There is not a one-size-fits all answer to this but generally speaking.
Any method/environment that gives you lots of comprehensible input (language that you can grasp the meaning of) and is just a little above your current level.
Secondly you will need some kind of ‘feedback loop’ in that when you try to use the language or guess at the meaning of difference phrases you will get some sort of response, i.e. you can not learn language in a vacuum.
Finally it should be enjoyable for you, when you are stressed it will stop you from absorbing language (see: the affective filter) and it will also cause you to refrain from practicing/learning again. A certain level of stress or confusion is normal, but too much can be fatal.
If you would like to hear more about language learning, particularly self-study you can follow Lingo Steve on Youtube, he is an educated, experienced professional language instructor with a lot of common sense advice for language learners.
Alternatively I have written a few short articles on the matter and you are free to send me any queries but I would definitely recommend you check out Steves work first!
Good luck with your language journey and my final advice is “intensity is always the best way to start” start with an intensive experience that won’t leave you in shock but will instead leave you knowing that you too have an ability to succeed in a foreign language.
Have you ever been in a job or situation where no body encourages you or appreciates you? Chances are you have probably experienced a situation like this at least once in your life. The reality I guess is we are wrong to expect appreciation or encouragement as in most cases it's not the norm. But it's just because of that, that is makes all the difference in the world.
I wanted to share this lesson that I gave my MCC (Motivational Conversation Class) last week because I think the message is particularly special.
I remember when I was still studying to be a teacher I used to work
mornings as a Postman.We didn't get great pay but one thing I did get
was appreciation. Whenever I did extra work the manager always made sure
to say thank you and appreciate me. When a new manager came to take
over the delivery centre the previous manager made sure to tell him all
about me "This is Hugh, one of our best workers, he's really bent over
backwards for us!" he said. It was this appreciation that made me feel
valued there, not the money that we got or the position I held. It's
that appreciation that made all the difference.
The first thing that we looked at in the lesson was a video of the Puget Sound Community School in Seattle.
The students at the school start and end every day with words of appreciation. They are also given huge independence in their learning. The director of the school says he has found when the character of the students are strong their academic progress naturally follows. Watch the video for more insight into this fantastic program.
We tried this appreciation technique in my class to see how it felt. All of the teachers made a circle and took turns to give appreciation, it could be to somebody in the room or somebody not present, it could of even been to a few people or a group of people. The atmosphere of the room automatically changed and I feel this is an invaluable technique to use with our students in schools or language institutes.
The next thing we did was listen to a couple of inspiring stories. The first is of Antwone Fisher. He was born in a an Ohio correctional facility (a prison) while his mother was incarcerated. By then his father had already been dead for two months. As a result, he grew up a ward of the state in foster care. For longer than 13 years he lived with a couple who abused him horribly. Daily he was beaten down - physically, verbally and mentally. He never received a Christmas gift or a dime of allowance from his foster parents. For years he was a victim of sexual abuse. And he was often tied to a post in the basement and beaten. His foster mother used to brag that she had once beaten him until he was unconscious.
By the time Fisher entered the third grade, he had lost any natural love for learning. In addition, the constant admonition from his foster mother that he was the worst child in the world had convinced him that he couldn't learn and had no future. He failed fourth grade and was scheduled to repeat it. But then something wonderful happened. His foster family moved, which put him in a new school district. His new teacher was Mrs. Profit. "If there is such a thing as human beings who act as angels in our lives, Brenda Profit was that for me."
Under Brenda Profit's care, Fisher began to change his thinking about himself. He says, "If self-esteem was what you used to fill up like a take of gas, the Pickets {his foster family} had siphoned mine out to nothing. Mrs. Profit helped changed [sic] all that." Despite his gains, his academic progress was still meager by the end of the year. He was in danger of once again failing fourth grade. But then Fisher got another break. It was decided that Mrs. Profit would stay with her class of students and continue teaching then in fifth and sixth grades. Knowing that, she passed Fisher into the fifth grade. And it was then that an event occurred that would change his thinking forever.
It happened one day during reading Fisher, a terribly shy child who sometimes stuttered, was asked to read aloud, and instead of panicking, he read well, including successfully sounding out a difficult word. Then Mrs. Profit praised him, saying, "I'm proud of you. I want you to know that I really struggled over promoting you, and I'm glad that I did. You are doing very well this year." That's when something clicked in Fisher's head. He writes, "Her honest and, careful words are the equivalent of lightning bolts and thunder claps. Outside I shyly accept her praise, but inside I'm flying with the birth of a revelation. It's the first time I've ever realized that there is something I can do to make things different for myself. Not just me, but anyone ...This lesson is a piece of gold I'll keep tucked in my back pocket for the rest of my life."
In that moment, Fisher changed his thinking about himself - and it changed his life. He had plenty of ups and downs after that, but he knew he wasn't hopeless and a better future was possible for him. He didn't follow the path of his older foster brother and friends into a life of drugs and crime.
Today Antwone Fisher thinks for a living. He is a successful screenwriter in Hollywood. And he has become the kind of responsible citizen and family man he always desired to be, with a wife and daughter. When asked what message he wants his story to convey, his answer is, "That there is hope even when you have the hardest beginnings, and there are good people in the world." (Story taken from Today Matters By Antwone Fisher and revised by John C. Maxwell in his book Encouragement)
That shows what a difference a teacher or anyone can make when they simply take the time to appreciate and encourage somebody. They can really be the one who makes the difference, you can really be the one!
The next story we had a look at was of a young man in the early 19th century. He aspired to be a writer but everything seemed against him. He had never been able to attend school for more than four years. His father had been flung in jail because he couldn't pay his debts, and this young man often knew the pangs of hunger. Finally he got a job posting labels on bottles of blacking in a rat infested warehouse, and he slept at night in a dismal attic room with two other boys - guttersnipes from the slums of London. He had so little confidence in his ability to write that he sneaked out and mailed his first manuscript in the dead of night so that nobody would laugh at him. Story after story was refused. Finally the great day came when one was accepted. True, he wasn't paid a shilling for it, but one editor had praised him. One editor had given him recognition. He was so thrilled that he wandered aimlessly around the streets with tears rolling down his cheeks. The praise, the recognition, that he received through getting one story in print, changed his whole life, for if it hadn't been for that encouragement, he might have spent his entire life working in rat-infested factories. You might have heard of that boy. His name was Charles Dickons. (Story taken from Dale Carnegie's book How to Win Friends & Influence People)
In both stories these men's lives were changed by the simple acts of encouragement and appreciation. It really makes all the difference, I can't say it enough. So the next time you see something you like or appreciate something somebody has done, speak up! It only takes a few seconds and is the easiest way to make somebody's day, maybe even change their life.
At the end of my lesson I got the teachers to all come up one by one and share how somebody's words of encouragement or appreciation changed their lives'.
Maybe you have a similar experience? Post it up to our Change Lives Together Facebook Group! And don't forget to subscribe to my blog if you've enjoyed reading.
Until next time, keep shining, sharing and succeeding!
Due to the passing of my father I haven't been able to write any new articles recently. So today I want to get back into it.
Sitting here with a nice mug of Cafe Latte I figured I should go over some more 'teaching basics' just for those out there who are still trying to fill in some gaps in their teaching.
Ever thought that the language you were teaching/facilitating in class just didn't seem real for the students?
I think we have all at some point in time or another been in such a situation. 'Making the language real' as it were can also be explained as 'contextualisation' putting the language into context. This is particularly important because as you know sometimes the exact same phrase or word in different contexts can have a completely different meaning. So making sure there is always a clear context for the language to fit in will assist the learning in approximating language use in a more natural environment.
The British Council defines contextualisation as:
"Contextualisation is putting language items into a meaningful and real
context rather than being treated as isolated items of language for
language manipulation practice only. Contextualising language tries to
give real communicative value to the language that learners meet. The
context can help learners remember the language and recall it at a later
date. Learners can use natural learning strategies to help them
understand contextualised language, such as guessing meaning from
context.
Example
Teaching the language used to give advice by looking at problem pages from teenage magazines gives the target language context.
In the classroom
Contextualisation can be as simple as providing an example sentence
that uses a new word, or as complex as preparing a telephone role-play
to practise functional language."
-Games and interactive activities
-Storytelling, dramatisation, singing
-Student presentations and projects
-Themes or topics in the activities
-Realia like post cards, brochures,objects, menus, etc.
With any of these the point is to contextualise the language with "real world" themes or topics.
An example would be to bring a map of a foreign town and a list of places they could see, it would be best to get a real map from perhaps a tourist/information booth and laminate it so you could use it for many classes. Perhaps when friends are going overseas you can request that the "oleh-oleh" (souvenirs) they bring back for you are tourist booklets, maps, menus and brochures in the target language, theses can all be used as realia.
The activity with the map could include practicing directions, likes and dislikes and/or making suggestions. You could also include an internet research project where the children research a particular destination on the map and then share it with their friends.
There are countless other examples of contextualising language in the classroom and you'll often find that good teachers hardly ever teach a language without a context. So make contextualising language one of your TEFL 101s and don't let it slip your mind. The more in context, interesting and real the learning experience is for you students, the better result you'll get.
So good luck guys and keep on changing lives with the wonderful gift of a foreign language.
Today I want to talk about a fairly famous method of learning a language but one that is frequently misunderstood or deemed to complicated or outdated to be practical in today's classrooms.
I want to try and dispel that notion for those who have heard of Suggestopedia and introduce it to those of you who haven't.
Unfortunately in most teacher training around Indonesia not much energy is put into studying and appreciating the different methods that have been used over the years to teach language. A lot of the time courses go into the theory of the different methods but often with a critical eye and by critical I mean 'criticizing' not 'important' which I think is an important differentiation
Suggestopedia rocked the industry when it was first released by it's creator and developer Georgi Lozanov. Unfortunately a mysterious and suspenseful curtain (an iron curtain to be precise) was drawn over the method before Dr. Lozanov could teach any practical application of the method. This curtain was only lifted momentarily when Dr. Lozanov was allowed by the Bulgarian government to go to the USA to share his method with Bobbi DePorter. He would not get many other chances to sit down in peace and share his method until the Berlin wall fell (signaling an end to the USSR) and he and his family were able to settle in Austria after hopscotching their way across Europe.
By that time though, the method had lost momentum amongst the Language Acquisition community and was perhaps considered old news. The uniqueness of the Suggestopedia method was perhaps also a great contribute to it's fall from popularity. Like TPR Suggestopedia did not rely on textbooks to work and thus probably wasn't accepted that widely in the formal education community.
This has been a reoccurring plague of thinking that has killed or hindered many good methods for language acquisition and even our basic concept of 'how we acquire languages' has fallen flat on it's face many times because Textbooks and most Summative Tests of 'knowledge' force teachers into a box (but we will discuss that more another day).
For now let's go over the basics of Suggestopedia. Firstly Suggestopedia is based on the concept of suggestion, some people may know it as hypnosis or NLP (Nuero Linguistic Programing). Basically Dr. Lozanov knew about how negative suggestion can seriously affect the brains ability to absorb language and information. An unideal state of mind such as being in a state of worry, stress or discomfort can also have a negative affect. After Dr. Lozanov, Prof. Dr. James Asher and then Prof. Steven Krashen also came to the same conclusions that the brains Affective Filter can hinder the ability for us to absorb a target language. I have discussed this before in my article 'Break Down the Barriers to Learning a New Language'.
What Suggestopedia does is give us a routine, environment and attitude as teachers to lower the Affective Filter and optimize our students state of mind for maximal learning ability. Sounds pretty good? Well we can perhaps discuss the theory of it some other time or in person if your really interested but I'm probably right when I assume it will probably bore you and you want to see practical examples and ways to apply it in your classroom right now. Okay so here we go!
Lesson One
Step one: New Identities (this is done at the beginning of a new course. Step Two-Six will be repeated several times in a course, Step One is only done once)
To improve students motivation and to help them get 'in the zone' they accept new identities which they will use for the duration of the course. This also assists in the students understanding the culture of the language as these new identities represent individuals who are native speakers of the target language.
Step Two: Presentation of Text
I have seen this done in two ways. the first using a dramatic scene where the teacher will act out the text. The second where the teacher hands out a the text, translated but with the translation in the left column and the target language in the right (according to Lonny Goldman this is because the brain has a natural urge to look to the right of the text as we do in reading) and then reads it in a dramatized voice. In both cases the students should be completely relaxed, without pressure to memorize anything and with classical baroque music playing in the background.
Lesson Two
Step Three: The Activation Phase
The Activation Phase will be the next lesson after the Presentation of Text Phase. Students are required to of taken the text home to read before bed and first thing after getting up in the morning. They are now ready for the Activation Phase. In the activation phase, up to 12 activities playing around with the language can be done in a hour. These activities are not always completed but sometimes finished half-way through (we can see reasons for this through psychological studies that show that people remember tasks more when they haven't been completed). These activities are also all masked as fun games or tasks that have no relation to to Language Learning or Acquisition at all (this is to keep the brain relaxed and 'in the zone').
Step Four: The Passive Concert
The Passive Concert takes place at the end of a Activation Phase lesson. Here the students relax completely while they listen to the text being read in a soothing and calm way. It is preferable that they are in a reclining position and listening the baroque or 'Alpha State' sounds. For those of you who are unfamiliar with the 'Alpha State' it is a state where the brains activity is at an optimum activity for absorbing knowledge, you can read more about it here: 'Alpha Waves'.
Lesson Three
Step Five: The Adaption Phase
The Adaption Phase is where the students now play around with the text they have been hearing. Here are some examples of Adamption Phase activities from Lonny Goldman's Website:
'a. Oral Comprehension. The whole class listens to a tape, and then breaks up into groups of three or four students per group. Each group receives a bundle of cut-up paragraphs, all of which, together, constitute the entire text just heard. The different groups can put the paragraphs into the right order first. When a group thinks it has won, the teacher replays the tape to check whether the order is right (more hidden oral practice!).
b. Written Comprehension. Each student receives a different newspaper clipping and quickly reads it. Then, in pairs, the students tell their partners about their particular article. The teacher now collects all the articles and puts them down on the ground (or pins them up on a wall). The students then mill about, looking at all the articles to identify which one their partner had.
c. Written Expression. Students must create something in writing based on a situation in the text. This might be an advertisement for a nice restaurant, an exotic tour proposed by a travel agency, a funny newscast, etc.'
-Lonny Goldman
Step Six: The Grammar Phase
This is the only time in the course where grammar is consciously examined. That being so, it's only grammar they they already subconsciously have an understanding of through the text. This phase is usually done in a similar fashion to the Activation Phase in that students play games with the grammar structures in a fun and stress free environment.
Okay Guys! Well I hope you enjoyed reading about Suggestopedia. As you can see it's actually very in line with what we have learnt about how the brain works in the last 25 years. It is also in line with Steven Krashen's 5 hypotheses of Language Acquisition. So why don't you give it a try some time?
Even if you can't follow the above steps that's know problem because being a suggestopedic teacher doesn't mean you follow a formula, it just means you understand the power of suggestion or 'desuggestion' (desuggesting negative feelings and filters) and you make sure your lessons all harness it's power.
If you'd like to see some suggetopedic lessons in action you can watch this movie series from Lonny Goldman (a practitioner of Suggestopedia from the USA):
