Activity - Luz - Photos

Using Pictures - Close ups

This activity would be suitable for revising any everyday vocabulary.  It could be adapted to any level and could be used as a warmer to recycle language already encountered and introduce new words. 

The teacher asks students to take close up pictures of household objects for homework.  In class, students work in groups and show their pictures to their groups.  Students have to try and guess what the object is. 

This activity allows students to take their own pictures, instead of the teacher simply googling images, which means students are more engaged. To keep the objects ‘on topic’ I would ask the students to take one picture of an object that they have come across in class and one other ‘wild card’ object. This object would be a different object to one they’ve seen in class, but they must look up the word in English and come prepared to explain the object to their group.  Having a mystery object also creates a real information gap.    The activity would also perfect for students to practice modal verbs of deduction or other language such as “I think it’s a…” “It looks like a…” if appropriate.

Here are some examples of objects in my own kitchen: 

Reflection - Luz - 2nd Session

We started our 2nd session with Luz with another warmer activity.  This time using two different types of paper.  I’m thoroughly enjoying all of these warmers that we’re doing, and I think it’s fantastic way for us a trainee teachers to learn all these nifty tricks by actually doing them.  I now need to get my hands on some moose poo paper…

We then talked about the place that traditional exercises have in the classroom.  Following the principles of the Flipped Classroom, these sort of activities would be ideal to set as homework, without going overboard.  Learning the mechanics of the language is important, and these sort of repetitive exercises do help memory, but too often it ends up being the only thing a teacher does!  One use of these types of exercise might be as part of the scaffolding process.  Students could use a typical gap-fill exercise to complete phrases they will use in a role-play or speaking activity.  This gives the exercise a purpose and relevance, rather than the teacher calling out the answers and moving on. 

Luz told us about the Minimax concept and recommended the book to us, I agree with her here that it’s one of those times when you find a book that vindicates what you’ve always thought and I definitely identify with the principles. 

1.     Minimise teacher output, maximise student input

I remember this clearly from the CELTA training, cut down on TTT (Teacher-Talking-Time).  In practice, this is harder than it seems.  When standing in front of a group of less-than-enthusiastic teenagers, the default mode for a teacher can be to keep talking to fill the dead air, however, with perseverance, they soon come out of their shell. 

2.     Personalisation and student’s imagination

Another revelatory moment. In many ways, teenagers are very predictable, they love talking about themselves and finding out about others!  Taking the time to find out what ‘makes them tick’ pays off in dividends, as making the lessons relevant becomes so much easier.  Imagination is important, but sometimes they are shy to do so or they haven’t been encouraged to do so.

3.     Put the focus on the students

Taylor here hits the nail on the head, all too often it is the teacher who is unwilling to relinquish control, but the benefits for both teacher and students cannot be understated.  

4.     Encourage student generated activities

Again, another key point. A teacher must plan effectively, but the plan mustn’t become a straitjacket.  There must be room for movement, to go off on a tangent if needs be, or if the students are engaged.  Students generating their own activities means that their needs are being met and mixed abilities are catered for. 

5.     Keep materials simple, and keep them.

Oh how I cringe when I remember how much photocopying I did when I had my first teaching job in Belfast… The other teachers smiled knowingly and said it was just a phase.  Some of the material I used then is still in my repertoire, but the majority went straight into the recycling bin.  It is so important though, to hold on to things that work.  Inspired by Luz and her ‘mochilla’ and Ana and her little boxes I’m determined to make my own library of stuff to keep to hand. I loved the little cards and object bags that we’ve seen in the sessions - they can be recycled over and over again and really prove the minimax principle.  Last year, I printed a list of games and activities that I found had worked and pinned it up near my desk.  It saved so much time in planning because I could simply glance at the list and decide what worked, and it often saved me when the class had finished earlier than expected and I had 5/10 minutes to fill. 

6.     Be flexible, make the most of preparation

One point here stood out for me, materials prepared for one class can so often be used with a higher or lower level, as has been said before in class by both Ana and Luz, the input doesn’t create the difficulty, only the activities you set. 

7.     Share correction

Another lightbulb moment, at the start of my time in the academy, I spent far too much type correcting homework, only for the student to look at the ‘nota’ and promptly put it in their bag.  If a majority of the students have got a certain point wrong, it’s obvious that the teacher hasn’t explained it effectively and it’s time to go over it again. I don’t mean correct homework question by question in class (which is a supreme waste of time), but instead look for the common mistakes that cropped up and allow students to correct themselves or peer correct. If that doesn’t work, it’s time for the teacher to tackle it from a different stance. Taylor’s 3 Ps of correction explain it perfectly - Perpetrator, Peer, Professional. 

8.     Organise and share responsibility

Similar to the point above, the teacher should let go of the reins from time to time, and systematically hand over some of the control to the students. 

9.     Start as you mean to go on

I’ve mentioned this before but the first day, and indeed the first few weeks, are crucial.  As Taylor says - “You will never have your class more in the palm of your hand than in the first lesson, so you must seize the opportunity to create the relationship you want.”

10.  Respect your students as people

There are lots of interesting points here, but I think another important aspect of this is something that has come up with both Luz and Ana and that I’ve mentioned before.  Our job isn’t to trick the students or make their lives difficult.  Exams should be challenging but not impossible, and even considering how we print out something to make their lives easier makes all the difference! 

In class, we then looked at brainstorming and another brilliant idea from Jamie Keddie and then other ideas such as psychology games.  I really enjoyed the egg test and I think students equally enjoy learning more about themselves through these kind of activities, but Luz made a very good point.  it’s so important to be careful with these types of activities, they must be light-hearted and not too serious, otherwise we run the risk of upsetting students! Finally, we looked at role-playing, I loved the idea of the shopping using ‘money’, and again, it’s another bit of preparation that, once done, you’ll always have. 

The general consensus among the class is that we’ve come away from these sessions bursting with ideas and food for thought - we now have to find a way to remember all these wonderful ideas that Luz and Ana are suggesting. These classes have really inspired me to get organised and get all the material I have accumulated to hand rather than languishing in a pen drive somewhere.  When I get everything together, I’d be more than happy to share the documents with the class.

Taylor, J. (2001). The Minimax Teacher: Minimise Teacher Input and Maximise Student Output. Delta Publishing

Reflection - Ana - 1st Session

We started our session with Ana with some more examples of warmers, both in this case for learning students’ names.  It seems obvious, but it’s of the utmost importance to learn students names if you want to create any sort of rapport with them.  Ana also advised us how the first few days of a new school year are vital.  We must be clear on our expectations from the students, on the rules we set, and importantly, what the consequences of their actions are.  Whatever we promise, we must follow through with, otherwise we quickly lose the respect of the students. 

Ana then explained the difference between an exercise, an activity and a task.  After so much theory on the subject, it finally became clear to us!  I think we all also breathed a sigh of relief when Ana advised us on the reality of doing projects.  Over the course of this masters it seemed that Project Based Learning was the only way to go and something we’d be expected to undertake right from the word go.  It stands to reason that taking on a project is not something to be taken lightly, it requires tremendous effort and coordination on the part of the teaching staff and is not something we’ll likely be involved in right from the beginning.  Projects are of course wonderful, but it’s also important to learn about the day to day reality of a language class. 

One really intriguing thing that Ana mentionned was about ‘learned helplessness’. This is a vicious cycle where students come to believe that they have no control over their learning.  Perhaps they have had a string of bad results in homework and in exams, the danger is that they will become resigned to the fact that they simply can’t do it, and as a result, give up trying.  

One thing that contributes to ‘learned helplessness’ is the feeling of being powerless, I’ve talked in my first blog post for Luz about the Paradox of Choice, and I think the same principle applies here.  We must offer students the chance to be autonomous in their learning and make their own choices, but we must also be careful not to make the decision so voluminous and unwieldy that students don’t know what they should do. 

Praise where praise is due is also important and even more important is how we praise.  I’ve also mentioned this in another blog post, talking about a video from Carol Dweck about the Closed Mindset and the Growth Mindset.  In short, she says how important it is to praise students for the process and for effort they make, and steer away from any sort of praise which refers to intelligence.  We are all capable of learning more and it’s only through persistence and effort that we can grow.  The video is fantastic, so I’ll post it again. 

Building on what was said earlier about learning names, it’s also important to find out what motivates and interests students, so that we in turn can attempt to make our classes more motivating.  If we’re really lucky we’ll achieve the holy grail of intrinsic motivation. 

The tasks we set as teachers are also important in avoiding ‘learned helplessness’. Tasks should be challenging but attainable.  Scaffolding and support are also vital.  Furthermore - and here Ana and Luz prove just how much they are two sides of the same coin - our objective isn’t to stump our students, it’s to help them achieve goals.  We shouldn’t set exams that are going to be ridiculously difficult for them, we should facilitate the process as much as possible, even if that means simply thinking carefully about how we set out an exam to make it easier for students to actually do the task. 

Speaking of facilitating learning, listening can often be a stressful experience for students.  If not adequately prepared, they have no idea what the listening is about and quickly get lost; if they have nothing to do while they are listening, it becomes overwhelming.  Pre-listening activities, therefore, are vital.  A pre-listening activity could simply be  predict the content from a picture or the title.  For the first listening, students need gist questions to get a general sense of the meaning.  I’ve sometimes combined Pre-listening and gist activities by playing Listening Bingo.  I choose a selection of words from the listening and write them up on the board in two columns.  The first column has words from the beginning of the listening and the second column has words that appear near the end.  (This is important!)  In pairs, students predict what they think the listening might be about, based on the words.  They then choose a selection of words, half from one column and half from the other.  The teacher plays the listening the first time around and students cross of their words until they get bingo!  Students also check their predictions to the contents.  Students are then ready for a second listening and more detailed questions.  It is also important to include a post-listening activity. Listenings are rich in language and learning opportunities and we as teachers must exploit these possibilities rather than checking answers to the detailed questions and moving on. 

In the session, we then turned to dications and how to make them more interesting, I think we all thoroughly enjoyed the running dictation activity and I love doing it in my classes. It’s such a wonderfully simple way to make an otherwise boring activity exciting.  I’m also a big fan of picture dictations and Dictogloss.  Another technique that I really enjoy doing is a sort of video dictogloss.  Any video with plenty of movement and action is perfect, half the class sit with their backs to the screen, the other half sit opposite them where they can see their partner and the screen.  The teacher mutes the video and plays a section, the student who can see the video explains what is happening and his partner makes notes.  Students then swap places for another section of the video.  After, they work together to reconstruct what happened in the whole video, then watch again to check.

We finished off the session looking at how to use songs.  I loved the idea of using a variety of different types of activity in the same song.  I admit that I usually fall back on ‘fill in the gaps’ but I will definitely be using the activities that Ana suggested in the near future!  

At this early stage of the classes - and unfortunately we have so few of them - I’d like to say what a privilege it is to be taught by Luz and Ana, who bring not only a wealth of expertise and insight into the craft of teaching but also passion and seemingly bottomless energy and enthusiasm!   

Activity - Luz - Competencias Claves

World Maps

The materials for this class are in this Google Slides document:

Materials needed:

●      A copy of the blank world map for each student.

●      One copy each of the other maps with the legends and titles blanked out. 

●      A projector to show the maps to the class. 

1.     As a warm-up, the teacher gives each student a copy of the blank map and plays a quick geography quiz.  The teacher reads out the names of countries and students write the name in the correct place on the map.  In this version, there is a list of easy countries (worth one point), slightly more difficult countries (worth 2 points) and really difficult ones (worth 3 points).  The quiz can be done in groups of three or four and students win points for their correct answers. 

2.     The teacher then reads out a selection of nouns and adjectives and, individually, students write the words on the country that comes to mind when they hear them.  Students then compare with their team and justify their answers. 

3.     Meanwhile, the teacher sticks up the other maps that have had their legends and titles blanked out around the room.  Students move about the classroom in their team looking at the maps and trying to decide what they depict.  If needed, the teacher could demonstrate with an example and reveal the answer. 

4.     After they have completed the activity and made their decisions, the students go back to their groups and as a whole class discuss what they think the maps depict.

5.     The teacher, using the projector, reveals the answers.  The class discusses the answers, for example, which one they found most interesting/surprising. 

6.     As a follow-up, the teams could choose one of the maps (or another one that interests them) and explore the topic further to present to the class. 

As well as working on the competencia comunicación lingüística, this activity deals with competencia matemática and competencia sociais e civicas.  If they undertook the follow-up activity, it would also bring in the Sentido de iniciativa e espíritu emprendedor. 

The second part of this activity comes from a great little book: Lindstromberg, S, (ed.). (2004) ‘Language Activities for Teenagers. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. 

Reflection - Luz - 1st Session

Our first session with Luz focused on the Competencias Claves.  I think I can speak for all us of when I say that over the course of our theoretical training on this topic, we’ve all struggled with working out just how to manage to include and assess these skills in the classroom.  In my time as a language teacher, the focus has almost entirely been on how to use certain activities for practising certain grammar points. It’s been a struggle to recalibrate my brain to use activities to practice competencies!    

When Luz arrived, the first thing she did was tell us to turn off our computers and move to the front of the room.  This really made us sit up in our chairs and a sign that these sessions are going to be decidedly different from the ones before.

We started with a warmer called Two Truths and a Lie.  After the task, Luz explained that these little activities, sometimes called ‘bell work’, are very important when starting a session.  Firstly, they should be connected to the topic and serve as a way of activating previous knowledge on a topic.  Secondly, it is very important to give clear instructions and to allow students to gather their thoughts before asking them to respond.  Finally, they also allow the teacher to quietly set up what they will need, turn on computers, take out notes etc. without the students getting bored waiting. 

This week, I was listening to BBC Radio 4 and one of my favourite programmes, The Incredible Truth, was back on.  It’s essentially three truths and a lie a lo grande! In the programme, there are four contestants, they are each given five unbelievable facts on a topic.  They write a ‘lecture’ on the topic, all of it false except for the five facts which they attempt to ‘smuggle’ past the others.  The others buzz in when they think they hear something that is true, they win a point if they’re right and lose a point if they mistake a lie for a truth. The speaker wins a point for every truth they manage to hide. This got me thinking about how this game could be used in the classroom.  The teacher could give students a topic, (relevant to the content of the course), they then look for three or five bizarre facts (depending on the level) and they have to write a short speech of 2 to 3 minutes.  Rather than buzzing in, the rest of the class should listen and note down what they think are the truths.  Then, in teams of three, they then have to decide together, justifying their decision.  Similar to the original, the teams win or lose points for their answers.  By having students wait until the end, this allows the speaker to continue without being interrupted, and also means that the others can have an chance to produce language to justify their opinions.  The lecture itself could be used by the teacher as an opportunity to assess speaking and presentation skills.  For a large class, the game could be carried on over a few sessions to give everyone a chance to deliver a speech, keeping the same teams and accumulating points over the course of the series of lectures. 

Going back to the competencias claves, we as language teachers really have it easier than a lot of other teachers, in that it is possible to include all the competencias given the wealth of topics we can use in class.  Practically everything is fair game in a language class!  Even the fact of writing the date on the board every day is working on their mathematical skills.  Luz took us through each skill and made it all look so easy!  One revelatory aspect for me was the difference between Competencia matemática y competencias básicas en ciencia y tecnología (CMCCT) and Competencia digital (CD).  It’s an important distinction, in the first ‘tecnología’ refers to the use of the device or apparatus; whereas the Competencia digital refers to being discerning when searching for information, distinguishing between reliable and unreliable sources.  In our world of ‘fake news’, this is an essential life skill. Two more of Luz’s suggestions really stuck with me. 

Firstly, Aprender a aprender (CAA). Students nowadays have a wealth of resources at their fingertips.  Unfortunately, traditional dictionary skills are often forgotten and students automatically go to Google Translate when they’re struggling.  Quite apart from the fact that it’s usually glaringly obvious to the teacher when they’ve used it, it means they don’t reflect properly on the process of translation and the problems that can arise.  Online dictionaries such as WordReference, still require students to think critically and know how to use them effectively.  When correcting students, whether it be their writing or speaking, it’s also important to make them reflect on the mistakes and give them a chance to correct themselves before the teacher does so.  Error correction in speech is something I’ve explored in a previous blog post but it’s important to note here that evidence suggests that ‘recasting’ errors made by students, that is, when the teacher immediately repeats what a students said with the correction, is not as effective as other forms of error correction.  Likewise, when correcting writing, it’s important to steer the students in the right direction, using correction codes or comments, rather than give them the answer.  All of this contributes to their skills in learning to learn.

Secondly, Sentido de la iniciativa y espíritu emprendedor. In this case, it is important to give students choice so that they can develop their sense of initiative, however, teachers must take into account the Paradox of Choice.  When given too much choice, we often become anxious about the choice, fail to choose effectively, choose the easiest option or feel unsure we made the right choice.  In the classroom, it’s important to give students choice, but within reason.  For example, students could choose how to present a topic, or they could be given a choice of subtopics within a broader topic.  Telling students to go forth and write ‘something’ about ‘something’ is counterproductive and moves the focus away from the task at hand. 

Luz recommended some videos for us to watch and I thoroughly enjoyed the conversation between Jeremy Harmer and Scott Thornbury.  A few things really stood out for me.  Firstly, Thornbury mentioned how we often see communicative tasks as something that comes at the end of a session, the class builds up towards the role-play or task.  However, these tasks can also be used effectively as a diagnostic test.  We can see at the point of use the gaps of knowledge that students have and teach in a reactive, rather than preemptive way.  Secondly, the relationship between form and meaning.  All too often, we spend a lot of energy drilling students on the correct form of a grammar point but fail to make the connection with the meaning.  We treat our students like Pavlov’s dog and are satisfied when they manage to repeat the form, but when we ask them to use the form in a meaningful way, they often revert back to default. It still shocks me when I see some of my students incanting ‘come, came, come’ (pronouncing it as ˈko.me, ‘ka.me, ‘ko.me) but having no idea what a past participle is, except that it’s in the third column.  Finally, Harmer mentioned Dell Hynes’ S-P-E-A-K-I-N-G model, for setting and scene, participants, ends, acts sequence, key, instrumentalities, norms, & genre.  Essentially, in order to use language effectively, it’s not enough to know the grammar and vocabulary, we must also consider the context the words are used in.  How someone speaks to their grandmother, to their friends or to the doctor changes completely, even if the ‘content’ is the same.  In that way, it’s incredible to think that every piece of language, in speech or writing, is inherently linked to competencias sociales y civicas. 

Tema 1 - Diario - Error Correction and The Growth Mindset

“A life spent making mistakes is not only more honourable, but more useful than a life spent doing nothing.” George Bernard Shaw

In the second session of this topic, we were asked to decide what two factors from someone’s L1 have an impact on the learning process of an L2.  For me, it is pronunciation and syntax. 

From my own experience, teaching pronunciation is a very difficult process, not least because it is something that often causes embarrassment on the part of a learner.  I have never once heard a student of mine say, “Well, actually, I’m very happy with my accent.”  It’s a strange situation in many ways, I myself do not have an English accent, and don’t pretend to, but I do put on a ‘Standard’ accent in class, mainly to avoid confusion.  In reality though, students shouldn’t be embarrassed by their accent.  One thing is a pronunciation mistake that impedes understanding (like ship/sheep or beach and the other word…), it’s quite another to have an accent.  I am very aware of my accent when I speak Spanish but I suppose it will always be with me in some way, I take great comfort from Micheal Robinson, a well-known football commentator on Movistar.  Despite having lived in Spain for many years, his accent is still glaringly obvious, but his Spanish is almost perfect. 

Another impact is the syntax of the target language. Word order can be a problem for even advanced students, a sentence makes perfect sense but something about the word order jars on the listeners ears.  Spanish word order is much more flexible that the fixed SVO of English, so a speaker might mix up the order and produce a question like, “Is it ready, the dinner?” Instead of “Is the dinner ready?” Pronouns are another syntactic difference, and students often forget to use them.  Either in Spanish it is not necessary to repeat them or the subject is not necessary at all, for example, saying, “Elena went to the shop.  Bought bread.” or “Is raining”.  These are just one or two examples, but other syntactic differences in adjective noun word order, negation and plurals are also common.  Of course, quite apart from errors my students make, I am also aware of the difficulties I have in learning Spanish. My personal bugbear is gender, further complicated by the fact that I’m told that some words in Spanish are feminine but in Galician they are masculine or vice-versa! 

It is a pity that we won’t have the opportunity to look more at error correction in this course, as I think it’s a very important part of the learning process. One thing we should clarify is what a mistake is.  Julian Edge (1989) identifies three broad categories:

A slip - is a small mistake that students could easily correct themselves.  They know the rule, but at the moment of execution they miss something because of lack of concentration, distraction or other factors. 

            e.g.  They picked up there shoes. 

An error - which students couldn’t correct themselves, the teacher would need to address this.  They may not know the rule, or they may not know it well enough.

            e.g. His room is more tidier than yours

(The student here might have learnt that to make comparisons in English we can add -er or use more, but it might not have been pointed out to them that both are not used together)

An attempt - where students try to be ambitious with language but don’t know how to do this (yet!)

            e.g. I wish he will come to the part tonight

The examples above are illustrative and, of course, what constitutes a slip, error or an attempt varies from student to student. 

Note that, above I said that students don’t know how to do this yet…  this is a very important distinction, and something that Carol Dweck explores in this wonderful RSA Animate video called ‘How To Help Every Child Fulfil Their Potential’.  

She talks about the ‘fixed mindset’ and the ‘growth mindset’ and how we have to be careful how we praise and criticise students. We, as human beings, don’t have a set amount of intelligence, it’s something that can de developed through effort, dedication, learning and mentorship. In a fixed mindset, effort is seen as a negative thing, if you have to try that means you don’t have the ability.  In a growth mindset, effort is seen as part of the process that activates ability. 

Dweck also explores how children react to setbacks in a growth mindset and a fixed mindset.  Those with a fixed mindset try to hide or run from their mistakes and conceal their deficiency.  Those with a growth mindset see mistakes as a part of the process. Praising children is of course important, but how we do it is equally as important. Dweck discovered that praising children’s intelligence or talent harms them, when faced with something difficult, they were reluctant to take on  the challenge because they were scared of being shown up or, proved to be not as inteeligent as they’d been told they were, whereas those praised for the strategy, effort, focus and persistence were comfortable with struggling and perhaps not getting it quite right.  They valued the process rather than intelligence. 

Dweck quotes a school in New York that, instead of failing students on a unit, gives them a score of “Not Yet.” We have to change our value system from “I’m not good at languages” to “I’m not good at languages, yet.” 

This is where error correction comes in, nobody likes making mistakes, and teenagers are especially reluctant to make mistakes and be embarrassed in front of their peers. From my point of view, when I first arrived in Spain and started teaching I was very reluctant to correct learners.  I didn’t want to embarrass them or interrupt the flow of their speech.  My adult students, all with quite low levels, struggled but I couldn’t quite find the right way to correct without discouraging them.  I quickly learnt though, that it is vital to correct or students run the risk of developing ‘fossilised errors’.  I also quickly learnt the right and wrong ways of correcting.  My cardinal rule is that there are no fixed rules.  There is always an exception, and even if the student wants a nice translation for something, there quite often simply isn’t one.  The example of comparisons I usd above is illustrative of how important it is for teachers to explain rules adequately in order to help students avoid mistakes. Yes, we make comparisons with -er, we also use more, but not together.  There are no hard and fast rules, and students must be open to exceptions.  This can only come about when the teacher adequately explains the rule. 

However, mistakes do happen, but how do we deal with them?  Jim Scrivener, whose Learning Teaching is the bible for the CELTA course, gives some advice. First, we must be clear on what the objective of the task is.  If the objective is accuracy, then of course we must be thorough and systematic with correcting errors.  If the objective is fluency, we should be more inclined to let small mistakes go, as long as they don’t impede meaning.  As Julian Edge says, “the most important mistakes are those which affect meaning and communication.”

Scrivener suggests we could simply ask the students to try again, to give them a chance to correct a slip.  If it turns out that it is an error, explanation would be necessary.  Gestures and facial expressions can also help the student along, and also minimise the interruption.  For example, the teacher could simply gesture behind to indicate that a student should rethink their sentence and use the past simple. Teachers could also use finger correction, holding out their hand and indicating where the error occurred.  They could also repeat the sentence up to the error and allow students to correct themselves.  Or they could repeat the error but change the intonation to show where the mistake is.  Humour can also be used effectively, always edging on the side of caution so as not to offend.  What might seem like gentle teasing to the teacher may be mortifying for the student.

Another technique that I have found useful, especially in big groups, is to listen while the students perform a task and note down any errors I hear.  I then put the errors up on the board, but change some key words so that the student doesn’t immediately know that it is their mistake on the board.  For example, a student might say “I am going to the gym every week”. I would change it to “I am going to the cinema every week” and then ask the whole class to identify the mistake.

We as teachers often see speaking tasks as a conclusion to a lesson, but they can also be used effectively at the beginning of a class for the teacher to identify at the point of use what gaps of knowledge there are before teaching a grammar point.  This is something I often did with a PET speaking class I had last year.  These students came to these extra classes to practice solely for the speaking exam; all had different teachers in their regular classes and had spent different lengths of time studying English.  By listening to them doing the speaking tasks, I was able to identify the sort of attempts and errors they were making and effectively point them in the right direction or refresh their memory. 

What it boils down to is changing our attitude to ‘mistakes'.  A mistake is not a dirty word, nor should it be something that we punish students for.  We need to both change how we think and how we react to mistakes in the classroom, instead of something punishable or negative, they are all part of the process.  It’s not the right answer… yet. 

Edge, J. (1989). Mistakes and Correction. London and New York: Longman  
Scrivener, J (2011). Learning Teaching: The Essential Guide to English Language Teaching (3rd Ed.). London: Macmillan

Tema 1 - Dosier - Variables, Contexts and Communities

During the first session after the Christmas break, Gonzalo gave us an introduction to the course and the topics we would be covering over the next few weeks.  I have to say that I am looking forward to this part of the course as I think we’ll finally get down to the nitty-gritty of language teaching. 

In the first activity we used a Venn diagram to discuss the differences and similarities between the concepts of mother tongue and foreign language.  This activity can be used effectively to activate previous knowledge and offers a visual variation to a traditional brainstorming activity. 

In our group, our Venn diagram looked something like this:

Next we discussed our ideas with another group and with the rest of the class.

We then moved on to the different contexts that language is acquired.  In English, we refer to ‘mother tongue’, ‘first language’ or ‘native language’. However, in our globalized world, the term mother tongue is becoming less and less used in sociolinguistics, and the preferred term is now usually ‘first language’.  Mother tongue and native language are, in my opinion, a little too emotionally connected with culture and leave little room for inter-culturality. However, the term ‘lingua inicial’ or initial language seems to me a much more fitting term. Rather than setting up a hierarchy, like first language, or barring those speakers not of a certain ‘culture’, like mother tongue or native tongue; initial language seems to me to be a much more fitting description - it’s a shame that it isn’t used in English!  In any case, regardless of the term used, it is agreed that this language is learnt unconsciously, without any concrete intention (except communication) and before the child begins school.  The child of course may have two initial languages.  Another problem with ‘first language’ and ‘mother tongue’ if the child speaks two languages learnt from his parents - which one is which?!

The term second language, usually refers to the language acquired after the initial language, it could be acquired at school, at home or in the ‘street’.  It could be a lingua franca, a language used in administration or a language used in the education system (rather than taught in the system) This is the case with many children in Galicia, Galician may be there initial language at home but they may learn Spanish later, or vice-versa.  With that in mind, second language should not be confused with the term L2, used mainly in English speaking countries that are generally more monolingual, and refers to a foreign language.  Finally, when we refer to a foreign language, it is in an educational environment, learnt consciously for a specific intention.

Our next activity was to look at these concepts in concrete situations. 

For this activity we used the ‘placemat’ technique.  Each group of four or five has an A3 piece of paper.  The paper is sectioned off around the outside to allow each student to note their own thoughts and a section in the middle is reserved for conclusions made by the group.  Our group was asked to consider the following:

In the European Union, over 40 different languages are spoken.  Are all of them used in the European Parliament? 

My initial thought was that members of parliament have the right to use whatever language they wish. From the point of view of politicians, I supposed that they would want to use the language of the people they represent, for example an MEP from a Welsh-speaking constituency would insist on using Welsh, however, I recognise that with more than 40 languages, this would be far too unwieldy and the poor interpreters would end up with sore heads!  The correct answer was that each of the 27 member states chooses their official language.  This makes a lot more sense, but does end up being a little unrepresentative - Irish is the official language of Ireland, but there are far fewer speakers of the language than Welsh, Galician or Catalan. 

The other questions put to the other groups were as follows:

In the European Union, over 40 different languages are spoken.  Are all of them used in the European Commission?

In this case, English, French and German are used, though English is the most used.

Inditex has more that 7,000 shops in the 5 continents.  What language do the employees use with the customers? In what language do they communicate with the headquarters in Arteixo?

Of course, here the employees use the language(s) of the country where the shops are.  To communicate with the headquarters, English or Spanish is used. 

Citroen has 13 factories in 7 countries.  In what language do the heads of the factories use to communicate between each other?

Usually, the managers of the factories are native French speakers, so they communicate in French. 

For the next placemat activity we looked at other more concrete situations. 

The question for my group was as follows:

Pedro is from A Coruna, he works in the Zara in Marineda City and he learnt to speak Spanish.  What language would he speak to a Galician customer? And to an English customer? 

            In this case, it is likely that Pedro would speak Spanish to the Galician customer, and would try to communicate with the English customer in English. 

For the other groups, the questions were as follows:

A Spanish-speaking History teacher is working in a public school in Galicia, in what language would she give classes?

            By law, she would have to use Galician. 

A group of Erasmus students from 5 different countries are deciding where to go for a night out.  What language would they use?

            It depends on the country, but the most likely is English. 

In a digital technology trade fair, there is a group of sales people from companies in France, Belgium, Côte d'Ivoire and Spain.  What language would they speak amongst themselves?

The most likely is that they would speak English, but it could be French depending on the knowledge of the Spanish representative. 

We then looked at the concepts of habitual language, working language and lingua franca.  The habitual language is the language used the majority of the time by a speaker to communicate with those around him.  The habitual language and initial language are not always the same, for example, for an immigrant. The working language, refers to those used in certain business contexts, so in the example of Citroen, the working language between the directors is French.  And finally, the lingua franca is the language used as a medium of communication between speakers of different languages. 

In the second session, we looked at the linguistic community and communities of languages in the class.  First, using the placemat technique we noted down all the languages and variations that we have knowledge of.  We then used Google Docs to collate all the languages in the class.  In groups, we then decided on what linguistic communities and what communities of languages there were.  At first, we were all a bit stumped by the differences between them, but to illustrate the difference, the results of my group was as follows:

The linguistic community refers to the repertoire of languages in our group, so:

English, Galicia, Castilian, French, German, Scottish Gaelic. 

The communities of languages were as follows:

English, Galicia, Castilian and French. 

All four of us can communicate in English, Castilian and Galician (slowly but surely, I’m learning a lot of Galician on this course!) Three of us can communicate in French.  As only Pablo speaks German and I am the only one who speaks any Scottish Gaelic - these languages aren’t communities of languages. 

We then turned to Google Docs again and looked at the didactics of language teaching.  It was interesting to note that apart from primary and online courses the Flipped Classroom is applicable to practically every situation. 

Gonzalo then presented the variables that arise in distinct contexts of learning and we did another Venn diagram to compare adult and young learners. 

Our Venn diagram looked like this:

Then we talked briefly about the effect of L1 on learning an L2.  For me, the biggest impact is pronunciation and syntax.  Something I’ll explore later, along with error correction, in the diario post. 

Finally, Gonzalo quickly took us through some key points regarding motivation, aptitude and multicompetences.  It’s a pity that this part isn’t on the syllabus for the masters as it was thoroughly interesting… perhaps a topic for the TFM?