Plans, plans, plans. I had thought of attacking the Flynn issue today, in a leap off the educational wagon. I might not have been leaping as far as readers expect. I believe that casual lying has become a steadily worsening problem in America and in America’s schools. Students lie before they are even sure they are in trouble. Some students seem to lie reflexively. This problem needs to be addressed, but not today. Ditto the problem of “Kyle,” the scary preschooler who must be watched almost every second. I hope to get to Kyle tomorrow.
Today, I want to reminisce, while making a curricular point. Earlier posts in this blog have talked about the Curriculum Death March, that attempt to slog through over 300 pages of a Spanish 1 textbook in one school year because 1) the District Office had determined we needed to cover the whole book and 2) the District Office had written the midterms and finals that were required for the multiple high schools within this district.
Students did not enjoy those Spanish 1 classes very much. We hugged the book. They went with the program for the sake of their grades.
I flashed back to another high school Spanish 1 class from my first year and “The Morris Show.” Students were given lists of vocabulary and other concepts to work into a presentation and then cut loose. One of my favorite all-time teaching memories came out of this assignment. Two young, African-American men came up with one of the funniest skits of my teaching career. It was hardly politically correct and I don’t know that the administration would have approved. When two of your favorite gang members get involved and even excited in Spanish, though, I’d say it’s best not to shut them down.
The two students enacted a “Maury Povich” show of sorts. Maury/Morris was quietly in the background while Student One accused Student Two of getting his sister pregnant and demanded he support the child. Student Two came back that Student One’s sister had lots of boyfriends and no way was he the dad. He proceeded to describe the sister as unattractive, with big teeth, and not his type. Student One came back that Student Two was attracted to his sister’s big breasts and it did not matter if she was pretty. Who cared? Etc. The fight rolled on at the front of the room on Maury’s invisible stage.
Um, pedagogically questionable, anyone?
Maybe so, but here’s what I want to observe: Those boys worked nonstop to make their presentation as good as possible. They kept coming back to get help and add vocabulary so they could present a TV show that flowed. Other students helped them, too. Other students watched them working and set out to do best work they could on their own projects. When the show went on, some students were practically falling in the aisles they were laughing so hard.
That project taught a great deal of Spanish and if students learned how to say ta-tas in Spanish, oh, well. The kids were engaged. Behavioral issues almost disappeared during project preparations. We had so much fun with that project, and others. I was proud of my students.
Eduhonesty: Method 1 for teaching Spanish: Set the bar high, require that kids learn exactly what chapters contain so they can be ready for canned mid-terms and finals, and then hammer the kids with stories in the book about Costa Rica that don’t interest them at all.
Method 2 for teaching Spanish: Pick a group of verbs, grammatical concepts, and vocabulary words you want to teach. Then let the kids use these verbs, grammatical concepts and vocabulary words to create an original story or skit. Make sure your rubric keeps the kids honest. They must use the vocabulary and concepts required.
Sitting here in the Twilight Zone of our educational times, I’d like to ask readers to kick an educational can or two and go back into public school shoes. Which approach do you prefer? Which approach will leave you remembering more Spanish in two or five years?
How excited and engaged we are while learning makes all the difference in terms of which material sneaks over into long-term memory and which material gets shelved instead, waiting unvisited until the words on the shelf get lost in time.