A Song-Based Grammar Lesson in Record Time Weighing the Whys ...

A Song-BasedGrammar Lesson inRecord Time

Weighing the Whysand Why Nots ofProfessionalDevelopment

Confessions of an Ex-Krashen Basher

by Andy Curtis

by Baxter Jackson

by Sylvan Payne

Three Examples ofBetter EnglishLearning throughthe L1

by David Balosa

TOEFL iBTReviewed by Barbara Schroeder Jensen

e s l / e f l . r e f l e c t i o n . p r a c t i c e

Teachers of English to Speakers of Other Languages, Inc. (TESOL)

Volume 3 Issue 1 March 2006

CL

Plenary Speakers at TESOL 2006Plenary Speakers at TESOL 2006

Keith Folse

Liz Murray

Michael McCarthy

Barry O’Sullivan

Jim Key Elliot L. Judd

March 16 - 18, 2006

From Homeless to Harvard

Wednesday, March 15,11:30 am–12:30 pm

Hitting the Mark:The Quest for Excellence

Thursday, March 16,11:30 am–12:30 pm

Roehampton UniversityLondon, England

Testing Times: Daring to Leador Failing to Follow?

Thursday, March 16, 2–2:45 pm

University of NottinghamNottingham, England

Spoken Fluency in Theoryand in Practice

Saturday, March 18,11:30 am–12:30 pm

University of IllinoisChicago, Illinois, USA

Turning 40: A Midlife Crisis forthe Profession?

Friday, March 17,11:30 am–12:30 pm

University of Central FloridaOrlando, Florida, USA

Almost Everything I Know AboutTeaching I Learned From MyOwn Teachers

Friday March 17, 2–2:45 pm

The Tampa Convention CenterTampa, Florida USA

Teachers of English to Speakers of Other Languages, Inc.

FROM THE EDITOR 2

COMMUNITIES OF PRACTICE

Circle Time 6What’s in a Name? by Judie Haynes

Home Room 8Storming the Bridgeby Jim Hughes

The Road Taken 10Seriously, How Did You Arrive at the Answer? by Debbie Zacarian

Multilingual Momentum 12Listening between the Linesby Ke Xu

In-Service 14Weighing the Whys and Why Nots of Professional Developmentby Andy Curtis

From A to Z 16Middle School Memoriesby Dorothy Zemach

PORTAL

Balancing the Input/Output Equation on the Web 38by Rong-Chang Li

A Song-Based Grammar Lesson inRecord Time 42by Sylvan Payne

Online Partner Projects for Future Citizensof the World 46by Cheri Powell

Developing Learners’ Critical Filter for Web Sites 50by Paul Stapleton

HOME AND OTHER PAGES

Words in PrintNew Directions: Reading, Writing, and CriticalThinking, 2nd ed. (Peter S. Gardner) 54Reviewed by Leslie Greffenius

Breaking Through: College Reading, 7th ed.(Brenda D. Smith) 54Reviewed by Catharine Hannay

Cybersights 55TOEFL iBT (Educational Testing Service)Reviewed by Barbara Schroeder Jensen

Soundbites 55Sister Act (Emile Ardolino)Reviewed by Abigail Bartoshesky

Software Thumbnails 56Speech Works (Trinity Software)Reviewed by Kaley Bierman

BULLETIN BOARDPresident’s Message 58Association News 60

OUT OF THE BOX

Confessions of an Ex-Krashen Basher 20by Baxter Jackson

Starting Conversations withContent Area Peers 24by Jenelle Reeves

Sharing Space with English 28by Elizabeth Coelho

Will Nonnative-English-Speaking Teachers Ever Get aFair Chance? 32by Yujong Park

To Be Equal,You Need to Give Them MoreCristina Alfaro and Natalie Kuhlman tellthe story of Xochil, a middle school ESLteacher who struggles to educate theadministration about the needs of English learners.

Three Examples of Better EnglishLearning through the L1Using ESL students’ first language (L1) inclass improves learners' self-image andmotivation, says David Balosa.

A Native Speaker of English Goes NonnativeNative English speaker Shannon Sauro’sforay into teaching German gives her apractical perspective on nonnative-English-speaking teachers of English.

Is Every Educational Use a Fair Use?How freely can you and the students youteach use Internet and multimedia resourcesin projects and Web pages? Lily Comptonguides you on a tour of the issues.

Grammatically SpeakingRichard Firsten differentiates nounadjuncts and compound nouns, explainswhy people say “God bless you” whensomeone sneezes, analyzes the rulesgoverning the use of much, and presentsa new Forum question.

1

CL

CL

CL

CL

CL

compleatlinksis the online component ofEssential Teacher. Look for thenext to titles in the table ofcontents. Then go to the Essential Teacher section ofhttp://www.tesol.org/, click onCompleat Links, and read theseextensions of the themes andtopics in this issue:

CL

MARCH 2006


VOL. 3 ISSUE 1

CL

CL

CL

CL

M a r c h 2 0 0 6

http://www.tesol.org/s_tesol/secetdoc.asp?CID=1222&DID=5718




http://www.tesol.org/s_tesol/sec_document.asp?CID=1222&DID=5723

From the

I was very honored to serve as interim editor of Essential

Teacher for the December 2005 and March 2006 issues.

At the same time, I was humbled to follow in the

footsteps of founding editor Kathy Weed, who had been

such a creative, capable, and caring leader.

I am pleased to announce the appointment of Tim

Stewart as editor of ET. An associate professor of

English at Kumamoto University, in Japan, Tim

will take the helm with the June issue.

I would also like to introduce two new columnists, Andy Curtis and Ke

Xu. Beginning with this issue, Andy takes over In-Service from Sheryl

Slocum, and Ke, Multilingual Momentum from Gu Peiya. Heartfelt

thanks to Sheryl and Peiya for their excellent contributions to ET, and a

warm welcome to Andy and Ke. To read more about Tim, Andy, Ke, and

other members of the ET team, see the ET page on TESOL’s Web site

(http://www.tesol.org/).

In this issue, teachers talk with you on a wide range of topics from

practical ideas for the classroom, to suggestions for improving your

teaching, to advice for content teachers and school administrators.

� Communities of Practice: Judie Haynes (Circle Time) wonders

whether it is reasonable to give anglicized names to immigrant

children in the United States. Jim Hughes (Home Room) takes you

along on another home visit to a student’s family. Debbie Zacarian

(The Road Taken) explains how to help equalize participation by

group members with group reflection facilitators. Ke Xu (Multilingual

Momentum) stresses the importance of teaching students how to

understand implied meanings in native speaker speech. Andy Curtis

(In-Service) weighs the whys and why nots of professional

development, and Dorothy Zemach (From A to Z) looks back with

humor at her year as a middle school ESL teacher.

2

� Out of the Box: Baxter Jackson traces his metamorphosis from a

Krashenite, to a Krashen basher, to a realistic Krashen admirer.

Jenelle Reeves offers suggestions for talking to non-ESL

colleagues about the inclusion of English language learners, and

Elizabeth Coelho emphasizes the need to take advantage of

students’ linguistic diversity. Yujong Park considers the benefits

and drawbacks of being a non-native-English-speaking teacher

(NNEST) in the ESL/EFL classroom.

� Portal: Rong-Chang Li describes ways for you to use the Web to

provide students with output as well as input opportunities.

Cheri Powell outlines the procedures for setting up online pen-

pal projects. Sylvan Payne explains how to prepare a music-

based grammar lesson in less than an hour, and Paul Stapleton

urges you to help students develop skills to filter the bad from

the good on the Web.

� Home and Other Pages: Leslie Greffenius and Catharine Hannay

each review a text for university students. Barbara Schroeder

Jensen introduces TOEFL’s new Internet-based test. Abigail

Bartoshesky shares her ideas for introducing a comedy feature film

in the classroom. Kaley Bierman describes a software program for

pronunciation improvement.

� Compleat Links (in the Essential Teacher section of

http://www.tesol.org/): Like Reeves, Cristina Alfaro and Natalie

Kuhlman stress the need for ESL teachers to educate colleagues

and administrators about the needs of English language learners.

David Balosa shares examples of his successful use of his

students’ L1 in his ESL class. Shannon Sauro, a native speaker of

English, contrasts Park’s experience as a NNEST with her own as

a teacher of German. Lily Compton discusses copyright and fair

use issues in regard to multimedia projects in the ESL classroom.

Richard Firsten (Grammatically Speaking) differentiates noun

adjuncts and compound nouns, explains why people say “God

bless you” when someone sneezes, analyzes the rules governing

the use of much, and presents a new Forum question.

Editor

Interim Editor

[email protected]

3MARCH 2006

Interim EditorChristine MeloniGeorge Washington UniversityWashington, DC, USA

Compleat Links EditorShannon SauroUniversity of PennsylvaniaPhiladelphia, PA, USA

Home and Other Pages EditorChristine MeloniGeorge Washington UniversityWashington, DC, USA

Out of the Box EditorPhil QuirkeAbu Dhabi Men’s CollegeAbu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates

Portal EditorMercedes RossettiProgramas Educativos en Multimedia,

SA de CVToluca, Mexico

ColumnistsAndy CurtisQueen’s University School of EnglishKingston, Ontario, Canada

Richard FirstenMiami–Dade County Public SchoolsMiami, FL, USA

Judie HaynesRiver Edge Public SchoolsRiver Edge, NJ, USA

Jim HughesLake SchoolWest Contra Costa Unified

School DistrictRichmond, CA, USA

Ke XuBorough of Manhattan Community College

City University of New YorkNew York City, NY, USA

Debbie ZacarianAmherst Public SchoolsUniversity of Massachusetts at AmherstAmherst, MA, USA

Dorothy ZemachCambridge University PressEugene, OR, USA

Staff EditorEllen GarshickAlexandria, VA, USA

Editorial Administration and Bulletin BoardCraig TriplettAlexandria, VA, USA

AdvertisingCindy FlynnAlexandria, VA, [email protected]

PrintingUnited Litho, Inc.Ashburn, VA, USA

Essential Teacher (ISSN 1545-6501) is published four times a year by Teachers of English toSpeakers of Other Languages, Inc. (TESOL).

For submission guidelines, see http://www.tesol.org/. Send correspondence [email protected] or

Essential TeacherTESOL700 South Washington Street, Suite 200Alexandria, Virginia 22314 USA

Essential Teacher is copyrighted to TESOL. All requests for permission to reprint should bemade through Copyright Clearance Center http://www.copyright.com

Names of teachers and students are pseudonyms or are used with permission.

Member ServicesPlease direct all membership queries toTESOL Membership Department700 South Washington Street, Suite 200Alexandria, Virginia 22314 USAor [email protected]

Current issues are a benefit of membership in TESOL. Requests for back issues of previous volume years, asthey become available, should be made to [email protected]

Officers

Jun Liu, PresidentUniversity of ArizonaTucson, Arizona, USA

Elliot L. Judd, Past PresidentUniversity of Illinois at ChicagoChicago, IL, USA

Sandra J. (Sandy) Briggs,President-ElectEducational ConsultantSan Francisco, CA, USA

Directors

Brock BradyAmerican UniversityWashington, DC, USA

Christine CoombeDubai Men’s CollegeDubai, United Arab Emirates

Gabriel Díaz MaggioliThe British SchoolsMontevideo, Uruguay

Lynne Díaz-RicoCalifornia StateUniversitySan Bernardino, CA, USA

Liz EnglandHong Kong Institute of EducationHong Kong SAR, China

Lía D. Kamhi-SteinCalifornia State UniversityLos Angeles, CA, USA

Joyce KlingCopenhagen BusinessSchoolFrederiksberg, Denmark

Penny McKayQueensland University of TechnologyBrisbane, Queensland,Australia

Suchada NimmannitChulalangkorn UniversityLanguage InstituteBangkok, Thailand

John SchmidtTexas InternationalEducation ConsortiumAustin, TX, USA

Jim StackSan Francisco UnifiedSchool DistrictSan Francisco, CA, USA

Stephen StoynoffMinnesota StateUniversityMankato, MN USA

Charles S. Amorosino, Jr.Executive Director/CEOAlexandria, VA, USA


TESOL’s mission is to ensure excellence in Englishlanguage teaching to speakers of other languages.

ˇç

Officers and Board of Directors 2006–2007

SEND

.gov .org.net.edu.biz

.gov .org.net

.edubi!Extra credit!Extra credit!

credit

Extra

4

5MARCH 2006

�

�

�

�

Basic English Grammar, Third Edition• New increased speaking practice through interactive pair

and group work.

• New structure-focused listening exercises.

• New additional activities that provide real communication opportunities.

• New Workbook with self-study exercises.

• New Audio CDs and listening script in the back of the Student Book.

Contact your ELL Specialist at 1-800-375-2375

To place an order, call 1-877-202-4572 • Visit our website at www.longmanusa.com

A Classic Grammar Text for Beginning Level Students

Join Co-author Stacy Hagen at TESOL, Friday 3/17

The New “Red Azar” Basic English Grammar Complete3:00 - 3:45 pm, Convention Center, Room 19 (Session #4378)

Immigrant students have alreadysuffered the trauma of leaving behindtheir extended family, friends,teachers, and schools. Then theyenter a U.S. school and are called bya new name. I often wonder how thisname change affects young children,who have no say in the decision.Isn’t your name part of your culturalidentity? It bothers me to call a newthird grader from Korea Leo when heis already so lost and confused.

Why do students from some cultureschange their names? A Korean friendexclaimed, “We do it for you! We doit so our names are easier forAmericans to pronounce.” When onestudent first came to the UnitedStates and enrolled in a school in aneighboring town, she wasimmediately asked, “What is yourAmerican name?” Her family feltobliged to give her a new name, andHee Eun became Helen.

In my school, we encourage parentsto keep their child’s original givenname, but we are usually foiled inthis attempt: the local immigrantcommunity tells parents thatAmericans cannot pronounceunusual names, and parents come toregister their child in school with anew name already chosen. Ourschool office records both names onall student lists so that all teacherssee them.

If the teachers, administrators, andoffice staff in your school are to writethe names of students from diversebackgrounds correctly, they need tounderstand how names are written indifferent cultures.

Here are some of the namingcustoms from the cultures of thestudents in my school.

Korean names are written with thefamily name (e.g., Lee) first. Thegiven name, which usually has two

COMMUNITIESCOMMUNITIES ofof practicepractice

I ’d like to be called by my Korean name, but Americans find it too hardto say,” a student informed me. Most of the fifth- and sixth-grade ESLstudents I teach feel conflicted about using an anglicized name, but

they want to fit in with their classmates. When I asked students how theirnew names had been chosen, they said that many parents had chosenbiblical names beginning with the same letter as the Korean name.

Circle Time What’s in a Name? by Judie Haynes

Why should

Hee Eun become

Helen unless

that is truly

her choice?

6

“

parts (e.g., Yeon Suk), follows. Eitherpart of the given name can be ageneration marker: Yeon Suk’s siblingsand cousins share the name Suk. Two-part given names should not beshortened—that is, Lee Yeon Sukshould be called not Yeon but YeonSuk. Yeon Suk’s mother does not takeher husband’s name but retains herown family name. This is why she hasa different surname on the schoolrecords. She may be called Mrs. Lee inthe school to accommodate U.S.custom, but this is not what she iscalled in Korean society.

Japanese names are also written with thefamily name first. The Japaneseelementary students I teach rarelyanglicize their names, but they dochange the order: Matsumoto Hirokobecomes Hiroko Matsumoto. (By theway, the given names of female studentsusually end in ko.) Japanese mothersuse their husband’s family name.

In Russia, children have three names: agiven name, a patronymic (a middlename based on the father’s first name),and the father’s surname. If ViktorAleksandrovich Rakhmaninov has twochildren, his daughter’s name would beSvetlana Viktorevna Rakhmaninova.(The a at the end of all three namesshows that she is female.) Her brotherwould be Mikhail ViktorevichRakhmaninov. Viktor Aleksandrovich’swife would be Ludmila MikhailovaRakhmaninova, unless she kept hermaiden name. In U.S. schools, Russianstudents generally use their given andfamily names following U.S. custom.

In general, children from Spanish-speaking families have a given nameand two surnames: the father’s familyname followed by the mother’s. Becareful not to drop one of thesesurnames. For example, if a childregisters as Ana López Ramírez, theschool should retain both López and

Ramírez. Ana’s mother is Mrs. López(her husband’s family name) deRamírez. Families who have lived inthe United States a long time mayeither hyphenate the double surnameor use the father’s family name.

Hindu parents from India usually basetheir children’s names on their raashis,which is determined by the position ofthe planets at the date and time ofbirth. The resulting names are oftenshortened by family and friends. Forexample, teachers may call brotherand sister Aditya and Aarushi by theseformal names, but family and friendsmay call them Adi and Ashi. Hindusdo not call older people by their firstnames. Aarushi, who is younger thanAditya, calls her brother Bhaiya (OlderBrother), and he calls her Ashi. Olderrelatives are called by their titles, suchas Aunt or Grandfather.

Chinese names are made up of threecharacters: a one-character family namefollowed by a two-character givenname. Families generally give their

children a nickname to be used byfriends and family as well as an officialname for the birth certificate and forschool. Students are usually called bytheir full name in school, but friendsand close relatives may use just thegiven name. When children enterschool in the United States, parents andchildren often take a new name, whichis used among friends, schoolmates,and colleagues, but the Chinese namesare used for official documents.

A parent in my school told me, “I havekept my Chinese name since I work atthe United Nations, where culturaldiversity is respected and encouraged.”Shouldn’t we as teachers strive to showthe same respect and encourage ourschool communities to learn topronounce names from other cultures?Why should Hee Eun become Helenunless that is truly her choice?

Thanks to Hyo Sook Chang, DeeptiDutta, Ruth Griffith, VanessaHernandez, and Xiao Quan Tang.

7MARCH 2006

The school office records both

names on all student lists so that

all teachers see them.

PAK, HELEN/HEE EUN


8

While most of the teachers are white,97 percent of the students arechildren of color, though some havemixed ethnicity. All of the childrencome from low-income families.Most do not speak English at home,and many parents are not veryliterate in their own language.

This context gives complaints adistinctive character. I hear teacherssay, “They have home entertainmentcenters but no books!” “Even if theydon’t speak English, why won’t theyread to their children in their nativelanguage?” “They send them off withchips, candy, and soda for breakfast!How can we teach kids who eat like that?”

In turn, I hear parents say, “I can’tunderstand the homework! Why don’tthe teachers explain it?” “How can mychild learn if she’s afraid she’ll be beatup at recess?” “Why go to schoolmeetings? Even if there’s a translator,nobody listens to what parents say!”

Attempts are made to bridge thegap—the desire is nearly alwaysthere—but the bridge is mostly one-way; parents cross it to access schoolgrounds. We send out notices andbulletins. We arrange meetings. Weschedule ESL, computer, andparenting classes and family math orreading nights. For a few families, weprovide therapy. Some parents come,but those who find the experienceunintelligible, intimidating, strange,or hostile are not apt to returnexcept to attend banquets andstudent performances.

In fall 1997, our principal and most ofthe teachers attempted to moderatecultural differences through home visits.The bridge became two-way. At parent-teacher conferences, I asked parents if Icould visit. Everyone appeared to agreeexcept for a Laotian mother who saidshe would need to ask her husband. Iwas shy about intruding on theirprivacy and preferred to wait for themto answer, but they didn’t.

At my elementary school, parents and school staff are separated bya cultural gap. On the surface, relations are usually cordial.Privately, some teachers and parents express deep frustration.

Home Room

Storming the Bridgeby Jim Hughes

There was one

family that I

was determined

to visit.

9MARCH 2006

For the same reason, I did not pursuevisits to parents whose willingnessseemed more polite than authentic.For example, when I broached thesubject of home visits during atelephone conference with a parent,her moment-too-long of silence mademe wonder about her reluctance.Were there goings-on she did notwant me to witness? Was shesuspicious of my motives just as I wasnow suspicious of hers? Or was shethinking, as I would be, about havingto clean the house?

Since I hadn’t time to see everyone, itwas far easier to call on those parentswho appeared eager to have me over.The visit I described in my December2005 column was typical. Perhaps, asa rule, I was right not to pursuereluctant parents. Home visits can beawkward. One does not ordinarilyinvite oneself to someone else’s house.Parents and teachers are strangers whomeet because of a mutual interest in aparticular child. Both parties haveideas and responsibilities relating tothis child, circumstances that can leadto conflict as well as cooperation.

There was one family, however, that Iwas determined to visit. MichaelRamos suffered from spina bifida, acongenital defect that had paralyzedhim from the waist down. I feared hewas being neglected. He had beendismissed from various therapiesbecause he did not keep hisappointments. Often his wheelchairwas in disrepair, his clothes were wornand dirty, and he needed a bath, amatter made acute by the fact that thiseight-year-old wore diapers.

His mother, Ms. Walker, put me off,mostly with the excuse that she wassick from pregnancy. I suspected otherreasons based on reports that herhouse was the site of domesticdisturbances and illegal drug activity.

Finally she gave in. I took our school’sfamily counselor with me. We wincedat how Ms. Walker gushed over herboy, hugging and kissing him andcooing, “My baby! My angel!”Michael’s father was not present,unless he was one of the three Latinomen who passed through. Ms. Walkerassured us that Michael’s seventeen-year-old sister, who had recently had ababy, bathed and diapered him. Thehouse, perhaps because of our havingto step over trash bags at the frontdoor, gave the impression of havingbeen recently picked up. Thepumpkin-colored carpet appearedfreshly vacuumed. It was, however,badly stained, and the curtains andupholstery were filthy.

“Sit down,” said Ms. Walker.

I put as little of myself as I could onthe sofa, perching on its edge. Idoubted there was anything real anduseful I could take from this visit.

Then Michael slid from his mother’s lapand crawled across the rug, pullinghimself by his arms, his legs dragging.

“I didn’t know you could do that!” Icried.

“I move fast, don’t I?”

“Want to do that at school?”

“Oh, yes!”

From that day forward, I lowered himto the rug when we formed a circle orwhen it was appropriate for him toplay or work there. I was glad I hadbadgered his mother for a visit. Howhe enjoyed scooting over to playcheckers or choose a book from the shelf!

But the meeting had not bridged thecultural gap, bringing us closer. Itsnature was inquisitorial. In themother’s eyes, we were officials of the

state, spying out evidence of childabuse. Ms. Walker’s duty, as she saw it,was to defend the bridge againstintruders or, at least, maintain barriers.She protected her family by making ashow of having a “normal”—that is, aclean, tidy, and respectable—householdwhose adoring mother was muchbeloved by her child. We made a showof being concerned, sympatheticadvocates for her and her son, thoughit was her child’s well-being that hadbrought us there.

Much, then, was pretense, which wasnot conducive to mutual learning or arelationship of trust, the intent ofhome visits. This visit, howevernecessary and productive, had beenabout storming the bridge.

Was she suspicious

of my motives just as

I was now suspicious

of hers? Or was she

thinking, as I would

be, about having to

clean the house?


10

“We worked with Taka,” arepresentative of the group replied.

“Taka? He doesn’t speak any English.Seriously, how did you arrive at theanswer?” Mr. Miller repeated.

“We worked with Taka,” they reiterated.

“Taka? He doesn’t speak any . . . .”Before he could bring himself to askthe question again, realizing that hemight sound foolish, Mr. Millerasked the group of students toexplain to him and the class howTaka had worked with them to solvethe problem set.

Watching carefully, he observed thegroup signal Taka to show them howhe had helped them solve key aspectsof the set. Sitting at a round table,Taka tackled the first element of theproblem, and his teammatesresponded by writing the nextelement. Within a short time, Mr.Miller realized that Taka had indeedplayed a key role in the group despitehis lack of English.

Taka was an active participant in thegroup and was contributing fully,concluded Mr. Miller. Thankfully, hethought, he did not have to be asconcerned about Taka in his math classas he had been. Within the next fewdays, however, while the team wascollectively struggling with a newproblem set, Mr. Miller noticed thatTaka did not appear to be participating.His eyes were focused away from thegroup and, therefore, not on theproblem, and the group did not appearto notice his lack of participation.

Mr. Miller was faced with a familiarchallenge: how could he ensure thatTaka had his mind on math, and thatthe assigned tasks and activities wereengaging and, most important,purposeful? The challenge was togive Taka multiple opportunities tolearn actively every day. Mr. Millerfelt that this was a tall order and thathis ability to create lessons that werepurposeful for the English languagelearners in his classes wasinconsistent at best.

H ow did you arrive at the answer?” Mr. Miller, a math teacher,asked the first group that had completed the problem set.

The Road Taken

Seriously, How Did You Arrive at the Answer? by Debbie Zacarian

Adding

reflection

facilitators and

turn-taking

charts

increased Mr.

Miller’s ability

to tap the

positive power

of group work.

“

11MARCH 2006

He had attended several trainingsessions about math teaching. Groupwork was always emphasized as animportant teaching method, and hebelieved strongly in its value. Recently,he had also attended manyprofessional development sessionsgeared specifically toward mathteachers of English language learners.These sessions had supported his useof group work as a way to providestudents with rich opportunities to useand practice English. He had also beenencouraged to create groups composedof native speakers of American Englishand English language learners. Varioustrainers had stated that thisheterogeneous configuration wouldenhance two important functions. Itwould support the ideal that eachstudent was an important resourcewith something important to offer, andit would provide English languagelearners with important languagemodels and opportunities to practicethe new language.

Armed with a strong belief in the valueof separating his classes into small,heterogeneous groups, Mr. Millerdesigned tasks and activities that hehoped would be meaningful andpurposeful for each student. He beganthinking about Taka and his unevenparticipation in the small group that hehad been assigned to and began

observing Taka’s group in earnest. Whatwas striking was that the students paidinconsistent attention to Taka. Often,they began a conversation withoutpaying any attention to who was or wasnot participating.

Mr. Miller developed a strategy foraddressing this dilemma. He askedeach group to select one member toreflect on the group’s collaborativeprocess, called, in Mr. Miller’s term, agroup reflection facilitator. “With yourgroup,” Mr. Miller said, “design achart that you will use to mark downeach time a group member speaks oruses body language, either to signalagreement with another member or tocontribute a new idea.” He asked eachgroup to share the chart with thewhole class so that all groups had theopportunity to see how other groupshad designed theirs. By the end ofclass, each group had completed thedesign of its chart.

The next day, Mr. Miller asked eachreflection facilitator to use the chart tomark the group members’participation. At the end of class, heasked the facilitators to share theirchart with their group and to discusstheir group’s process. Interestingly,several noted that the Englishlanguage learners in each group hadnot participated as often as the other

members. Noting this, Mr. Millerasked each group to encourage theparticipation of the English languagelearners so that the turn taking wouldbe more equitable. He asked thereflection facilitators to note the turntaking of the group on the chartduring the next five classes and todiscuss their group’s process at theclose of each class.

By the end of the second week of thisintervention activity, almost everyone,including Mr. Miller, noted a higherrate of participation for each student.Mr. Miller believed that the strategy ofadding reflection facilitators and theturn-taking charts increased his abilityto tap the positive power of groupwork. He also believed that thisintervention increased theperformance of the English languagelearners, in math and in English.

He asked each reflection facilitator to use the

chart to mark the group members’ participation.

Jamie Juan Taka Amy


12

At a recent reception given by theChinese Consulate in New York City,I met a group of Chinese scholarspursuing advanced degrees in theUnited States. We talked about theirearly experiences as students at U.S.universities. When I asked about thelinguistic difficulties they hadencountered as new arrivals, quite afew mentioned that weak listeningcomprehension skills had kept themfrom feeling comfortable inconversational settings.

Over the years, I have heard similarlaments from other students juststarting their degree programs. Iknow from my own experience,however, that this unease andinsecurity is as addressable as it iscommon. In my ESL classes at theCity University of New York, I havemade the building of listeningconfidence one of the mostimportant basic objectives.

New York City offers learners ampleopportunities to practice listeningoutside class—on the bus, in shops, inthe workplace, anywhere students

come in contact with the city’s manyinhabitants. My job is to encouragestudents to take risks by helping themdevelop skills and strategies that willbuild their listening confidence.

Brown (2001) suggests that learning tolisten really means learning to respondand to continue a chain of listeningand responding. In the classroom, theteaching of listening must at somepoint include instruction in the two-way nature of listening.

The adults I teach respond best tolistening activities that are trulycommunicative and interactive. Thekey is creating opportunities forthem to interact with each otherinstead of only with me. Thissemester the class and I have focusedon developing a comfort level withimplied speech and sustaining aclassroom environment that makesthe students feel safe enough to takerisks, especially in small groups,since much real-world interactionoccurs in small groups.

From drums and gongs,

You hear the beats;

From human talk,

You perceive the hints.—Chinese proverb

Multilingual Momentum

Listening between the Linesby Ke Xu

I teach students

how to listen

between the lines

by creating

contexts that

help sharpen

their sense of

implied meaning.

13MARCH 2006

ESL students often fail to function inreal-life communication because theylack experience with impliedmeanings, especially in conversation.In the words of the Chinese proverb,they can’t perceive “the hints fromhuman talk.” One hot day, forexample, I walked into my classroomand realized immediately that the airconditioning was off. I asked Kim, aKorean student sitting next to the airconditioner, “What happened to theair conditioner?”

“Nothing happened,” he answered.

“Don’t you feel hot?” I asked.

“No, I am OK. Thanks,” he answeredpolitely, not understanding that I wassuggesting that he turn it on. Anotherstudent, who did understand themessage, turned on the air conditioner.

I now teach students how to listenbetween the lines by creating differentcontexts that will help sharpen theirsense of implied meaning. For example,seeing an empty seat next to a student,I might point to it and ask, “May I?” OrI might look at the clock on the wall,saying, “Oh, it’s eleven o’clock,” andthen wait for my students’ response:“Time to take a break!”

Sometimes we watch clips frommovies or listen to audiotapes anddiscuss scenes in which the charactersperceive or miss implied meanings.My favorites are comedies built on thehumor that results when someoneintentionally ignores the conventionalimplication. The students discuss ingroups what they’ve understood,comparing notes on what is funny,what message was implied, and how itwas misinterpreted.

After a few months, many studentshave increased their understanding ofU.S. culture, and they find it easier toperceive implied meanings in real-lifecommunication. For instance, aChinese student told me that, beforehe took my class, he didn’t know that“I won’t keep you here any longer” or“Thank you for coming” may actuallymean “It’s time for you to leave.”

In class, the students and I also focuson the listening skills necessary forclass discussions. We practiceunderstanding and producing phrasesand expressions students need tonegotiate meanings—implied anddirect, such as when giving feedbackand asking for clarification.

Group work functions well as a way ofgenerating interactive language, butsetting up effective groups requirescare. For example, my classes includemany Chinese students who speak acommon native language. How shouldI group them so that they will feel safeenough to use English rather thantheir first language? One techniqueI’ve used is to survey same-language

speakers to find out which part of thecountry they are from, which dialectthey speak at home, and how manyand which dialects they understandaurally. One semester, the resultsdemonstrated that, although most ofthe Chinese students read Chinese,they speak different dialects (e.g.,Mandarin, Cantonese, Fukianese,Hakka, Taishan). Few students arecomfortable speaking a second dialect,so I have placed those speakingdifferent dialects into the same group,where they interact in English.

I also try to design learning tasks thatare closely related to real life. Forexample, some of my students happento be preparing for job interviews.One successful activity (from Nunan1995) focused on helping studentspractice for upcoming interviews.Students read a job description andcandidate requirements, listen to anaudiotape of candidates beinginterviewed for the job, and thenselect the best person for the job.

Perceiving the hints from human talkis no easy task, but it is notimpossible. As long as teachersprovide guidance and appropriatestrategies, learners can move past thebeats and into the comfortable realmof listening and responding with ease.

References

Brown, D. 2001. Teaching by principles: Aninteractive approach to language pedagogy. 2nded. New York: Addison Wesley Longman.

Nunan, D., ed. 1995. New ways in teachinglistening. Alexandria, VA: TESOL.

Seeing an empty seat

next to a student, I

might point to it and

ask, “May I?”


14

A good starting

point for

professional

development is

to realize that

the whys greatly

outnumber the

why nots.

This is just one of the manyinteresting things I learned from arecent visit to Colombia, where Ipresented at the Fortieth AnnualConvention of the Association ofColombian English LanguageTeachers. I also learned that engagingin professional development is a realchallenge for Colombian teachers.Wherever I went, the English languageteachers I met agreed that professionaldevelopment was important but thatthere were many obstacles to engagingin it. From visits to more than twentycountries over the past ten years, Ihave learned that this is a recurringtheme among teachers.

What factors limit the quantity andquality of the professionaldevelopment that English languageteachers can engage in? Some yearsago, I started to compile a list ofreasons given by teachers in differentcountries (see Bailey, Curtis, and

Nunan 2001 for more detail). Hereare the top ten limiting factors given,listed more or less in the order offrequency of response:

� lack of time: I’m too busy.

� lack of energy: I’m too tired.

� no motivation: I’m not clear onthe purposes and benefits.

� lack of institutional support: Idon’t have funding, release time,and so on.

� lack of encouragement: Colleaguesand supervisors don’t supportprofessional development.

� dislike of theories and experts: Ithink teaching is all about practice.Theory has little to do with it.

� dislike of fashions and fads:Professional development is justanother temporary trend.

T he Colombian government has reportedly issued a letterexpressing official displeasure at the Brad Pitt–Angelina Joliemovie Mr. and Mrs. Smith, about an ordinary, suburban married

couple who are secretly—and unbeknownst to each other—professionalkillers. Apart from the dubious plot line, the Colombian government isunhappy because the opening scene, full of helicopter gunships,explosions and angry-sounding, Spanish-speaking military police, is setin Bogotá, Colombia.

In-Service

Weighing the Whys and Why Nots ofProfessional Developmentby Andy Curtis

15MARCH 2006

� interference with the teachingprocess: Professional developmentis a distraction.

� resistance to change: If it ain’tbroke, why fix it?

� fear of confronting the self: I’mafraid of seeing aspects of myselfI may not like.

Most of the items on the list are all toofamiliar and self-explanatory, though afew are worth looking at in a little moredetail. For example, I’m disappointed tosee that some teachers still cling to theartificial and simplistic theory-practicedichotomy. Useful educational theorycomes out of and feeds back intoeffective classroom teaching, with suchteaching informing and being informedby such theory. This reason may relateto the idea that professionaldevelopment may be taking teachers’attention away from teaching, butagain, consistently effective teaching isoften the result of deliberate,structured, and systematic involvementin teacher professional development.

The last reason given, fear ofconfronting the self, relates to whatBailey, Nunan, and I (1998) havereferred to as “undeniable insights.”We mean that if, for example, yourpeers, your supervisors, and yourstudents tell you that you talk tooquickly in class, you can resistchanging because the impetus tochange has come from outsideyourself. However, if one day you arewatching a video of your teaching andrealize that you do in fact speak tooquickly in class, then you mustchange because you now know—through your own, self-generatedinsight—that this cannot continue.This, then, is one of the central goalsof any teacher professionaldevelopment: to enable self-generatedawareness and insights so you canmove forward.

What is perhaps even more importantthan these factors limiting teachers’professional development is teachers’response to the question: In spite of suchconstraints, why do English languageteaching professionals still strive toengage in professional development? Inmost of the countries in which I askedthese two questions, the teachersgenerated nearly twice as many reasonsto engage in professional development asthey did factors limiting it. Here are thetop twenty reasons given, again not inany precise order:

� acquire new knowledge and skills

� upgrade present knowledge and skills

� develop new language teachingand learning approaches,methods, and techniques

� learn about new materials, suchas new course books

� learn about or learn to use newtechnologies, such as the Internet

� share ideas and challenges,problems, and solutionscollaboratively and cooperatively

� cope with changes in the contextand setting outside of the school,such as large-scale, nationalpolitical change

� cope with changes in the contextand setting inside the school,such as small-scale, internalpolitical change

� cope with external educationalinitiatives, such as thoseintroduced by local, provincial, ornational governments

� network with other Englishlanguage teaching professionals

� earn higher income and greater prestige

� enhance promotion prospects

� empower myself

� gain enjoyment from creativeproblem solving

� fulfill a need for variety and novelty

� avoid routinization, that is, excessivereliance on automatic responses

� create professional interest andsupport groups

� communicate with the widercommunity, including parents andother educational stakeholders

� prevent burnout

� gain respect as a professional

Again, most of the items on the listare familiar and self-explanatory. Inmy June 2006 column, I will look atpractical ways in which you can takepart in professional developmentwithout adding excessively to youralready-too-full schedule. But beforelooking at the question of how, a goodstarting point is to realize that thewhys greatly outnumber the why nots.

References

Bailey, K. M., A. Curtis, and D. Nunan. 2001.Pursuing professional development: The self assource. Boston: Heinle and Heinle.

Bailey, K. M., D. Nunan, and A. Curtis. 1998.Undeniable insights: The collaborative use ofthree development practices. TESOLQuarterly 32:546–56.


16

It was . . . different. I taught thelowest level classes, so the studentscame in with almost no English.Fortunately, they were young, flexible,and living in an English-speakingcountry, and within just days theywere confidently calling out their firstEnglish phrase: “Extra credit!” (Whatis it with extra credit? Students wouldask about it before even beginning theregular assignment, and would workharder and longer on something withthat magic label. If I had to do it allover again, I’d just call everythingextra credit.)

The contact hours were higher than atthe university, the classes were larger,and the students had twice as muchenergy and three times as manyquestions, many of which had nothingto do with ESL. It was an exhilarating(if exhausting) ride, but at the time Ihad trouble making sense of it all. Eachclass period seemed like an episode in asituation comedy in which I played thebumbling title role.

Last fall, my own child started middleschool, and the memories cameflooding back. And I realized that

enough time has passed for me torecognize the lessons presented to mein such memorable episodes as these:

The feminine protection episode: Justbefore class, Marina franticallybeckoned me outside. As soon as Istepped out, she pulled me to theside and whipped a tampon out ofher pocket. “I have to know how touse this before third period,” shesaid. “For PE [physical education]class. Swimming. In America, it isn’texcuse.” Her mother, it appeared,didn’t know how to use one eitherand had sent her off with inadequateinstructions. I’d never actually read ajob description for my position, but Iwas sure this wasn’t in it.

In my cowardice, I attempted to passthe buck: “Why don’t you ask your PEteacher?” Marina blushed. “I’m tooembarrassed to ask him.” Fortunately,we had just been studying givinginstructions and had even talkedabout the value of a diagram, which Ihastily drew. I never asked for aprogress report, but Marina passed PE,including swimming.

I ’ve spent most of my teaching life in university classrooms. However, insearch of a job with health insurance, I once spent a year in a privatesecondary school, armed with only dim memories of my own school

days and some helpful suggestions from colleagues (“Remember—they cansmell your fear”). After all, I reasoned, how hard could it be? ESL is ESL.These students would be just the same as the others, only shorter.

From A to Z

Middle School Memoriesby Dorothy Zemach

Each class

period seemed

like an episode

in a situation

comedy in

which I played

the bumbling

title role.

17MARCH 2006

The unfortunate nickname episode: Ingrammar class, students were takingturns reading aloud from a textbooksome sentences they’d put into thesimple past. One by one, they readsentences in which various characters—Mary, Bob, Sandy, and so on—performed their simple past actions.Things went smoothly until little Kazuread out sentence 6: “Dick ____ hisapartment in a hurry this morningbecause he was late for school.”Pandemonium broke out. “Ms.Zemach! Did you hear what he said?”“Is he going to get detention?” “Read itagain, Kazu!” “Is that really someone’sname? It’s not against the law?”

In his embarrassment, Kazu actuallyslipped through the back of his seat,wedging in his rear end and leavinghis arms and legs flailing in the air infront of him. It took me and a huskyTongan boy several minutes of tuggingto extract him. No more grammar waschecked during that class.

The squashed bug episode: Our ground-floor classroom, whose door to theoutside I left open for ventilation,attracted a number of slow-movingbeetles. The boys stepped on themuntil I threatened the loss of fivepoints on a quiz to any killers. Oneday, as I carefully swept another beetle

outside, the art teacher walked byoutside and squashed the beetle flat infront of the class, to the students’ vastdelight. “Are you going to take fivepoints off her quiz, Ms. Zemach?”

The minimal pairs episode: Kenta’sfavorite English phrase was “No fair!,”which he used liberally and often. I’dannounce a quiz the next week: “Nofair!” Some homework for thatevening: “No fair!” Amultidisciplinary project: “No fair!”Some group work: “No fair!” Ignoringit, challenging it, and questioning itdid nothing to discourage him. FinallyI used the five-points threat, whichworked. But he stayed after classshortly after to ask me what waswrong with saying “No fair.” I toldhim using the phrase was whining,blaming someone else for his ownfailure to take responsibility.

He looked confused. “But then why isit OK for Americans to wear it ontheir shirts?” (Our school’s dress codeforbade offensive language on shirts.)

“I don’t think anyone has that on a shirt.”

“They do, lots of them,” he insisted.He pointed to an older boy walking byoutside. “See the back of his shirt?” In

large letters, it said “No fear”—thebrand name and slogan of a popularclothing company that sold surfinggear. Here was a teaching moment inboth pronunciation and attitude, andafter five minutes of drilling, I gaveKenta permission to say “No fear!”when I announced an assignment.

Here are the lessons I learned fromthese episodes:

� Expect the unexpected. You maybe (or seem to be) the onlyresource the students have.

� If you’re writing a worksheet (ora textbook), and you must use ashort name in order to save space,try Rick or Nick or Vic. But notthat other one.

� The threat of losing points on afuture quiz is a pretty good toolfor behavior modification.However, you can only controlyour own classroom, not theworld outside.

� Things aren’t always what theyseem. Before you assume a studenthas an attitude problem, take thetime to talk with him or her.

And never forget the power of extra credit.

Students would work harder and longer

on something with that magic label.!Extra credit!Extra credit!

credit

Extra

18

Please visit the University of Michigan English Language Instituteat Booth 443 and learn more about our international examinations, testpublications, university admissions exam, and many more exciting programs, products, and services.

The University of MichiganEnglish Language Institute

TESOL 2006

March 15:

March 16:

March 17:

March 18:

Diane Larsen-Freeman, “Complex, Dynamic, and Ecological Perspectives on Language Learning”

Rita Simpson-Vlach w/co-panelists, “English for Specific Purposes: Genre and Corpora in EAP Classrooms”

Chris Feak w/co-panelists, “Grammar in and for Academic Writing”

Fernando Fleurquin, panel “TESOL and the Assessment Movement”

Sheryl Leicher, “From Corpora to EAP Classroom Materials”

Fernando Fleurquin, “Mapping EFL Exams to the CEF”

Julia Salehzadeh, “Data Commentaries in Conference English”

Fernando Fleurquin w/co-presenter, “New Materials for a New ECCE Test”

Fernando Fleurquin, “Developing EFL Tests for Young Learners”

www.lsa.umich.edu/eli

March 15-18Tampa, Florida USA

When English Language Learners WriteConnecting Research to Practice, K–8

Katharine Davies Samway0-325-00633-4 / 2006 / 224pp / $24.00

Teaching Reading and Writing in Spanish and English in Bilingual and Dual Language Classrooms

Second EditionYvonne S. Freeman and David E. Freeman

0-325-00801-9 / 2006 / 288pp est. / $32.00

Help! My Kids Don’t All Speak EnglishHow to Set Up a Language Workshop in

Your Linguistically Diverse ClassroomNancy Akhavan

0-325-00798-5 / 2006 / 224pp / $25.00

A How-To Guide for Teaching English Language Learners

In the Primary ClassroomPat Barrett Dragan

0-325-00700-4 / 2005 / 272pp / $28.00

Save10%when you order online!

www.heinemann.com

To place an order, call 800.225.5800, or fax 603.431.2214. www.heinemann.com

19MARCH 2006

Out of the Out of the boxboxOut of the Out of the boxbox

uring my second semester in the TESOL program at California

State University, Sacramento, I discovered Stephen Krashen.

His set of five interrelated hypotheses (1985) on second

language acquisition (SLA) was so intuitively appealing that I couldn’t

help but be amazed.

Here’s the story of why I grasped onto hisideas so quickly, how I subsequentlybecame disenchanted, and how Ieventually came to a theoretical andpedagogical reconciliation with his ideas.

Unconscious Acquisition According to Krashen’s theory, languageacquisition is a subconscious and intuitiveprocess of constructing the system oflanguage. It’s how children seem to pickup a language without effort. On theother hand, attending to form—figuringout rules and becoming aware of one’sown language processes—ischaracteristic of language learning. One issubconscious and easy, and the other isself-conscious and difficult.

Buttressing this theory with Long’s (1985)interaction hypothesis, which states thatcomprehensible input is the result ofmodifications native speakers and othersmake to render their messages intelligible,I was nearly instantly convinced of itsvalidity. In his acquisition-versus-learningdichotomy, I could find no fault. I became,although I wouldn’t hear the term formany years, a Krashenite.

The MonitorThe monitor, the second part of Krashen’sfive-pronged theory, which states thatlearners consciously examine their own

D

Confessions of an Ex-Krashen Basher by Baxter Jackson

20

speech only when physically and mentallyable, made logical sense, too. I had, afterall, monitored my own speech in a secondlanguage, and, frankly, it was exhausting.Even thinking about shaping andrefocusing sound in an area of the mouththat I was not used to using—changingmy facial and mouth muscularity—mademy face hurt. Each time I recalled all myconscious monitoring of my own output,his learning/acquisition dichotomyseemed to make more sense.

The Natural Order of ThingsThat people acquire language in apredictable or natural order was appealingin a very natural way. The memory of mylittle sister’s emerging speech seemed toagree with Krashen’s natural orderhypothesis. The more I read and reflectedon my own experiences with SLA, themore convinced I became. “Here was theanswer!” I thought.

i + 1The fourth part of Krashen’s theory of SLAis the input hypothesis. If acquirers are atstage or level i, and the input they receiveis just a bit beyond their current level (i +1), then they will comprehend most of themessage they are receiving (either viaspoken language or print media). At i +1,acquirers will be challenged just enough to

make progress in the language, and theywill eventually become communicativelycompetent. My own experience withpeople who had spoken to me in thisfashion (at i +1) in a new languageconfirmed this theory while Long’s (1985)hypothesis seemed to vouchsafe it all.

At this point, I should have run forpresident of Krashen’s fan club.

The Affective FilterIn the last part of his theory, Krashenagain articulated what I had personallyexperienced on a number of occasions.Simply put, when defensive or anxious,you’ll find it hard to understand oracquire anything. He called this theaffective filter hypothesis.

Now, not only did I have a theoreticalexplanation for those times when Icouldn’t understand, but I also had anexcuse for the future! “My affective filterwas high, you see. That’s why I didn’t getit.” Krashen put words to what I hadexperienced, and I ate it up.

A Sin of Omission?My status as a self-proclaimed Krashenitespanned two continents and a couple ofyears of teaching experience. By providingESL students with large amounts ofunstructured comprehensible input,reducing form-focused languageinstruction, avoiding corrective feedback,and focusing on meaning, I made sure hishypotheses informed my classroompractices. Not until my second-to-lastsemester in my TESOL program, when Iread the first heading of the class syllabusfor an advanced class on SLA theory, “TheFailure of Input/Interaction,” did I beginto suspect that Krashen had committed thesin of omission.

Swain’s (1985) study on the role ofcomprehensible input and output on thedevelopment of communicativecompetence was like a slap in the face. Ididn’t want to believe thatcomprehensible input wasn’t enoughbecause if I did, then I’d have to rethinkmy whole teaching philosophy. OtherSLA research I read at the time onlydeepened my growing concern.

Taking InventoryI couldn’t avoid the inevitable: I had totake stock of Krashen’s five-pronged inputhypothesis by articulating (1) the reason hehad argued that teaching grammar wasnot necessary, (2) the validity of thesearguments, and (3) the evidence thatcomprehensible input and communicativeinteraction alone were not sufficient topush SLA to high levels. Sato’s (1986) lookat the role of interlanguage in SLA andSchmidt’s (1983) notice-the-gap theorypointed toward a possible sin of omission.Could I have been deceived?

Begrudgingly, I began the examination.The much-echoed criticism of the inputhypothesis that I read was thatcomprehensible and communicativeinteraction were not enough to pushSLA to high levels. Reflecting on myown experience teaching ESL studentswho were born and raised in California(Generation 1.5 students) yet lacked thenecessary writing skills to succeed incollege supported this criticism. With allof the prerequisites for SLA in place,what could explain their poor writingability? Here was a clear gap betweenthe input hypothesis and reality, and thebeginning of my transformation fromignorance to knowledge.

Using TESOL Quarterly’s guidelines forquantitative research (TESOL 2003), Irevisited Swain’s (1985) study of theacquisition of French by Canadianchildren in elementary schoolimmersion classrooms. Because herparticipants had had seven years ofcomprehensible input, they seemedideal candidates to answer the question,Is comprehensible input enough?

The immersion students’ achievementscores on tests of math, science, history,and other subjects were just as good asthose of students enrolled in the regularEnglish curriculum. This seemed to provethat the input was comprehensible. Andbecause Swain’s participants were notexposed to French outside of theclassroom, she was able to control forother variables that would reduce therobustness of her results.

21MARCH 2006

�

“ “

I had to reconcile mydifferences withKrashen’s theory of SLAby giving credit wherecredit was due.

An Epiphany Swain’s conclusions followed logicallyfrom her needs analysis, design, andmethods. She concluded thatcomprehensible input and communicativeinteraction alone were not enough to pushSLA to higher levels. She found that thestudents were similar to native speakersin terms of discourse competence but notin their grammatical and sociolinguisticcompetence (although their scores wererelatively high for both of these domains).This finding was, in fact, congruent withLong’s interaction hypothesis but was notsufficient to explain the students’ lack ofnativelike proficiency.

The answer became obvious;comprehensible output plays as big a rolein the SLA equation as communicativeinteraction and comprehensible input do.Any model that ignores or denies theimportance of one of these threecomponents is not looking at SLAholistically and is, in fact, missing a keyvariable in the SLA equation.

The UnravelingMy days as a Krashenite were over. Ihad been willingly misled! Like an ex-smoker critical of those who still smoke,

I became wildly intolerant of Krashenand his ideas. I became a Krashenbasher. To me, his input hypothesis wasriddled with fast-and-loose definitionsand oversimplifications, and was basedon a false dichotomy. His definitions ofacquisition and learning, of consciousand subconscious, were fuzzy at best.

I found others who agreed with me.McLaughlin (1990), for example, agreedthat these terms “were too laden withsurplus meaning and too difficult to defineempirically to be useful theoretically” (p.627). Krashen had built the falsedichotomy of the input hypothesis on thebasis that acquisition was subconscious,that learning was conscious, and that therewas no overlap between the two. Bystating that comprehensible input was thesingle cause for SLA, Krashenoversimplified the complexity involved inacquiring a second language.

And now I come to the near present. Afew days before writing this article, Ireceived the reading for the first part ofthe comprehensive exam in TESOL(which is required for graduation). Wegraduate students were supposed to readit critically and prepare as best we couldfor what we thought would be asked of

us. On the following Friday, we wouldhave three and a half hours to respond.

The reading was a chapter from a bookby Krashen. Apparently, mytransformation from ignorance toknowledge was incomplete. To preparefor the exam, I had to reconcile mydifferences with Krashen’s theory ofSLA by giving credit where credit wasdue. This article is my tribute to hisideas and how they have influenced mypedagogical decisions.

Acquiescence and GratitudeI have to admit that some of Krashen’sideas still inform my approach to teaching.They have, however, been somewhattempered. Rather than engaging in real-life, authentic language in the classroom tothe total exclusion of any potentiallyhelpful controlled exercises, grammaticalpointers, or other analytical devices, as Itended to do before, I have incorporatedthem into a part of my approach. Iunderstand now that “teaching is not onlya matter of providing the learner with theright data at the right time, of teachinghim how to learn, but of developing inhim appropriate learning strategies andmeans of testing his hypotheses as well”(Corder 1973, 133).

22

“

I didn’t want to believe thatcomprehensible input wasn’t enoughbecause if I did, then I’d have torethink my whole teaching philosophy. “

23MARCH 2006

Like many others in my field, at theoutset of my career I longed forsomething simple on which I could basemy methodology. Krashen’s theoryseemed to reflect established principles.His ideas were appealing, and fromsome footage that I’ve seen, he was apowerfully persuasive speaker. Histheory was the first seemingly coherentpicture I had of how people acquiresecond languages. Like the manyresearchers he lit on fire with hisoverreaching claims, I looked carefullyat what was known, what the researchevidence was, and what the plausiblealternatives were.

Even today, with most of us teachersadopting a cautiously eclectic,integrated approach to SLA thatbalances input, output, and interaction,some of the ideas that Krashensynthesized will live forever, and forthat we should be grateful.

References

Corder, S. P. 1973. Pedagogic grammars. InGrammar and second language teaching: A book ofreadings, ed.W. E. Rutherford and M. S. Smith,123–45. New York: Newbury House.

Krashen, S. D. 1985. The input hypothesis.London: Longman.

Long, M. H. 1985. Input and second languageacquisition theory. In Input in second languageacquisition, ed. S. Gass and C. Madden, 377–93.Rowley, MA: Newbury House.

McLaughlin, B. 1990.“Conscious” versus“unconscious” learning. TESOL Quarterly24:617–34.

Sato, C. 1986. Conversation and interlanguagedevelopment: Rethinking the connection. In Talkingto learn, ed. R. Day, 5–22. Rowley, MA:Newbury House.

Schmidt, R.W. 1983. Interaction, acculturation, andthe acquisition of communicative competence:Acase study of an adult. In Sociolinguistics and secondlanguage acquisition, ed. N.Wolfson and E. Judd,137–74. Rowley, MA: Newbury House.

Swain, M. 1985. Communicative competence:Some roles of comprehensible output in itsdevelopment. In Input and second languageacquisition, ed. S. Gass and C. Madden, 235–53.Rowley, MA: Newbury House.

TESOL. 2003. TESOL Quarterly quantitativeresearch guidelines. http://www.tesol.org/s_tesol/sec_document.asp?CID=476&DID=1032.

Baxter Jackson works for Microsoft Corporationas a language specialist in support engineeraccent reduction, in India.

e could wow them with numbers.”

Two ESOL teachers, a curriculumcoordinator, and I—a teacher educator—were brainstorming ideas for kicking offan in-service program for a local highschool’s content area teachers. The topic:linguistically appropriate content areainstruction for English language learners.Our audience would be harried teachersin the middle of a busy spring semester.The four of us had worked hard to securetwo hours of in-service time, and wewanted to start off on the right foot. Thatmeant grabbing the teachers’ attentionand opening our conversation on teachingwith English language learners on apositive note. The question was, howcould we do that?

Starting off with statistics, as one of ourteam suggested, was one way to go, and Ihad used that tack before in in-serviceprograms. The numbers were certainlyattention grabbing. This school, a smallcity high school in the southern UnitedStates, had seen the number of Englishlanguage learners double in the past year,and the state had experienced a 315percent increase in English languagelearners over the past decade (NationalClearinghouse for English LanguageAcquisition 2004). A neighboring statehad gone from 10,000 to nearly 60,000English language learners in the sametime span. And census projections werefor future immigration increases (U.S.Census Bureau 2004).

These statistics had good shock value,and the implications were clear: ifteachers had not yet had Englishlanguage learners in their classrooms,they would soon, and in ever-increasingnumbers. I had recited similar statisticsbefore, supporting the numbers withhelpful charts and graphs. Sharp intakesof breath and expressions of surpriseamong my audience members told me thetechnique had worked. But I began towonder, at what price?

Is Fear Productive?I could not shake a feeling of unease witha statistics-based conversation opener. Inexamining the kind of attention therecitation of newcomer statistics stirred inthe audience, I realized that no small partof the reaction might be fear. The teacherswere already feeling some discomfort inthe face of the inclusion (or impendinginclusion) of English language learners intheir classrooms. This discomfort had, infact, been instrumental in winning us thein-service time. English language learnerswere a new kind of student for thisdistrict, and anticipating the changesthese students would bring wasunsettling to many in our audience.

Would the recitation of English languagelearner statistics, accurate as they were, bea productive way to open ourconversation? Not if it tapped into adiscourse of fear that was already apparent

Starting Conversations withContent Area Peers by Jenelle Reeves

24

“

W


in the region and the nation as a whole:the fear of an immigrant invasion.

Finding evidence of that fear is notdifficult, and the news media are a goodplace to begin the search. The languageused in the media to describe the recentincreases in the immigrant populationcommonly suggests that the UnitedStates is in the midst of a full-fledgedinvasion. Tuning into cable and networknews broadcasts, you are likely to hearabout the influx of immigrants, the floodof illegals across the U.S.-Mexicanborder, and the inundation of U.S.schools by non-English-speakingstudents. Such language conveys imagesof teeming hordes of outsiders pouringinto the country, laying siege to U.S.language and culture.

The rhetoric might stir up already-simmering anti-immigrant sentiment orplant the seeds for it, but it would notopen a conversation with contentteachers on the productive note we werestriving for. We could easily lose analready skittish audience of teachers tothe discourse of fear that shock-and-awestatistics could produce. The beginningof our conversation with content areapeers ought to bolster their confidencein their ability to include Englishlanguage learners in content learning,and reduce the distance between theselearners and their content teachers.Perhaps the conversation we started atthis in-service could help subvert, or atleast throw into question, local andnational narratives of fear.

Principles for a Productive DialogueHow, then, could we open a productivedialogue? In this article, I offer threeprinciples to guide you as you initiateconversations with content area peers:make it personal, make it positive, andmake a connection.

Make It PersonalTelling content area teachers aboutEnglish language learners’ lives is oneway to facilitate the inclusion of theselearners. In my experience in schoolswith small or emerging English languagelearner populations, many teachers knowlittle about learners’ experiences aslinguistic and cultural outsiders. Teachersmay have little experience as second

language learners, for example. Helpingteachers see through the eyes of Englishlanguage learners may deepen theirempathy for newcomers.

A language submersion activity can bean effective way to personalize theexperiences of English languagelearners. This activity has the advantageof capturing the audience’s attention aswell as focusing that attention on theoften frustrating experience of learningcontent in a second language. In otherwords, in a language submersionexperience, you put teachers in Englishlanguage learners’ shoes.

Our team chose this approach to startinga dialogue with content area teachers.One of our team members, a fluentSpanish speaker, volunteered to be aSpanish language content instructor.During the submersion experience, shedelivered a short lecture on CentralAmerican social class structures entirelyin Spanish. The lecture was devoid ofcontext clues as to its content: nopictures, no examples, no repetitions,and no clarifications of any sort. Most ofthe teachers struggled to make sense ofthe lecture, and a sense of frustrationquickly set in. Groans, nervous laughter,and, eventually, grumblings in Englishbroke out among the teachers. On themock quiz following the lecture, ouraudience, with the notable exception ofthe Spanish language teachers,performed quite poorly.

The lecture was given again, this timewith pictures, repetition of importantwords, emphasis on cognates, andopportunities for students to interact.On the second quiz, the teachersperformed much better. Surprised bytheir ability to understand some of thesheltered lecture in Spanish, many of theteachers reported finishing the activitywith a new sense of what it might belike for the English language learners intheir classrooms.

As a conversation opener, the activitywas a big success. It grabbed theaudience’s attention, made the content-learning experience of English languagelearners personal to the teachers, andled smoothly into a discussion ofsheltered instruction techniques. (Forsimilar activities conducted with Englishlanguage learners’ mainstream peers,see Kubota et al. 2000 and “I Was Lostbefore the End of the First Minute,”Essential Teacher, Summer 2004.)

Make It PositiveThe difficulties of English languagelearner inclusion, particularly at thesecondary level, were well known, or atleast well rumored, within our contentteacher audience. But tales of hardshipare not the only stories about inclusion.Success stories are relatively easy tocome by, and sharing them is anotheravenue for starting a conversation on apositive note.

25MARCH 2006

�

“I offer threeprinciples to guideyou as youinitiateconversationswith content areapeers: make itpersonal, make itpositive, andmake aconnection.

“

Local stories of success with Englishlanguage learner inclusion will likelyprove most effective. You can collecttestimonials from teachers and Englishlanguage learners in print or videoformat before in-service meetings. Foran even more powerful punch, havespeakers relate success stories in person.In a pinch, you can find success storiesin much of the recent TESOL literature,including this magazine. See also Cary’s(2000) Working with Second LanguageLearners: Answers to Teachers’ Top TenQuestions for vignettes of success withK–12 English language learners; for adetailed case study of a multilingualelementary school, consider Schechterand Cummins’ (2003) MultilingualEducation: Using Diversity as a Resource.

Make a ConnectionFor TESOL professionals, makingconnections with English languagelearners and establishing workingstudent-teacher relationships may seemquite simple and straightforward, evenold hat. Content teachers who are newto English language learner inclusion,however, may find this a challenge.

In my experience with content teachers,one of the most frequently mentionedconcerns is the size of the language andcultural barrier separating them fromEnglish language learners. Teachers’perceptions of the barrier mayexaggerate its size, but, real orimagined, the barrier can stymieteachers’ efforts to establish aproductive student-teacher relationship.You can help shrink the distancebetween English language learners andtheir content teachers by encouraging aconnection between the two.

Perhaps the most obvious way to fosterthis connection is to bring Englishlanguage learners and teachers together.You may not be able to do this withinthe time and space of an in-serviceprogram, but there are other ways to laythe groundwork. A conversation openerthat fits the constraints of in-serviceprograms is the presentation of student-produced videos. Through this medium,English language learners introducethemselves to teachers and tell what

they need in content classrooms.Producing a video may provide richlanguage learning opportunities forEnglish language learners; you couldeven point out this benefit.

Technological innovations such as e-mail,Web-based chats, and online discussionboards can also facilitate a connectionbetween English language learners andteachers who are at a distance, whetherliteral or figurative. Online discussions, inparticular, can be effective in gettingEnglish language learners’ voices heardabove the cacophony of traditional, face-to-face class discussions that are, morelikely than not, dominated by nativeEnglish speakers. Teachers may well besurprised by the participation of Englishlanguage learners, whose silence theyhad thought to be a sign of disengagement.

In addition to helping teachers connectwith English language learners, youcould also pay attention to the linkbetween newcomer and veteranteachers of English language learners.When veteran teachers are not on-site,you can again turn to technology tomake this connection. An electronicdiscussion list, such as the Teachers ofEnglish to Speakers of OtherLanguages Electronic Lists (TESL-L; seehttp://www.hunter.cuny.edu/~tesl-l/),is one connection-making forum.

Deal with the Numbers Choosing to start your conversationswith content area teachers withoutshock-and-awe statistics does not meanthat you should ignore the numbers. Inthe past twenty-five years, the UnitedStates has undergone an immenseimmigration boom, and schools areenrolling record numbers of studentswho speak a first language other thanEnglish. Local and national newcomerstatistics are relevant to teachers’ work,and teachers will benefit from anawareness of the shiftingdemographics in their schools.Providing this information inthoughtful, nonsensationalizing waysis essential as you initiate productiveconversations with content area peers.

Frank discussion of newcomerstatistics can be accompanied by frankdiscussion of anti-immigrantsentiment, English-only ideologies, andthe receiving society’s fears. As yourconversation with content peersprogresses, discomforting discussionsof fear, racism, and xenophobia mayarise; therefore, establishing aproductive dialogue from thebeginning is essential.

Considering the importance of therelationship between ESOLprofessionals and content teachers, it iscritically important to consider howyou engage colleagues in conversationabout effective English languagelearner inclusion. If you open yourconversations with content area peersin a positive way, it will set the tone forharmonious, mutually beneficialrelationships to follow.

References

Cary, S. 2000. Working with second languagelearners: Answers to teachers’ top ten questions.Portsmouth, NH: Heinemann.

Kubota, R., K. Gardner, M. Patten, C.Thatcher-Fettig, and M.Yoshida. 2000. Mainstream peerstry on English language learners’ shoes:A shocklanguage experience. TESOL Journal 9 (4): 12–16.

National Clearinghouse for English LanguageAcquisition. 2004. Rate of LEP growth.http://www.ncela.gwu.edu/policy/states/alabama/03_demo.htm.

Schechter, S. R., and J. Cummins. 2003.Multilingual education in practice: Using diversity asa resource. Portsmouth, NH: Heinemann.

U.S. Census Bureau. 2004. U.S. interim projectionsby age, sex, race, and Hispanic origin.http://www.census.gov/ipc/www/usinterimproj/.

Jenelle Reeves is an assistant professor in theDepartment of Teaching, Learning, and TeacherEducation at the University of Nebraska--Lincoln, in the United States.

26

CL

27MARCH 2006

March 15 - 18, 2006

TESOL 2006: Daring To LeadThe 40th Annual TESOL Convention and Exhibit

For more informationTESOL Conference Services Department700 South Washington Street, Suite 200

Alexandria, Virginia 22314 USATel 703-836-0774 Fax 703-836-7864

email [email protected] site http://www.tesol.org/

Teachers of English to Speakers of Other Languages, Inc. (TESOL)Tel. 703-836-0774 �� Toll free 888-547-3369 USA

TESOL's 40th Annual Convention will be held atthe Tampa Convention Center, Tampa, Florida.Daring to Lead will be the theme for 2006. TESOLwill be celebrating its 40th Anniversary (1966-2006) with many special activities, programs andevents. We look forward to your being a part ofTESOL's 40th celebration and hope you plan tojoin us in in Tampa.

Network with and learn from more than 6,500 of your peers from 100 countries. More than 700 sessionsprovide tips, ideas, reflections, and research to help you help the students in your classrooms.

Attendee registration and hotel reservations for TESOL's 2006 convention available after October 2005.

Pre-registration for TESOL's 2006 convention opens December 1, 2005.

hen I first began teaching English to speakers of other

languages, most language teachers worked hard to keep those

other languages out of the classroom. We worried that students

who spoke community languages, such as Urdu or Hindi, when they were

not in school were disadvantaged.

We encouraged parents to use English athome—even if they barely spoke itthemselves—and we chastised students ifthey “slipped” into using their ownlanguages in class. Some of my colleagueswho spoke a community languagepretended not to understand studentswho spoke the same language. Many ESLteachers made students pay a small fineeach time they used their own languagein class.

Even today, schools serving multilingualcommunities in Canada and the UnitedStates generally do not place a high value onstudents’ languages. In most multilingualschools, only the students are multilingual.After they have gone home, little evidenceremains of the many linguistic communitiesthey come from.

While English language learners needfrequent opportunities for interaction inEnglish, maintaining the first language (L1)is not a disadvantage in learning another.Quite the opposite is true, in fact. Manyacademic and social benefits are associatedwith continued development in L1 duringthe learning of English (Cummins 2000;Cummins et al. 2005; Thomas and Collier2002). In this article, I offer a rationale forincorporating students’ languages into theschool environment and suggest some waysyou can do so, even if you don’t speak anyof the community languages.

Why Support CommunityLanguages?Schools should encourage L1maintenance and continued developmentfor these reasons: � A strong foundation in the L1 supports

the acquisition of English. Successfulsecond language acquisition dependson a variety of factors, one of the mostimportant being the level ofdevelopment in the L1. For example,literacy skills developed in the L1 canbe transferred to the second language(L2) (Cummins 2000).

� Continued development of the L1contributes to academic success.English language learners need accessto the L1 as a tool for learning, at leastuntil their proficiency in English isadequate for academic tasks. Indeed,the strongest predictor of academicsuccess among English languagelearners is the level to which their ownlanguages continue to develop(Thomas and Collier 2002).

� Students’ languages support theirsense of identity and help maintaineffective communication within thefamily and the community (Cumminset al. 2005). Loss of the L1 can havenegative effects on students’relationships with family and othermembers of their cultural community(Wong Fillmore 1991).

W

Sharing Space with Englishby Elizabeth Coelho

28


What about BilingualEducation?Studies have shown that a well-developedprogram of bilingual education offers thebest chance for English language learnersto meet curriculum standards (Thomasand Collier 2002). However, bilingualeducation may not be a practical option inmany multilingual schools and schooldistricts. For example, students in Toronto,Canada, public schools speak more thanone hundred languages, and forty or morelanguages may be represented in a singleschool. In such situations, schools mustfind other opportunities to honor andsupport students’ languages.

Making Space for OtherLanguagesYou can turn linguistic diversity into anasset by acknowledging and celebratingit throughout the school environment,by providing opportunities for studentsto use their own languages and learnabout other languages in the classroom,and by using community languages towork with parents.

Advertise Your Multilingual SchoolEnvironmentA multilingual school is an enrichedlinguistic and cultural environment, andthis should be evident to all who walkthrough the hallways, visit the library,listen to the public addressannouncements, or attend special events. � With a group of students and parents,

create a multilingual “Welcome”poster in the front entrance. Thinkabout other signs and notices thatyou could display in more than onelanguage. Perhaps students coulddeliver some of the public addressannouncements, such as a Thought ofthe Day, in community languages aswell as in English.

� Display material that communicatespositive attitudes toward linguisticdiversity, such as a graph showing thelinguistic and cultural backgrounds ofthe students in the school.

� Enhance peer and cross-gradetutoring programs by recruiting andtraining tutors of various languagebackgrounds, who will use theirshared L1 to explain concepts to newEnglish language learners beforetransferring to English.

� Train student ambassadors of variouslanguage backgrounds to assist in thewelcoming and orientation of newstudents and their parents.

� Encourage students to use the L1when natural and appropriate. Forexample, it would be unnatural for agroup of Korean speakers havinglunch or working on a projecttogether to use English. Work withstudents and parents to develop someguidelines for appropriate languagechoices in various situations.

� Collect library materials in variouslanguages. Community newspapers

are often readily available, andparents can help you find materials incommunity bookstores. Severalpublishers produce dual-languagechildren’s books. In secondaryschools, provide reference dictionariesfor the languages of the school.

� Post information in communitylanguages on the school’s Web site.Students and parents could writesome sections, such as an orientationfor newcomers.

� Bring students’ linguistic worldscloser together. Many students takeheritage language classes outsideschool. Invite them to bring in someof their work from these classes. Insecondary schools, think about whichlanguages should be taught in themodern languages department. Insome communities, Korean or Urdumay be more appropriate than someof the languages currently offered inthe school.

� Include community languages whenyou plan special events such asconcerts or open houses. Forexample, feature some songs inlanguages other than English inconcerts; parents can translate theminto English. Ask students andparents to help create signs andprinted programs for open housesand other events. Acknowledgefestivals and other significant days,and draw on the expertise ofstudents and parents to createmultilingual display material (see“Building Self-Esteem throughCultural Pride,” Essential Teacher,December 2005).

� Consider proficiency in a communitylanguage when hiring teachers andother staff.

Create a Multilingual ClassroomEnvironmentWithin your classroom, you can create alearning environment where all students’languages are valued.� Learn a little about your students’

languages. For example, knowingsomething about the script systemmay help you understand learners’difficulties with learning to write inEnglish. You don’t need in-depthknowledge: The students are theexperts, and you can prompt

29MARCH 2006

�

“Learn someexpressions in thestudents’languages. Thestudents will greatlyappreciate yourefforts even if youlearn only a fewsimple greetings.

“

discussion and comparison by askingsome generic questions such as“What is the direction of print?” or “Isthere a printed and cursive form?”

� Learn some expressions in thestudents’ languages. The studentswill greatly appreciate your effortseven if you learn only a few simplegreetings. Just learning to say hello orgood in a few of your students’languages will enhance themultilingual climate of the classroomand demonstrate commitment to theconcept of a multilingual society.

� Encourage students to learn somewords and phrases in each other’slanguages. For example, a group ofFarsi-speaking students could teachthe class some greetings and politeexpressions that everyone will use forthe rest of the week or month.

� Encourage students to produce dual-language assignments. For example,creating dual-language books is aliteracy activity that can be adaptedfor all ages and subjects (for someonline samples, see The MultiliteracyProject n.d.; Thornwood PublicSchool 2001).

� Give students the opportunity towork with same-language partnersfrom time to time. This may enablestudents to be more successful onchallenging tasks than they would ifthey were required to use Englishonly. Give them extra time to switchto English before showing theirwork.

� Develop some multilingual projects(see Edwards 1996; Cummins andSchecter 2003). For example,students can compare how differentlanguages express concepts such asnumbers, proverbs, and names.Encourage parents to get involved.

� Provide opportunities for Englishlanguage learners to develop ideas inthe L1 (e.g. produce their firstwriting samples; clarify concepts;discuss problems; plan group tasks;write notes, outlines, and first drafts).This will be a preliminary steptoward producing work in English,and it will ensure a better product inthe end.

� Encourage beginners to write in theL1. For example, they could writetheir first journal responses in theL1, or they might insert words inthe L1 when they don’t know theEnglish word. If another student ora colleague can help withtranslation, you may be surprisedby the quality of the students’writing compared with what theycan produce in English.

� Demonstrate ways for English-speaking students to help classmateswho are learning English—forexample, by repeating, rephrasing, orusing gestures and drawings.

Make Connections with ParentsParents and guardians who do not feelconfident in the language of the schoolare less likely to visit or becomeinvolved in their children’s education.Using community languages to reachout to parents encourages and enablesthem to participate in and contribute tothe life of the school and to help theirchildren at home.

� Develop networks of parents whospeak the same language. Whenparents enroll their children, putthem in touch with someone who canprovide orientation, answerquestions, and help with translationand interpretation.

� Seek the help of parents and othercommunity members in findingmaterial in their languages, andinvolve parents in creatingchildren’s books.

� Give children activity materials totake home, with instructions forparents in the languages of theschool community.

� Explain to parents the value ofmaintaining the L1, and encouragethem to enroll their children inheritage language programs.Parents can also create a richlanguage environment by tellingstories and reading to theirchildren, by involving them informal and informal communityevents, and by discussing programson community TV or items incommunity language newspapers.

� Give parents a role in the classroom.Parents who may not feel confidentin English can use their ownlanguage to help newcomers or helpcreate resource material, such as dual-language glossaries and picturedictionaries. Some parents may enjoyreading aloud, telling stories, orteaching songs in their own language.

� Use community languages foroutreach to parents. Haveimportant communication, such asreport cards, newsletters, andconsent forms, translated into thelanguages of the community. Ifprofessional services are notavailable, parents may be able tohelp. Parents who are proficient inEnglish as well as a communitylanguage can help set up meetings,welcome parents to the school, andserve as facilitators for smalldiscussion groups. However, besure to use bilingual educators orprofessional interpreters inmeetings with an individualstudent’s parents, especially if youare discussing sensitive orconfidential topics.

30

“Successful secondlanguageacquisitiondepends on avariety of factors,one of the mostimportant beingthe level ofdevelopment inthe L1.

“

31MARCH 2006

CL

Tap the PotentialAll students can benefit from immersionin a multilingual environment.Celebrating linguistic and culturaldiversity at school can foster more openattitudes among various culturalgroups. Also, monolingual Englishspeakers in a multilingual school maybe encouraged to learn other languages,which will benefit the individual, thecommunity, and the nation. Mostimportantly, a rich multilingualenvironment will help ensure that allmembers of the school community feelvalued, welcomed, and included.

References

Cummins, J. 2000. Language, power and pedagogy:Bilingual children caught in the crossfire. Clevedon,England: Multilingual Matters.

Cummins, J.,V. Bismilla, P. Chow, S. Cohen, F.Giampapa, L. Leoni, P. Sandhu, and P. Sastri. 2005.Affirming identity in multilingual classrooms.Educational Leadership 63 (1): 38–43.

Cummins, J., and S. Schecter, eds. 2003. Multilingualeducation in practice: Using diversity as a resource.Portsmouth, NH: Heinemann.

Edwards,V. 1996. The other languages: A guide tomultilingual classrooms. Reading, England: NationalCentre for Language and Literacy.

The Multiliteracy Project. n.d. Michael Cranny PublicSchool: School projects. http://www.multiliteracies.ca//index.php/folio/viewSchoolProjects/3.

Thomas,W., and V. Collier. 2002. A national study ofschool effectiveness for language minority students’ long-term academic achievement. Santa Cruz, CA: Centerfor Research on Education, Diversity and Excellence.http://www.crede.ucsc.edu/research/llaa/1.1_final.html.

Thornwood Public School. 2001. Dual languageshowcase. http://thornwood.peelschools.org/dual/index.htm.

Wong Fillmore, L. 1991.When learning a secondlanguage means losing the first. Early ChildhoodResearch Quarterly 6:323–46.

Elizabeth Coelho works for the Ontario Ministryof Education, in Canada.An earlier version of thisarticle,“Sharing Space with English and French:How to Create a Multilingual SchoolEnvironment,” appeared in Inspire:The Journalof Literacy and Numeracy of Canada, January2006, http://www.inspirelearning.ca/english/.

Choices. Contributions. Challenges.

Introducing Communities of

SupportiveProfessionals

Edited by Tim Murphey and

Kazuyoshi Sato

TESOLpublications


The Professional Development in Language Education Series

PO Box 753, Waldorf, MD 20604-0753 USAToll Free USA 888-891-0041 � Tel. 301-638-4427 or -4428 � Fax 301-843-0159

E-mail [email protected] � Order online at http://www.tesol.org/

Essential for ongoing professional development

hen I came to the United States in 2004 as a doctoral student in

language education, I was prevented from working as an ESL

instructor, being informed that the position was open only to native

speakers of English. As an EFL teacher with seven years of experience in my own

country (Korea), this rejection both confirmed my deficiency as an English

language teacher and deprived me of financial opportunity based on my

identity as a nonnative-English-speaking teacher (NNEST). What, then, is my

standing in this profession?

As a NNEST, I have always faced thedilemma of teaching a language that I amnot fully proficient in. I feel guilty when Icannot provide students with the nativelikepronunciation of a word or when I comeacross a cultural barrier that even I, as ateacher, cannot fully comprehend. Thisidentity as a deficient NNEST is furtherstrengthened by students’ and employers’perceptions of NNESTs in the Englishlanguage teaching profession. However, Iwas confident that I had been making adifference to the students I taught and washelping them learn English, which was soimportant to their future careers. So myrejection was hard to accept.

Although they do not usually say soopenly, most English teachers andstudents seem to perceive the native-English-speaking teacher (NEST) assuperior to the NNEST. But has the timecome to change this perception? What,exactly, are the relative benefits anddrawbacks of having a NNEST in theEFL/ESL classroom?

The Struggle for Equal TreatmentEnglish has become the lingua franca ofthe twenty-first century, and manystudents whose native language is notEnglish feel the need to learn it. As a result,

NNESTs have grown in number in theUnited States and in many non-English-speaking countries, and in the past fifteenyears, the issue of discrimination againstNNESTs has taken center stage for theEnglish language teaching profession. In1991, TESOL provided the followingstatement on nonnative speakers of Englishand hiring practices:

TESOL shall make every effort toprevent such discrimination …[andshall] work towards the creation andpublication of minimal languageproficiency standards that may beapplied equally to all ESOL teacherswithout reference to the nativeness oftheir English. (p. 1)

Whether this statement has had any effecton hiring practices is not known. However,many employers still openly prefer andadvertise for native speakers only.

The majority of English teachers in theworld are not native speakers of English,yet NNESTs continue to struggle for equaltreatment in the profession. The desire ofstudents to learn from a native speaker ofEnglish strengthens and justifiesemployers’ prejudices. TESOL’s statementprovided a meaningful start to the debate,but many other issues need to be resolvedin order to change student perceptions.

W

Will Nonnative-English-Speaking Teachers Ever Geta Fair Chance?

32

by Yujong Park


Issues within the ControversyIs the Dichotomy Useful?Even though there have been argumentsagainst the dichotomy of native versusnonnative speaker, language teachersand researchers use the terms as widelyas ever. Some argue that nonnativespeakers can never achieve a nativespeaker’s competence, and manybelieve that nonnative speakers cannever be as linguistically creative ororiginal as native speakers can. Johnson(2002) showed that nonnative teachersthemselves generally lack self-confidence and focus on teaching whatthey know they are best at.

A good way of distinguishing who is andwho is not a native speaker of English isthrough self-definition (Lazaraton 2003). Imyself do not want to be called a nativespeaker. I am aware of the differences,and obscuring the dichotomy is not whatI want. However, I am opposed to beingjudged as incompetent solely on the basisof being a nonnative speaker. EvenNNESTs may hold this view ofinferiority: the NNESTs in a teachertraining course in Hong Kong believedthat NESTs were superior to them inspeaking (100 percent), pronunciation (92percent), listening (87 percent),vocabulary (79 percent), and reading (72percent) (Tang 1997).

Who Is the Better Teacher?A statement composed at the 1961Commonwealth Conference on TESL inUganda held that the ideal teacher ofEnglish was a native speaker. Nativespeakers were felt to be better qualifiedbecause they could better demonstratefluent, idiomatically appropriate

language, the cultural connotations ofthe language, and acceptable forms.

Since then, many studies have comparedthe teaching styles, competence, andperceived and actual differences inteaching behavior of NESTs andNNESTs (see, e.g., Medgyes 1994). Mostof this research has focused on therelative advantages of NNESTs: asEnglish learners, they can serve asimitable models of successful learners ofEnglish, teach learning strategies moreeffectively, provide learners with moreinformation about the English language,anticipate language difficulties, havemore empathy for the needs andproblems of learners, and share thelearners’ mother tongue. I would addthat NNESTs often have an intimateknowledge of the learners’ culturalbackground and expectations and thatthey have inside knowledge ofinstitutional culture and goals in theircountry or local context.

Knowledge about language use andculture are two areas in which fewNNESTs can compete with NESTs.Although this knowledge may belimited to one culture or one English-speaking country, it is a very powerfuladvantage since a NNEST can rarelyachieve such a high level of culturalcompetence (Lazaraton 2003). Anotheradvantage of hiring NESTS is that thepresence of native speakers in a schoolcan broaden the horizons of the otherteachers as well as of the students.

Teacher collaboration can maximize thestrengths of both NESTs and NNESTs.Native-English-speaking colleagues ofmine have explained how they have

gained insights from NNESTs on thedifficulties their students face. The twogroups can benefit from each other byconferring on teaching practices andthrough collaborative teaching.

According to Phillipson (1992), “theuntrained or unqualified native speaker isin fact potentially a menace because ofignorance of the structure of the mothertongue” (as cited in Medgyes 1992, 14).This statement supports the contentionthat the distinction should be not betweenNESTs and NNESTs but between qualifiedand unqualified teachers. Unfortunately,in many parts of the world, including mynative Korea, teachers are employedbased on their native language and nottheir qualifications.

Can Nonwhites Be Seen as GoodEnglish Teachers?The race and identity of the NNESTraise complex problems of diversity. TheEnglish-speaking teacher is generallyconsidered to be white. Even if a teacherhas the necessary teaching competenceand is a near-native speaker, beingAsian or otherwise nonwhite mayprevent that teacher from being seen asa good English teacher. The followingclaim by Lee (2000) vividly illustratesthe issue of acceptance:

In the college where I am teaching, Iam the only Asian in the ESLdepartment. In my first encounterwith students, I have been askedsuch questions as: “Are you avolunteer?” “What are yourqualifications?” . . . . Now I havebecome more conscious of this urgeto be good, because I know that it

33MARCH 2006

�

“

“

The qualities that effective teachers should embody do notdepend on their race or language background but on theirmotivation and zeal to become good teachers.

requires much more effort toconvince students that NNS teacherscan be equally good, if not better,English teachers than their nativespeaker counterparts can. (p. 1)

How can the English language teachingfield address these concerns? First,TESOL and other professional bodiesshould publicly define the terms nativeand nonnative to show that there is nointrinsic connection between race andability in English. And in the classroom,teachers should address languagelearners’ assumption that nonwhitepeople cannot be authentic Englishspeakers (e.g., by discussing withstudents their experiences with Englishteachers of different races, andcomparing students’ language goals andways teachers with different culturalbackgrounds can address them). Thequalities that effective teachers shouldembody do not depend on their race orlanguage background but on theirmotivation and zeal to become good teachers.

Changed Perceptions Arethe KeyNESTs and NNESTs clearly differ inculture and language. Native speakers

can provide students with knowledge ofEnglish pronunciation, culture, andvocabulary. Nonnative speakers can givestudents knowledge of English learningstrategies and explain difficult conceptsthrough the mother tongue they sharewith the students. NNESTs can alsoserve as empathetic listeners forbeginning and struggling students,needs analysts, agents of change, andcoaches for public examinations in thelocal context.

The key to gaining acceptance for NNESTsis to change English learners’ perceptionsof them. And these perceptions willchange only when there are more NNESTsand when they become the norm ratherthan the exception (Lee 2000). That canhappen only when hiring practices in theESL/EFL profession are influenced byresearch. For example, in Korea, theMinistry of Education advised in its 2001national curriculum that NESTs should behired for conversation classrooms inmiddle and high schools. Such decisionscan lead to the marginalization of localNNESTs and to the hiring of unqualifiednative English speakers.

In the late 1990s, TESOL established theNonnative English Speakers in TESOLCaucus, and as its membership grows, the

issue of the legitimate place of thenonnative teacher in the profession isbecoming more widely recognized anddiscussed. I hope voices like mine will helpbring about equity in English languageteaching practice, so that teachers arejudged not by their race or nationality butby their ability. Ideally, changes inperception will lead to more nonnativeteachers in the field, and, eventually, to alevel playing field for NNESTs.

References

Johnson, K.A. 2002. Social identities and theNNES MA TESOL student. TESOL TeacherEducation Interest Section Newsletter 17 (2): 6–7.

Lazaraton,A. 2003. Incidental displays of culturalknowledge in the nonnative-English-speakingteacher’s classroom. TESOL Quarterly 37:213–45.

Lee, I. 2000. Can a nonnative English speaker be agood English teacher? TESOL Matters 10(February/March): 19.

McNeill,A. 1994. Some characteristics of native andnon-native speaker teachers of English. ERICDocument Reproduction Service No. ED 386067.

Medgyes, P. 1992. Native or nonnative:Who’sworth more? ELT Journal 46:340–49.

——. 1994. The non-native teacher. London: Macmillan.

Tang, C. 1997. On the power and status ofnonnative ESL teachers. TESOL Quarterly31:577–80.

TESOL. 1991.A TESOL statement on nonnativespeakers of English and hiring practices.http://nnest.moussu.net/articles/hiring.pdf.

Yujong Park, a doctoral student at the Universityof California, Los Angeles, in the United States,has taught EFL in Korea for seven years.

34

Out of the Box is edited by Phil Quirke ([email protected]).See http://www.tesol.org/ for submission guidelines.

SEND

“

“

What, exactly, are the relativebenefits and drawbacks ofhaving a NNEST in theEFL/ESL classroom?

CL

TESOL 2006 Sponsors

TESOL 2006 Sponsors

PLATINUM +

GOLD

SILVER

Cambridge University PressEducational Testing Service

Education Research & Development (R&D) Training ServiceHarcourt Achieve McGraw-Hill ELS

National Geographic School PublishingSantillana Publishing

Thomson-HeinleUniversity of Central FloridaUniversity of South Florida

AmidEastGES Exposition Service

Kaplan English ProgramsUniversity of Houston-Downtown

The Hampton Brown CompanyHarcourt Achieve

LeapFrog SchoolHouse

PLATINUM

35MARCH 2006

36

��

��

��

��

��

37MARCH 2006

More than 120 lucky TESOL members will be anniversary winners!

Each month during its 40th anniversary year, TESOL will draw 10 names atrandom. Winners will receive $40 or more worth of prizes from KETEnterprise, LeapFrog SchoolHouse, McGraw-Hill ESL/ELT, Protea TextWare,TESOL, Thomson-Heinle, and University of Michigan Press. No entry necessary. Visit TESOL’s 40th anniversary Web page to learn more.

Only TESOL members are eligible to win, so be sure to keep yourmembership current!

SUBMIT YOUR STORY TO TESOL TESTIMONIALS• How did you become an English language teacher? • Who inspired you? • When did you first join TESOL? • What’s your fondest memory of a TESOL project or event?

Share your story with your colleagues in TESOL Testimonials, part of TESOL’s 40th Anniversary Web page. Submit your testimonial to [email protected], with TESTIMONIALS in the subject line.

WHAT’S NEW FOR THE 40TH? Visit http://www.tesol.org/ and check out TESOL’s 40th Anniversary Web pageto learn about the latest anniversary events and celebrations.

THIRTY PEOPLE ALREADY HAVE WON PRIZES INTESOL’S 40 FOR THE 40TH GIVEAWAY!

We wantto hear

from YOU!

English learning, attracts ESL learners and teachersworldwide. Another popular ESL chat room isEnglishClub.com’s ESL Chat Room (http://www.englishclub.com/esl-chat/). Both sites require you toregister, which makes the chat room safer but causessome inconvenience to users who have troubleremembering passwords. One site that does not requireuser registration is 1-language.com’s ESL Realtime Chat(http://www.1-language.com/chat/), where you needonly give yourself a nickname to enter.

From Text to Voice ChatThe chat sites I’ve mentioned are limited by thesoftware they use, and you can chat only by typingtext. Unfortunately, many ESL learners type slowly,and a chat room is not a good place for them topractice. And most users I’ve encountered in ESLchat rooms are not ESL/EFL learners but teachersdiscussing teaching or other visitors who simplyenjoy chatting. In the hope of attracting more ESLlearners to online chat, I created an ESL community(the ESL Online Talk Community, http://www.rong-chang.com/guest/talksign.htm) where users can talkthrough computer microphones as well as write toeach other.

Balancing the Input/OutputEquation on the Web

ESL/EFL teachers try to maintain a balance

between offering students language input

(reading, listening, and studying) and giving

them opportunities for output (structured and

communicative activities in which students speak and

write in English) (Brown 2000). For most teachers,

giving access to input is relatively simple: just provide

appropriate reading and listening material.

Opportunities for output, however, may not be so simple

to create, and many teachers spend a great deal of time

designing speaking and writing activities for students.

by Rong-Chang Li

If you and the students you teach have access tocomputers and an Internet connection, you can helpbalance the input/output equation through Webresources that take advantage of new computertechnologies, such as artificial intelligence, text-to-speech, and speech recognition. Students can carryout ready-made structured and communicativeoutput activities. Once you are comfortable with thetechnology, you can create your own.

Two online activities that have helped improve thecommunication skills of the students I teach areparticipating in an online ESL community andchatting with an online language robot.

ESL Chat Communities Learners in countries where the main language isnot English often have trouble finding someone withwhom to practice speaking English. Onlinecommunities can address this problem byconnecting learners over the Internet.

In 2002, I discovered numerous online chat groupsbut few that catered to ESL learners. Dave Sperling’sChat Central (http://www.eslcafe.com/chat/chatpro.cgi), the first chat room dedicated to

[ ]PortalPortal

38

Chatting BasicsTo participate in the ESL Online Talk Community,students need access to a computer with amicrophone and an Internet connection. A computer-mounted video camera (a Webcam) is useful but notnecessary. For software, I chose MSN Messenger. Tojoin, students do the following:

�download and install MSN Messenger(http://messenger.msn.com/)

�open a free, Web-based e-mail account at MSNHotmail (http://www.hotmail.com/)

�sign up at http://www.rong-chang.com/guest/addguest.html by entering their name,their e-mail address, and a brief self-introduction

Using a guestbook program, I post all themembers’ self-introductions online. To find a chatpartner, students browse the guestbook and add theHotmail addresses of the members they areinterested in chatting with to MSN Messenger’sContact List.

The program signals the student when a person onthe Contact List is online. The student then invitesthe person to talk, and, if the person accepts, thetwo can speak to each other through theirmicrophones. If both students have Webcams, theycan have face-to-face conversations by clicking on abutton within MSN Messenger.

Orientation to Online ChatAs an introduction to online chat, I bring thestudents into a computer lab and show them how to

add potential partners to MSN Messenger’s ContactList. Nowadays, software installation from the Web isfairly straightforward. If students need to install MSNMessenger on their own machines, I direct them tothe Web site, and they are usually able to downloadand install it without help.

Another important part of this orientation is anintroduction to the use of microphones. If amicrophone does not work, often it is either muted orplugged into the wrong socket. In the computer lab,I show the students how to troubleshoot theseproblems. Some students initially have difficultyusing microphones and end up chatting by typinginstead of speaking. With time, students becomemore comfortable using microphones andvideoconferencing. And with the increasedavailability of broadband Internet connections, audioquality has improved.

Chatting by AssignmentEvery semester, I have students find a chat partnerthrough the ESL Online Talk Community. Becausestudents choose their own partners, I cannot monitortheir communication directly, but I ask them to sendme at least one e-mail in which they tell me abouttheir e-mail exchanges. I reply to their message withencouragement and with some online chat safety tips(e.g., do not use your real name; do not give out yourtelephone numbers and addresses; end the conversationif you do not feel comfortable chatting with someone;do not arrange to meet anyone from a chat room).Having an online chat partner has improved the Englishlanguage skills of the students I teach and has helpedthem make friends around the world.

39MARCH 2006

Online robots learn with

experience. They record all the

questions being asked, and the

creator can study the

conversations to develop

better responses.

Human: Hi, Alice.

ALICE: Hello there.

Human: What are you doing?

ALICE: I am just killing time.

Human: What kind of books do you like to read?

ALICE: International bestsellers are usually the best.

You say:

�

A.L.I.C.E., the Chat RobotComputers cannot yet think like humans, but thanksto the Artificial Intelligence Foundation’s ArtificialLinguistic Internet Computer Entity (A.L.I.C.E.;http://www.alicebot.org/), computers can now chatwell enough to hold simple conversations withhumans online.

Like humans, online robots learn with experience.They record all the questions being asked, and thecreator can study the conversations to developbetter responses. When students repeatedly practiceconversations on a specific topic, the robotdevelops a huge database. It can respond to onequestion or remark with various appropriateresponses, which is what happens in real life.

How Does A.L.I.C.E. Talk to Students?Programmed with Artificial Intelligence MarkupLanguage (AIML), A.L.I.C.E. can form responses toquestions and other input based on a database withthousands of grammar and logical inference rules(Wallace, Tomabechi, and Aimless 2003). As theleading open-source conversational system on theWeb, A.L.I.C.E. has won the Loebner Prize three timesfor producing responses that are indistinguishablefrom a human’s (see Loebner 2003).

A.L.I.C.E. speaks to users through a technologycalled text-to-speech, a form of speech synthesisthat converts text into spoken voice output. Thevoice is computer synthesized, but, in my opinion,it is good enough for language learning practice.The three-dimensional character, smooth animation,and lip synchronization make students feel as ifthey are actually talking to a human. AlthoughA.L.I.C.E. is not intended for learning English andthe robot’s remarks aren’t always appropriate,talking to A.L.I.C.E. gives English learners anenjoyable way to practice speaking.

By configuring their computers to use speechrecognition software, students can chat withA.L.I.C.E. by speaking into their microphones. If youuse Windows XP, you already have a speechrecognition engine installed on your computer. Toconfigure it, go to the Control Panel and click onthe Speech icon; you should see Microsoft English

ASR Version 5 Engine. Close the Speech window andclick on the Regional and Languages Options icon.Select the Languages tab, and then click on Details.Choose to add Speech Recognition and show theLanguage Bar on the desktop. After you restart thecomputer, you will see a microphone icon on thedesktop. When you speak into the microphone, thesoftware will convey your speech.

Speech recognition technology has made amazingprogress over the past few years, but it is still notperfect. An ordinary microphone works, but not verywell; a better choice is a high-quality,unidirectional, noise-cancellation microphone. Andstudents can improve the accuracy of the softwareby training it to recognize their voice and adapt totheir pronunciation—for example, by readingparagraphs into the microphone in a normal voice.

Ready-Made Chat RobotsFrom the A.L.I.C.E. Artificial IntelligenceFoundation’s Web site (http://www.alicebot.org/),students can access the free chat robot, or they cansubscribe to three other bots for US$9.99 a monthor US$99 a year. The free and paid bots use thesame database and respond to typed or spokeninput. In the free version, the robot responds viawritten text; in the paid versions, the robotsrespond with a computer-synthesized voice.

Build Your Own Language BotPart of the reason for the popularity of A.L.I.C.E. isthat its programming language, AIML, is as easy asHTML. Once you have mastered AIML (a primer isavailable at http://www.alicebot.org/), you cancreate your own robot. If you don’t want to take thetrouble to learn AIML, you can use online authoringtools, but learning AIML will give you more powerto customize your robots.

Pandorabots (http://www.pandorabots.com/) is arobot-hosting service that allows you to create,design, and publish software robots. All you need is acomputer with an Internet connection and a Webbrowser. To create a robot, sign up for a free accountat Pandorabots. Log in with your user name andpassword, and click on Create a Pandorabot. You can

[ ]Portal

40

choose whether or not to include a ready-made set ofAIML content in your new Pandorabot. Give yourrobot a name. Then add content to your robot withthe authoring tool or through AIML programming.

A Robotic ESL TutorTo help my students practice English, I created a robotcalled ESL Tutor (see http://www.rong-chang.com/esltutor.htm) that uses A.L.I.C.E.’s huge database.When visitors chat with the robot, the conversationsare recorded in a log, which, as the creator of therobot, I can check. If I’m unhappy with one of therobot’s responses, I click on the Modify button andtype in the response I prefer. Then I save and reloadthe program. The next time the question is asked, therobot will give the new response.

As optional homework, I ask my students to chatwith A.L.I.C.E. fifteen minutes a day. If speechrecognition doesn’t work well for them, they canchat by typing. I check the chat log to see whatkind of questions my students are asking and whatthe robot’s responses are. From the chat log, I cansee what kind of errors my students are making,which helps me adjust my teaching.

My experiment with this robot demonstrates thatESL teachers can use artificial intelligencetechnology to create online ESL tutors and otherteaching assistants. For example, you might create a

robot to answer students’ grammar questions or aconversation robot to teach students what to say indifferent situations. You might even create a familyof online ESL robots, each an expert on one topic,such as shopping, traveling, or seeing a doctor.

Let the Technology Serve YouNew computer technologies can help Englishlearners develop communication skills in new andexciting ways. If you learn to use thesetechnologies, or even to use tools others havecreated with them, you give your students moreopportunities for output.

References

Brown, H. D. 2000. Principles of language learning andteaching. 4th ed. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice Hall Regents.

Loebner, H. G. 2003. The Loebner Prize home page.http://www.loebner.net/Prizef/loebner-prize.html.

Wallace, R., H. Tomabechi, and D. Aimless. 2003. Chatterbotsgo native: Considerations for an eco-system fostering thedevelopment of artificial life forms in a human world.A.L.I.C.E. Artificial Intelligence Foundation.http://www.pandorabots.com/pandora/pics/chatterbotsgonative.doc.

Rong-Chang Li teaches ESL as adjunct faculty at PasadenaCity College, in the United States.

41MARCH 2006

I created an ESL community where users

can talk through computer microphones

as well as write to each other.

Name:

HotMail:

City or State: Country:

Self-Introduction:

students? Too immature? Will my students enjoy thesong, or is it merely something I like? Is thelanguage too obscure? Too simple? Is the song shortenough? Do I have enough time in class to play thesong three, four, or five times? Will the students getbored with the song before they even finish theactivity? Is the song’s tempo too fast for mystudents to comprehend the lyrics? Are the wordssung clearly enough?

The ideal song is short, slow, and clear; repeatskey phrases; attracts students’ attention; andteaches some natural, interesting language withoutoffending anyone.

Finding and Buying the Lucky HitIn the search described at the beginning of thisarticle, putting key phrases within quotation marksensured that the search engine would find only Webpages with those exact phrases intact. Adding theword lyrics helped limit the search to lyrics pages.Surfing through a number of lyrics pages andscanning the words is a fast way to find a song thatmight work.

The Internet contains literally hundreds of thousandsof lyrics pages. Many are supplied by volunteertranscribers and corrected by input from readers. One of

A Song-Based Grammar Lessonin Record Time

Recently I had a free hour before a

grammar class. I had prepared a lesson

on the past forms of the modal should:

should have and shouldn’t have, but I wanted to

connect the grammar point to something in the real

world. I was thinking that English speakers use these

modals to express regret, and what better source of

regret than a lost love? I opened my Internet

browser and typed “shouldn’t have”, “should have”,

and lyrics in the search box.

by Sylvan Payne

Songs are a rich and compelling source of naturalinput for the language classroom. While evokingemotions and awakening interest, music can be usedto teach structure, vocabulary, or pronunciation; forlistening practice; or as a general warm-up activityfor a discussion topic. Music is also closely tied toculture, and the variety of musical genres in theEnglish-speaking world expresses the wide culturaldiversity. Indeed, the extensive variety of music andthe ever-increasing catalogue of songs available canbe overwhelming.

I have found the Internet to be an indispensabletool for quickly and efficiently sorting through,locating, and downloading appropriate songs for theclassroom. You can put together a song-based,grammar-focused lesson in less than one hour,including searching for the song, downloading itover the Internet, converting it to a classroomaudio format, making a lyrics handout, and planninggrammar activities based on the song.

The Ideal Song Not every song is ideal for the classroom, and ittakes some searching to isolate appropriate ones.When choosing a song for the classroom, askyourself: Is the topic or language potentiallyoffensive? Is the song’s theme too mature for my

[ ]PortalPortal

42

the first hits in my search results was a page from LyricsDepot (http://www.lyricsdepot.com/) with the lyrics ofthe song “All the Things I Should Have Known” by therhythm and blues (R&B) duet K-Ci and Jojo.

Scanning the lyrics told me it had plenty ofpotential. It had twenty examples of should have orshouldn’t have and even used the word regret, a keyvocabulary term for my lesson. Best of all, the songincluded this delightful phrase: “all the should’ves inthe world, they won’t bring you back.” I copied thelyrics and pasted them into my word-processingapplication (see the box for a caveat ondownloading and copying lyrics and music).

Then I searched for the music. I logged ontoApple’s iTunes Music Store (http://www.apple.com/itunes/store/) and found the song in its collection. Ilistened to a thirty-second sample and decided thatthe song was appropriate for the students. Thepronunciation was clear enough, and it was relativelyslow. I purchased the song in MP3 format for 99cents and downloaded it to my computer. (The MP3format compresses an audio file to a relatively smallsize while maintaining nearly perfect sound quality.In most cases, one minute of music is one megabyte[MB] in size.) The MP3 file for this song was around7.5 MB in size and took only a couple of minutes todownload over a broadband connection.

The iTunes Music Store is only one of many sourcesfor MP3 music downloads. Microsoft has its ownstore, called MSN Music (see http://music.msn.com/), with similar offerings and prices. Someretailers, such as Wal-Mart (http://www.walmart.com/music_downloads/introToServices.do) and Best Buy(http://www.bestbuy.com/), have their own onlinemusic stores. Each site has its own peculiar set ofrestrictions and rules, and it pays to look around tofind the music store that meets your needs and yourcomputer’s capability before setting up an account. Iuse the iTunes Music Store because it has over twomillion songs and the most liberal rules of use. It’salso very easy to use and works with both Macintoshand Microsoft Windows operating systems.

43MARCH 2006

A Caveat on Copyright and Fair Use

The relative ease of obtaining and reproducinglyrics and music from the Internet does notmean that their classroom use is always legal.Before selecting lyrics and downloading music,you should educate yourself on copyright andfair use policies.

One good source is the University of MarylandUniversity College’s (2004) “Copyright and Fair Usein the Classroom, on the Internet, and the WorldWide Web” (http://www.umuc.edu/library/copy.html). See also the Compleat Links article, “IsEvery Educational Use a Fair Use?” in the EssentialTeacher section of http://www.tesol.org/. And besure to check the guidelines set out by your owneducational institution.

Copying lyrics:

� The song lyrics on my handout came to fewer than 250 words.

� I included the copyright information on my handout.

Downloading music:

� I had paid for the song.

� I used it only once in class.

� I used it for noncommercial, educational purposes.

On the handout, I included information on how topurchase the song or CD. I feel this promotes theartists. Language students often want to knowhow they can get their own copy of a song oncethey have studied it in class, and in this casesome of my students went out and bought the CDthe same day.

�

Double-Checking As soon as I had downloaded the MP3 file, I listenedto the song and double-checked the lyrics I hadcopied into my word-processing application. Sincelyrics Web pages are unofficial and usually fan-supplied, do not assume that the lyrics provided arecorrect or even match the version of the song you have.

In my case, there were a number of errors tocorrect. The transcriber didn’t like using the shiftkey, so the lyrics were all in lowercase. I made someadjustments in spelling as well. I glossed relaxedspeech such as wanna (want to) and gonna (goingto) by putting the standard speech equivalent inparentheses. I also glossed the abbreviated -ingverbs kissin’ (kissing) and holdin’ (holding). Iindicated that the ooohs and wohhhhs were sounds,not words, so that the students wouldn’t waste timelooking these sounds up in their dictionaries.

I burned the song onto a CD and tested it. Iusually use CDs because they are the fastest mediumto produce and the easiest to use in the classroom.You can also copy the music file to an audiocassetteor MiniDisc (MD) by connecting your recorder’s

auxiliary port to your computer’s speaker port usinga double minijack cable. MDs, which use a digitalcompression technique to store music, are usefulbecause you can create separate tracks within asong, making it easy to advance, replay verses, orquickly find a place you want to highlight in a song.

I then spent time making photocopies of thelyrics and deciding what to do with the song inclass. Since the song was quite long, I didn’t wantto have to play it too many times—the way I wouldif I were doing a cloze listening activity. Instead, Idecided to give the students a handout with all ofthe lyrics. The entire process took less than an hour.

In the ClassroomBefore playing the song in class, I handed out thephotocopies of the lyrics and had the studentslocate and highlight all the uses of should have andshouldn’t have. They then listened to the song andnoted the pronunciation of the modals. Finally, Ihad the students do an exercise in which they hadto deduce what the singer had done or had notdone, based on what he said he should have or

[ ]Portal

44

The ideal song is short,

slow, and clear; repeats

key phrases; attracts

students’ attention; and

teaches some natural,

interesting language

without offending anyone.

should have known

shouldn’t have let

should have caredshould have cared

listenedshouldn’t have listened

45MARCH 2006

shouldn’t have done. For example, “I shouldn’t havelet my sweetie go” means the singer did in fact lethis sweetie go. “I should have cared just a little bitmore” means he didn’t care enough.

We finished up the lesson with some small-groupstorytelling. Volunteers were encouraged to tellpersonal regret stories using the target modals.These were generally hilarious, and the studentsenjoyed hearing about their classmates’ past woes. Iassigned each student to write a short regret storyfor homework.

Grammar Comes AliveThe students thoroughly enjoyed this song and theaccompanying activities. Current R&B is a populargenre with the students, but few knew of K-Ci andJojo or had heard this song before. Seeing the focuslanguage point set in a song made the grammarcome alive for them. Using the Internet to sortthrough and locate appropriate songs, find the lyrics,and download the corresponding audio files can savetime and help you expose students to a ready sourceof natural input.

Reference

University of Maryland University College. 2004. Copyright andfair use in the classroom, on the Internet, and the World WideWeb. http://www.umuc.edu/library/copy.html.

Sylvan Payne has taught English in Canada and the UnitedStates, and currently teaches at International ChristianUniversity, in Japan.

CL

how they and their partner are different and howthey are alike. In short, they will take one stepcloser to becoming citizens of the world.

A School for Future Leaders Located about a three-hour drive from the U.S.-Mexico border, Tec (as the school is affectionatelyknown) is one school in a network of thirtycampuses with headquarters in Monterrey. Tec hasbeen operating for about sixty years and isconsidered one of the leading educationalinstitutions in Mexico. The school incorporates bothhigh school and university studies, with an emphasison technology. Students are required to have accessto the Internet, either in their home or through alaptop that they can plug into one of the myriadoutlets available on campus. As a former computersystems analyst and programmer in a second careeras an ESL teacher, I now teach ESL writing classes inthe high school.

Online Pen Pals with a PurposeAccording to its mission statement and goals, Tecseeks to make its graduates the national andinternational leaders of tomorrow. I took the school’smandate seriously and decided to introduce thestudents to people in other parts of the worldthrough an online pen-pal project.

Online Partner Projects forFuture Citizens of the World

What is the first thing you notice when you

meet someone new?”

“Eyes.”

“Smile.”

“Height.”

“Overall appearance.” The responses

are given randomly.

by Cheri Powell

Thus begins my introduction to an online pen-palproject that will consume the high school students Iteach at the Instituto Technológico y EstudiosSuperiores de Monterrey, in Hermosillo, Mexico, forthe final seven to eight weeks of the semester. Theyare curious about what I have in mind for them.

“What would you do if you were blind? How wouldyou get to know a person you couldn’t see?” Theythink about that possibility, and the ideas start to come.

“I’d ask them what they looked like.”

“I’d ask how old they are.”

“I’d ask to touch their face.” Soon a list of ideasis on the board.

The students then list ways they would describethemselves to someone else. They turn this list intoan introductory e-mail in English to a student inanother part of the world whom they have never met.

The students are intrigued and a littleapprehensive about communicating with someonewho is totally unknown to them. Through thisproject, they will learn about people in another partof the world, gain exposure to new ideas, and learnabout new technology. They will learn how tohandle frustration and solve problems. They will see

[ ]PortalPortal

46

Undertaking a project like this involves planningbefore the course starts and flexibility throughout thesemester. Although the students write the first e-mailto their partners well after the semester has begun, Istart making the necessary contacts and work out thedetails of the project much earlier. After running theproject for several semesters, I have come up with aflexible checklist that helps me organize the projectand have a more successful outcome (for some keyrecommendations, see the box).

Find the Right Partner ClassThe first step is to define the general demographicsof the desired partner class and the scope andobjectives of the project. You can choose a partnerclass located in any part of the world, and making adecision is much easier if you ask yourself a fewsimple questions at the beginning of the semester:

�What age should the students be? I havesuccessfully matched high school students withhigh school students, community collegestudents, and university students.

�What language will the students correspond in?Will the project be in English, or will it be bilingual?

�Is a specific level of language proficiencynecessary?

�What culture or country is desired? Is onespecific geographic location better thananother? Diverse time zones can affect thecommunication process negatively.

Once you have answered these basic questions, youcan search for a partner class. Many sites on theInternet, some individually sponsored and others setup by schools, offer a pen-pal service. The two sitesthat I have used most often, ePALS ClassroomExchange (http://www.epals.com/) and Teaching.com(http://www.teaching.com/), have services that linkteachers looking for partners. I search through otherteachers’ postings for a class that fits the criteria Ihave established based on the questions above. If Ifind a few possibilities, I send e-mails to theteachers who have posted the notice and explainwhat I am looking for. I also create a posting of myown so that other teachers can find me.

Within a few days, I typically have four or fivereplies, and I start narrowing the search. Class sizehas turned out to be the most important delimitingfactor. Projects seem to work best when the ratio ofstudents in my class to students in the distant classis as close as possible to one to one. If I have aspecific project in mind, I give as much informationas I can to the other teacher. An excellent source ofengaging project topics is Dave Sperling’s InternetActivity Workbook (1999). Many of these can beadapted to assignments that get the students talking.

47MARCH 2006

�

Tips for a Successful OnlinePartner Project

�Start early. Give yourself plenty of timeto plan and work out problems.

�Communicate often with the other teacher.Make sure you both know exactly what youexpect of the students.

�Use e-mail for initial student introductions.

�Create a chat room to give studentsanother way to communicate.

�Assign similar projects in both classes.The more alike the assignments are, themore likely the students are to meet allthe requirements on time.

�Be aware of holidays, vacations, breaks,and exam periods. There is nothing worsethan finding out that the studentshaven’t heard from their partners becauseof a vacation you didn’t know about.Make a schedule of special days, and giveit to your partner teacher.

I also consider these questions: What type andscope of project does the other teacher desire? Willthe students just chat online, or will they turn in anassignment? How structured will the assignment be?Will both classes have the same assignment? Will thestudent partners create one final product jointly, orwill they each create a separate product?

Set up the Project StructureOnce I have found a compatible class, I set upcommunication with the teacher using instant-messaging software, such as Yahoo! Messenger (seehttp://messenger.yahoo.com/) or MSN Messenger (seehttp://messenger.msn.com/). We agree on a time totalk and work out the details for getting started.

First, we each collect the e-mail addresses of allthe students. We then divide the students intogroups of four, two from each class. The groups canbe larger or smaller, depending on the scope of theproject, but smaller groups cause fewer problems,and all members are more likely to participate.

We also agree on when we will introduce theproject to our classes—ideally, the same day forboth classes. Before that day, I set up a chat roomat Yahoo! Groups (http://groups.yahoo.com/) or MSNGroups (http://groups.msn.com/) where the studentscan chat with their partners. The group site alsoserves as a place to upload the final assignments soall the students can see them.

In class, each student is assigned to a group andgiven the e-mail addresses of the other students inthat group. From their personal e-mail accounts,they write and send an introductory e-mail to theirpartners in the other class. Once the students havesuccessfully made contact with their partners, I givethem instructions for accessing the chat room I haveset up and encourage them to experiment with otherforms of communication, such as instant messagingand Web phone.

Assign the Project The project usually consists of two parts, a getting-to-know-you part and an assignment that involves ajointly researched or discussed topic. In a recent

project, I assigned a different topic (e.g., pets, art,cities, crime, food, family, marriage) from theInternet Activity Workbook (Sperling 1999) to eachgroup. The students’ assignment was to discuss thetopic as it related to their culture and explore theattitudes toward the topic in the culture(s) of theirpartners. The final assignment was a group MicrosoftPowerPoint presentation that showed the differencesand similarities between the two cultures.

Partners in TroubleshootingDuring the project, I stay in close contact with theother teacher. The most successful projects are onesin which we maintain open and frequent contact.Whenever I am at my computer, I keep my instant-messaging software open so that I can contact theother teacher whenever necessary to work outproblems that arise.

Nevertheless, things do go wrong. Students maycomplain, “I sent an e-mail, but nobody ever answered.”In response, all students must now send me a copy of

[ ]Portal

48

Through this project, students

will learn about people in

another part of the world, gain

exposure to new ideas, and learn

about new technology.

all e-mail communication. The chat technology isblocked on campus. Now students are told to set upchat times on their home computers. As each problemsurfaces, I verify it, discuss it with the other teacher,and come up with a solution. My goal is to handleproblems as they arise, not to have a problem-freeproject. Most students learn more when they overcome adifficulty or solve a technical or logistical problem.

Other, nontechnical problems arise, too. During theproject, students typically go through a cycle of initialenthusiasm followed by difficulties. At first, they are fullof curiosity and eagerly write their e-mails. Later, theymay experience frustration when problems arise—forexample, when they do not have a reply from theirpartner or are dissatisfied with the reply they receive.Most groups overcome the difficulties without beinghelped or complaining, but some do not. I tell studentsthat they will have to overcome communicationobstacles, both technical and interpersonal, and theywill be graded on how well they define and overcomethese problems. Knowing this empowers the students tomake decisions and take chances.

A Small Step toward GlobalUnderstanding, a Great Sense ofAccomplishmentThe students may struggle at times during thisdifficult project, but they come away from it with afeeling of accomplishment. By working with apartner from a different culture, they have taken onestep toward global understanding. For the teacher,the benefits are the same. But there can be oneadditional benefit: the second time around, theproject is a lot easier.

Reference

Sperling, D. 1999. Dave Sperling´s Internet activity workbook.White Plains, NY: Pearson Education.

Cheri Powell is an ESL teacher at the Instituto Technológico yEstudios Superiores de Monterrey, Campus Sonora Norte, in Mexico.

49MARCH 2006

This comprehensive

16-book series helps

students achieve

academic success

through a focus on:

College Oral Communication 1-4Marsha Chan | Ann E. Roemer Cheryl L. Delk | Steve Jones

New! Find outmore about

the HoughtonMifflin English

for AcademicSuccess series

• Visit our web site: esl.college.hmco.com(download our current newsletter)• Contact your Houghton Mifflinsales representative

• Contact our Faculty Services Center by Tel.: (800) 733-1717 x4019

College Reading 1-4Cheryl Benz | Myra M. Medina | LindaRobinson Fellag | John D. Avery | CynthiaM. Schuemann

College Writing 1-4Karen E. Walsh | Eileen Cotter | GabriellaNuttall | Li-Lee Tunceren | Sharon Cavusgil

College Vocabulary 1-4Julie Howard | Chaudron Gille Keith S. Folse | Marcella Farina | John D.Bunting

Essentials of Teaching Academic Englishvolumes are available for teacher training.

ORDER YOUR EXAM COPIES TODAY!

• Academic Content

• Competency-Based

Learning Objectives

• Classroom Tested—

Adjunct Approved

• Master Student Tips

• Robust Assessment

New for 2006

Sourcework (Advanced Writing)Nancy Dollahite | Julie Haun

From College to Careers (High Intermediate –Advanced Listening)Angel BishopPetty Robert Engel

Essential Academic Vocabulary(Advanced Vocabulary)Helen Huntley

Targeting Pronunciation, 2/e(High Intermediate –Advanced Pronunciation)Sue F. Miller

Key Concepts 1 & 2(Mid – High IntermediateOral Communication)Elena Vestri Solomon John Shelley

For more information onadditional Houghton

Mifflin products,services, or to obtain an

examination copy:

AvailableNow!

From Great Paragraphs toGreat Essays (Intermediate)Keith S. Folse

Key-Word SkillsChoosing key words is a skill in itself. Here are threebasic suggestions you can offer to students:

� Choose multiple words that most closely capturethe subject matter you are looking for. Forexample, a student was writing a term paper onthe use of silence in Chinese culture. Her key-word search using the words silence and Chineseturned up some useful links; however, a searchfor silence, communication, and Chinese turnedup many more useful links.

� Avoid entering articles, prepositions, and otherhigh-frequency words that are not directlyrelevant to the topic.

� Use the advanced searches offered by majorengines. Advanced searches can look for exactphrases or avoid false hits (e.g., making surethat the key word Dolly leads you to sitesdiscussing cloning rather than ones about acountry singer).

Popularity Is Not the Same as QualityOnce you enter key words, a search engine looks formatches in the titles and first few paragraphs of upto nineteen billion sites on the Web (CNN/Money2005). If the search engine finds many matches, theresults pages (usually with ten or twenty links perpage) may show where these key words appear mostoften. Search engines may also return results basedon the frequency with which pages are linked toeach other (The Economist 2004). In other words, if

Developing Learners’ CriticalFilter for Web Sites

Acouple of years ago, I read a comment

about immigration and race in a student

essay that included a reference to a Web

site. The comment was not inflammatory in any way,

but I checked out the referenced Web site anyway.

by Paul Stapleton

The site appeared innocent enough, but oneremark puzzled me, so I searched further. There wasno “About Us” page or mission statement at thesite, so my only recourse was to delete some of thesubdirectories in the URL to see what turned up. Atthe home page I was disturbed to see links to hategroups. Later, when I asked the student whether sherealized that her reference had connections to hateorganizations, she appeared genuinely shocked.

This incident highlights a growing concern amongsecond language teachers. As the Web graduallybecomes the primary source of information for manypeople, teachers need to help students develop aheightened critical filter when they use contentfrom Web sites. This is especially the case forsecond language learners. When they arrive at a Website after a key-word search, they may focus more oftheir energy on decoding the language than onevaluating the quality of the source.

When learners search for information on the Web,they need skills in three areas: choosing and using asearch engine, examining the Web site’s genre andlayout, and evaluating the Web site’s content.

Teach Some Search Engine SkillsSometimes I get the impression that students thinksearch engines are equivalent to library databases.While search engines often produce uncannilyaccurate results, they have their own nuances, andsome basic knowledge about search engines willhelp students understand their limitations ingenerating high-quality results.

[ ]PortalPortal

50

a site is very popular, it has a greater chance ofappearing on the first page of results.

Both methods mean that Web page makers canmanipulate content in order to appear on that keyfirst page. (According to McLaughlin 2002, 70percent of viewers do not go beyond the secondpage of search engine results when looking forinformation.) Naturally, popularity is not necessarilya good indicator of quality, and if content ismanipulated to attract visitors to a site, this furthercompromises its value.

While you don’t need to explain search enginealgorithms, learners need to be aware that searchengines do not always generate reliable links. Anylarge organization with an agenda to influencepublic opinion may optimize its Web site so thatcertain key words result in its appearance on thefirst page of results.

Choose the Right Search EngineMany students I have taught assume that the big portalengines, such as Google (http://www.google.com/) andYahoo! (http://www.yahoo.com/), are the only ones inexistence. However, many online newspapers offer freeuse of their engines to search the Web, and the linksthat these searches generate are generally reliable.Newspaper searches are useful for researching currentevents. For example, if a student is looking forinformation on the issue of whale hunting, The New YorkTimes (http://www.nytimes.com/) and Japan Times(http://www.japantimes.co.jp/) search engines offerprecise links on entering the key words whale, hunting,and meat.

For more serious, academic searches, students canuse Google Scholar (http://scholar.google.com/) orScirus (http://www.scirus.com/srsapp/), which limitsearches to academic and other scholarly sources (fora review of Google Scholar, see Essential Teacher,December 2005).

Look at the Web Site’s Genre and LayoutOnce students have used a search engine to generatea list of Web sites, they can learn a great deal abouta Web site by being aware of its genre and lookingfor certain features of its layout.

Is the Site Selling or Informing?Web site genre usually refers to the main domain namesuffix (e.g., .com, .org, .gov). In isolating the genre,you are trying to learn whether the site is sellingsomething, pushing an ideological agenda, or simplyinforming the public, among other purposes. Be aware,though, that the domain name suffix does not alwaysaccurately tell you the genre. For example, a URLcontaining geocities.com often designates a personalWeb site. (Yahoo! GeoCities is a company that hostsWeb sites for individuals and organizations.)

In any event, domain name suffixes can sometimesbe good indicators of genre. For instance, if a learneris looking for statistics about a country, a site with a.gov or .go (government) domain name suffix isprobably reliable and up-to-date. On the other hand,information derived from a personal site requiresmore scrutiny.

Warn students to view even sites of well-knownuniversities (with main domain names ending in .edu or.ac) with caution. Some students and teachers uploadworking papers or lecture notes on servers that areattached to their university’s domain. The quality ofsuch sites can range from admirable to abysmal.Encourage learners to look closely at the URLs in thesearch engine results (which appear, for example, ingreen on Google’s results pages) and judge accordingly.

Does the Site Tell You about Itself?By layout, I refer not to the appearance of the sitebut to the use of standardized features: the date(Last Updated), the Webmaster or author, and thepurpose (About Us or Mission Statement). Looking atthese features is helpful but not sufficient. Forexample, some mission statements have transparentdescriptions of the site’s purpose while others arecloaked in vague terms and high-minded language.Even extremist groups can claim that their goal is to“educate the public with facts about . . . .”

Nevertheless, in general, these standardizedfeatures are another way to judge quality. When theyare absent, encourage students to deletesubdirectories in the URL, if they exist, in order toexplore the site (e.g., in the URL, start at the endand delete the material back to the next slash, thenthe next, and so on).�

51MARCH 2006

Evaluate the ContentThe most important aspect of a Web site is itscontent, and some key indicators are helpful inevaluating quality.

Don’t Be Fooled by Appearance On arriving at a Web site, you are greeted by thedesign, including colors, fonts, photos, and graphics.With the availability of increasingly sophisticated,user-friendly software, almost anyone can make adecent-looking Web page. The problem is thatviewers (including students) may find it difficult toassess a site’s quality by its appearance. Individualswith an ideological agenda can create a reasonablygood-looking site, and well-funded organizations canemploy Web designers to make their sites look veryprofessional. The bottom line is that usingappearance as a guide to the quality of Web contentis less and less reliable.

Examine the Text with a Critical EyeEvaluating the quality of a Web site’s content is notmuch different from evaluating a book or magazine.Although the same principles apply, you need ahigher critical filter because, unlike most books,most Web sites do not have to pass through several

screenings by editors, reviewers, and publishers.Here are some aspects of the text that studentsshould be aware of.

Language: Use of language can often be a goodindicator of the quality of the information at a Website. For example, emotionally charged language cansignal excessive interest in a certain belief. Termssuch as shocking and heartbreaking sometimes showan overly emotional attachment to a topic andshould be viewed with some suspicion. Likewise,encourage students to view vague, unsubstantiatedassertions, for example, “the majority of Americansbelieve . . .,” with some doubt. They should also beskeptical of sarcasm, another emotionally laden wayto express a viewpoint.

Arguments: Fallacies, or poor reasoning, areanother feature to be wary of (for examples ofcommon fallacies, see textbooks on writing andcritical thinking, e.g., by Ramage and Bean 1999).Some of the more common types include redherrings, which try to divert the reader’s attention toan unrelated matter; straw person arguments, whichgreatly oversimplify any counterarguments; andslippery slope arguments, which assume that any stepin one direction will result in extreme consequences(e.g., marijuana smokers will inevitably end up using

[ ]Portal

In isolating the genre, you

are trying to learn

whether the site is selling

something, pushing an

ideological agenda, or

simply informing the public,

among other purposes.

52

.com.gov .org.net.edu.biz.info

.com.gov .org.net

.edu.biz.info

heroin). Many touchstone controversial issuesdiscussed at Web sites, such as same-sex marriage orgun control, often use appeal to emotional premisesarguments. Such issues also seem to include manyhasty generalizations, or the use of one isolatedexample to represent the norm.

Statistics: Information on Web sites often includessupporting statistics. Normally, readers respectnumbers as objective and unassailable, and oftenthey are. But learners need to view such figures witha healthy dose of skepticism if no source is shown orif they appear illogical. One example is the nowinfamous claim that 150 people a year are killed byfalling coconuts, which was based onunsubstantiated research and circulated on theInternet by a travel company (see Adams 2002).

Photos and graphics: Make students aware thatphotos can be used as persuasive tools. I recentlyvisited a Web site with an environmentalist agendathat showed a photo of a bloodied whale beingpulled aboard a factory ship. When I visited a pro-whaling site, I was greeted by a smiling, animatedwhale. The difference in mood conveyed by the twovisual images was stark.

Balance: Finally, encourage students to look forbalance. Sponsors of reputable Web pages usuallymake some effort to include links not only to pageswith ideology sympathetic to their own but also tothose with opposing views.

Breadth, Depth, and Pitfalls In the end, you and the students you teach shouldbe aware that the Web represents a still-burgeoningmedium that is awesome in breadth and depth butoffers many pitfalls for the naïve user. For Webcontent evaluation forms and guidelines that youcan adapt to students’ needs, see Stapleton andHelms-Park (forthcoming) and Widener University(2003). By teaching students to look at Web siteswith a critical eye, you can help them avoid beingtaken in by fallacious information on the Internet.

References

Adams, C. 2002. Are 150 people killed each year by fallingcoconuts? The Straight Dope, July 12. http://www.straightdope.com/columns/020719.html.

CNN/Money. 2005. Yahoo!, Google search for upper hand.August 15. http://money.cnn.com/2005/08/15/technology/google_yahoo/.

The Economist. 2004. How PageRank works. September 16.http://www.economist.com/science/tq/displayStory.cfm?story_id=3172188.

McLaughlin, L. 2002. The straight story on search engines. PC World, July, 115–24.

Ramage, J., and J. C. Bean. 1999. Writing arguments. Boston:Allyn and Bacon.

Stapleton, P., and Helms-Park, R. Forthcoming. EvaluatingWeb sources in an EAP course: Introducing a multi-traitinstrument for feedback and assessment. English for Specific Purposes.

Widener University. 2003. Evaluate Web pages.http://www.widener.edu/Tools_Resources/Libraries/Wolfgram_Memorial_Library/Evaluate_We b_Pages/659/.

Paul Stapleton is a professor at Hokkaido University, in Japan.

53MARCH 2006

SEND Portal is edited by Mercedes Rossetti ([email protected]).See http://www.tesol.org/ for submision guidelines.

T eachers of advanced ESL/EFLstudents in academic preparationclasses face a challenge: finding

compelling materials that bridge the gapbetween what the students learn in lowerlevels and the critical thinking, reading,and writing skills they need to develop foruniversity classes. New Directions providesa useful framework for helping studentsacquire these skills. It includes an

engaging array of thematically basedreadings as well as discussion, writing, andvocabulary activities that are appropriatefor young adults. Each chapter alsocontains a unique writing emphasis.

To this text’s second edition, the authorhas added a timely chapter on the massmedia and technology, many new andupdated readings, and several helpfulexercises, including a note-taking task that

encourages students to read actively. Bestof all, this edition includes acomprehensive new reference section,“Essentials of Writing,” which thoroughlyand systematically lays out all the stages ofthe writing process.

Leslie Greffenius is president and codirectorof the Olin Center, in the United States.

Home&O T H E R P A G E S

New Directions: Reading, Writing, and Critical Thinking, 2nd ed. Peter S.Gardner. New York: Cambridge University Press, 2005.

B reaking Through: College Readingis designed to help entering collegestudents gain the reading strategies

and study skills they’ll need in typicalfreshman classes in different departments,including business, history, politicalscience, and psychology.

Each chapter focuses on a different skill,such as guessing the meaning of newvocabulary from context, increasingreading speed, and making inferences.There are typically several exercises to

practice the skills on brief excerpts fromdifferent textbooks. This is followed by afew longer passages of two or three pages.Each of these ends with a list of Web sitesfor further reading.

Unfortunately, at a little over sixtydollars and a little under 600 pages,Breaking Through: College Reading issimply too expensive and too heavy forsome students. (One student split it in half,which at least solved the second problem.)

On the whole, though, my classes have

been quite happy with the book. They findit highly motivating to use an authenticbook (i.e., one not designed specifically forESOL students), with the type ofvocabulary and structures they’re likely toencounter in their future studies.

Catharine Hannay teaches in the IntensiveEnglish Program of the Center for LanguageEducation and Development at GeorgetownUniversity, in the United States.

Breaking Through: College Reading, 7th ed. Brenda D. Smith. New York: Pearson Education, 2005.

Words in print

54

TOEFL iBT. Educational Testing Service.http://www.ets.org/toefl/.

If you listen carefully, you can hearit. Students from all over theworld are grumbling, and some are

even panicking, as they prepare totake the new Test of English as aForeign Language (TOEFL). Nolonger will their noncommunicativetest-taking strategies of memorizingvocabulary words and grammar ruleswork. In September 2005, EducationalTesting Service (ETS) beganadministering a new and improvedTOEFL known as the TOEFL iBT(Internet-Based Test). This isn’t justthe previous test put on the Internet;it represents a complete overhaul ofthe entire test. This revision, which isbeing unveiled in stages around theworld (China, Japan, and Korea willchange over in May), is supposed tomore accurately predict students’communicative competence in anacademic context.

The buzzword for the TOEFL iBT isintegrated. Instead of independentlyassessing discrete skills in listening,grammar, and reading, the new testrequires students to combine skillsjust as they would in a real academiccontext. The new test takes severalleaps up Bloom’s taxonomy. No longerjust testing knowledge andcomprehension, the test now requiresapplication, analysis, and synthesis.

The listening section still includesconversations and minilectures, but nowasks questions about the speaker’sattitude and purpose, a far moresophisticated task than just listening forcontent. The writing section has added a

second essay that requires students tosynthesize information from a readingand lecture in their response.

The biggest change, however, is theaddition of a speaking component. Thespeaking section contains six questions:two independent questions (similar tothe Speaking Proficiency EnglishAssessment Kit [SPEAK]) and fourintegrated questions that ask students tosummarize, synthesize, and expandinformation from minilectures orconversations and readings. The sixty-second responses are graded holisticallyon the basis of topic development,delivery, and language use.

The TOEFL iBT site devotes hundredsof pages to the TOEFL iBT, includingstandard-setting materials withcomparison charts, the speaking andwriting rubrics, and details of thedevelopment of the test and the pilotingprocess. The site also includes a freepractice test and a seventy-one-pagebrochure called TOEFL iBT Tips, whichstudents can download or request by e-mailing [email protected].

Whether or not the TOEFL iBTreally predicts students’ academicreadiness remains to be seen. What iscertain, though, is that you’ll neveragain have students skipping theiracademic speaking class because theywere home studying for the TOEFL.

Barbara Schroeder Jensen, outgoingchair of TESOL’s InternationalTeaching Assistants Interest Section,teaches at Princeton University, in theUnited States.

Sister Act. Motion picture. Directed by Emile Ardolino. Burbank, CA: Touchstone Pictures, 1992.

Whoopi Goldberg’s hit movie Sister Act is anamusing crime caper that can serve as the basis for avariety of enjoyable activities for ESL learners. In thismodern-day fairy tale, Goldberg plays a flamboyantLas Vegas lounge singer who goes into hiding in acloistered convent after witnessing a murderorchestrated by her mobster boyfriend. A beginning-level class might focus on the colorful, visual side ofSister Act. Intermediate-level classes can cover theplot, music, and characters. More advanced-levellearners might focus on the idiomatic language andjokes and compare this film with other pop-culturestories that carry a moral.

Musical films provide the added benefit of songsand lyrics that can enhance learning. The Sister Actsoundtrack includes a number of tunes with easy-to-understand lyrics and a rock-and-roll rhythm. Thelyrics to these catchy songs can be found atSoundTrack Lyrics (http://www.stlyrics.com/; for acaveat on downloading and copying lyrics, see “ASong-Based Grammar Lesson in Record Time,” in this issue).

ESL teachers can incorporate Sister Act intoinstruction in many ways. For instance, the filmcomplements thematic units on crime, religion, andurban living. Students may also enjoy acting out orwriting about the comical scenes and stereotypicalcharacters. In addition, students can brainstormalternative story endings or write their own reviewsof the film in the style of a magazine or newspaper.

Abigail Bartoshesky is a visiting assistant professor ofteacher education and anthropology at SouthernMethodist University, in the United States.

[ ]Cybersights sound

bites

55MARCH 2006

Home&O T H E R P A G E S

Software ThumbnailsSpeech Works: Interactive Pronunciation Practice for All Ages, Personaland Teacher Versions. Trinity Software, http://www.trinitysoftware.com/.

S peech Works: Personal Version, available for Windows orMacintosh operating systems, is designed to help students modifyand improve their English pronunciation. The Teacher Version

gives you the opportunity to personalize the lessons and interact withyour students. It is designed for individual work but allows for student-teacher interaction. It would not be particularly effective for group work.

This well-organized program is divided into twenty-four units. Eachunit includes Discriminating Sounds Exercises, Word Pairs Drills,Sentence Exercises, Professional Vocabulary Exercises, WorkplacePractice Exercises, and Extra Practice. The visual clues in the exercisesare effective in aiding navigation. A particularly useful feature of thePersonal Version is its presentation of three modalities for students touse in processing the information: print, audio, and visual.

In Speech Works, students work with various kinds of informationand then perform a variety of tasks at different levels of difficulty.Students can build their own connections in exercises that ask them, forexample, to think of a word they use in the workplace. The student mustthen use the word in the exercise, thus personalizing the information.

Two activities are particularly useful. In one, students listen to twosounds in English and decide whether the second sound is the same as ordifferent from the first. In another activity, students listen to a model voiceand record their own attempt, which is then compared with the model.

The Teacher Version adds the following features to the PersonalVersion: probe quizzes that assess students’ specific pronunciationproblems, diagnostic tests to determine which units will be the mostuseful for individual students, a tracking feature that allows you to keepscore while the student works at the exercises, an instructor’s programthat creates files on the progress of individual students and stores datafrom their work, and personal practice files that allow you to createspecialized exercises.

The Personal Version is very reasonably priced at US$79.95, which ismuch less than many other similar programs. The Teacher Version costsconsiderably more (US$395.00), but it has many more functions. TheTeacher Version can also be used by students since it has the sameexercise functions as the Personal Version.

Kaley Bierman is a teacher and program adviser in the Intensive EnglishProgram at Brevard Community College, in the United States.

Home and Other Pages is edited by Christine Meloni([email protected]). See http://www.tesol.org/ for submission guidelines.

SEND

56

Activities By Teachers, For Teachers

New Ways in TESOL Series

The popular New Ways series offers languageteachers effective classroom techniques andactivities. This 18-volume series includes topicssuch as authentic materials, communicativegames, English for specific purposes, English atthe secondary level, content-based instruction,reading, speaking, and many others.

TESOL publications

PO Box 753, Waldorf, MD 20604-0753 USAToll Free +1 888-891-0041, Tel. +1 301-638-4427 Fax +1 301-843-0159E-mail [email protected] Order online at http://www.tesol.org/


57MARCH 2006

Stephen Stoynoff and Carol A. Chapelle

ISBN 193118516-6 Order #166$24.95 (member $19.95)

ESOL Tests and Testing

TESOLPublicationsPO Box 753, Waldorf, MD 20604-0753 USAToll Free 888-891-0041 � Tel. 301-638-4427 or -4428 � Fax 301-843-0159E-mail [email protected] � Order online at http://www.tesol.org/

Stoynoff and Chapelle introduce teachers and administratorsto the PRINCIPLES, METHODS, and VOCABULARY of language assessment.

Twenty-one experienced ESOL test reviewers consider howto evaluate tests and testing manuals, and they discuss testpurpose and method. Practitioners learn how advances inmeasurement theory and language testing research havechanged the assessment landscape.

The sequence approximates how teachers and administrators might evaluate a standardized test.

Preview the overview chapter and two sample tests at http://www.tesol.org : Books : AssessmentOrder online at http://www.tesol.org/


B U L L E T I Nboard

President’s MessageTESOL’s Strategic Plan, Part Two

In my December column, I discussed the first three goals of TESOL’s three-yearStrategic Plan: (1) policy promotion for the association, (2) professional development,and (3) research. I now turn to the last three goals, with the objectives and activitiesembodied within each: (4) standards, (5) worldwide professional participation, and (6)organization sustainability and growth.

Goal Four: StandardsOne of the most important activities of any professional association is devising anddisseminating professional standards. TESOL has already been quite active in thisarena. Under the Strategic Plan, one objective is to devote additionalorganizational resources to standards-based projects. TESOL will continue todevelop and distribute publications, and hold workshops on standards as part ofprofessional development. Connected with this effort, TESOL will explore newways to distribute its standards-based products through cooperative arrangementswith other professional associations and other entities involved in Englishlanguage teaching (ELT).

A second objective is for TESOL to become a resource for developing ELTstandards in new contexts. Since English teaching occurs throughout the globe, innative- and nonnative-English-speaking contexts, TESOL will draft guidelines fordeveloping appropriate, locally relevant TESOL standards that meet the needs of avariety of ELT situations.

The third objective is for TESOL to develop and promote TESOL standards for newand emerging areas within the field. In particular, TESOL hopes to developtechnology standards for use by teachers, teacher educators, and learners.

Goal Five: Worldwide Professional ParticipationTESOL’s next goal is to ensure that the association assumes a leadership role inworldwide professional participation. Increasing the collaboration between TESOLand other organizations in the field will help bring about this goal. TESOL shouldseek out opportunities to create partnerships through regional symposia andconferences, create cyberlinks among organizational Web sites, and encouragecollaboration among TESOL affiliates and between affiliates and TESOL itself.

Another objective is for TESOL to conduct research toward establishing profiles ofELT instructors worldwide. These profiles will reveal who teaches English worldwide,what qualifications are required of them, and what issues they encounter. The firstactivity needed to meet this objective is to create an e-instrument to collect the datato answer these questions and others. Then, TESOL needs to initiate research

58

responses to help ELT professionals in diverse,resource-challenged situations.

Finally, TESOL and its affiliates need toincrease their membership. TESOL plans tocreate a promotional DVD about theassociation, work with teacher educationprograms to help inform others on why ELTpractitioners need to join professionalassociations, and identify and increase thenumber of TESOL affiliates inunderrepresented areas while supportingcurrent TESOL affiliates.

Goal Six: OrganizationSustainability and GrowthThe last goal in TESOL’s Strategic Plan isorganization sustainability and growth. Simplystated, if TESOL is to achieve all its objectivesand deliver all its services to the membership,the association must be healthy fiscally andorganizationally. TESOL leaders have afiduciary responsibility to monitor theassociation’s operations in such areas asbudget, staffing, and fiscal policies. They mustensure that sound practices are in place togovern the association and that they areeducated about TESOL’s financial operation.Further, they must ensure that the goals andobjectives articulated within the Strategic Planare being fulfilled.

Another key objective is to increase TESOL’smembership worldwide. All TESOL membersneed to identify potential members and urgethem to join. TESOL needs to create newmembership initiatives to interest those whoare not currently involved in TESOL andexplore new membership categories for thosewho feel excluded from TESOL. Additionally,the association needs to retain currentmembers and make sure TESOL meets theirprofessional needs. All of these activities willrequire new strategies to educate ELTprofessionals about TESOL.

Yet another objective in this goal is toexpand nondues revenue sources to supportmember programs and initiatives worldwide.Since most TESOL members have limitedmeans, the association cannot rely solely ondues for support. TESOL needs to enhancedevelopment awareness among members,analyze and expand sponsorship opportunities,and seek opportunities for financial supportfrom individuals, private foundations,educational institutions, corporations, andgovernment entities.

Finally, to maintain a vital, dynamic, andgrowing professional association, TESOLneeds to continue to involve its leaders andmembers in the association. The associationneeds to seek members’ ideas on how to makeTESOL a better association and encouragethem to assume leadership positions.

Taken as a whole, TESOL’s Strategic Planprovides an ambitious but feasible road mapfor the association over the next three years. Itsets goals and objectives for TESOL yet allowsthem to be modified should circumstanceschange. I invite all in TESOL to join in makingthis plan a reality.

A final note: With this column, I concludemy term as president of TESOL. I thank allwho have helped me during my term. Youhave made me a better TESOL professional,and that will remain with me for the rest ofmy career. I wish Jun Liu much success aspresident in 2006–07.

Elliot L. JuddPresident, 2005–06

59MARCH 2006

B U L L E T I Nboard

The 40th Annual TESOLConvention to Be Held inTampa, Florida, USA, March15–18The advance program was mailed in mid-November. Convention registration andhotel reservations began December 1.Visit http://www.tesol.org/ for updates.The TESOL home page also has the linksto Laser Registration, to register for theconvention, and to the Tampa HousingBureau—Passkey, to make hotelreservations, as well as to otherconvention information. Look for a boxtitled Convention 2006.

Do you have questions on registration orwant to confirm your TESOL conventionregistration? This year TESOL hasprovided toll-free numbers for callers inthe United States and Canada. Please call1-866-999-3032 for information. The faxnumber for registration forms is 866-614-5463. Convention attendees fromoutside North America should directregistration questions to LaserRegistration, in Montréal, Canada, at514-228-3074. Fax your registrationforms to 514-228-3151. Please use thefax numbers provided here. Faxing yourregistration forms to TESOL CentralOffice in Alexandria, Virginia, will delayyour registration.

Download Presentationsfrom TESOL 2005 TESOL has developed an online repositoryof convention presentations and materials.Participants were asked to submit theirmaterials and papers by early June 2005.Watch for information on when and howyou can access these resources in TESOLConnections and at http://www.tesol.org/ :Professional Development.

2005 and 2006 SymposiaTwo symposia were held in 2005. TheTESOL Symposium on Dual LanguageEducation: Teaching and Learning TwoLanguages in the EFL Setting took placeSeptember 23 at Bogaziçi University,Istanbul, Turkey. The featured speakerswere Cem Alptekin, Istanbul, Turkey;Jim Cummins, Ontario, Canada; andBarbara Seidlhofer, Vienna, Austria.Hüsnü Enginarlar, Ankara, Turkey,provided closing remarks.

The TESOL Symposium on EnglishLanguage Teaching in Resource-Challenged Contexts took place December16–17 at the Sofitel Teranga Dakar Hotel,in Dakar, Senegal. The featured speakerswere JoAnn Crandall, Baltimore County,Maryland, USA; Pai Obanya, Ibadan,Nigeria; and Brian Tomlinson, Leeds,England. Moussa Diouf, Dakar, Senegal,provided closing remarks.

The TESOL Symposium on Words Matter:The Importance of Vocabulary in EnglishLanguage Teaching and Learning will takeplace March 27, 2006, at Dubai Men’sCollege, in Dubai, United Arab Emirates.For more information, [email protected].

Association News

60

v

Tampa Convention Center

2006 TESOL AcademiesTESOL will hold two academies in 2006, one in theUnited States and the other in Korea. The first2006 academy will be held at Roosevelt University,in Chicago, Illinois, in the United States, June23–24, 2006. This academy will feature six hands-on, ten-hour workshops. The TESOL InternationalSummer Academy will be at the SookmyungWomen’s University, in Seoul, Korea. This academywill feature four hands-on, ten-hour workshops.

For more information about TESOL Academies, e-mail [email protected].

2006 Online Courses and SeminarsLearn about online professional developmentopportunities through TESOL, including thePrinciples and Practices of Online TeachingCertificate Program and TESOL virtual seminars.TESOL virtual seminars focus on key issues in ESLand EFL. Bring together colleagues at your school ororganization for a live Webcast (or, when it fits yourschedule, use the virtual seminar’s playback feature).Virtual seminar participants can also take part in anonline discussion. For more information, [email protected].

Results of the Elections for the2006–07 Board of Directors andNominating CommitteePresident-Elect, 2006–07: Sandra J. Briggs

Directors, 2006–09: Joyce Kling, Gabriel DíazMaggioli, John Schmidt, Jim Stack

New Nominating Committee Members: KhadarBashir-Ali, Ester de Jong, Lisa Harshbarger,Constantine Ioannou, Ann Johns, GabrielaKleckova, Susanne McLaughlin, Beth Witt

Board of Directors ApprovesPosition Statements on No ChildLeft Behind Act, U.S. Visa PolicyAt its meeting in October, the Board of Directorsapproved two new position statements. The firstaddresses assessment of English languages learnersin the United States under the No Child Behind Actof 2001, and the second focuses on U.S. visa policyfor international students and scholars. Bothstatements are available at http://www.tesol.org/.

Research AgendaIn October 2004, the TESOL Board of Directorsapproved a revised Research Agenda developed by theSecond Research Agenda Task Force, whichcomprised Simon Borg, Andrew Curtis, ChrisDavidson, Zhao Hong Han, Dudley Reynolds, andTom Scovel (chair). The Research Agenda was created

to help TESOL professionals and others organize andcoordinate inquiry in the field and to promotebroader awareness of what constitutes research inTESOL. Built on the broad, methodologically andtopically pluralistic foundation of the first ResearchAgenda in 2000, this document presents TESOLprofessionals with priority areas for research andshould help funding applicants and agencies decidewhat research to pursue and support. The 2004Research Agenda includes a special hot-linked sectiontitled “References, Resources, and Web Sites.”

To download the current agenda, go tohttp://www.tesol.org/ : Professional Issues :Research Agenda. A version in portable documentformat (PDF) is available. TESOL welcomes yourcomments and suggestions as well as youradditions to the resources section. Please sendthem to [email protected].

Visit the TESOL Center during theTampa ConventionStop by the TESOL Center (Booth 123) at the annualconvention and pick up a free TESOL pen. Check outchanges to TESOL’s Web site, purchase a one-of-a-kindfortieth anniversary pin, review new publications, orchat with knowledgeable staff about what is going onin TESOL. There will be several author appearanceswith opportunities for book signings.

TESOL Awards and GrantsThe generous contributions of TESOL membersmakes it possible for TESOL to provide sixty awardsand grants each year. You can support the Awardsand Grants program when you register for TESOL’s40th Annual Convention and Exhibition, whenrenewing your membership, or by buying a ticket atthe Annual Awards and Grants Raffle (held during theannual convention). Or, if you’d like to make yourU.S., Canada, and Mexico tax-deductible contributiontoday, visit http://www.tesol.org/ : Association: HelpSupport TESOL : Awards and Grants.

40th Anniversary Web Page Visit http://www.tesol.org/ : Association : TESOL’s40th Anniversary to learn more about thecelebrations and events that will mark the occasion.Among the resources now available or coming soon: � a TESOL Timeline, marking significant events

in the association’s history� testimonials from members and supporters� a calendar of events taking place during

2005–2006� information about the 40 for the 40th

Giveaway. Check back often to see if you areone of the lucky winners of hundreds ofdollars in prizes being given away eachmonth—no entry required!

61MARCH 2006

Annual FundSupporting TESOL’s work has never been easier. Nowyou can make your contributions online. Visit theSupport TESOL section of the Association page to makeyour U.S., Canada, and Mexico tax-deductible gift to theassociation. And to see how your contribution is put towork, be sure to take a look at TESOL’s 2005 AnnualReport, also available online. For more information, orto receive a hard copy of the report, contactDevelopment Manager Jane Kaddouri at 703-518-2539or [email protected].

TESOL ConnectionsTESOL Connections is a free semimonthly e-newsletterfor members. It includes briefings about TESOL andTESOL members in the mainstream news and hot linksto field-related resources. Articles and items and storiesby and about members that are posted on the TESOLWeb site are highlighted and linked through TESOLConnections. Sign up at http://www.tesol.org/ :Membership : Membership Benefits.

Contact TESOL When You MoveTESOL wants you to receive your issues of EssentialTeacher and TESOL Quarterly in a timely manner. Toensure uninterrupted delivery, please notify TESOLwhen you move. As a member, you can change youraddress online. Just log in with your member number,view your current profile, and edit your address changes.Or you may send a message to either [email protected] [email protected]. If you send a message, please besure to include your member number.

If you currently receive issues at your institution,consider changing your address to receive your issues athome. This small adjustment may significantly improvearrival time.

Access TESOL Quarterly throughIngentaConnectCurrent TESOL Quarterly (TQ) subscribers candownload articles from 2001 forward free fromIngentaConnect (http://www.ingentaconnect.com/content/tesol/tq/). Subscribers may either create auser name and password with IngentaConnect, orthey may access TQ through TESOL’s Web site bylogging in, then visiting the Membership: MemberBenefits section and clicking on Member Subscribers:Access TESOL Quarterly Online. Subscribers whochoose to access TQ through TESOL’s Web site do notneed to register with Ingenta. Nonsubscribers mayread TQ abstracts and tables of contents throughIngentaConnect for free, and they may purchasearticles. Current prices are US$25 for articles andUS$15 for reviews. Users in the European Unionmust also pay tax. The entire run of TQ is alsoavailable on CD-ROM from http://virtualcopy.com/.

TESOL Quarterly ForumTo share ideas, comments, and questions about thearticles in TESOL Quarterly’s December issue, visit theTQ Online Forum (http://communities.tesol.org/). Withthe December 2005 issue, the forum adopted a newapproach: The authors themselves suggest relevantquestions, and readers have the opportunity to discussthe research with the authors. Visitors are alsoencouraged to post questions.

Graduate Student ForumThe Graduate Student Forum is a student-runminiconference. The forum provides a venue at theTESOL convention that allows MA-level students toshare the results of their research, their teaching ideasand experiences, and the materials they have developed.They can also meet and network with fellow graduatestudents (and faculty) at other universities. This forumallows graduate students to formally participate in theTESOL convention without having to meet the earlydeadlines for submitting proposals or compete withexperienced professionals for time on the conventionprogram. For more information, please visit http:// www.tesol.org/.

Conduct TESOLBusiness OnlineYou can join or renew yourmembership, subscribe to TESOLserial publications, and purchase TESOL publicationsonline. TESOL members get an average discount of25% on publications.

Main [email protected] [email protected] Services [email protected] [email protected] Programs [email protected] Services [email protected]

Affiliates [email protected] [email protected] Services [email protected] [email protected] Sections [email protected]

President (Board of Directors) [email protected] [email protected]

Advertising [email protected] Teacher [email protected] [email protected] Quarterly [email protected]

62

SPONSORSHIP TESOL thanks its sponsors.

Doctoral ForumThe Doctoral Forum (formerly the PhD Forum) willbe held in Tampa as part of the 40th Annual TESOLConvention. TESOL invites doctoral students toparticipate in this informative event. The Forum isan informal meeting that brings together doctoralstudents and experienced ESOL professionals whoare interested in similar research topics and researchapproaches. The forum enables doctoral students toget feedback about current issues pertaining to theirdissertation research from their peers as well as fromthe seasoned ESOL professionals (mentors). It is alsoan opportunity for doctoral students to network withone another. While this may sound formal, the eventis actually a relaxed, informal gathering where thestudents can talk casually about their research. Formore information, please visit http://www.tesol.org/.

PartneringTESOL and the National Council of Teachers ofEnglish (NCTE) have partnered in thedevelopment of an ESL module hosted athttp://www.ncte.org/profdev. Paula Leoni-Bacchus,an ESL/bilingual/Spanish teacher and adjunctprofessor for language, literacy, and culture atLesley University in Boston, Massachusetts, in theUnited States, is the content leader for TESOL onthis project.

The module has been developed to aid mainstreamteachers in meeting the needs of today’s multilingualclassrooms. Components of the module includearticles from TESOL publications as well as fromNCTE’s, reading invitations, writing engagements,and bulletin board forums.

Go to http://www.ncte.org/profdev to learn moreabout the CoLEARN program and how to enroll.To view the TESOL module, click through toCoLEARN TESOL.

TESOL Revises Pre-K–12 EnglishLanguage Proficiency StandardsIn the nearly ten years since the publication ofTESOL’s (1997) ESL Standards for Pre-K–12Students, the standards movement has continuedto grow and influence educational systems at alllevels throughout the United States. The provisionsof the No Child Left Behind Act of 2001 (NCLB)have also focused attention on English languagelearners’ needs by requiring each state to developEnglish language proficiency standards.

With TESOL’s 1997 publication as a starting point,the standards were revised to reflect recent changesto the NCLB legislation. The 2006 volume alsopresents detailed tables that show indicators ofsuccess at different levels of proficiency. For moreinformation on the revised standards framework,visit http://www.tesol.org/PK12ELPStandards. Thepublished volume will be available in late March.

Platinum Plus Cambridge University PressEducational Testing Service

PlatinumThe Hampton Brown

CompanyHarcourt AchieveLeapFrog SchoolHouse

GoldEducational Research &

Development Training Service

McGraw-Hill ESL/ELTNational Geographic

School PublishingSantillana PublishingThomson-Heinle

University of Central FloridaUniversity of South Florida

SilverAMIDEASTGES Exposition ServiceKaplan English ProgramsUniversity of

Houston—Downtown

2006

For information on how to become a sponsor, contact Jane

Kaddouri at 703-518-2539 or [email protected]. 63MARCH 2006

64

Newsweek Education Ad (Password Protected)

Teachers of English to Speakers of Other Languages, Inc.700 South Washington Street, Suite 200Alexandria,Virginia 22314 USA

Change Service Requested

Call today or go online for a free demo CD-ROM

1-800-561-8179www.RosettaStone.com/et1Classroom Edition. Solutions for individuals also available.

When a student succeeds, everyonesucceeds. For ESL students, the possibilities are endless when they learn to speak, read, write and understand English. Rosetta Stone®

language-learning software helps makethis possible every day in US schools.

> Every step of the way, our Dynamic Immersion™method provides audio and visual feedback; so theyknow they’re getting it right.

> Students of any age or ability are challenged at theirown pace and level through customizable curricula.

> Tracking their success is simple with our integratedStudent Management System.

> Stunning imagery, native speakers, real-life contexts and hands-on interaction keeps students engaged.

THE #1 ESL SOFTWARE IN US SCHOOLS HAS STUDENTS……Succeeding in English.

Free 30-day Trial!Sign Up at Rosetta Stone Booth #610/612at TESOL in Tampa FL

Visit Rosetta Stone Sessions at TESOLSession 1: Computer Based Language Learning in the ESL ClassroomWednesday, March 15, 10:30–11:15Exhibit Hall, Tampa Convention Center, Room 37

Session 2: Implementing Rosetta Stone for ESL LearnersThursday, March 16, 3:00–3:45Exhibit Hall, Tampa Convention Center, Classroom G

A Song-Based Grammar Lesson in Record Time Weighing the Whys ...

Documents

Transcript of A Song-Based Grammar Lesson in Record Time Weighing the Whys ...