Stumbling in my adults’ BGE Lesson #5

While Lessons #3 and #4 at the Akademie Schönbühl went well, the plan for #5 led to an unplanned and highly emotional evaluation-discussion. After I had the participants write a fax (like a written test, which most of them managed quite well), I had the usual preparatory section. Already during that phase, two groups complained that the topics were too demanding: the group that had to present “how to talk about things in the past” (i.e. simple past) and the group that had to present “how to contrast things” (i.e. comparative). Then there was first a revision and then a vocabulary group (I used the vocabulary exercise also to revise old vocabulary). Then, during the “past tense” group’s turn, people seemed so stressed that I broke up the lesson and started a discussion/evaluation.

It was strange that all of sudden people did not remember words that we have had in every single lesson. They claimed that there were so many unknown words and so few revision exercises (while I, in contrast, had noted that they didn’t even fully use the revision offers in class properly). Back home, I first had to correct the diagnosis. What I could draw from their impressions and feelings is, that it must indeed be stressful for the presenters to pay simultaneous attention to (1) the language, (2) the voice/presentation style, and (3) the contents, and that it must indeed be stressful for the listeners (1) to decode the words and (2) to process the contents. Therefore, I have decided to provide the worksheets for the experts with a German translation in small print and, for the rest of the learners, to intersperse complex contents with more explanations in the learners’ mother tongue. Also, most of the participants seem to have forgotten how to learn, so I will probably have to repeat my teaching advice more frequently.

Let’s see how it will work tonight.

Joachim Grzega

BGE, LdL and socioeconomic linguistics in dissertations

A German student contacted me because she wants to write her Master of Education thesis on BGE and LdL. A student from Singapore is writing his Ph.D. thesis on the use of English in China and aims at integrating BGE and my ideas on socioeconomic linguistics. That is a fantastic development.

Joachim Grzega

4th LdL lesson in Lindau

Our latest BGE-and-LdL lesson at the Akademie Schönbühl went quite well. First I did a plenary pronunciation exercise and a game exercise in pairs (during which I also observed and, if need be, corrected pronunciations of single individuals). The pronunciation will continue to be a challenge for me. Then we had groupwork: there was again a preparatory phase in groups of 3-4 people (revision group, dialog group, word-list group, game group, cultural contrast group). The single presentations took a bit longer than planned because some people didn’t know a game which I had expected as internationally known (“Happy Families”/“Go Fish”) and because people still have to get accustomed to some presentation techniques, e.g. the presentation of the dialog in three steps: (1) presentation in slow motion with the “sandwich technique”, i.e. when you say a new word/phrase, then a background interpreter gives the German equivalent and the literal German expression before the new word/phrase is uttered again (e.g. How are you? — Wie geht es Ihnen?, wörtlich: Wie seid ihr? — How are you?), (2) presentation in normal speed, (3) dialog hand-out plus reading.

During the single presentations, I will take care that the presenters stick to the wording on my sheet when they explain something and that good learners (“false beginners”) don’t choose expressions that the “true beginners” are not able to understand yet.

Joachim Grzega

LdL in adult learner groups? Definitely yes!

In my adult BGE class at the Akademie Schönbühl in Lindau, I used LdL in a rather light way during the first two sessions. I wanted to see first how people get along with my personality. And I didn’t want to risk anything since adult learners are known to focus rather on input than on effect. These were reactions triggered by a talk of mine that I held at an institute for adult classes. But yesterday I dared to do it. Yesterday’s BGE session was pure LdL–and … it worked fantastically. We had

• a revision group
• a pronunciation group (it’s debatable if this wouldn’t be better led by the teacher)
• a “number and months” exercise group
• two dialog groups

All participants—even those who have begun English from scratch—felt very comfortable. One of the future BGE teachers also said that she was impressed how well it worked. Of course, things need to be improved (e.g. people in the center have to speak louder, people should listen to those in the center), but I am fully convinced that LdL is also a very good vehicle for adult learner groups.

Joachim Grzega

Surprise and skepticism: BGE’s effectivity at primary school level

On Wednesday I was invited to a primary school to present on BGE. After I showed my videos and the results from the written tests, the audience showed a mixture of surprise and skepticism: “It can’t be true that the kids are able to speak like that only after a few lessons.” Yes, it is possible, if you have faith in them and if you give them the time to produce utterances and if you see that they listen to each other. I’m confident that many of the teachers, who have ordered my materials, will see that BGE is a realistic way to allow kids the acquisition of basic communicative competence.

Therefore, it is really a pity that university colleagues here in my region are not interested in BGE and that some prominent ones of them have reversed the formula “message before accuracy” into “accuracy before message” as their policy.

Joachim Grzega

2nd BGE lesson in Lindau

There are now 17 learners in the group. In the 2nd lesson I inserted more partner work so that people practiced more, but it was also harder to give feedback on their utterances. On the other hand, if I have everybody read or say 1 or 2 sentences followed by a feedback on my part, then this takes a lot of time where the others are rather passive.

I think that I’ve managed to respect the heterogeneous skills of the learners in a better way. At the same time, it’s also demanding to see that the better ones don’t scare off the “true” beginners (who are actually the real target group of BGE).

I try to present grammar basically in two ways: the lexical approach and presentation in the form of tables and rules. And I give learners fixed dialog that they may want to memorize at first before replacing elements with elements that are more personalized.

Despite my improvements, I’ve sent out a feedback questionnaire to get an idea of the learners’ feelings.

Also of note, we have still another teacher now among us. She will observe and give me feedback, too. She suggests to work more with “learning streets”. This seems an idea worth reflecting on, but such a technique must, in my view, not lead to a smaller degree of dialog/interaction.

And I’m definitely going to include much more LdL. (e.g.: Grammar sections could be prepared and presented by better students).

Joachim Grzega

Trying out my skills in Romanian

Last week I was invited to a conference in Romania. Beside some valuable intercultural experience that I could make, the 2-hours trip back to the airport which I spent in a cab was very interesting, because it showed me that there is still a lot to do in the development of self-teaching material. I had bought myself a language guide “Last-Minute Romanian”. I had practically no knowledge of Romanian (and it is a Romanic language very different from the other Romanic languages I know). I had manage to do 12 of the 20 lessons, but they did not allow me to talk with the driver in an efficient (and sometimes not even in an effective) way.

• The situations that had been covered by the lessons did not help me here.
• The lessons presented only people who already know Romanian so that I had not learned sentences that mean “Slowlier, please” or “I don’t understand”.
• I had not learned to produce an internationalism in Romanian.
• The book included only a Romanian-German, but not a German-Romanian glossary. It was also interesting how the driver started to speak not proper Romanian, but “foreigner Romanian” or “telegramm Romanian”.

If we hadn’t been forced to be together for two hours (in his cab), then the conversation would soon have been over.

Joachim Grzega

1st BGE lesson with adults

Last Tuesday I had my first BGE lesson at the Akademie Schönbühl: 16 adult learners + 1 future BGE teacher. The group is very heterogeneous: some already have basic knowledge in English (“false beginners”), some are true beginners and represent the actual addressees of the course. Due to this heterogeneity I have to pay attention that the beginners are not scared off and I have to be ready to offer special services to these participants. On the whole, though, the atmosphere was very good and not even the video-camera was bothering. The principle of rapid “teacher-role rotation” worked well and it seems that LdL will be well suitable for the group. I’m also glad to see that I can use some of my self-teaching material and that I don’t have to revise and supplement my adult group material from scratch.

Joachim Grzega

BGE course for adults starting on Tuesday

17 people have signed up for my first complete BGE course for adults. This response was unexpected. And I’m glad that many people seem interested in BGE in the Lake of Constance region. The course will start at the Akademie Schönbühl next Tuesday. There will also be one guy that wants to become a BGE teacher. Let’s keep fingers crossed for the first meeting.

Joachim Grzega

New LdL Book

A new LdL book has come out this week: LdL – Lernen durch Lehren goes global. It was edited by Guido Oebel, who started to make LdL known in Japan. The book unites contributors from Japan, Taiwan, Korea, Austria and Germany–including articles by Jean-Pol Martin and myself. Here is a brief summary of the contents (in German).

Joachim Grzega