Foray into Comprehensible Input

A few weeks ago my intermediate students turned in a take-home exam and since I couldn't realistically expect them to prepare new material for the day, I opted to "comprehensible input" them with weather and season vocabulary. Normally I would assign them a few pages to pre-teach themselves a concept and a few exercises to give them practice with the basics. Instead, this was the framework of my lesson plan:

• 5 minutes Me narrate/describe photos and weather outside
• 2 min en français-faisons du brainstorming au tableau des nouveaux mots/expressions 
• 2 min en français-nous utilisons le nouveau vocabulaire                       

                        aujourd’hui il… ?

                        en février en général il…. ?

I used images like this:

http://theplunder.com/i-photographed-my-dog-enjoying-a-snowy-day/

And:

http://laurentowers.blogspot.com/2013/07/stormy-day.html

This was a significant departure for them. They didn't stare at the book or rifle through pages to look at a vocab list. They answered the most basic of questions. For example: "Il fait chaud?" while pointing at the first photo. "Il neige?" while pointing at the second. I did as much repetition (and gesticulating) as I could before asking them to use the new words themselves. 

The results: 4 of the 6 students said they liked the format, although 2 added the caveat that they wouldn't want that format all the time. They were afraid of missing something if they looked away, but they also wanted to take notes. At the end of the unit, one added more emphatically that he thought the change was really helpful for him. 

I had very mixed feelings about the experience. The change to CI felt like the fairest way to begin the new material. I selected images ahead of time that would weave in a broad variety of vocab, but otherwise I didn't plan much ahead. I appreciated that they were all engaged. I was impressed by how much they could say after just 5 minutes or so. 

On the other hand, the success was thanks to MY preparation. They didn't have to do anything outside of class. Our accrediting body requires us to put a statement about the workload expectations for the course on the syllabus (1-2 hours outside of class per hour inside of class), but students NEVER, EVER put in that much time outside of class. I've been frustrated that we can't accomplish more task-based activities because they hinge on scaffolding that students must do outside of class. That day I wasn't frustrated by their lack of preparation, but the CI model totally circumvents those challenges, and not necessarily in a healthy way. It puts the responsibility almost solely on the instructor. I wonder what homework looks like in a purely CI-based classroom. With college age students, I resent essentially doing the hard work for them. 

My personal conclusion is that on days when I can't expect them to prepare outside of class, I am willing to integrate CI-lite strategies. I am willing to give a CI-esque intro to new chapters and concepts. I am unwilling to use CI everyday because it is so passive. 

Bread is a Teaching Tool

"A baguette,

few days old,

2 tiny green mold spots,

and 2 more even tinier.

I scraped off the mold,

stuck the whole thing in the oven,

400 degrees, 10 minutes.

I think I should eat it.

Do you?" 

(Facebook question posed by a rhetoric professor to a biology professor)

The francophone in me who claims France as her second home is shocked at the idea that a baguette could linger, unfinished, for days. A real, quality, French baguette would be better suited for building construction or self-defense after a few hours, let alone a few days. But what a brilliant teaching opportunity.

ACTFL recommends teaching culture through the lens of 3Ps-products, practices and perspectives. Here we have the same product, baguettes, consumed by two different cultures. In one culture the practice is to consume the baguette within the day, leaving it for one additional day at the absolute most (and only then with the understanding that it still might be dreadful after that short amount of time). In this culture, quality bread is regularly consumed, best eaten fresh, and easily procured. In this culture, the perspective is that artisan bread-baking is an art that does not include preservatives and access to this type of bread should be widespread so it can be the staple that it is.

In the other culture, most groceries are purchased in large quantities once or twice per week, making preservatives a necessity (practice). There are far fewer artisan bakeries so replenishing the bread supply is a greater challenge (practice). Dietitians, athletes, bloggers and the like debate the appropriateness of carbs at all, let alone daily and at most meals (perspective). If people believed more strongly in the cultural and nutritional value of high quality bread (perspective), there would be more bakeries (practice).

From the consumption of a simple baguette we could have a whole conversation about urban planning, transportation, small business ownership, waste, and environmentalism. Studying a language is a powerful thing.