Artigos



Ensinando línguas a disléxicos
Associação Brasileira de Dislexia
Março de 2007



Juan Uribe - Pedagogo

Creio que os alunos disléxicos também aprendem línguas. Aprendem quando o método que pelo qual a língua é apresentada é apropriado a forma como eles melhor aprendem. Disléxicos aprendem melhor quando se movimentam, falam sobre si, desenham, criam, participam com o que melhor fazem. Cada disléxico têm suas características, sua história e suas habilidades que representam desafios pedagógicos para o educador.

O educador que trabalha afetivamente com um aluno disléxico consegue atuar melhor quando discute com o aluno formas de planejar, registrar e avaliar o estudo, tanto em seu conteúdo quanto em sua forma. Este dialogo e a construção desta parceria é fundamental para que possarmos ter um clima de transparência e confiança entre aluno e educador. Este clima fortalece o processo de aprendizagem  nos momentos de devolutiva e discussão sobre como ambos se sentem e como o progresso é sentido.

Trabalhar a auto-estima do aluno mostrando que ele também é capaz, de outra forma e em outro ritmo, é uma área que deve ser planejada, refletida e sistematizada para que o aluno consiga ter uma nova auto-imagem e dar se uma chance de aprender de forma desligada de experiências anteriores com um ensino não apropriado a suas necessidades.

Um trabalho junto a família para que esta valorize o processo, os esforços e reconheça os pequenos passos dados é também fundamental. Este educador deve ser um pesquisador curioso que estude a dislexia e que registre o processo pelo qual passa com este novo aluno, para que possa também organizar seus pensamentos e agir de uma forma consciente e reflexiva. Uma ação espontaneísta priva o aluno disléxico de progredir.

Abaixo coloco algumas formas que tenho utilizado e que tiveram bons resultados com alunos disléxicos:

  • Utilize movimento entre atividades curtas.
  • Faça projetos de interesse do aluno.
  • Mostre seus objetos pessoais, suas fotos, fale de você.
  • Desenvolva projetos de artes que tenham produtos.
  • Valorize e incorpore atividades nas quais o aluno tem sucesso.
  • Tenha momentos de relaxamento e descontração no inicio e no fim de aulas.
  • Faça revisões freqüentes, de formas diferentes.
  • Trabalhe o conteúdo de diversas formas
  • Utilize diferentes cores e associe figuras a palavras
  • Use músicas e ritmos
  • Escreva com giz grande e use massinha
  • Use o computador e jogos para fixação

O disléxico aprende e trabalhar com ele é um desafio. Converse com outros profissionais  que também atendem a disléxicos para a troca de experiências. Boa sorte!



Self-esteem through Storytelling
SEAL Newsletter - Society for Effective Affective Learning
Maio de 2005

By Juan Uribe

In the days of today in which children get hooked on television, internet and videogames I believe it is of utmost importance to rescue important behaviours that together make a big difference in children development . One is communication and sharing in the family. Many parents feel guilty because they can not be with their children during the whole day and dedicate themselves to their young ones as much as they would like. A powerful way to have quality time and to reach your child is through storytelling. While telling stories we are able to look, touch, think, understand, and laugh together. As a consequence we develop a closer relationship with our children. This close relationship will help children feel more loved and able and to develop healthy self-esteem.

Storytelling is an experience in itself. More than just being involved and interested in the content and how a story is going to finish, storytelling creates a relationship. When asked of which stories we were read and told when we were little, many of us remember one or another favourite and what certainly all of us really remember is the warmth and cosiness of being told a story and the feeling that we were important and that someone dedicated this special time to be there with us. It is not by chance that Lewis Carroll called storytelling a love gift.

This love gift can help us build our self-esteem. But before continuing I´d like to share a good definition of what self-esteem is. It is the feeling we have about ourselves. We have high self-esteem when we feel loved and able. It develops through the life experiences children go collecting in their lives. Children value themselves in the same way significant people in their lives have treated them. Storytelling has many linguistic and social benefits and it can work in different areas which foster high self-esteem. Below I analyse five different areas and the benefits brought through storytelling.

Sense of security: Storytelling prompts conversation and questions about routine happenings and hypothetical situations. It opens a door that might be blocked when parents only talk superficially to their children giving commands and asking routine questions. We also provide quality listening time when we avoid making judgements and telling your child what to do. Stories give security to children when they show that others have had similar problems to the ones children are facing and that have managed to find a solution. It also allows parents to provide instructions directly and convey acceptable and expected values and behaviour. Children must feel that they are accepted in the way they are and that they are physically and emotionally protected.

A way to promote security is to respect the needs of expression of your child. Storytelling can refine speaking skills, improve listening skills and empower children to relate better to the world expressing themselves and their feelings. It is important to accept during storytelling how the child feels, even if different than what you would like. Many children feel insecure because they do not know what might happen if they do something wrong. Some children for instance might think parents will not like them and even abandon them if they break a glass. Show logical natural consequences that have happened in the story: the character broke something and then he fixed it or cleaned it. This fosters the sense of responsibility. The child must not constantly worry about what is going to happen. Build the sense of trust and how characters have gained it or lost it.

Sense of identity: Telling stories allows parents to interact with children at a personal level and both can identify positive and negative qualities in the characters in the story and how they have contributed to the character’s destiny. In this movement we teach children to identify their own abilities and abilities in others they would like to develop. Describe the abilities and qualities of a character and the child has to guess who you are talking about. You can describe the child´s abilities and cheat saying that you have chosen the child. It´s important to teach that we are all different and unique.

Critical and creative thinking skills are enhanced and give resource to the child fostering independence. It does also nourish children’s intuitive side, which helps in decision taking. Have an exercise in which you ask the child what the character is thinking and if it´s right or wrong. Children have a strong sense of identity when they like themselves and know who they are. It is important that parents and teachers seriously listen to what children have to say. The child’s image is formed in the way other people have treated and valued the child.

Sense of belonging: Children feel they are part of a larger community, starting with the family and school. Playing and working together as a family unit and at school build the sense of closeness a child needs. When they are comfortable with others they are able to better relate and to become members of other social groups. Children who are unsure of how others feel about them feel rejected or lonely.

Stories teach children that we live in society and how to be group members. They present social skills such as inviting, apologizing, asking for help, thanking, sharing, taking turns, which are essential for the child to be accepted in groups. Show the difference of uninterested help and helping expecting something in return. In this way we incentivate children to engage in service to others and when children feel they are contributing, their sense of belonging is strengthened.

Important concepts and values are better internalized through stories, instead of parents presenting them in a very rational way. Children will give more value to the story of Johnny who lost all his teeth than to mom saying that the child will have to go to the dentist. The child transfers the story context straight to his or her reality
Share family stories, build a sense of pride, and help children understand where they come from. Encourage them to tell their own stories to you and younger ones and to discover their own family roots. A common way to share is to tell short happenings at dinner time reporting good and bad moments of the day. Here storytelling couldn’t be more realistic! Start out your family traditions!

Sense of purpose: Try working with stories in which you do not show pictures and have your child listen to the story with eyes closed. Storytelling helps with imagination and visualization, which are essential in the process of goal setting. When we dream and visualize we are making a mental plan, thinking of steps and actions necessary to achieve a goal. Help children identify character’s goals in the story and establish ways in which they can achieve them. In this way we lead children to have goals and find ways to achieve them. Ask: “ Why is the hen planting the seeds ?”

Positive endings show children that it is rewarding to have an objective and work hard and that things will turn out to the good. There are many books that convey values in very different ways. A second great benefit is the interest in reading. Let our child choose books and suggest stories for your child to read on his or her own. Incentivate building a library.


Sense of personal competence: We develop the sense of competence through feedback of others on how we do things. Share with them the sense of accomplishment of a character who has achieved a goal. Play that you are one of the characters and congratulate your child for the outcome, let your child also congratulate you. Pay attention that you are giving specific feedback instead of a ‘well done’, which doesn´t help the child to know what he or she did right. Let children retell you the story and identify the process and how successes have happened. Plot what the character has achieved so far.

Stop in moments and incentivate the child to think of alternatives to solve the situation and to identify what needs to be done. Avoid the temptation to tell your child what you would do or believe is best. The child gets the feeling of personal competence by learning how to solve problems independently. With these skills they can accomplish anything that comes their way. As a consequence children know that they are able and confidently face situations in which they do not have the solution at first.

Storytelling is something that we must bring back to the lives of our children. It develops the essential feeling of partnership and we are able to address important areas of self-esteem such as the senses of security, identity, belonging, purpose and personal competence. Let’s remember that we can build self-esteem in ourselves and our children by the way we look, talk, and relate to them. It is also done by the expectations we set, and by the kinds of experience we allow them to have. Storytelling is definitely one of these experiences. We are all storytellers and we can start today. I guarantee that the result is very rewarding: children with high self-esteem are eager to learn, get along with others, enjoy new challenges, and live in peace.

Juan Uribe is a teacher and teacher trainer in São Paulo, Brazil. He coordinates holistic language acquisition courses for children at Juan Uribe Language Acquisition. He is currently the representative of the International Council on Self-Esteem in Brazil. His e-mail is juan@juanuribe.com.br and his site is www.juanuribe.com.br .


Self- esteem : a matter of everyday doing.
Humanistic Language Teaching Magazine 
Março de 2003

by Juan Uribe, Brasil ( Juan runs a language school for kindergarten aged children)

We all know that self-esteem is in great part the determining factor of the success a person achieves in life. It sets how we choose our friends, our profession, and the lifestyle we are going to have. But how do we develop it from the early years ?

There are many definitions of what self-estem really is. I found a simple and clear one by Dorothy Briggs: Self-esteem is to feel loved and to feel able. There is a great difference in parents loving their children and their children feeling loved. Children value themselves in the same way that they have been valued by significant people in their lives.

Besides respecting children physically, parents must pay attention to children's feelings. This is an area parents take for granted and believe they are always doing their job. Sentences such as: “Why did I have a child ?” or “I wanted a girl, but a boy came” convey feelings that the child is not loved.

Comments such as: ”I love you because you are a great student.” bring conditional love and feelings of insecurity. These children lose ground when they do not go well on a test. They immediately ask themselves”Am I loved now?” . Parents must accept their sons and daughters in the way they are and never use their love as a manipulation tool.

Affirmations made by parents are always taken as the absolute truth by children. Be careful with sentences such as: “My son is good in Math and doesn't have talent for arts” or “You are messy”. Just say “Today your room has many things out of place, I'd like you to have it tidy”. Language has a lot of power !

The self-acceptance and sociability come from the family bond and it is of vital importance that the child can express himself or herself freely. An interesting way to incentivate sharing at meal times is to have every family member saying a good and a bad thing that happened during the day. Unexpected things will come up and members are better able to see themselves. Television should be definitely off.
Children give up when somebody believes they are no longer able to achieve something. Share your dreams and projects. Give chances for children to know different kinds of music, arts, theater, and sports. Parents should show and teach children how to achieve development and goals and celebrate together when a member has conquered an objective.

I believe that teachers and parents can together make a big difference in the shaping of tne personality of our students and children. In one of my meetings with Robert Reasoner, president of the international Council on Self-Esteem, he told me: Juan, self-esteem is not a matter of knowing, it is a matter of doing. And I complete adding: it is a matter of doing everyday.

Here below I have prepared a list of 100 ways that we can show our children that we care. Let's start today !

100 ways to foster high self-esteem
Set rules with them
Be available to meet privately
Brainstorm problems they might have at school and find solutions
Contact students when they miss several days
Contact parents of students who do well
Be clear with expectations
Make it unacceptable to ridicule anybody
Display trust in their work
Have a bulletin board with outstanding work
Acknowledge different cultures in your class
Use different teaching styles
Write positive comments on students' homework
Share likes and dislikes
Give them choice of homework
Look in their eyes
Smile.
Touch them gently in the shoulder
Use cooperative learning
Pay attention to isolates
Research mixed-ability activities
Have special interest groups
Play the body game
Have experts on certain areas
Do something for the community as a group
Help them to set goals
Identify heroes and role models
Display quotes at the front of the room and discuss them
Give objective feedback to students
Help them with time planning
Have a celebration when a major goal has been achieved
Use Brain Gym
Listen. Listen. Listen.
Encourage them to ask mates for help
Ask how they would like to do things
Ask them how they liked activities
Express interest in them as individuals
Seek to understand how they are feeling
Let them know you appreciate their work
Avoid patronizing
Ask them to redo work when it is below what they could have done
Redirect behavior in private
Let them demonstrate their strengths
Talk about the origin of names
Use puppets to redo hard situations that happened in class
Send get better and birthday cards
Develop a mentoring system
Read stories from people who have made it despite difficulties
Have a Special day for every student
Do circle time
Study NLP and teach reframing
Use visualization to see future goals
Develop a class slogan
Use soothing music at the beginning of a class
Let them know what is coming next
Establish routines
Let them evaluate you
Teach social skills
Applause the group
Develop traditions
Ask
Let them show their feelings
Never ever label
Set limits that protect them
Give them undivided attention
Share their discoveries
Let them teach you something
Contribute to their collections
Tell them jokes to relax after hard moments
Apologize when wrong
Thank
Get to know their families
Tell them how proud you are
Let them commit mistakes
Inspire them
Build something together
Be spontaneous
Expect the best, not perfection
Hide a surprise
Accept them as they are
Dream with them
Praise more
Criticize less
Be flexible
Be curious towards their attitudes
Play with them
Ask for their opinions
Have a feelings chart
Use psychodrama
Talk to them at their height
Pay special attention to some students in days that are hard for them
Be honest
Work on your self-esteem
Keep your promises
Give them unconditional love
Tell them you have missed them during holidays
Ask for help
Be silly together
Tolerate their interruptions
Make decisions together
Celebrate success together !!!


My e-mail is juan@juanuribe.com.br


A tailor-made course for children
Braz-Tesol Newsletter - artigo de capa
Abril de 2001
By Juan Uribe
"To educate a child is not to fill a vase, it is to kindle a fire"
Montaigne


Should the course fit the learner or should the learner fit the course? This is the question Bernard Dufeu raises and answers in his remarkable "Teaching Myself". I agree with Bernard that courses should fit students and thus provide them with a unique individual path to learning motivated by their own inner flames of motivation.


They are then able to enter the state that Csikszentmihalyi calls flow, in which positive emotions energize the individual by aligning the intrinsic pleasure of the activity with the sheer magic of language discovery.


For centuries Descartes' mechanized view of the world and the heavy importance put on the masculine side of our personality, read left brain, have made foreign language teaching a disguised memorization exercise in which learners are exposed to heavy loads of lexical items that are usually not in sintony with the students' needs and reality. Take the example of children learning names of animals that they have never seen. Our children continue being taught in a non-flexible repetitive way while creativity and flexibility have utmost importance to control our computers.


By my experience working with young learners, I conceive children acquire language best when:


1.The process is holistic
2.The process is affective
3.The process is success-oriented
4.The process is perceived as play


The process is holistic


It is important that teachers see children as individuals with fears, strengths, and desires. Teachers should not label students as good or bad; elementary, intermediate, or advanced; or even most recently: visual, auditory, or kinesthetic. By having a global picture of how our students really are, we are able to work with language in a way that is relevant to them as individuals.


Children at home engage in activities that demand a lot of their cognitive skills. Many times in the EFL class these very same children are asked to glue the arms and the legs to a gingerbread man. No wonder they feel terribly bored. I would too.


Also, heavy praising for easy tasks, and no chance for children to express themselves, hinders involvement and lowers student's self-esteem. Teachers have underestimated, patronized and have not challenged children, because they feel that children are not capable and that learning can not be done together with play.


If we want to consider the idea that language is a means to convey information, one basic question arises: Would my student go away thinking I am dumb if what I would say in English were said in Portuguese? Just by posing this simple question, I realize that:


I need to use language naturally and make sure that the content I teach matches the child's cognitive level.


If we do this, we are then listening to people, and are going beyond the English class boundary. Content is provided, communication flows , acquisition inevitably takes place and students and teacher's friendship flourishes.


The process is affective


No teaching is effective if it is not affective.
I conceive children learn or acquire language better if they are the subjects of their learning processes, instead of being objects of courses that are designed for them, or imposed on them.


Why not learn with boys playing Hercules and girls playing Little Mermaid? With a relevant, comfortable, and productive environment we are able to align language presentation and production with an activity they would normally do at home in which they have intrinsic pleasure.


It is a matter of teachers being prepared to "hear" what their students want and adapting to these demands at the moment. This is more demanding, but more dynamic, exciting and rewarding. The teacher helps students tell things that happened to them last week, no matter if students have not seen the verb tense that will be used. They will play with Pokemon and run to save Pikachu and students and teachers will share dreams in English.
For this to happen, it is important that we pay close attention to what children are doing in the classroom, so we can:


a) use language to express what the child senses at the moment,
b) facilitate presenting language holistically when the students need it.


An example would be the moment in which a little girl opens a box and is delighted to find the long lost doll and teacher echoes the feeling presenting "I found it! I'm so happy!" or when student and teacher go down a rollercoaster screaming "Awesome". I've done the last one once!


In this approach to teaching, the teacher begins bonding with students by playing with him/her, using a mixture of the native tongue and English in which students interpret the i+1 present . For example: "Meu carro está broken. Preciso consertar " From context the students will figure out that "broken" means "quebrado". The discovery comes from within, nourishing learner autonomy and confidence. Contrast this example with the traditional "This is a car ". The first treats language as Gestalt, while the second is what Paulo Freire calls banking education, where language is "deposited "from the outside.


This process does not follow a grammatical syllabus, but one which meets the learner's needs to express themselves, considering the child's feelings and emotions.


The process is success-oriented


It is undeniable that children learn best when they succeed and hence the importance of successful early interactions. The feeling young children develop towards languages is the feeling they will carry to their adult life. So it is essential that young learners see language learning as easy, natural and pleasant.


One technique that helps children achieve this goal is Total Physical Response, TPR, in which gestures are used in the process of presenting and producing language.


TPR uses (VAK) Visual, Auditory, Kinesthetic, interactions which help children produce what they want to say in English. The students give the command in Portuguese, the teacher zooms in, by saying part of the word or sentence and by doing the gesture, which helps students retrieve the information and produce it confidently. Later the teacher only helps with the gesture. After this, no help is given and students speak.


e.g: S: Vem aqui por favor !
T: ( Does the gesture for come )
S: Come
T: ( Does the gesture for here )
S: Here
T: ( Does the gesture for please )
S: Please
T: ( Does the gestures for come, here, and please, quickly in a row )
S: Come here please


With TPR, tasks are always success-oriented and even if the child can not produce commands only with the gesture, only the task is simplified by giving the beggining of the word or sentence , so that children do not even notice that it was not achieved at first. They feel good because they got it right.


e.g. S: Dorme um pouco
T: (Does the gesture for sleep )
S: ( Student does not remember language )
T: Ssss .....
S: Sleep
T: ( Does the gesture for a little)
S: A little
T: ( Does the gesture for sleep and for a little, quickly in a row )
S: Sleep a little


Another success-oriented concept is the respect towards the child's silent period . For many hours, while language is being interpreted , processed, stored, confidence is gained and then, only then, studentscan begin to produce how and what they want to say. The teacher then scaffolds language meaningfully, making sure that it is accessible to the learner, by being in his/her zone of proximal development, a little beyond the students' acquired competence.


Finally, through loop input feedback children are taught what they are saying at the moment, in a success oriented manner, not as a simple echo, but with input that presents what the student said in a different way by agreeing, disagreeing, asking questions, showing surprise and doubting. I call this phase twisting language.


S: Eu vou catch aquele car que a minha mother comprou.
T: Your mother bought you a car ! Where is it ? I wanna see the car your mother bought you.


We then find humanistic language resonance because students are expressing themselves with their own words confidently, because they are producing at their rate, and consolidating their self-esteem, which will enable them to take risks and play with the language. Here we have reached not only lexical productivity , but also humanistic where children express real feelings in the target language.


The process is perceived as play


There are two ways in which an activity can be perceived by an individual. It can be either noticed as play or work. Asher analyzed the main factors involved in distinguishing play from work :


1.Difficulty: Play is easy, Work is hard.
2.Willingness to participate: We always want to play. Sometimes we do not feel like working.
3.Pressure to produce: Play has no deadlines. Work does.
4.Relevancy: We care about what we are doing when we chose to do it. In work situations we may not havehad this choice.
5.Intrinsic pleasure: In play the focus is on the process and in work, on the goal.


Below I have listed ways I have found to make activities be perceived as play:
Normal play: I use the students' toys to play, letting them lead and create situations.
Adventures: We pretend we go camping, fishing, scubadiving, etc. This is a great activity to
retell experiences and how things happen. Add lots of emotion here through TPR, verbalizing students' emotions.


Puppets: These are used to enter the child's world of fantasy, to project problems children might have at home, (such as not wanting to brush their teeth), and as partners in adventures. Among the main advantages, they help increase motivation, and bring out shy kids and ease aggressive ones, by reducing fear and releasing anxiety.


Storytelling: The magic moment of communion fosters trust and helps children reanalyze the way they see the world. Stories also offer great opportunities to lead children to positive values.


By using these four processes, in which teacher and students see each other holistically and together build their own paths to discover language, as a means to convey real thoughts. We guarantee that students are involved physically, affectively, and intellectually in a social and spiritual context in the target language.


Mahatma Gandhi said: when what you think, say and do are in harmony, there is happiness.
I complement this by saying : Motivation in discovering is happiness. Thinking, saying and acquiring aligned are motivation.


It will be a pleasure to hear from you. My e-mail is juan@learnfun.com


Glossary


EFL: English as foreign language.
I+1: Term coined by Krashen to mean language not know by the learner and made accessible through the use of context and extra-linguistic information.
Gestalt: Psychologic approach which sees people.
Banking education: Term coined by Freire to mean information passively deposited, not connected to student's reality.
Silent period: Time in which the student listens, interpretates and builds competence without oral production.
Zone of proximal development: Area a little bit beyond the student's competence level.

Bibliography:
DUFEU, Bernard. Teaching Myself. Oxford University Press, 1994.
CSIKSZENTMIHALYI, Mihaly. Flow. Harper & Row, 1990.
ASHER, James. Brainswitching. Sky Oaks Productions, 1988.
KRASHEN, Stephen. Principles and Practice in Second Language Acquisition. Pergamon Press, 1982.
ARNOLD, Jane. Affect in Language Teaching. Cambridge University Press, 1999.
Biodata


Juan Uribe is a teacher and a teacher trainer in São Paulo, where he coordinates holistic language acquisition programs for very young learners at Juan Uribe Language Acquisition. He is also a teacher trainer at Pilgrims in Canterbury, UK and is currently the representative in Brazil of the International Council for Self-Esteem. He has been involved in TESOL for 8 years and is also an international presenter.






Bilingual storytelling
Braz-Tesol Newsletter
Junho de 2000














By Juan Uribe, São Paulo, Brazil

Want to learn Portuguese? Listen to this story!


I was alone, sozinho, with no friends on this trem going to Macchu Picchu in the Andes in Peru. It was not day, era noite, midnight. Noite fria (mimic for cold), muito fria. Zero Degrees. E muito frio nos Andes no Peru.


In my compartment, ninguém, not even a mosquito, I was completely sozinho. I was cansado (mimic for tired), muito cansado. I had walked for three hours naquela noite. I hate to caminhar (mimic for walk) de noite, specially sozinho. It might be perigoso caminhar sozinho de noite no Peru.


Eu escutei (mimic for listen) something strange, esquisito, muito esquisito. I tried to dormir (mimic for sleep), mas eu nao consegui. Fazia muito frio e o trem ia rápido (mimic for fast), muito rápido. The noise, o barulho, grew stronger and closer, mais perto. Cada vez mais perto.


Fiquei com medo (mimic for scared). Muito medo. What could I do? I needed uma idéia (mimic for idea), bem rápido. Chorar (mimic for cry) como um baby? Esconder (mimic for hide) and then hope that nobody would find me? Pular (mimic for jump) do trem, não, it was going rápido and I could die. Tinha medo, fazia frio e o trem ia rápido.


De repente, eu escutei another, outro barulho. This time it was …. My despertador, trimmm trimmm. It was six in the manhã. It had been a pesadelo. Que alívio! (mimic for what a relief!)
How was the experience? I hope you liked it.


This is a technique I have been developing during the past six years. It was an answer to the needs of my very young students who were acquiring English through play. Having read Krashen I knew that:
·Input had to be relevant. Why would I work with a coursebook teaching very young students words? They wanted to play. Besides, the process had to be fun for both of us.


·I+1 had to be respected. I could not start speaking only in English because students would be puzzled and their affective filter would rise and hinder the whole process.


·I should concentrate more on content and less on the order in which grammar is introduced in textbooks. If the child is going to Disney soon I feel working/playing with this situation is more important than presenting the present tense.


·I had to deliver input in quantity, besides respecting the silent period, in order to foster a strong base for future production.


It was only last year in July that I discovered that this very technique was being researched and that Mario Rinvolucri was studying it! I was elated to know that what I was doing was "right" and that it was not something that only my team and I were using, specially in times where native languages have been excluded from the classroom.


The main advantages of this exercise are:


·Students decode meaning individually, acquisition comes from within and students are not spoonfed.
·Spontaneity is maintained because both animator and participant are speaking at the same rate as they do in the Native Language. Also children's right of expression is preserved, once they are free to convey meaning, building their self-esteem and respecting them as individuals.


·Language is transmitted through the bond which is established between animator and participants.


·Comprehensible input is always achieved.


·Children are intrinsically motivated and eager to have the next class.


·The teacher's role is to be a facilitator who presents language connected to students' reality.


Below are the ways in which language was made accessible to participants:


·Use of context: "It was not day, era noite, midnight." It is important that there's only one answer to it. If I say I ate one abacaxi, it doesn't help much. By the way abacaxi is pineapple.


·Rephrasing: "I was alone, sozinho." Here the animator introduces the new word in the L2 right after it is said in the native language.


·Cognates: "on this trem going to Macchu Picchu." Words that are similar can be passed straight into the target language as long as contextualized with other words in the native language or with TL words the participant can easily decode.


·Knowledge of the world: "It might be perigoso caminhar sozinho de noite no Peru." Context only does not help, but when connected to personal experience decoding is easily done. Someone who lives in a very peaceful village and knows nothing of theft might have trouble here. Nowadays it is dangerous to walk anywhere alone at night.


·Gestures: "Eu escutei something strange". Do the gesture while saying the word. It will be invaluable during the elicitation phase.


·Spiralling/Knitting: "Tinha medo, fazia frio e o trem ia rápido". Here we again present all together in one sentence the previously individually decoded phrases or words.


Below are two phases that you have to be aware of before trying this technique out with your groups.


Phase 1: Tips for when you prepare your task


1.Choose an interesting and relevant story for you and your students, which you could be telling them even in their native language and write it out.


2.Decide which key words or phrases you will rephrase; which L1 cognates you will use in the L2; where you will use gesture and insert knowledge of the world to clarify meaning. Finally where you can repeat words in a spiral, joining new ones with previously decoded ones creating new novel sentences. Students are overwhelmed when they notice that they understand.


3.After you have completed the story check to see if each of the new concepts you have introduced can be figured out in less than 3 seconds. In order to verify this tell your story to a peer, do not read it. The sheet of paper becomes a barrier. One does not retell own experiences reading.


Phase 2: Tips for delivering it:


1.Speech should be delivered at normal rate and the target language words stressed.


2.Start gradually by first involving students in the story and by providing clues that lead to easy guesses. It's the warm-up phase.


3.Words that are presented and "picked up" immediately should not be repeated again in the native language nor clarified with clues. (By doing this we help students develop autonomy and tacitly lead them to focus on new language.)


4.Be ready to improvise, go back, rephrase, incorporate students' questions. Pay special attention to students' facial expressions, which clearly indicate lack of comprehension. Go with their rhythm.


5.Use emotion. Pause, look in their eyes, swallow, whisper, shout, build suspense, pace them emotionally and take them to a grand finale!


In a nutshell, we go back to ancient Confucius, who wisely said: Show me and I'll look, tell me and I'll forget, involve me and I'll ….learn.


My email is juan@juanuribe.com.br and I'll be glad to receive and answer any questions or comments.