More Observations about Student Grammar Errors

This semester, I am focusing on having students do free writes for their writings. Previously during a normal face-to-face teaching setting, I would have students retell the particular story in Latin which we had been going over for that unit by writing it down in a composition book. Since we had reviewed the story so much as input, writing would be a natural way for output to occur. However, in this digital setting and having students type out their writings of the stories on a Google Document, I soon found that many students were just copying and pasting from digital copies of the story which were already on Google Classroom from previous assignments and submitting that as their writings. As a result, I decided to focus on free writes, where I give students a prompt for them to complete, and their job is create a sequel to the story on their own from that prompt.

Here are some examples of Latin 3 student writing based on the prompt which my colleague John Foulk created: Monstrum et puer nunc sunt amīcī. Cum monstrum et puer aquae appropinquant, subitō…

Example 1

Monstrum gaudet. Monstrum est laetus. Monstrum est lateus qoud amici habet. Monstrum numcam habet amici. Monstrum non queritur dentes e ocolus. Subitio de aquae Peppa pig surgit. Peppa vult cibum. Peppa dicit “puer dat cibum NUNC!” Puer timet. Monstum non placet Peppa.Puer est eius amici, non vult puer timit sed vult puer lateus. Monstrum petit Peppa. Peppa  pettit monstrum. Petit e petit e petit Subito Peppa cadit in Aquea et perit. Puer est lateus sed non iam timet. Peur est latues quod oculous habet et puer potest videre monstrum est un amici.Monstrum et Puer ambulat ad tabernam. Subito Peppa surgit et didct “redibo”. “Non iam pax in gens sed bellum, bellum gerit contra puer et monstrum.”

Example 2

Puer cadit in aquae. Puer non potest natare. Puer est patitur. Monstrum nonscivit liberate puer. Monstrum parat videt mortuus est puer. Monstrum est tristis et patitur, videt drowning puer. Monstrum tristissimus et fugit ex from aquae. Monstrum in dolore et searches for miles ut liberate puer. Monstrum et miles fugit ad puer, sed puer non iam in aquae. Iam puer cum piratae. Piratae liberavit puer et nunc puer est piratae. Pirataes non placet monstrum. Pirataes bellum gerit monstrum. Sed Monstrum fortissimus. Monstrum caedet pirataes et pirataes nunc mortuom. Monstrum vicit pirataes et nunc odit puer. Puer est vulneratus et non iam placet Monstrum. Puer odit Monstrum. Puer fugit ab ex monstrum. Puer videt aliud monstrum sed non amici est. Nunc Puer odit et ab fugit omnes monstrum.

Example 3

Imperator appropinquant. Imperator fortis et audax. Imperator habet arma et vult bellum gerit. Imperator of Bikini Bottom ingens et cancer. Monstrum et puer timet. Monstrum et puer vult pax, non vult proelio. Monstrum iubet ut pax. Imperator iratus et non vult pax. Imperator cadit in terra. Imperator manet in terra. Imperator patitur sed imperator vulneteratus. Imperator non iam vult bellum gerrit. Monstrum, puer, et imperator nunc sunt amici. Subito, regina Sandy appropinquant. Sandy considit in terra, Bikini Bottom. Monstrum, puer, et imperator considit in terra. Imperator audit Patrick et SpongeBob mortus. Imperator iratus et non lauetus. Imperator in dolore. Monstrum et puer in dolore. Omnes Bikini Bottom patitur. Pauci homines such as Squidward non patitur et guadit. Squidward laetus et canit carmen. Monstrum, imperator, puer, et Sandy non nunc sunt amici with Squidward. Omnes iratus at Squidward. Imperator et Sandy videt taberna. Imperator, Sandy, monstrum, et puer vult comedere.

Now if you are familiar with Latin, the first thing which I am sure that stands out to you is the SHEER AMOUNT of grammar and spelling errors! And I am certain that for many of you, it is very PAINFUL to read. However, if I view these writings through the lens of a sympathetic reader (an ACTFL term), then wow, these students are communicating in the language! Even though these are Latin 3 students, in terms of language acquisition, knowledge, and grammar control, they are novice-high/intermediate-low writers. If my students were children learning their first language, they would be equivalent to 2-3 year-olds. As a result, their language is going to be incredibly MESSY! To use an example from Bill Van Patten, when a 2-year old says, "Mommy go bye-bye," do you correct that child's grammar and choice of vocabulary? Absolutely not, because you as a sympathetic listener know exactly what that child is attempting to communicate. That child is piecing together whatever vocabulary has been acquired to communicate. You can try to correct that child, but we know that the child's language will improve over time with more input and exposure.

I have used this illustration before, but it is so true!

Why can I relate to the above illustraion? Because the first time I truly spoke Latin in 2010 at Rusticatio, a weeklong immersion event, everything that came out of my mouth was in the nominative case and in infintives. Keep in mind, I have my Masters in Latin, but when it came to truly speaking in Latin for the purpose of communication and conversation (something which I had never done before), I was a novice - a very LOW novice. My grammar was horrible! Case endings, verb endings, and subject/verb agreement went out the window, because all i could do was just get vocabuary to come out of my mouth - any vocabulary!! 

I love Nancy Llewellyn's quote which she traditionally gave in her opening talk at Rusticatio:

You are going to make the same kinds of grammar errors that if your own students were to make them, you would skin your knees running to grab a red pen to correct them. So be patient with yourself.

That was ten years ago. I can say that I am probably an Intermediate High level speaker now, but I still definitely struggle trying to put it all together with correct case endings, subject/verb agreement, correct usage of subjunctives, noun/adjective agreeement, pronunication, etc.

So when getting students to write in the target language, be sure that there has been plenty of input first so that there is a natural overflow of output, but be prepared for it to be messy. However, if you are viewing the output from a proficiency viewpoint instead of a performance lens, you will be amazed by what students are attempting to communicate in the language.

Reflections So Far

The following video describes how I feel about my current teaching situation:

Do you feel like this? That administrators, politicians, and parents want teachers to teach digitally/concurrently but yet no one knows what this means or looks like? But yet, we keep being told to teach this way?

I cannot believe that I have been doing concurrent/hybid teaching for the past 6 months now. Throw in the two months of shelter-in-place from last year, and I have been teaching in a digital environment for roughly 9 months. At the same time, I am trying to keep perspective. Yes, this is not at all an ideal situation. Yes, I have no training in this hybrid/concurrent situation. Heck, I have never lived through a pandemic before. 

I can place blame on district leaders, students, parents, politicians, anyone, etc., but big picture: there is only so much which I can control in all of this. What I can control though are my reactions and how I personally deal with the situation. As a result, I need to celebrate my victories no matter how small or insignificant you may think they are, because these truly are positives:

• Over these past 11 months, I am amazed at how resilient I have been in all of this. I have always known that I am rather flexible in situations and that I am not one who initially over-reacts emotionally. So why have I not fallen apart in all of this? From personal experience, I know that life is always going to be a series of storms and of sunshine, and that no one is ever immune from hardships of any kind. I have endured the loss of both of my parents in the past 10 years to dementia and to cancer. I lived through both of those experiences, so I can certainly live and gain new perspective through all of this too. I look forward to a continued, future, even stronger resilience. 
• I amazed at what I have learned to do with Google Classroom. If it had not been for the pandemic, I never would have learned how to use this learning management system. I can vividly remember during pre-planning watching videos on how to set up Google Classroom, create assignments, etc., and having no clue of what to do and being nervous about mis-steps. Now I look at myself and see just how saavy I have become with Google Classroom, and although I could say, "Wow, why was I even concerned about this, since it is so easy?", I realize that I need to say, "Wow, I truly have come a long way since July!"
• This pandemic has brought to light a lot of "shortcomings" in my own nature. You can read about some of them here in this blog post. 

So what have I learned about digital teaching in all of this? I can definitely say that my views have completely changed over the past months. 

• Do not worry about what students are not going to learn this year, because this is not a normal teaching situtation. To project that onto this current learning environment is not going to work. As a teacher, you are going to become frustrated, and students are going to get lost in the way.
• Focus on deep and simple, and on what you can teach them. Now more than ever, I am truly learning this. By no means is this a normal learning environment for students - honestly, I really have no idea what language (if any) students are acquiring through all of this. I know that they are completing online assignments, but all that this tells me is that they completed it and did the work. In other words, it may be possible that no true long-term learning has occurred. As a result, I need to really go deep and simple with the material.
• Less is more. What worked face-to-face probably will not work for every student in this digital setting. So many of my colleagues in the core areas have had to re-evaluate their own expectations of what can be accomplished and of what students are able to do in all of this, because what they would like to see and what is actually happening/what is realistic are two completely different things. 
• When we do return to a "normal" teaching situation, I will evaluate what it is that students know and adjust my curriculum based on that. 

Talk to me in 6 months, and let us see if I still feel this way...

Digital Word Cloud "Predict the Story"

I am currently taking a district-level, learning management system professional development, and one of our assignments dealt with creating a digital lesson demonstrating concept attainment/application/prediction (yes, very Educationese terms) which would use with our students. Rather than invent and learn a new web app tool, I decided to revise/adapt an already existing strategy to a digital setting: Word Clouds.

I am introducing a new reading with students, so I created a word cloud for students involving words which would be in this passage (see here for how to create a word cloud using MS Word). Based on the word cloud, students are to predict what they think will happen in the story which they will be reading soon. 

In creating the word cloud, I found using Dark City color format was easier for students to distinguish the words. I also set the layout to Horizontal. 

Directions

1. On a Google Form, insert your word cloud as an image/picture.
2. The directions are simple: ONLY using the words from the word cloud, write your FOUR sentences in ENGLISH below. Be sure to number your sentences. 

Why respond in English and not in the target language? Because this is a prediction activity using vocabulary, I need for them to respond in English to demonstrate comprehension of those words. If I asked them to respond purely in the target language, I would get students who would put the Latin words together to form a sentence, but if the sentence were not to make any sense, I would not know why: did they just throw Latin words together just to complete the assignment? Did they not understand the meaning of a particular word which then impedes my comprehension of what they wrote? What if students just created a sentence which was all nouns or all verbs? By having them respond in English, I can at least tell that students are demonstrating comprehension of the given vocabulary words.

Observations

1. This was a very easy digital assignment for students to complete, but it still involved some degree of higher-level thinking, as it was dealing with prediction based on given information.
2. This was a very easy digital assignment for me to create. Probably creating the word cloud took the most time.
3. I enjoyed reading student responses. Many students tried to predict the entire story, but most just wrote four random sentences (which is perfectly okay!).
4. Students told me that they liked the assignment, because it was short!

Top 5 of 2020

Yes, it is that time of the year for me to list my top-5, most-viewed blog posts of the year. I cannot believe that 2020 is coming to an end, because I feel like I view time in 2020 as either Pre-Covid or Covid. I also feel like March never ended, as April and May became like March 53rd, March 54th, etc. Then once we started up school in August, I was always in a state of flux and transition from 100% digital to a weird, hybrid blend of in-person and digital students simultaneously. 

Here are my top-5, most-viewed blog posts of 2020 (notice that many of them relate to digital learning):

1. Picture/Sentence Matching on Google Forms
2. Using Google Forms for Reading Comprehension Assignments
3. Is Latin Exclusive and Elitist? The Desperate Need for a Remedy
4. Listening/Matching Activity
5. My 2-Week Digital Lesson Plans

What a past 9 months this has been, and I do not expect the first half of 2021 to be much different. However, I do now have 9-months of experience on which to build and to continually adjust.

I will be on blog hiatus for the rest of the month and will start blogging again in January 2021. Thanks for being a part of my blog journey - I appreciate you for thinking that I have something to say.

Being an "Adequate" Teacher is SO Freeing

I am finishing up roughly my 4th month of digital, hybrid teaching, and with only two weeks left in the semester, I am finally reflecting on this whirlwind of a semester. I can honestly say that I have survived it somewhat unscathed with very little battle scars and wounds and looking back at it all, I can say that I am pleased. My secret to all of this: from the very start, I purposed in my heart just to be an adequate teacher when all of this began during pre-planning.

For some of you, what I just stated in that last sentence is blasphemous - how dare I advocate that adequacy is okay? But let me be honest: I am an overachiever, and now that I have had to take a step back from teaching the way in which I have been accustomed and must now teach in a completely different way in this weird hybrid setting, I realize that I have two options:

• I can drive myself to do the best I can and to be the best, because I feel that I have to, regardless of the situation OR
• I can do enough just to get by and learn to adjust as I go

I have chosen the latter, and it has made all of the difference. 

As I said, by nature, I am an overachiever, and it is very easy to always operate in that mode and it starts to feel normal, but in actuality, it is not. If achieving is what is giving me pleasure, purpose, and a feeling of self worth, and if the need for achieving is what is driving me, then I need to back away from that., because that is not healthy. Back in March, when we suddenly had to switch over to digital learning, I was all about making videos and tons of resources for students, but I also burned out fast as a result. This semester, I purposed not to drive myself to do this, because I refuse to burn out again and to lose myself in all of this. Quite frankly, it is not worth it, or maybe better stated, I have always put too much worth in it, and I am aware of that now. 

Being an adequate teacher in this weird time of teaching has been so freeing. Let me also say that as an overachiever, my idea of "adequate" is probably most teachers' idea of "very good/excellent," so it is all relative. Many may feel that I am still overachieving. However, I have learned that it is okay and quite honestly, VERY NECESSARY to be selfish during this time and to put myself first in this time of crisis. 

To put things in perspective about teaching hybrid during this time:

• This is something which most teachers have never done before. We have never received any type of training or ever anticipated that we would be teaching like this. We are learning as we go, so it is natural to feel like you have no idea what you are doing.  
• This is something for which most school districts had never planned. Should they have? For one of my grad school projects, I had to investigate my district's emergency contingency plans, and although the plans had provisions and anticipations for every type of natural disaster (flooding, tornado wiping out the area, blizzard, power outage, hurricane/tropical storm), there was nothing regarding a pandemic. Quite honestly, whose school district had on its radar the possibility of any type of pandemic in its contigency plans prior to Covid?
• Hybrid learning is new for students also, so they are learning to adjust to it and what it entails.
• There are no true metrics yet regarding what is considered effective and ineffective teaching in a hybrid situation. In other words, we are the pioneers of this. Honestly, this is freeing to me!
• You are probably doing your best to keep your head above water as a teacher, and in these situations, that is success!
• It took me YEARS to learn and to feel comfortable as a CI teacher in a normal classroom setting, so being a CI teacher in a hybrid learning situation is not going to happen overnight either.

Do I like hybrid teaching? Not at all. The majority of my students are digital, and even when on Zoom, I have no idea who is actually paying attention and is engaged since they all have turned off their cameras and microphones. I feel like I am shortchanging my in-person students, because I now teach solely from my desk behind a computer screen and plexiglass guard. I am completely stationary and by no means am I teaching like I want to. However, the situation is what it is, and there is only so much which I can control and only so much energy and personal effort which I am willing to exert in all of this. 

So when lesson planning and creating assignments for both synchronous and asynchronous sessions, my test is simply this: are students still receiving understandable messages (and repetitions of these messages) in the target language? If so, then I have achieved my goal. Even though there are times where I feel like my lessons are so minimal in nature, if students are still receiving some form of comprehensible input, I am doing my job. I am just not going to drive myself to be the teacher which I was pre-Covid, because the two situations are completely different.

So those are my thoughts and what is directng me as a teacher in this hybrid situation. I have never felt so free as a teacher, and I am so grateful for this change in perspective and for setting personal boundaries. I am also looking forward to when I can teach again like I did face-fo-face pre-Covid. That time will come - I just need to be patient.

The Wishgranter - Movie Talk

This is a Movie Talk which I did last year pre-Covid. In my Latin 3 classes, we were reading the novella Perseus et Rex Malus, and I wanted to preview the words conatur (tries) and iacit (throws). Yes, considering that it was just two words I could have previewed these words much more quickly, but I really like doing Movie Talks! In addition, because this Movie Talk involved so many words already known by students, it allowed me to concentrate on these target words while reviewing known words in a new context. To me, the best animated movie shorts are those which contain tons of repetition in them, so this one worked perfectly for what I needed.

The plot of the animated short is simple: a "wishgranter" attempts to grant the wishes of a young man and woman who both throw coins into a fountain. Something goes awry, and that is where the wacky fun begins!

Movie Talk script (Latin)

Movie Talk (English)

Movie Talks on my Blog

So I have added a new page to my blog: my list of movie talks from this blog! I have listed the movie talks with target language and links to my blogs posts. You can find this page along the vertical dashboard at the top of this blog, but here is the link to that page:

List of Movie Talks

This list only represents the movie talks which I have posted on this blog, but I have SO MANY more that I will add and update to this list. Hope you can use some of these!