Re:Homework: Listen&Do (production) problem A tool

[kellogg]

As usual, Minkyeong is the pioneer! She managed to put together HER answer to the midterm question even before I could do a model one myself.

This is VERY good news for the rest of you, because when I do model answers, they tend to be a bit long, and then everybody feels obliged to write even more.

But Minkyeong's is just the right length! It's also a very competent answer. So in gratitude, I'm going to show you all my GRADING secrets!

2008/04/04                     SNUE 교육대학원 초등영어 M20081412 이민경

★ Homework 1: How I solve the production problem of "Listen and Do"

Let's remember what this is. The P3 problem is how the children can retain and USE what they understand and listen to. In the midterm exam, it looks like this:

c) Do you think the children remember what they hear? What is it they remember: meaning or wording? How can we know? If we do not know, how could we find out?

Now, notice that the question has THREE parts. There's a yes/no question. That's followed by two wh-questions, one of which is closed (meaning or wording) and the other one open. And finally there's a quite open "how..." question.

What this PROBABLY means is that the professor will give a LOT of points for the first question (because professors like high scores, particularly in grad school, and if you weren't going to get a high score you probably wouldn't be in grad school in the first place). Then the next question will give a few points. And the last question, the hardest one, will probably be only ten points or less.

It's a trap! Most of the graduates will simply answer the yes-no question, and then they might answer the easy wh-question, and then they will think the question is answered. But in fact the REAL points that distinguish the As from the A+s are probably right there in that last question. Let's keep that in mind.

☆ My data: 6th Grade English Class Transcript            

 ① Date: Friday, March 28th, 2008

 ② Situation: This lesson is the first unit of 「Lesson 2: Is This York Street?」. After the students watch a video from CD-ROM, I present some sentences related to asking and giving directions. They first practice speaking with symbol pictures and then speaking with hand motions.

This is what Vygotsky means: "Our movements--these are our teacher!" Notice that in this case Minkyeong is using gesture to mediate UTTERANCE--right away, she is NOT doing "listen and do"--she's getting the kids ready to handle that third problem, the production problem. She does this from the OUTSIDE--by getting the kids to associate utterances with gestures.

But what is a gesture and how does it work as a mediator? It's not EXACTLY a sign. Shall we call it:

a) tools?

b) roles?

c) rules?

Minkyeong makes it easy for us: she presents PICTURES too! So this is an example of TOOL use.

When they can say the basic expression‎!s with ease, I introduce this 'listen and do' activity. Taking an imaginary situation, one student becomes the other student's puppet and moves as the other commands.

This is ANOTHER example of mediation. Shall we call it:

a) tools?

b) roles?

c) rules?

 ③ Characters: The students are from one of my 6th grade classes. There are 27 students - 14 boys and 13 girls.

 ④ The problem: How can the teacher get the children to use what they have learnt? (S-T, S-S, Roles)

Good! Well stated. We want to know how well the children have INTERNALIZED the presented language. And for that, we need to find out if they can use it without assistance or only peer or self assistance. How can they work WITHOUT teacher mediation?

T: Now, look at what I'm doing, and you do the same. (I turn toward the board, so the students look at my back and I do hand motions.) Go straight.

Ss: Go straight.

How do they know they are supposed to speak and do at the time? Is that included in "you do the same"? (Is "do" also a verbal process?)

Is this:

a) T-T

b) TS-TS

c) T-S

T: Turn left.

Ss: Turn left.

T: Turn right.

Ss: Turn right.

T: It's on your left.

Ss: It's on your left.

T: It's on your right.

Ss: It's on your right.

Notice that THIS is not a material process! How does the teacher convey this?

T: Cross the bridge.

Ss: Cross the bridge.

T: Let's do it one more time.

(More practice with motions)

* Some students come to the front and play teacher. They say the sentences as they do the motions, and the rest repeat after them.

T: I want one volunteer who can come up here and help me. (raising my hand)

(Some students raise their hands.)

Difficult metalanguage!

T: 정기, please. (S1 comes to the front.) 정기 is my puppet. He has to..

(Students laugh hard.)

S1: 꼭 그래야 해요?

T: 내 장난감이야, 장난감.

S1: 아이, 아이...

(Students laugh hard again.)

T: I say. He listens and moves. Go straight.

S1: (being shy) 아이, 어디로 가요. (moving)

T: Stop. Turn left. Go straight.

S1: 아, 자리로 돌아가요?

T: Stop. Turn right. Go straight. Stop. Turn right. Go straight. (Ss giggle.) Stop. Turn right. Go straight. Stop. Turn right. Go straight. Go back to your seat. 잘 했습니다. (pause) I want two students to come up here. (gestures) One person says, and the other person moves. (raising hand)

(Quite a few students raise their hands.)

T: 민준, 지헌. Please come to the front. Who wants to say?

S2, S3: Me. Me.

T: Okay. Rock-scissors-paper.

S2, S3: Rock-scissors-paper.

T: (nudging one student toward the starting place) Here.

S2: Go straight. (S3 moving) Stop. Turn left. (S3 turning and asking “어?”) Turn left. (S3 turning and then moving forward) 야, 말 안 했는데... Turn right and go straight. Stop. Turn left. (S3 being a little confused which way is left) Left! Left! Go straight. Turn left and go straight. (S3 saying “어?”)

T: (enunciating) Turn left and go straight. (pause) 어... 니가 자동으로 돌면 안 되지. This way. This way.

Ss getting frustrated) 아.. 어후! 이쪽으로 가라고!

Notice the use of open pairs and S-T-S! Now, of course this DOES solve the P3 problem--but only for two students. Still, it is a good mediating form--it opens the way to closed pairs and S-S.

T: This way.

Ss: (raising hands) Me, me, me, me, me....

T: Okay, go back to your seat.

S2: 선생님, 바꿔서 하면 안 돼요? 바꿔서, 제가?

Ss: (raising hands) 아~ 저요. 저요~. Me, me, me, me....

T: 어.. 현정 and 백호.

In fact, there are THREE students in the activity: S4, S5, S6 (what happened to S3?)

(Ss stay quite noisy for a while.)

S4: (S5 moving forward) Go straight. 아직이야. Stop. Turn left. Go straight. Stop. 그 다음에.. Turn left.

S6: (Talking to S4) 부딪히게, 부딪히게... Go, go, go, go, go...

S4: Go straight.

S5: (wondering) What? Straight? 어디로 straight?

S6: 쭉 가게 해.

(Too much fooling around)

T: Thank you. Go back to your seat.

Ss: (raising hands) 저도 하고 싶어요. 저도 할래요!

Notice that we've got two DIFFERENT metalanguages and two different languages for organizing activities. The teacher uses a non-reversible form of English (a kind of English that the children cannot use, which incorporates embedded clauses and conditionals). How do the children take part in the organization of open pairs?

Is there anyway to create a language for organizing activities that teacher and children can share?

(I point at two students, and they come out to the front.)

S7: Go straight. (S8 moving) And turn right. Go. Stop. Turn left. Go straight. Stop, and turn left. Go straight. Stop. Turn left. Go straight. Stop. (giggling) Turn left. (S8 hesitating) Left. Left.

T: (looking at S7) "Turn left."면 이쪽 맞잖아.

S7: 아아..

(Students laugh.)

T: Okay, great job! (clapping)

We can see that the teacher is using sequential OPEN PAIRS. This DOES solve the P3 problem--but only for five students. The other students are actually not even listening and doing; they are only looking and listening.

Obviously there are good reasons why the teacher does not want to attempt simultaneous closed pairs. The kids are fooling around too much already! But you can see that while the P3 problem is (only partially) solved, the P2 problem is not solved at all.

Our teacher sees this VERY clearly. Look!

☆ My afterthought: - This activity got great responses from the students. This class is usually proactive, but they really couldn't get enough of the activity. The roles (puppet & master) made the students speak, listen and do very actively.

This suggests that they might actually respond well to closed pairwork; they are frustrated by the "looking and listening" that is imposed on the class by open pairwork. BUT they are also not self-regulating enough for closed pairwork, becuse they were fooling around a lot, and a great deal of the open pairwork is actually done in Korean or purely by nonverbal means. What can be done?

 The students who were watching got also involved and produced interesting utterances like "Open the window. Jump.", "Open the door. Go out.", "Sit down. Go straight. (오리걸음 자세) Jump and go straight.", "Dance!", "Sing!", etc. However, since only two students can participate at a time, only about 10 students could do it in the alloted time. I devised a tool to solve this problem, which was used in the second unit of the lesson. The tool is as below. 

★ Homework 2: A "tool" that helps children use what they understand actively

- Target students: 6th grade students

- Materials: a map from the textbook and a counter for each student

- One team usually has four or five students. No. 1 student in each team gives directions to the other students using the sentences that they learnt from the lesson. (Such as "Go straight.", "Turn left/right.", "It's on your left/right.") The other students place their counters at the starting point and move as no. 1 student commands. When no. 1 finishes giving directions, s/he asks "What is it?", and the others say, for example, "It's the bank." finding the right building on the map. Then they take turns to give directions. This way, everybody in each team gets a chance to speak and also listen & do. 

Excellent. But the problem is that in the data we have above, the teacher found it very difficult to stop the kids from fooling around and to keep them on task.

Won't this problem be even more serious if we put them in groups? Unless...is there someway we could have a VISIBLE OUTPUT, some kind of PHYSICAL RESULT, some kind of TANGIBLE CONSEQUENCE to the activity?

If this happens, the teacher can:

a) monitor the task while it is going on, not by listening but just by looking to see if the kids are producing the visible output

b) tell at a glance when one group is finished.

c) "add labour", by picking up the result and asking, e.g., "S1, tell me about S2".

Let's go back to the midterm question:

c) Do you think the children remember what they hear? YES OR NO (70 POINTS)

What is it they remember: meaning or wording? How can we know? (20 POINTS)

If we do not know, how could we find out? (TEN POINTS)

[이민경]

Professor, when I put students in a group of 4 or 5 and told one of them to give directions and the rest to move their counters on a map, I could see the physical result of their doing so. Also, they took turns to give directions and did that closed-group practice a few times. I think the activity had a visible and physical result. A question: Is the midterm question for us to write about? Until when? This midterm question was not mentioned during your lecture. Please elaborate. Thank you.

[kellogg]

Take a look at the posting "Let's Have a Midterm", Minkyeong! It's all there.