In 22 years of teaching a second language, I have learned that all students, now matter how good their academic ability in any other area, struggle with listening. I've asked them how they see listening tasks, and their answers are pretty consistent. They say things like "you either get it or you don't", "sometimes I … Continue reading
This is the third in a series of blog posts about my inquiry project for my current coursework. The first two can be found here and here. This post represents the second step in what I had outlined as my monitoring process, and it was much bigger than I had anticipated. Here's what I wrote … Continue reading
During my years as a second language teacher, I have learned some things about my student's struggles with pronunciation. This scene from My Fair Lady shows poorEliza struggling to master one lesson right after another, using a bewildering and changing array of learning strategies. https://youtu.be/MJr9SSJKkII First, I've learned that despite many teachers' complaints to the … Continue reading
For the past 4 years, I have been part of a committee in my school district looking at a range of programs from publishers, with a goal of finding a new program for our schools to adopt in our French as a Second Language (FSL) classes. One of the biggest objections to the old programs … Continue reading
This blog post is a little sample of how I'm changing my instructional strategies for September of the coming school year. I'm working on integrating curricular strategies on a wider scale, because (a) they're the basis of the curriculum, (b) I'm moving to a school that is structured around cross-curricular competencies, and (c) this gets … Continue reading
Full confession - while there is no actual holiday during which everyone gets together and celebrates cheese and chocolate (although... wouldn't that be amazing?), planning a classroom experience like this is an opportunity to showcase certain aspects of French culture that are fun, interesting, easy to compare to others, and very popular with my high … Continue reading
My collaboration partner and I have been using stations (sometimes also called centers) in our secondary level French as a second language classes over the past year. When we tell our colleagues what we're doing, reactions vary. If we're talking to secondary teachers, the reaction is somewhere between asking us what we're talking about to … Continue reading
I've been working with my collaboration partner, preparing a presentation we will give at an upcoming conference. The focus of the presentation is the ways in which we integrate culture in our lessons. We've worked really hard to get away from viewing the integration of culture as (a) a checklist, or (b) simplistic. We have … Continue reading
As a high school teacher, I have heard from colleagues that they don't know why I use stations in my classes. They tend to see stations as something that happens in elementary schools, but not at our level. I have learned that breaking down the barriers between elementary and secondary is often one of the … Continue reading
Our languages department recently celebrated Carnaval at our school for the first time, and I wanted to share what we did for others who are planning cultural celebrations. For those who may not have heard of it, Carnaval is celebrated in a few parts of the world, and this quick video (in French) explains its … Continue reading
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