Proficiency and Families: Parent Night

I've written on Path2Proficiency about bringing parents in on the path to proficiency, since so many of us learned a language, well, not with a proficiency focus.  Because so many of my students' parents had the experience of "studying a language for four years, but can't speak it,"(we've all heard it), I thought I'd share what I send out to parents on our annual fall parent night, to communicate what working toward proficiency looks like.  

For the 6-9 year olds:

¡Español! 

 septiembre 2017

Teachers: Siobhan(Ext Day/6-9)       Valerie Shull (9-12/middle school, Program Director) class blog: xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

¡ Muy bienvenido al nuevo año escolar! When it comes to language acquisition, long term thinking is required. Starting in Extended Day and 6-9, we envision what the 8th grade graduate will look like, and beyond that- the young adult speaker of Spanish. So, let’s start with that vision and program goals:
What are the goals?
● Language development happens over time-much longer than just one or two school years. By
the time the children graduate 8th grade, the goal is for them to function at the Novice High-Intermediate Low speaking levels in class. What does that mean?

• ○  Intermediate speakers of a language are know as survivors-they can survive in the target culture.
  
• ○  The Intermediate level is characterized by the ability to combine learned elements of language creatively, though primarily in a reactive mode.
  
• ○  The Intermediate level speaker can initiate, minimally sustain, and close basic communicative tasks.
  
• ○  The speaker can ask and answer questions and can speak in discrete sentences and strings of sentences on topics that are either autobiographical or related primarily to his or her immediate environment.
  
• ○  Novice High speakers are on the cusp of being able to perform Intermediate tasks in a sustained and consistent manner.
  Remember- Novice High/Intermediate Low is the goal of our graduates . What that means is that in 6-9, the children are interacting and having fun using the language to explore different topics. While the priority is interpersonal communication, we start some reading during the second and third years and introduce writing-all of which support oral communication. The children in 6-9 navigate real life situations encountered in childhood using Spanish-play, asking questions, grace and courtesy, talking about themselves and exploring culture through the language.
  We hope that you will sign up to follow the Spanish class blog where we post information on language learning, news on what’s happening in class and practical ways you can support Spanish language learning outside of school. Please contact us with any questions you have. We love talking world languages! 
  
  And for the 9-12 year old families:
  
  septiembre 2017
  
  
  Teacher:  Valerie Shull(9-12/middle school, Program Director)    
     
  
  
      class blog:xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
          ¡Muy bienvenido al nuevo año escolar!  I am so happy to welcome you back.
  
  
  In 9-12 we use a  teacher created Spanish curriculum developed based on current research and best practices in the field. This curriculum has been under development over the several years and supports  further Spanish language acquisition, aligns to the ACTFL World Readiness Standards,  and encourages critical thinking by our young global citizens.  
  
  
  About the program:
• The program is centered around themes that both support the children in acquiring Spanish language and encourage critical thinking about the world and the perspectives of its cultures. Some example units include:
• Global Challenges in the Natural World(biodiversity and the environment)
• Belonging: What Makes A family?
• Identity: Who Am I?
• Well-being: A healthy lifestyle
• Exploring: Where  I live and my Place in the World
• Challenges: What the World Eats

• This way of learning is very different than the way most of us experienced a language class in middle school or high school. You will not see textbook conjugation charts or workbook pages with grammar drills.  The children are learning language in context of authentic texts, audio and video and activities in which they use the language as the vehicle for communication. Communication and global competency are the focus; this approach to language teaching is based on the most current acquisition and teaching research.

What are the goals?

• Language development happens over time-much longer than just one or two school years.  By the time the children graduate 8th grade, the goal is for them to function at the Novice High-Intermediate Low speaking levels in class. What does that mean?  

• Intermediate speakers of a language are know as survivors-they can survive in the target culture.  
• The Intermediate level is characterized by the ability to combine learned elements of language creatively, though primarily in a reactive mode.
• The Intermediate level speaker can initiate, minimally sustain, and close basic communicative tasks.
• The speaker can ask and answer questions and can speak in discrete sentences and strings of sentences on topics that are either autobiographical or related primarily to his or her immediate environment.
• Novice High speakers are on the cusp of being able to perform Intermediate tasks in a sustained and consistent manner.

Remember-Novice High/Intermediate Low is the goal of our graduates. Children in 9-12 operate at the novice level-living primarily in the world of the concrete and predictable,  answering in words, utterances and sentence fragments. That’s right on track.

I hope that you will sign up to follow the Spanish class blog, where I post information on language learning, news on what’s happening in class and samples of the children’s work.  Please contact me with any questions you have. I love talking world language!

• 
  

Life Outside the Bubble

I believe in language proficiency--real life use of the language.  My professional community believes in language proficiency.

I'm realizing we're still a minority in the WL teaching corps.

This post is a way for me to try to work through the feelings I have about sending my awesome Spanish speakers into traditional grammar-driven high school programs in our city.  I recently administered the STAMP assessment for the first time, to my 8th graders.  It's the best money I've ever spent on my program--the data I'm getting holds a mirror up to my program and is making me look hard at what I do, and celebrate the successes: I have Intermediates and Novice High!  Most of my students are graduating 8th grade on the fence of NH-IL--quite a few falling solidly into Intermediate.  I've been walking on clouds the last few days. So have my students.   The assessment has confirmed our stated goal of NH/IL as the range of proficiency for our graduates.

But, as the students are taking their high school Spanish placement tests, I'm getting a dose of cold water to the face. So are the kids.

Almost all of them are being asked to take written discrete grammar tests--many disappointingly landing into Spanish I.  In trying to advocate for one of my IL/IM students, I sent the STAMP results to the new school, only to get the response that my student "is not proficient in preterite."   My alumni kids who go into such programs always come back wishing they hadn't wasted the year in Spanish I--getting bored and resentful.  The ones who attend more proficiency driven programs thrive--and often enter into Level 2 or 3.

Here's where I feel guilty--I feel like I've failed them and I am pulled to go ahead and do some grammar focused teaching to help them transition into life outside the bubble, where they will likely be in the position to fill in the blank to show what they know about preterite, progressive...you name it. At the same time, I know that what I'm doing in my program is working to develop real language proficiency, and I don't want to give up doing that to satisfy the needs of programs that don't.

It's a lot to consider, and I'm leaning toward just helping the kids bridge the gap, and talking to them explicitly about what they may encounter(will encounter) as they transition to high school: Split the difference and focus on proficiency while sneaking in some help on how to play the school game.  As much as I hate that idea.

This isn't about judging individual teachers for what they do--I've written before about using textbooks-- but there is a huge disconnect between using language for real life and memorizing certain grammar points because the textbook dictates it. In the end, the students are not well served by this gap. 

A much trusted colleague recently suggested that I educate and empower parents to advocate for proficiency based programs at their new high schools.  I'm thinking to use my parent blog to do just that--and that will be time well spent, but I live in a city of 3 million with a huge, slow to change public school system. Our students fan out all over to different schools, of which our little school is not a part.  I know it will be a Quixotic task.

This is the hardest part about having made the switch.  Not the work. Not shifting mindset. Not convincing my school.  It's helping my students with life outside the bubble. It's helping them to feel accomplished about what they can do, even though they will be judged for what they can't as they move out of our school.   I'm not sure there's much I can do to help this year's graduates, but I've got  decisions to make about next year.

Is this a challenge where you teach?  How are you bridging the gap? 

Getting Through The Hard Days

If you read my recent post, So You Use a Textbook...Stop Judging Yourself, you know that I feel strongly that we have to be forgiving of ourselves. We all have rough days in which survival is the goal.   There are those days where there just is not enough coffee, and looking at the day's classes feels insurmountable. In my school, there are no subs for Spanish. So, no teacher =no Spanish class.  On the rough days, I hike up my big girl panties and face the day.

But am I always my best, well-planned, game-face-on self?  NO WAY.

 This time of year, I find myself having more of those days than during the rest of the year, with special events, field trips, you name it interruptions to the schedule.

When I made the switch to teaching for proficiency,  I tossed out my old textbooks and worksheets.(Nuts! I miss them on days like these.) Since I've recently switched over to thematic units, I'm also low on 'stock activities' I can pull from when the going gets tough.  Facing the last couple of months of school, and a bumpy re-entry from spring break,  here are a couple of things I did in class that took little set up or creative energy on my part.(Plus it put more responsibility on the the children!)

5th grade survival class:

• We're talking about biomes and conservation.  I put up cards that were used in previous lessons that list animals in each biome(picture/TL label) and show a picture of the biome, with its name.   The children made bingo cards with the name of a biome or animal in each square.   To play, I described the biomes and animals, and the children had to identify them to mark the bingo card. (If they were more familiar with the biomes, I would have had them say something about the biome or animal when they read off their cards.) Even though I was feeling off, we still maintained 90+% TL and worked some vocabulary in context of descriptions with photos. In the past, I would have simply shown the picture and had children identify the vocabulary word--now they're having to listen and glean meaning from the description.

 

6th grade survival class:

• 6th graders are exploring the essential question "Where does the world live?" Children came in and started class with a silent writing time, describing this photo: 

Afterward, they shared their descriptions with a partner. After reading to a friend, they returned to writing. I asked them to answer the question "Quién vive en esta casa?"(Who lives in this house?). The children then wrote some very funny descriptions of the people who live in this house and what they do.  What I did: posted a photo and asked two questions. What the children did: All the work. Something else I could have done is to have the children write three questions they could ask the people who live in this house.   I have also used, in a similar way,  the photographs from The Material World by Peter Menzel, which provides a rich cultural context.

One change I made this year that facilitates activities like these, is explicitly teaching transaction and transition phrases, like--Please pass me....(pencils, markers), I don't understand, Can you help me?  How do you say...?, Can I go to the bathroom, water fountain...? What do you think? What are we doing? My turn? Your turn?

Now, I notice that during something like bingo card preparation, or making a poster about something, the children speak in the TL and the process of setting up the activities becomes an opportunity for them to interact with each other.
 
Going forward, I'd like to empower the children to take charge of some of these activities, too, especially since they've gotten a sense of working toward proficiency and know it's about TL and communicating in it.  I'd also like to build a cache of meaningful activities so that on rough days, I can grab and go, and feel good about my survival tactics.

Are there days coming up when Banagrams in Spanish are coming out?  Definitely. It's about survival in these last 35 days.(Am I counting?) 

So You Use A Textbook...Stop Judging Yourself

During a recent #langchat that focused on unit development, amid the caffeinated Saturday morning conversation, several teachers hesitantly shared that they use a textbook for their unit ideas, followed by some self-depricating apologies for it.  Colleen Lee-Hayes and I simultaneously tweeted out the same message, "Let it go--let's drop the judgement."

You use a textbook for whatever reason--you're new, your district says you have to,  all your teachers used them, you like it, you teach 100's of students and pee only during your lunchtime of 10 minutes. The list goes on. With on-going conversations about what proficiency is and what's the 'best' way to get there, it can be tough if you're at the beginning of making a shift in your teaching or  are already mid-stream. So. Let it go. Stop judging yourself. You don't need to apologize. We're all learning and growing. Did you see my post on when things go wrong? Seventeen years in, I'm still wrestling with this and continuing to learn.

One of the most freeing things I've heard along my teaching  journey is that you control the textbook--not the other way around. It's a resource. What can we do with it?  Some questions to explore:  Can we take the good cultural stuff at the end of chapter and use it as input and to pique interest at the beginning the unit?  What about writing an essential question and can-dos for the chapter?  How about scanning Pinterest for some rich authentic materials that go along with the chapter theme and support cultural competency and provide needed input? Is it possible to write an IPA or some performance based formative assessments?  Do you have the freedom to re-order or combine some chapters to create a unit?  Do the students have to have the unit's whole vocabulary list or can you get that paired down so they can focus on function? How to flesh out the three modes--are there plenty of opportunities for communicative tasks?

Personally, I am in the process of writing my own units. The amount of time this takes plus teaching sometimes overwhelms me. Using a textbook may be the resource that is allowing you to address other teaching duties (Hello carpool and committees! Recess supervision anyone?).

During the process of writing this,  Colleen Lee-Hayes sent me this post .  Colleen is a #langchat moderator and teacher I respect--her words on judging ourselves are balm for the language teacher's soul.

Teaching for proficiency is a mindset, not a material.  You control the text, not the other way around.  Let's drop the judgement.

Talking to Parents About Proficiency

 Working toward proficiency is the focus of my K-8 Spanish program. But when I try to explain this to parents and colleagues in my school community, I struggle a bit to find a succinct way to do it--especially since it's contrary to the way so many of us learned language(if we did!).  Last week, I posted this to my classroom blog for parents(keep in mind, in Montessori, the levels are ages, not grades):

At our school, the Spanish program focuses on proficiency--this is a different paradigm from the grammar and vocabulary list driven programs most of us experienced in high school.  Working toward proficiency focuses on the process of acquiring the language and using it for real world purposes. This means that I focus on what the children can do using the language.

So, what does that look like?

• Extended Day children use Spanish to greet each other,  talk about their feelings and express some of their likes and dislikes.
• 6-9 students can converse with a friend about what they like to do in class, what they like to eat, talk about where they live, and describe how other children in the world live. 6-9 year olds can also ask each other some questions.
• In 9-12, children can talk about real world challenges, like biodiversity, conservation, health and hunger and suggest solutions for them. They can also understand some information from recordings of native speakers and interpret context related videos from other countries. They can open and close a conversation. They can order in a restaurant, understand a letter written in Spanish and write a response.
• Middle school students can be understood by a native speaker accustomed to foreigners, ask and answer questions during predictable transactions, and use Spanish for travel(tested out during our trip to Costa Rica).  These students can get needed information in Spanish from websites and blogs. They can answer some higher order questions using Spanish.  Middle schoolers can also sometimes talk about things that happened yesterday, last week or  last summer and what they plan to do in the future.

 By focusing on what children can do using the language, we are preparing them to use Spanish for study, work and travel in their adult lives.

This, of course, is not the first time I've sent out a message like this, rather I make it part of my regular communication, and a consistent message to my school community. 

  
Want to see what I send out on parent night?  It's part information, part sales pitch:

¡Muy bienvenido al nuevo año escolar!  We’re so happy to welcome you back and share exciting news about our Spanish program. Last fall RPMS was recognized by the American Council on the Teaching of Foreign Languages(ACTFL) Global Engagement Initiative for our 8th grade trip to Costa Rica.***This initiative recognizes outstanding community and culturally-engaged learning experiences within the world language curriculum at all levels on instruction.  We so look forward to sharing this impactful travel experience with your children when they are in Aspen.

When it comes to language acquisition, long term thinking is required.   Starting in Extended Day and 6-9, we envision what the 8th grade graduate will look like, and beyond that- the young adult speaker of Spanish.  So, let’s start with that vision and program goals:

What are the goals?

• Language development happens over time-much longer than just one or two school years.  By the time the children graduate 8th grade, the goal is for them to function at the Novice High-Intermediate Low speaking levels in class. What does that mean?  

• Intermediate speakers of a language are know as survivors-they can survive in the target culture.  
• The Intermediate level is characterized by the ability to combine learned elements of language creatively, though primarily in a reactive mode.
• The Intermediate level speaker can initiate, minimally sustain, and close basic communicative tasks.
• The speaker can ask and answer questions and can speak in discrete sentences and strings of sentences on topics that are either autobiographical or related primarily to his or her immediate environment.
• Novice High speakers are on the cusp of being able to perform Intermediate tasks in a sustained and consistent manner.

Remember-Novice High/Intermediate Low is the goal of our graduates. What that means is that in 6-9, the children are interacting and having fun using the language to explore different topics.  While the priority is interpersonal communication, we start some reading during the second and third years and introduce writing-all of which support oral communication. The children in 6-9 navigate real life situations encountered in childhood using Spanish-play, asking questions, grace and courtesy, talking about themselves and exploring culture through the language.

We hope that you will sign up to follow the Spanish class blog, where we post information on language learning, news on what’s happening in class and practical ways you can support Spanish language learning outside of school.   Please contact us with any questions you have. We love talking world languages!

***Blog reading friends--you should also apply for this on the ACTFL website this coming spring!