anything else, it needs to be explained and practiced. I like to use the six strategies of inferencing, elaboration, self-monitoring, summarization, self-evaluation, and toleration of uncertainty. You can download a handout developed by pbworks based on research by Young (1997) here that I like to use.

  

RESOURCE: Listening Project (in English with English examples, can be adapted to other languages, stands alone as a project)

RESOURCE: Listening Project (in English with English examples, can be adapted to other languages, has a connection to a genius hour project)

RESOURCE: Listening Project (instructions in English for French students, examples in French, stands alone as a project)

RESOURCE: Listening Project (instructions in English for French students, examples in French, has a connection to a genius hour project)

RESOURCE: Listening Project Evaluation (in English/French)

RESOURCE: Listening Project Evaluation (English only)

How do you engage students in listening? Feel free to share in the comments!

Considering Ungrading

This blog post is my response to a Lesson: Impossible podcast episode with Agent Jessica Zeller where we discuss ungrading, which got me thinking about how this applies to second language acquisition contexts. As you will read below, this is a concept that intrigues me mightily, but I’m still trying to figure out what it would like for me in my classes!

Lafeyette College defines ungrading as “an umbrella term for any assessment that decenters the action of an instructor assigning a summary grade to student work. While there are many ways to do ungrading, instructors generally provide students with formative rather than summative feedback, which may be combined with student self-evaluation and/or peer feedback, as well as dialogue with the student.” It can manifest in a variety of forms, but my understanding is that at the base, it means decoupling assessment from traditional ideas of evaluation and authority. While I’ve heard a lot about ungrading in the past, particularly from my podcasting colleagues Batsheva Frankel of Overthrowing Education and Natalie Vardabasso of EduCrush, as well as an episode on my own podcast, this interview finally made it click for me. I think it’s because Jessica is an associate professor of dance, and when talking about assessing something physical, rather than mental, I am better able to comprehend how ungrading really works. I can imagine how every dancer’s body is different in a way that I can’t see that every student’s intellectual strengths are different.

Personally, from the beginning of my career until now, I went from grading everything, most of it out of 10, to minimal grading accompanied by a lot of student reflection. However, I have yet to take that final step and, as Jessica describes it “turn over the authority of the red pen to students.” She also goes as far as to turn much of the criteria and even the curriculum over to the students. As much as I see the potential, it has been really hard for me to wrap my head around a) me not having the final evaluative say and b) letting students guide the learning outcomes. I was a guest on the BigEDidea Podcast recently, talking about, as usual, incorporating improv into my teaching practice. One of the comments that the host made was that simpler lesson plans are almost always better for student learning than complicated ones.  And I agreed wholeheartedly despite absolutely loving making complicated, detailed lesson plans. Why do I love my multi-step, super-involved lesson plans? I think that it’s based on a sense of control, the feeling that if I can roadmap my students’ learning journey down to the second, then I can make sure that we all get to the pre-programmed destination. But, as Jessica points out, road-mapping the journey means that we never get a chance to explore any interesting things that pop up along the way. She also said something that hit a little too close to home: “The feeling of authority and holding on to authority is something that as individual teachers we need to look at in ourselves.” How can I be saying that the key to improv is to trust students when I am not trusting them in other facets of my teaching? Perhaps I need to think more about what Jessica says about her pedagogy, which is that she “put[s] most of [her] eggs in the basket of trusting students.”?

Image source: https://www.chronicle.com/article/why-to-use-ungrading-when-you-teach-writing

Reflecting on language classes, I think that it’s actually a perfect place for ungrading. Like in the dance classes Jessica describes, students have a pretty clear feeling of improvement: they can speak and write with more detail, more fluidly, more accuracy, etc. However, when I went looking for resources I found a ton for other types of classes, particularly English Language Arts, but really had a hard time finding resources or examples for world language/ELL settings. There are many, many excellent books and blog posts (see: Jesse Stommel’s “Ungrading: A Bibliography” or check out the references on this post) about going gradeless/ungrading, but they are not specific to language teaching. Here’s a sample of the few that I did find:

 If you want to learn more about ungrading you can also check out these podcasts (in addition to my interview with Jessica Zeller):

  • Teachers Going Gradeless Podcast (no featured language teacher, but maybe in the future?)

  • Overthrowing Education’s episode “Starr Sackstein: How to Go Gradeless and Assess Better” (again, not specific to languages, but I’m a fan of the podcast!)

  • Teachers on Fire’s GOING GRADELESS: Katelynn Giordano, Deanna Lough, Jeffery Frieden, Aaron Blackwelder, & Abby French (and it continues… not specific to languages but super interesting, AND pinged on my search term for “French”)

  • Lesson: Impossible’s episode with Katelynn Giordano (also featured above)

 

Have you gone to, or ever considered going to, an ungrading model? Do you have any language-learning ungrading resources to share? Feel free to comment below about your experiences!

Mixin’ It Up: Ways to Pair Students with New Partners

Your language-teaching mission, should you choose to accept it, is to encourage your students to converse with a variety of speaking partners by using fun and unique partnering strategies.

Image source: https://sites.google.com/a/fpsct.org/iar-school-counseling/mix-it-up-day

I’ll often tell my students that they should ‘mix it up’ and find someone new to talk to. Sometimes they do, but most of the time they end up talking to the same people they always do. For me to admonish them would be hypocritical, as I too am guilty of this: I tend to sit in the same chair in the staff room, talking to the same people, every lunch time. Therefore, as the teacher, it’s my responsibility to give them opportunities and encouragement to meet and work with new people. However, there are more fun ways to do this than telling them to “find someone new” and hoping for the best!

Methods for Mixing Up Partners:

Clock Partners

This is great at the beginning of a semester when students are getting to know each other. Students are given a ‘clock’, and make appointments with another student. For beginner students I’ll have a script on the board that will be something like:

“Hi, my name is ________. Can I be your ____ o’clock clock partner?”

“Hi ________ , I’m _________. I’d be happy to be your ____ o’clock clock partner”

“Hi ________ , I’m _________. Unfortunately, I cannot be your ____ o’clock clock partner. How about ____ o’clock?”

Once everyone has their ‘appointments’ they keep the sheet in their binder. Then, when we have conversation prompts, I’ll tell students to find their _____ o’clock partner. When I’m particularly on the ball, I’ll keep track of which ‘times’ I’ve already called so that they visit with everyone prior to repeating the time. Two problems I’ve had with this are a) if a student is away, (but you can easily toss them into a group of three), or b) you have less than 24 students in the class, (which you can remedy by having certain ‘times’ blocked off).

RESOURCE: Clock Partners sheet (French)

RESOURCE: Link to the many, many clock partners sheets to choose from (English)

Find someone who

 Give an arbitrary criterion so that students can reasonably find someone who fits. For example, “find someone who has the same color shirt as you” or “find someone who also does or does not have glasses”. You can use less obvious physical cues that force students to chat, like “find someone who has the same pet as you” or “find someone who has a similar hobby to yours”.

Take a card (any card!)*

All you need is a deck of cards. Have as many cards as students, and hand them out randomly. Then say “find the person with the same number card”. This one is great because if you want to start with a group of two, and then transition to a group of four, you can start with “find the person with the same number and color card as you” (ex. the six of diamonds and six of hearts are now partners) and then “find the group with the same number but different color as you and your partner and make a group of four” (ex. the six of diamonds and six of hearts are now also partners with the six of spades and six of clubs). I had some comically large playing cards that were a hit and less likely to get lost.

Take a postcard (any postcard!)*

I bet if you ask around, there’s people with postcards they’ve never sent (I certainly have great intentions and poor follow-through for postcards when on vacation). Take the postcards (or really any image) and chop them in half. Randomly distribute the half-cards to students and then they need to ‘match’ up with their new partner. If you have an old game of ‘memory’ for kids, that would be even easier.  

Vocabulary Partners*

This is a way to review vocabulary and find a partner (mwahahahaha!) Half the students are given a word in the target language. The other half are given either a picture that matches one of the vocab words or a matching vocab word in the L1 (If you’re interested, I have a blog post about how vocab learning is one of the times using students’ L1 in the classroom is beneficial). They must find the person who is their match, and that person is their partner. You can also do this as an introduction to new vocabulary, which takes considerably longer, but it’s interesting to see students using inferences to guess the meaning of the word and helping pair each other up.

Walk ‘til the Music Stops

Students wander around the room while the music is playing. When the music stops, whoever is closest to them is their partner. In some classes the students clump together to guarantee they’ll end up with their friends, which means I don’t do this with them again. However, some classes love the chance to get up and walk (and dance around!), so participate in the way it was intended in order to keep doing it.

Handshakes

 This one is good for the beginning of the year and it is definitely a pre-Covid activity (but hopefully we’ll be back to this kind of interaction again!) Instruct students to find someone, introduce themselves and shake that person’s hand. Then, find someone new and shake their hand. Then find someone new and shake their hand. By the fifth time they’ll have started branching out to new people, which is when you say “okay, the person’s hand that you just shook is your partner”. I like to switch it up by having a different ‘hello’ task each time, so I’ll use a variety of:

Image source: https://www.mashupmath.com/blog/handshake-math-challenge?rq=handshake

  1. Shake the person’s hand

  2. Fist bump

  3. High-five

  4. Low-five

  5. Elbow tap

  6. Bow

  7. Train-handshake (I usually need to demonstrate this one, but you grab the other person’s elbow and saw your arms back and forth saying “choo choo!”. This gets a lot of laughs, and is usually where I stop and say “this person is your partner”)

This is also an opportunity to talk about cultural mores around greetings. For example, in France it is very common to do La Bise (cheek kisses) when seeing someone, even for the first time! Depending on which region you are in, you start on the right or the left, and give either one, two, three, four, or even five, kisses. (The English comedian Paul Taylor has a hilarious video about this, though there is some swearing.) I don’t feel comfortable asking my students to se boujouter (as they say in Normandy), as culturally in North America, this is not a common greeting for people who are not already pretty intimate. However, it does spark some interesting conversation!

 

* If you have the time and energy (or, have an eager student volunteer) you can tape the cards or a slip of paper with a vocab word under their chairs or desks. There’s something magical about being told “check under your seat!” and grabbing something!

 

How do you pair students up to make sure they’re talking with new people? Feel free to share in the comments!

4/3/2 Fluency Technique

Your language-teaching mission, should you choose to accept it, is to help your students become more confident and fluent speakers when talking about a chosen topic using the 4/3/2 technique.

What is the 4/3/2 technique?

 Dr. Paul Nation makes the point that “At every level of language proficiency, learners should try to be fluent with what they already know.” Therefore, he created an activity that helps students focus on meaning, speed, and volume with a familiar text. This is an activity I use with students to help increase confidence and fluency, and also encourage solid reading comprehension when it’s paired with a text.  

How does it work?

  • Step One: Students become ‘experts’ in a particular topic. This can mean they are about to talk about the subject of their project, or what book they are reading, or the main idea of a small article they read. A resource I recommend for this type of activity are magazines by Rubicon Publishing. They have sets in French and English with ‘Top 10 [blank]’: Top ten spies, top ten sports showdowns, top ten outrageous hoaxes, etc. I had access to class sets of 30, so the whole class would read on the same topic. I would assign 3 students to read each article together, then they would be the ‘experts’ in their entry and would find someone not in their group to talk to for the next steps.

  • Step Two: Student A pairs up with Student B and then talks about their topic for four minutes. Student B cannot interrupt, even to ask questions. Once the four minutes are up, Student B gets to speak for four minutes. This time, Student A patiently listens.

  • Step Three: Student A now pairs up with Student C and repeats the process. However, this time, they only speak for three minutes.

  • Step Four: Student A is now with Student D but speaking for two minutes.

There are some great videos to watch to learn more. Paul Nation delivered a presentation on developing fluency in reading and includes an explanation of his 4/3/2 method. There’s also this video by IELTS Master that explains the activity directly to students.

Image soure: https://soundpracticelanguagelearning.com/2020/04/11/whatisoralfluency/

 Why does this work?

 There are three reasons why this exercise is more valuable than a turn-and-talk and not a waste of 9 minutes:

  1. Different audience: the student doesn’t feel the pressure to add new information, because the topic is new to the listener each time.

  2. Repetition: each time the student repeats their talk they become more confident and have less difficulty in accessing the vocabulary needed

  3. Time reduction: as the student becomes more fluent in their speech, they need less time. As the time reduces at the same rate, they don’t have any pressure to fill the rest of the time with new information.

A study of ten randomly selected ELL participants in Algeria found that “repeating the same talk three times yields positive effects on enhancing’ fluency maximizing students’ speaking speed, accuracy, and conciseness as well as reducing their hesitation and unwillingness” .

How can I change it up?

For lower-level students Christopher Redmond uses the same principles to improve the yes/no game. For higher-level students Olya Sergeeva adds mind-mapping with related English-language expressions. It can also be used to help students practice for presenting their Genius Hour projects or any other non-scripted presentations.

 

Have you ever done this activity with your students? It was new to me as a French teacher, but seems to be pretty popular with ELL teachers. Feel free to share in the comments!

Inclusive Language & Français Inclusif:

Your language-teaching mission, should you choose to accept it, is to make all students feel welcome in your class by using inclusive language.

I’ve been working hard to make my speaking and writing in English more inclusive, and finally feel like I have a handle on the singular ‘they’ and finding better ways to talk to groups of students other than “ladies and gentlemen”. However, although I’ve talked to my students about non-gendered pronouns, I’m still figuring it out myself. This post is all about French specifically, as there are so many issues to consider in a language that has adjectives and verb endings that need to match gender, not to mention the use of gendered titles for everything (writer, teacher, translator, etc.). Although the rest of this post is for my fellow French teachers (and therefore in French), I think that regardless what language you use, it’s worth reflecting on how you can best make your students feel safe and included while using that language!

This is not an uncontroversial subject. The Académie française has released a statement condemning gender neutral language. This is part of a debate within many gendered languages, and I’ve found some interesting articles (in English) to perhaps explore:

Personally, I think this is an example of languages responding to cultural needs, and am excited to see these inclusive changes!

UPDATE 12/2021: The Gender in Language Project has a guide for Spanish and Mandarin!

UPDATE 10/2022: For International Pronouns Day @SaraSavoia_ has a thread of some great pronoun resources to use in elementary school classrooms!

Le français inclusif:

Je me suis retrouvée ignorante du français inclusif. Pour changer ça, j’ai regardé un vidéo avec Hélène Frohard-Dourlent et Gabriel.le Villeneuve: « Webinaire sur le français inclusif ». J’ai appris qu’on parle de l’inclusivite, il y a une différence entre la langue inclusive et neutre. Le langage inclusif est pour parler de groupes mixtes (ex. traducteur.rice) et le langage neutre est pour parler de personnes non-binaires et propose un nouveau genre grammatical (ex. traductaire). Les deux présentataires (<– regarde ce que j’ai fait là ?!?!) discutent l’un et l’autre.

Il y a beaucoup de façons que le français serait inclusif pour les femmes, comme créer des termes féminins (ex. écrivaine ou inspectrice), donner le féminin l’emporte (ex. « La plage et l’océan sont belles »), faire l’accord basé sur la proximité (ex. « L’océan et la plage sont belle ») ou inclure un double flexion totale (ex. les collaborateurs et les collaboratrices (ou « collaborateur.rice.s »). Ces stratégies pour la féminisation sont plus bien connues, mais les stratégies pour la neutralisation étaient nouvelles pour moi. Pour exemple, il faut utiliser le syntaxe et vocabulaires épicènes (c.à.d. androgynes), comme « collègue », « scientifique », ou « une personne étonnante ». Aussi, il suffit qu’on utilise les néologismes neutres. On le fait ça avec les pronoms (ex. iel, ol, celleux, elleux), un article neutre (ex. an, san, man), des mots-valise ou modifications (ex. toustes, froeur / adelphe [de grec], Mondame, Minêtre, heureuxes) ou une omission (ex. an traduct*).

Je pense que j’aurai besoin de pratique pour faire mon langage plus inclusif. Les choses que je peux immédiatement changer sont : utiliser une double-flexion partielle (ex. mes ami.e.s), respecter si quelqu’un utilise le pronom « iel »,  et dire « une personne » + un adjectif pour éviter d’identifier un genre. Plus, j’aime beaucoup « toustes » pour s’adresser à un grand groupe ! J’ai appris aussi un nouveau verbe pour quand on utilise un pronom ou accord grammatical qui ne correspond pas au langage que la personne utilise : « mégenrer ».

ALORS j’ai tellement aimé cette vidéo que j’ai fait un aide-mémoire à envoyer à mes étudiant.e.s et collègues pour qu’ils l’utilisent ! J’en ai mis une copie ici aussi : Strategies pour une langue neutre et inclusive.pdf

Des ressources supplementaries:

Des ressources supplémentaires:

NOTE: As of November 4, 2022, I’ve started a separate blog post collecting resources, which I will continually add to. You can find it at https://www.lessonimpossible.com/blog/ressources-francais-inclusif

Une liste de termes épicènes ou neutres : https://bdl.oqlf.gouv.qc.ca/bdl/gabarit_bdl.asp?id=5465

Plutôt que de choisir entre deux mots (ex. un représentant et une représentante) on peut essayer de trouver un autre mot (ex. une porte-parole) 

Guide de grammaire neutre et inclusive : https://divergenres.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/04/guide-grammaireinclusive-final.pdf

Un guide pour comprendre et utiliser la grammaire inclusive par Diver Genres

Guide pour la rédaction inclusive à l’Université Laval : https://divergenres.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/03/guide-redaction-inclusive-2020-femul-2.pdf

Un guide qui discute les définitions, l’historique, la démystification, les règles, les formes d’écriture inclusives et des exemples. 

Guide pour désigner les personnes non binaires: https://www.noslangues-ourlanguages.gc.ca/fr/cles-de-la-redaction/ecriture-inclusive-lignes-directrices-ressources#lignes-directrices

Un guide écrit par l’Office québécois de la langue française.

Un article academique: https://www.florenceashley.com/uploads/1/2/4/4/124439164/ashley_les_personnes_non-binaires_en_fran%C3%A7ais_-_une_perspective_concern%C3%A9e_et_militante.pdf

“Les personnes non-binaires en français : une perspective concernée et militante” par Florence Ashley de McGill University

Les formidables ressources de Kris Knisely: https://www.krisknisely.com/resources-for-educators

Les info-graphiques comme “Oral Communication Strategies used by non-binary speakers of French” et “Language forms used by non-binary speakers of French”.

 Un post sur le blog “En Tous Genres”: https://entousgenresblog.wordpress.com/2017/04/19/quels-pronoms-neutres-en-francais-et-comment-les-utiliser/

Un post sur “Le langage neutre en français : pronoms et accords à l’écrit et à l’oral”

Écriture inclusive en correspondance : https://www.noslangues-ourlanguages.gc.ca/en/cles-de-la-redaction/ecriture-inclusive-correspondance

Une guide pour la correspondance par le Bureau de la traduction du Governement du Canada

Sam Utilise Iel: https://www.lessonimpossible.com/blog/inclusive-pronouns-en-franais-sam-utilise-iel

Une petite histoire illustrée pour les élèves pour expliquer comment on peut utiliser le français inclusif avec un.e. ami.e non-binaire

Lexique de Genre Neutre: https://www.alpheratz.fr/linguistique/genre-neutre/

Extrait du livre d’Alpheratz “Grammaire du Français Inclusif” (2018). Merci à @YaruSol de m’avoir présenté ce site.

Guide & Zine d’élève: https://juliaspiegelman.wordpress.com/resources/

Un google doc (A Student’s Guide to Queer and Non-Binary French) et un zine crée par un.e élève non-binare (“IEL: A Zine on Gender-Affirming Language for the French Classroom (by a trans* French student”)). Tous en anglais.

Le Devoir Article: https://www.ledevoir.com/lire/649374/litterature-un-iel-vieux-comme-les-cultures-autochtones

“Un «iel» vieux comme les cultures autochtones”

Open Educational Resource Conversation Tool: https://pdxscholar.library.pdx.edu/pdxopen/40/

CITOYEN.NE.S is a French language method for the conversation class at the intermediate/ advanced level. Content and activities are built around the concepts of diversity, inclusivity and equity, and engage students to practice French while questioning and participating in the world they live in – to be full citizens whatever their background, their race or their gender identity.

How to Use Proper Pronouns: https://properpronouns.com/

Un guide pour l’utilisation des “proper pronouns” (une mention d’une personne en particulier dans la troisième personne). En anglais.

Teaching with Music Videos

Your language-teaching mission, should you choose to accept it, is to use music videos as a gateway for language learning.

Music, especially music videos with their creative visuals, are an amazing access point for language learning. Not only are our brains hardwired for music, most musicians are way cooler than the majority of language teachers will ever hope to be.

I’ve involved music videos in my curriculum in a lot of different ways. It can be a complement to a unit not related to music. For example, when doing a thematic unit there’s usually a music video or two that you can find that can be used as a good hook for your lesson. There’s a French song called “Cendrillon” which I only use for my oldest students during our fairy tale unit because despite the upbeat song and video, the lyrics are dark. I’ve also made music one of the focuses of the unit. For example, in my unit on natural disasters, I was able to find quite a lot of songs that talk about the weather literally and metaphorically (See: Neko Case’s English song “This Tornado Loves You” or Indila’s French song “Dernière Danse”). We focused a lot on pronunciation, literary devises, and rhyming. Then, the final project for the class was writing and performing a poem (since songs are just poems sung aloud). Moreover, I’ve used songs to illustrate certain grammatical concepts. For example, there is a song called “Si” (“If”) by Zaz that works for teaching the conditional in French or Mika’s “Elle Me Dit” for indirect pronouns.

Music Wednesdays:

There is one way I like use music videos throughout the entire year, which is the focus of today’s post: Music Wednesday (or “Musique Mercredi”)! Each Wednesday (I chose the day both for the alliteration and the fact that half-way through the week it’s nice to have a musical pick-me-up) a student or two presents a music video in the target language.    

A student picks a song that is primarily in the target language and has either an engaging (but appropriate) video or lyrics video. The student then makes a presentation (powerpoint, googleslides, prezzi, etc.) that includes the following:

  1. the title of the song

  2. the name of the artist (with a photo)

  3. the musical genre of the song

  4. the artist’s country of origin

  5. three interesting facts about the song and/or the artist

  6. five words found in the song lyrics

  7. a quick summary of the song’s meaning

Something that I tend to harp on about in my classroom is that there are a lot of strategies that one can rely on if you don’t know a word beyond translating into the L1. Therefore, for the ‘five words found in the song lyrics’ part of the presentation, students need to put up words from the lyrics that was new to them and have the class guess the definition using inference. To get full marks they need to use a variety of ways to give clues to their classmates, such as:

  1. Gestures

  2. Sounds

  3. Synonyms

  4. Antonyms

  5. Related words

  6. Roots of the word

  7. Images

As the presentations progress I have students keep a list of vocabulary in their journals. Then, at the end of the year, they need to use the musique mercredi vocabulary in their final projects (see: genius hour post). The vocab words also make great improv or quickwrite prompts!

I make my own presentation for when I explain the assignment, modeling what I am looking for them to do. Students then sign up for when they will present throughout the semester. If they want to ‘claim’ a song, they must write it down on the list. I don’t let students re-use the same song, artist, or vocabulary words of another student. I also want students to expand their musical repetoire and search out more diverse artists. Personally, I know that my musical tastes are very North-American/Euro-centric and I want to encourage my students to find artists with a variety of styles and origins.

RESOURCE: Musique Mercredi rubric (rubric is in English)

RESOURCE: The presentation I use to model (French)

RESOURCE: Sign-up list

RESOURCE: A student example (since this ppt is in pdf format, the definition of the word is not obscured, as it would be while the class guesses).

RESOURCE: Manie Musicale is a competition where students vote on their favorite French songs from a field of sixteen. The songs are chosen from french-speaking artists from around the world.

RESOURCE: My amazing friend Vanessa Drew has created a powerpoint with a variety of francophone artists from around the world.

RESOURCE: My other amazing friend Mariève has a folder of French songs with lyrics as well as song analysis activities

What are ways you use music videos in your classroom? Feel free to share in the comments!

CSI: Color, Symbol, Image

Your language-teaching mission, should you choose to accept it, is to facilitate students in showing their thinking through a Color, Symbol, Image activity.

I came across this video recently (a 4 minute French video about how technology isn’t ruining our brains, but it is changing them!) and because I cannot turn my teacher brain off for any amount of time, my first thought was “this would be great for a CSI”! Then, I decided that this would be a great time to share a simple activity for having students demonstrate what they know.

What is CSI?

 CSI is one of the many amazing activities in Making Thinking Visible (2011), which is, in my opinion, the best book to give to new teachers! This particular “thinking protocol” is perfect for language classes, in that it does not rely on written language.

Step One: Students read/watch a source text.

Step 1.5: Sometimes it’s helpful, before moving to the next step, to discuss any interesting, important, or insightful thoughts that students had while reading. Especially if it’s the first time doing this thinking protocol, generating a class list of ideas can let students focus on the next step of transforming their thoughts into CSI, instead of struggling with the text to begin with.

Step Two: Students, either individually or in a group, (or first individually, then in a group) draw one color, one symbol, and one image that describes the core idea of the source text.

  • A color is… a color. The authors of the book make the point that “the connections students make are highly personal and need to be understood in terms of the individual’s explanation. For example, one student may choose black to represent an idea because to them black represents possibility and the unknown, whereas another student may associate blue with the exact same idea because blue reminds him of the openness of the sky and infinite freedom and possibility” (pp. 119-120).

  • A symbol is a simple image that represents a larger idea. The way I introduce this idea to my students in talking about the apps on the home screen of an iPhone: an envelope represents the email app, a microphone represents the podcast app, the silhouette of a bird represents Twitter, etc.

  • An image is a drawing of a scene. Students identify a moment or idea that they want to represent through a drawing as a way to draw attention to its importance.

Step Three: Students share out, either in pairs, or the whole class (or first in pairs, then with the whole class) what they drew and WHY.

 Step 3.5: This is an opportunity to have students moving around and practicing explaining their thoughts. For example, a group of 3 could do a CSI. Each student is assigned a number. All the 1s stay with their work (probably on a huge piece of paper) and the rest of the students wander around the room looking at the other groups’ work and asking questions of the students who are with the paper. Then it’s time for the 2s to stay with the paper, and the others wander, etc.  

 

Why does it work?

 Students are asked to think metaphorically and synthesize their understanding of the text. Not only are students asked to go beyond simple recall, but they need to transform their thoughts from one medium to another. Furthermore, in explaining their choices they are developing important oral communication skills.

CSI can work with all content areas, but for language especially, it’s fantastic for allowing students to express themselves in a deep way without needing a lot of vocabulary to support it. For example, lower-level students who just have a vocabulary of colors and adjectives can do the “C” part of CSI for any texts they encounter.

 CSI can also be expanded beyond responding to texts. Students can use it to respond to events, future plans, or how they feel about other people/objects/places. Basically, if you want students to be thinking about something, and want to give them enough structure to feel confident, but not too much structure that they can’t think freely, CSI is a way to do that!

Feel free to share in the comments if you use CSIs or any other visual thinking protocols! If you’re interested in more of Harvard’s Project Zero thinking protocols, you can check them out here.

Warm-Up: Find 5 Things

Your language-teaching mission, should you choose to accept it, is to start class with a fun, visual warm-up game that enhances students’ vocabulary knowledge.

The “5 things” game is one that was modeled for me at a professional development session, and I used it the very next day in my classroom! My students like it, it’s easy to explain, there are literally infinite variations on it, and it somehow manages to be both competitive AND team building!

STEP ONE: Students are put into pairs (or threes if needed). They do not need to be sitting close to their ‘partner’, in fact, it’s better if they are not!

STEP TWO: The teacher puts up an image. Literally any image, as long as there are at least five things (hence the name) that can be identified.

STEP THREE: Ultimately, the goal of the game is to gain points by having the same five words as your partner to describe the picture (one point per answer, maximum five points per round). Once the image is revealed, I’ll give students a few minutes to write down their answers silently and secretly. So, for example, if I show this picture, a student might write down:

Image still from: The Princess and the Frog (Disney)

  1. Princess

  2. Frog

  3. Night

  4. Kiss

  5. Tiara

This can be made harder or easier, more focused on grammar or less. For example, the first image I used was pretty simplistic. I’m not saying you should use Where’s Waldo, but an image of a Haitian market, for example, might make the game more difficult! If the parameters I give are just to have the same words, I always have the rule that all nouns, adjectives, verbs, and adverbs are all allowed EXCEPT for colors! Unless it’s a beginner-level class, having to rely on colors seems a bit like cheating to me. However, you can definitely make this more complex by putting stricter parameters around the image. For example, I may say that students need to find two nouns, two verbs, and one adjective.  Therefore, the imaginary student’s list might look like this:

1.     NOUN: a frog

2.     NOUN: a princess

3.     VERB: to kiss

4.     VERB: to blush

5.     ADJECTIVE: romantic

If you’re working on a particular grammatical construction, then you can put up an image and say “find five of the same verbs in the imperfect form”. Or if there is an image that involves a lot of unit vocabulary you can say “find five of the same words (doesn’t matter what part of speech), but spelling counts!”

STEP FOUR: Partners tally up the points (the silent and secret part is now over). Using the above first example, if Student A wrote princess, night, frog, kiss, tiara and Student B wrote princess, frog, kiss, gloves, dress then they would have 3 out of 5 possible points because they chose three of the same words. It’s then the honor system for students to share out how many points they have. Sometimes I’ll do multiple images and we’ll have a ‘winner’ for that day’s total. Other times, I’ll do an image a day for a week and we’ll have the ‘winner’ for that week’s total.

STEP FIVE: Share out some the answers! It’s a great way to build vocabulary for the rest of the class, and some of the answers can be really fun or surprising. My favorite question to ask is “what is a word that your partner had that you didn’t?” because those are usually the more unique words and students are more likely to share their partner’s answer in order to showcase their partner’s brilliance than they are their own (though that’s high school students, elementary students might be more open to sharing their own thoughts!)

STEP SIX: Continue using it as an intermittent warm-up for class and change it up however you see fit. I like using themed images (example, fairy tales for my fairy tale unit) but as long as the image is appropriate, why not use it! Like I mentioned above, I’ll put different parameters around the words they need to find and sometimes I give the ultimate difficult instruction: find five words that your partner DOES NOT have! Students only get points if their words are totally unique… so they really need to dig deep into their vocabulary knowledge stores. The other thing you can then do is use the same picture, now that they have a bunch of vocabulary at the ready, for a quickwrite.

 Some examples of dynamic pictures to use as prompts:

Have you ever played this game or a variation on it? Are there any constrictions or images you prefer using? Share in the comments!

4 Times When Language Teachers Should Use Students’ L1

This article was originally published at SchoolRubric.com on October 24, 2021 at https://schoolrubric.com/4-times-when-language-teachers-should-use-students-l1/

I have spent most of my language teaching career wondering “Am I speaking too much English?” “Are my students speaking too much English?” “Should we be speaking English at all?” as well as the ever-important “Can I hold my pee until lunch?”

Bodily needs aside, the issue of using students’ first language (L1) while they are being taught an additional language (L2) is a thorny one. Ernesto Macaro outlines three theoretical positions that educators can hold regarding use of the L1 in the classroom:

  • The ‘virtual position’: students can only learn a language through that language. These are the teachers that have signs with the word ‘English’ crossed out, or pretend not to hear a student who speaks English to them.

  • The ‘maximal position’: teachers believe in the ‘virtual position’ (above) but acknowledge that this is not always possible, and will therefore use the L1 while feeling super guilty.

  • The ‘optimal position’: using the L1 will enhance students’ learning of the L2.

As a high school French teacher, I have often discussed with colleague and students how much English, if any, is appropriate in the classroom. I began my teaching career in the ‘maximal position,’ feeling shame when defaulting to English when students were confused by a concept; I was short on time; I wanted to explain a new concept without alienating lower-level students; or I myself lacked the vocabulary to express what I needed. However, I have since come to embrace the ‘optimal position’ and believe that there are indeed occasions that the L1 should be welcomed into my classroom, guilt-free!

Reason 1: Vocabulary Acquisition

When listening to bilingual speakers, we will often hear them move in and out of two languages one word or sentence at a time (a practice called code-switching). Looking through my recent text messages with my francophone friends, this practice is everywhere, my favorite being “MDR tu m’as butt-dialé” which translates to “LOL you butt-dialed me!” While for many years code-switching was seen as a deficit, or proof of incomplete language learning, it is now seen as an asset to language learning and communication. In fact, in studies show that students who code-switched retained more and used their words more actively.

Studies show that students who code-switched retained more and used their words more actively.

There is also some evidence that suggests that using the L1 definitions or paraphrases can trigger deeper semantic processing! Like everything we do in the classroom, it all depends on your students, but studies have found that the younger or less advanced the learners are, the more effective code-switching can be. Moreover, if you’re worried about breaking the fluidity of your speech when speaking to students, or risking switching completely to English, Miles Turnbull recommends sprinkling in definitions. For example:

Je vais décrire ma famille, la famille family de Madame … après, dans dix minutes, vous allez décrire, describe faire une description de votre famille… Vous allez dessiner, draw, faire une image, de votre famille. Vous comprenez ? Ça va ?

I am going to describe my family, the family family of Mrs…. After, in ten minutes, you are going to describe, describe make a description of your family… You are going to draw draw, make a picture, of your family. Do you understand? Everything’s good?

Reason 2: Group Work

Even if they wanted to, it would be exhausting and impossible for teachers to constantly monitor and enforce their students’ L2 use, especially when students are working in groups. Some teachers have even reported limiting the amount of group work they do in the classrooms for this very reason. However, allowing students to use their L1 during group work actually has a lot of cognitive and social benefits! In a study of immersion students planning an oral presentation, researchers found that only 12% of students’ L1 use was off task. The other 88% was helping their peers, fostering cooperation, and talking through their difficulties. In fact, this latter task is an example of translanguaging, a practice that allows students to apply strategies they have gained in another language to their learning of a new language. By allowing students to use the L1, they can apply their previous knowledge of their own language to the new language, making important connections that actually enhance their L2 development! Socially, students were able to take turns, share ideas, and, most importantly, help keep each other on task. What more could a teacher want?

Allowing students to use their L1 during group work actually has a lot of cognitive and social benefits!

Reason 3: Communicating Complex Topics

We’ve probably all been there: you don’t understand something, so you ask the teacher to clarify. The clarification, delivered in the L2, leaves you even more confused, but you’re too embarrassed to say anything else, so you just smile and say you understand. With my students, I refer to this as “double jeopardy”, as in the US law that prohibits anyone from being prosecuted twice for the same crime. How can I fault them for failing to understand something complex, if they don’t understand what is being explained to them? For me, this means explaining new grammar rules in English, but keeping all the chatter around the new rules (e.g. “let’s move to the next slide” or “turn to your partner and explain” in the L2).

Also, we know that both learning new tasks and comprehending a second language are mentally taxing endeavors. Why burn out students’ limited working memory with both tasks? Similar to what we saw with vocabulary, when surveyed, the more advanced a learner was, the less likely they were to see using the L1 while learning complex concepts as a necessity. However, even advanced learners are not always at a point where they are capable of thinking only in the L2.

We know that both learning new tasks and comprehending a second language are mentally taxing endeavors. Why burn out students’ limited working memory with both tasks?

We’re also denying students a cognitively important tool: their first language. As mentioned above, we can use students’ knowledge of their L1 to help make connections to the L2. For example, when doing a brainstorming activity, you can encourage students to suggest ideas in both languages (code-switching) to expand their creativity and pool of vocabulary, as long as the teacher can help facilitate translations to the L2. Lastly, using the L1 can be a time-saver. If our goal is to maximize the amount of input of the L2, communicating complex subjects quickly in the L1 allows us to save that time for more meaningful L2 discourse. Not to mention, sometimes you just need to clarify assignments, instructions, or activities in that one minute before the bell rings!

Reason 4: Student-Teacher Relationships

Students want to connect with their teachers, be seen as an individual, and feel emotionally safe in their learning environments. When surveyed, students describe teachers who do not use their L1 as being more emotionally distant, so it’s not surprising that most learners express a preference for teachers who are able to communicate in their L1. The use of the L1 can provide an emotionally safe space for having difficult conversations, particularly involving discipline. I try to avoid “double jeopardy” with student relationships as well: if the problem is miscommunication between me and the student, or them acting out because they don’t understand, trying to have a conversation about these issues in the L2 is, in my opinion, only going to make it worse.

Moreover, students (and teachers!) sometimes need to switch to the L1 to fully express themselves and know that they are understood, both literally and metaphorically. The danger here is that in trying to build student-teacher rapport by using the L1, we risk signaling that the L2 is only a topic to be studied, and not a communication tool.

Students want to connect with their teachers, be seen as an individual, and feel emotionally safe in their learning environments.

Therefore, I think that it’s important to build in moments to share our thoughts, feelings, and experiences in the L2 in the classroom. I’ve had success with starting classes with sharing circles where we discuss simple questions (what did we do on the weekend?) to more profound ones (when is it ethical to lie to a friend?). In these circles I work hard to create an emotionally safe space for students to not only share their perspectives, but to not fear grammar corrections from me. I only interject if students request a word or help phrasing something, and if students feel the need to switch to their L1 for a word, or even a sentence or two, I don’t see it as an issue as long as they tried their best.

In conclusion, Miles Turnbull (the same man who drew a family) recommends that teachers ask themselves three questions before using the L1:

1. Could a student explain in the L1 so that I can remain in the L2?

2, Have I tried all the strategies I know to continue in the L2?

3. What will I gain by changing to the L1?

While the first two questions can only be answered in the moment, I believe that I have presented some contexts where there is much to be gained by using the L1:

  • When teaching vocabulary, particularly to less advanced learners, the L1 is a valuable tool to increase retention and use.

  • When doing group work, students should be encouraged to use the L1 in order to be metacognitive, on task, and supportive of their peers’ learning.

  • When communicating complex topics, teachers should consider using the L1 so that students can fully comprehend what they are being taught.

  • Finally, when building relationships with students, teachers should consider using the L1, though not to the detriment of the L2 learning environment.

Of course, there is no magic formula for the amount of L1 that is appropriate for the classroom. Each group of students will have different needs and expectations, and there are many other factors to take into consideration, such as whether all students are able to use what the teacher considers the L1. However, for those teachers wishing to embrace an ‘optimal position’ of L1 language use in the classroom, I hope the contexts that I have outlined have provided some guidance!

 Suggested Further Reading:

Almohaimeed, M.S., & Almurshed, H. M. (2018). Foreign Language Learners’ Attitudes and Perceptions of L1 Use in L2 Classroom. Arab World English Journal, 9 (4), 433- 446.

Anton, M., & DiCamilla, F. (1998). Socio-cognitive functions of L1 collaborative interaction in the L2 classroom. Canadian Modern Language Review, 54(3), 314-342.

Baker, C., & Wright, W. E. (2017). Foundations of bilingual education and bilingualism (6th ed.). Bristol, UK: Multilingual Matters.

Dailey-O’Cain, J., & Liebscher, G. (2018). Teacher and student use of the first language in foreign language classroom interaction: Functions and applications. In M. Turnbull, & J. Dailey-O’Cain (Eds.), (pp. 131-144). Multilingual Matters.

Galali, A., & Cinkara, E. (2017). The use of L1 in English as a foreign language classes: Insights from Iraqi tertiary level students. Advances in Language and Literary Studies, 8(5), 54-64

Lee, J. H., & Macaro, E. (2013). Investigating age in the use of L1 or English-only instruction: Vocabulary acquisition by Korean EFL learners. The Modern Language Journal (Boulder, Colo.), 97(4), 887-901.

Lee, J. H., & Levine, G. S. (2020). The effects of instructor language choice on second language vocabulary learning and listening comprehension. Language Teaching Research: LTR, 24(2), 250-272

Macaro, E. (2005). Codeswitching in the L2 classroom: A communication and learning strategy. Dans E. Llurda (dir.), Non-native language teachers: Perceptions, challenges and contributions to the profession (p. 63-84). New York: Springer.

Macaro, E. (2018). Teacher use of codeswitching in the second language classroom: Exploring    ‘Optimal’ use. In M. Turnbull, & J. Dailey-O’Cain (Eds.), (pp. 35-49). Multilingual Matters.

Shin, S. J. (2011). Bilingualism in schools and society: language, identity, and policy (2nd ed.). New York: Routledge.

Swain, M. & Lapkin, S. (2000). Task-based Second Language Learning: The uses of the first       language. Language Teaching Research 4(3). 251–274.

Tsagari, D., & Giannikas, C. N. (2020). Re-evaluating the use of the L1 in the L2 classroom: Students vs. teachers. Applied Linguistics Review, 11(1), 151-181.

Turnbull, M. (2006). Employons le français en français de base! Revue Canadienne Des Langues            Vivantes, 62, 611–629.

Turnbull, M., & Arnett, K. (2002). Teachers’ uses of the target and first languages in second and foreign language classrooms. Annual Review of Applied Linguistics, 22, 204-218

Turnbull, M. & Dailey-O’Cain, J. (2009). First Language Use in Second and Foreign Language Learning. Bristol, Blue Ridge Summit: Multilingual Matters.

Zulfikar, Z. (2019). Rethinking the use of l1 in l2 classroom. Englisia, 6(1), 42-51.

5-Minute Differentiation Strategies

Your language-teaching mission, should you choose to accept it, is to make small changes to your language lessons in order to support all of your learners.

Screen Shot 2021-10-14 at 9.12.36 PM.png

On the Lesson: Impossible podcast this week I’m talking with Drew Thompson about supporting neurodiverse learners. In honor of his sharing his perspective and tips for supporting diverse students, I thought I’d share the strategies that I try to use in my language classroom, most of which can be implemented in less than 5 minutes!

We know that each of our students have strengths and weaknesses that we need to adapt to, but differentiation can seem overwhelming, no matter how long you’ve been teaching. The idea of reaching each individual learner seems like an incredibly time-consuming pursuit: if it takes me X hours to craft a lesson, does not mean I need 30 times that amount to sufficiently plan for my 30 students? However, the good news is that there are a TON of ways that you can make your lessons more accessible, and most of them can take less than 5 minutes to prep. A colleague and I developed this list of small adaptations in 2016, and I taped it on my desk. Before each lesson I’d run my eyes down the below questions and see what I could do to make one or two changes to what I had planned. In my opinion, that’s the key: if you try to change everything at once, you’ll get overwhelmed quickly and it will feel impossible. However, adding one or two tools to your teacher toolbox at a time is doable!

These questions are meant to be for all subject matters, though the examples below are specifically for language teachers. Feel free to share with any colleagues you think might benefit!

RESOURCE DOWNLOAD AS PDF: Quick & Easy Strategies for Differentiation

Examples:

Example of a quick check for understanding: If I have time, or I’m covering a really important concept, I like to use CSI (Color, Symbol, Image) , which is explained in more detail in this post.

Example of a reference guide: It can be as simple as a hand-out with verb conjugations or as complex as a guide on how to be better communicators (see post on the TALK Strategy)

Example of self-differentiated learning targets: In order to practice their use of the future tense, I have a fun, easy “Game of Life” that students can play in small groups. When we play, I’ll put up a slide that outlines my expectations for ALL, for SOME, and for only a FEW students:

Let me know in the comments what strategies you use and if they should be added to list!

T.A.L.K. Strategy

Your language-teaching mission, should you choose to accept it, is to support your students as they engage in dynamic discussions in the target language.

TALK strategy.png

As teachers of communication, I think we can often forget that we need to teach how to communicate, not just how to use the target language. Participating in a group discussion in an active and respectful manner is a skill as much as correctly conjugating verbs. Those of us who became language teachers probably do a lot of the skills I discuss below innately, but some students, especially the younger ones, can really benefit from explicit teaching. 

So, several years ago, after realizing that I needed a strategy to get students to be better group communicators, I talked to the literacy coordinator of my district and together we came up with ‘TALK’ (which we thought was an original idea but is actually similar to a strategy with a different acronym that is found in Shrum & Glisan's Teacher's Handbook and is referenced in the ACTFL Keys to Planning for Learning book by Terrill & Clementi).

 I have had a lot of success with this strategy, and it only takes about three to five minutes out of class time but has improved the small group conversations my students have been having in my language classes (see how I adapted into French below) as well as my Social Studies classes!

The beauty is that this can work from elementary school all the way through to senior students and can be used for almost any cooperative task students are engaged in, though I primary used it for small discussion groups.

How it works:

I’ll let students know we’re going to ‘TALK’ today in class, and remind them of the four components:

T – tell an idea

A – ask a question (these can be content based questions or questions that involve someone who hasn’t told an idea yet, such as “what do you think about this Billy?”)

L – listen to others

K – knit ideas together (able to help the group solve a problem or make connections between what everyone has said)

I made big signs for my classroom (printed each page on 11x17 paper) so I could point to it and use it as a reminder.

RESOURCE: TALK classroom signs

talk table mat.png

I also made table mats that could be printed and laminated as TALK reminders. Another possible use would be to print them and have students put them in their notebooks.

RESOURCE: TALK table mat

 At the end of all the class activities and discussions I give them time to reflect.  The goal is to be “all talk” but sometimes a student can be an ‘alk’ (asked, listened, helped problem solve, but didn’t contribute new ideas), a ‘lat’ (listened, asked, told, didn’t problem solve), a ‘ta’, ‘kat’ – you get the idea.  It gives them concrete goals to work towards and a very quick way of reflecting on how they did that day. 

I also would occasionally ask students to reflect more concretely on their TALK skills and use an exit slip to see how they thought they were doing.

RESOURCE: TALK self-evaluation

In doing this activity I actually had one student say “I’m glad I worked with [classmate] because I’m a ‘tk’ and he’s an ‘al’ so together we can help each other be ‘all talk’ – I ask him what he’s thinking so he can add a ‘t’ and then I stop talking while he’s answering so I can be an ‘l’.”  While ideally, I’d like them to be sharing and listening for the sake of sharing and listening, if it’s about ‘winning’ the cooperation activity, why not!

How to use this in a non-ELL/English L1 classroom:

I love this strategy so much that I would encourage you to take the time to make an acronym in your target language. It could even be a fun activity to brainstorm ideas with your students and utilize their creativity in creating it. Please also consider sharing what you came up with in the comments!

For my French students I developed P.A.R.L.E (literally “talk” in French).

P – Posez une question (ask a question)

A – Aidez une autre (help another person)

R – Racontez des idées (tell some ideas)

L – Lisez-les ensemble (tie them [ideas] together)

E – Écoutez attentivement (listen carefully)

PARLE.png

You’ll notice there’s an extra letter than the English TALK, so I was able to add “Help another person” which is especially important in a language class when some people struggle to find the right word or get their ideas out the way they want to. We also discussed how helping someone else can mean NOT supplying the right word, but letting them engage in productive struggle by using their language strategies (like rephrasing, gesturing, finding a synonym, etc.)

RESOURCE: PARLE signs

I also developed a guided conversation tool for more advanced French students to use. It guides groups through using a variety of tenses but talking about the same subject (in the example, books) and also gives them a chance to practice PARLE! In my classroom I liked to keep a bucket of activities that were self-explanatory in case I was ever so sick that my note to the substitue could be one line: “please use any activities you want from the green bucket”. In said bucket were some games, improv prompts, and this guided conversation.

RESOURCE: Multi-tense guided conversation for French