I just read this post from The English Teacher Blog, and I feel guilty enough to write a whole post about it.
Basically, she talks about, well, talking – and how we teachers often go to fast for our students’ brains to process. She mentions students with IEPs and English Language Learners… well, guess what? Same goes for Spanish Language Learners.
I’m a fast talker by nature. Maybe it’s because I come from a large family (OK, not huge, but there were four of us – big enough); partly I think it’s due to the stereotype that Latin people speak at superspeed. I want to use Spanish in the classroom as much as possible, but I know that too often I fall into my normal speech rythm, which is superspeed, and it scares my students.
When I try to slow down, I feel I’m talking so slowly they’ll be offended that I’m talking to them as if they were stupid (part of the reason for that is the blank stares I get from the class – that is, from the few in the class that don’t have their noses buried in their laptops, working on anything OTHER than what I’m talking about – not confused, I’m-trying-to-understand blank stares, but will-you-just-get-on-with-it-can’t-you-tell-we-could-not-care-less blank stares). But I need to remember that THEY DO NOT KNOW THE LANGUAGE. They need me to slow down… I’m pretty good about repeating, stressing the key words, pausing, but I need to work on s l o w i n g d o w n even if it makes me feel silly.
So, that’s going to be my mission for tomorrow. (And the rest of the week. And semester. Obviously.)
I don’t have much of a lesson, but since today marked the beginning of Hispanic Heritage Month, and tomorrow is Mexico’s Independence Day, I guess we can work on a history/culture lesson for tomorrow.
Still not caught up on grading. However, I did write up something to be read in the morning announcements about Spanish Club (which I am reviving from a long-ago forgotten death). Baby steps, Bob… baby steps.
Eesh, this is what I need to work on too. Except I have ELLs who know Spanish (the majority of them anyway) and need to know English. And I talk wayyyyy too fast. I think I’m talking super slow and I’m still talking too fast. Born and raised in Jersey, it’s hard to shake the speaking at lightning speed thing.
Comment by MBT — September 17, 2008 @ 4:11 pm
I don’t know how LiveJournal handles threaded comments, but I wanted you to know that I responded to your comment.
Comment by Jasmin Loire — September 20, 2008 @ 1:12 am
I went to a conference this summer where one of the presenters told about how they have moved to an “all Spanish, all the time” format in all of their Spanish classes- starting with level 1. This is good in theory, but even language guru Blaine Ray says that if the kids don’t understand you, they’re going to tune you out. I struggle with the whole Spanish thing in class. I would love to speak more with them, but when they give me that “deer in the headlights” look, I feel like I have to throw them a bone.
Comment by mrs t — October 14, 2008 @ 8:46 pm