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I got behind on my meeting oulines, so sent briefer versions by email. Here is the one for this meeting:
It looks like I won't have the detailed version of the plan for tomorrow ready for email and website until late tonight, so here is the short, informal version:
1) More about Project 1, including its scoring guide. Please look at the examples I've provided earlier.
2) Lesson plan resources for content areas.
3) Humboldt Project: more background info (see previous handout for plant geography module) and maybe even a brief discussion about how to bring forth languages as vehicles for content areas (whether for plant geography, chemistry, social studies, music); or - in a little vacation from CBI - how to add the HP to a non-CBI course, even (especially?) one for specialized types of learners (TAG, AP, heritage)
4) Looking ahead to Projects 2 & 3, and to readings in CBI-related pedagogies (team-based learning, etc.)
5) The request for support for ESL with abused women.
Of that's a lot, and we probably won't do it all. Rather than portraying that negatively as "biting off more than we can chew", I'd prefer to quote some poetry here: "A man's reach should exceed his grasp, or else what is Heaven for?" Lord Byron, I think, or maybe Shelley. Of course we should rethink "man", though we have no right to rewrite the poem itself. That would horrify my mother, who taught me the quote when I was child. She was a grade-school teacher of the old school - I learned a lot of canonical poetry, and received much explicit grammatical instruction (EGI); I was around 8 when she said, "'If I WERE you' is correct, not 'If I was you'. I know your father says it that way, but: subjunctive - condition contrary to fact."
And now a segué from poetry back to CBI, offered as the traditional "teaser": One of you pointed out that one kind of CBI we encounter, even or especially in conventional programs in our field, is the literature course (or the literary text used in the lower-level language course). So what if you decided to design a truly CBI literature course? What (non-student) identities are out there available for learner and teacher, if they are to agree to abandon their identities, suspend their disbelief, and "become" someone else while still learning language? I can think of two such "contexts", where literature is discussed by fairly ordinary people, but not in a "literature class". Hint: my wife will return from one such in probably just a few minutes. Another such recalls in me fond memories of Mrs. Moberly. We'll check it out tomorrow.
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(20') From my recent email: I think we need a discussion about what we (ourselves, our learners) want language teaching and learning to accomplish, so that we can examine the pros and cons of CBI (and other teaching methods or tools). Example: Some people prize language courses for what they contribute to the development of students' intellectual rigor (logic, clear thinking, understanding of system, rules, principles); such people may also say: "…especially Latin" or "…but of course they can get the same things from a stiff geometry course". To what extent is that view / goal compatible with CBI? What if the students' goal is to… [name several different goals]?
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(10') How to assess CBI activities (not the projects for this course, but rather what the learners do when we teach with CBI). The SpeakEasy course scoring guide. Hypothesis: If the CBI activity is designed properly, and you then assess the student's performance according to how well the CONTENT was learned, that will also indicate how much LANGUAGE was learned.
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(10') Some of you have asked for background reading in the basics of language pedagogy: In class I'll show or at least mention several of the standard books (Omaggio, Lee/VanPatten, Shrum. And here are some article on your CD-ROM:
0068 Spinelli, Language Teaching and Learning in the 21st Century - BIG PICTURE
0120 Lafayette & Strasheim, The Standard Sequence… GOOD FOR HISTORY of methods
0153 Principles of Effective Practice - LONG AND GOOD, but read this one LAST
0156 Omaggio, Comparison of Methods - GREAT BRIEF overview of the implications of various methods
0677 Eight Approaches - START WITH THIS ONE
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