The new syllabus directions encourage us as teachers to help students develop knowledge across all the specific skills in a more fluid manner than we did in the past. Previously we may have planned our lessons around single skill-based tasks such as a listening drill, a speaking task, a reading comprehension and a writing task. The new syllabus goes as far as grouping skills such as reading and listening under terms such as Accessing and responding. In order to better prepare students to develop such a fluid mindset I have been reflecting on how we can structure activities in class to develop such skills simultaneously. Here are 3 ideas I have been enjoying this week.

1.The question word warm-up

Due to the structure of our exam system in Year 11 and 12, students tend to focus their language learning on being able to answer questions, rather than ask them of each other. As such, I find many of their speaking errors are actually due to not focusing on the specific question word used. They tend to predict rather than consider what is being ask of them. For example, a common error if you ask what grade are you in (何年生ですか。) is to tell me their age confusing the two common questions (何才ですか。). I know that they know the answers to both of these questions so the error is not an issue of ability but rather an issue of  unfocused listening.

This warm-up activity begins by having students brainstorm all known question words in Japanese such as いつ、なに、どこ. I then selected the question they had remembered least well and had them jot down, if they could, 3 questions using this word. Each student then had to tell me one of their questions and I wrote it on the board helping them correct any errors that may have been in their original question. Once the questions were on the board, the students had to choose one, read out the question and respond to it. This allowed for natural differentiation as students self-selected the question they felt confident answering.

If you have a large class, you can have them do the task in pairs or threes, generating the initial questions and generating the answers together.

2.The uso/maji game.

I have a son in Year 7  so I know personally how hard it can be for teenagers to listen to others and process what the other person is actually saying! This game works on improving this weakness.

Students are asked to write 4 statements about themselves in Japanese. This could be as simple as 4 statements using すき・きらい or as sophisticated as describing experiences they may or may not have had using たことがあります. Three of the statements are true and one is false (or you could do the opposite.)

The rest of the class then listens to the student read out their statements and they have to decide which is the うそ(lie). They write down in their books the statement in the following way : うそは「へびが好きです」。The teacher calls on 3 people to read their guesses and the student who wrote the statements answers with either 「はい、うそです。」or 「いいえ、まじです。」. I found the students loved to use the slang まじ (for real)  and it gave the game more a more “edgy feel”.

Again, in larger classes, you can do the task in pairs or small groups. For younger students you may want to focus on particular scaffolds for grammar structures you are studying. For older students I would correct on the spot if they had any errors and write the changed sentence on the board if needed.

3.The writing stimulus

For Senior students encouraging them to write more frequently is always a challenge. I find boys in particular struggle in writing tasks because they try to stick to the truth, rather than write well within the confines of their vocabulary and grammatical knowledge. This task works on improving the students ability to be imaginative and flexible when answering in the writing task space.

We began this task by looking at 4 stimulus questions from their textbook which happened to be about travel in the future tense. The questions focused on where the person was going, by what mode of transport, how long it would take and what they would do there. I then paired the students up and had them answer those question in the past tense reflecting on the recent school holidays. The answers could be as bland as “I went to the local shops by train and went shopping.” Student A then took that information and had to write a recount of Student B’s day. They were allowed to be imaginative within appropriate boundaries. I found by writing about another, based on very scant details they were better able to move beyond the truth and tap into a creative response within the confines of their language ability. We did the speaking aspect of the task during class and the writing task at home.

 

All three tasks aim to move from one skill to another fluidly, combining listening and speaking with reading and writing as much as possible.

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SPEAKING STATIONS

Enabling student success in languages

Improving productive skills via contemporary issues

New Year, New cohort. But are your students equipped to learn a language?

As a Language teacher in Australia, I often describe myself as a naive optimist. I almost consider this mindset to be an essential trait of my job. The odds are stacked against us in many ways, yet we continually strive to bring fresh energy and enthusiasm to our lessons each year.

Last year, I realised though, that perhaps we were missing a key step. Although we made huge efforts to teach languages well to our students, perhaps we didn’t always check first if the students were ready for the journey. It’s like taking a group hiking without checking what they have in their backpack. Do they have water and food? Appropriate clothing and shoes? How is their current fitness levels?

Some may argue that they do a quick survey at the start of the year to check if the students have had experience with language learning. This is a good first move but it doesn’t provide us with much real data on how equipped our students are to learn a language with us, now, as high school students.

I have come to the conclusion, that explicit teaching of skills to access learning in language is the essential first step in the language journey. To this end, I have developed two short introductory courses for secondary students called Base Camp level 1 and level 2. 

The first course is pitched at Year 7/8 students who may be beginning a language course for the first time. It covers five key concepts to develop student skills in learning and motivation. These include concepts such as implementation intentions, habit stacking and the two-minute rule.

The second course is pitched at Year 9/10 and 11/12 students who may have continued into elective courses. This sequence looks more closely at specific learning strategies to support independent learners. It suggests ways to revise and extend one’s knowledge in the macro skills using accessible resources from the students’ world. This includes various strategies to harness teenager obsession with social media for positive learning gains in language.

Both of these resources outline how to harness research into the psychology of motivation to help students find time and motivation for their language learning and provide an infrastructure for successful learning to occur.

Although there are two levels, I would suggest that students, who have not worked with the level 1 materials, would benefit from working through those, before attempting the level 2 materials. The Base Camp level 1 and 2 resource is sold as a set for $50 and can be purchased by emailing jblog1help@gmail.com .

If you are interested in learning more about this topic, you may be interested in attending our Noosa Workshop in July. Details and booking information is available via this link.

Good luck with your new classes in 2020!

One of the difficulties of teaching languages in Australia is our lack of time on task. We simply don’t timetable enough hours a week in the school curriculum to do justice to language acquisition. One way to improve this situation, is to have students spend time out of class doing their own revision and learning at home. Imagine the increased learning gains you could achieve if you introduced new language in a one-hour lesson, and then the students returned two days later having mastered that content and were ready for more. Imagine if for every hour you taught, they matched it with an hour of home learning?

This doesn’t tend to happen in Australia for a multitude of reasons but let’s just focus today on 3 scenarios you can change.

Scenario 1 : the binger

This student only studies when they are given something specific to do such as complete a worksheet. They tend to do all the homework in one sudden hit and then forget about it.

Scenario 2 : the procrastinator

This student rarely completes work because they are disorganised and forget there was even work to do, or because they are worried they won’t be able to do the work well, so they don’t even attempt it.

Scenario 3 : the excuse master

This student has a busy life flitting between part-time jobs, sporting commitments and family/social engagements. They considered doing the work but there just never seemed to be the perfect opportunity.

The key problem with these three scenarios is that the teacher is driving the home learning. The teacher is setting the homework, setting the deadline and then most likely controlling the marking and feedback. No wonder teachers are burned out! How can we increase the level of student autonomy in home learning tasks?

Step 1 – Clarity

“Many people think that they lack motivation when what they really lack is clarity. It is not always obvious when and where to take action.” Page 71, Atomic Habits by James Clear

A research study in Great Britain in 2001 found that subject rates of exercise increased from 35% to 91% simply by having participants identify how, when and where they would exercise in advance.

Could we not have students do this with their home learning? Students could be responsible for identifying home learning goals in a similar manner. For example:

I will practice level 1 set of hiragana flashcards everyday in my bedroom after I shutdown by computer at 8pm.

I will write 5 sentences using the new kanji I learned today in the kitchen at 4pm on Tuesdays before I go to netball training.

I will read aloud the sample text on page 10 to my mum in the car on Wednesday after school and summarise what it means in English.

If students don’t look for time in advance to learn, it is unlikely that it will just happen.

Step 2 – Support systems

The second step is to have your students form small groups of 3-4 who act as study coaches. Each group has a shared google doc where they log their specific home learning goal for the week. Students spend 5 minutes at the end of the lesson on Monday logging their specific goal (what, when, where) with the group. At the start of the Friday lesson, groups report back and log how their learning went. Did they study when they said they would? Why or why not? What obstacles did they face? How could they overcome them next time? Over time students will become more conscious of their habits and they are far more likely to listen to a peer who calls them out on using the same excuse each week.

Step 3 – individual success

“Tend to your dreams every day. Even though you’re not quite seeing the shoots, something unseen is percolating.” Sonia Choquette

One of the problems with language learning is the “plateau of latent potential”. James Clear describes this as the “valley of disappointment” where we feel discouraged because we can not see the results of our hard work. He states “we often expect progress to be linear. At the very least, we hope it will come quickly. In reality, the results of our efforts are often delayed.” (page 22, Atomic Habits.) Sarah Pavy’s research also supports this perspective, noting that students often complain of a lack of progress indicators in their language learning. This is one reason why I use the Patch system to teach Hiragana, Katakana and Kanji. By dividing up the learning of the scripts into levels, students can enjoy progress at their own pace. My son has just started this system for his own learning of hiragana. At first, he struggled with just level 1, but then one day it suddenly became easy. He noticed this change himself and was motivated to learn the next level. When we introduce new vocabulary in class, sometimes we move on to the next list before a student feels that sense of accomplishment. Instead they end up feeling like they half know the words on 10 lists – “a jack of all trades but a master of none” as they say. When we give them a system, like the Patch series, they can run their own self-paced home learning that is complimentary to what you are doing in class. You can focus on teaching task-based interesting lessons and leave them to the grunt work of mastering key concepts like script or vocabulary at home.

Good luck with improving the home learning system in your language classroom.