As a foreign language teacher, what is your position on students speaking the target language in the classroom?
At first, I thought the answer to this question was fairly simple: of course I want the students to speak French in class. My cooperating teacher for my internship agrees with me, as she wants the students to speak ONLY the target language. However, this has been more challenging than I thought. When we hear the students speaking English in class, we prompt them to speak French. We tell them that i our classroom they need to speak only French, especially since that is the most effective way to learn a foreign language.
Some students in particular like to challenge us, as some refuse to speak French. If students ask to say something in English, sometimes we allow them to. But a couple of students in particular say "I'm just going to say this in English because I cannot say it in French." It has gotten to the point where I tell the students if they can't say it in French then they can't say it. If a student has a relevant question then I am a little more lenient, but would like them to at least make the effort in the target language.
We have tried to incorporate methods that make the students want to speak the target language. For instance, I went skydiving over the summer and I have a video of the experience. We made a deal with one of our classes that if they speak only French in class for an entire week, then we would show them the short video. Unfortunately the class spoke some English, so they will have to try again, but we were very impressed by their effort. I have been thinking of incentives for the students to speak only French. For instance giving the each student five poker chips at the beginning of the week. If they speak English then you take a poker chip away. At the end of the week the number of poker chips that they have left can equal extra credit or points towards something.
I wonder though how other foreign language teachers approach this situation. I observed a Spanish class on Friday because they were giving presentations about Barcelona. In between the presentations the students were speaking some English, and the teacher didn't seem to mind. If the students spoke to her in English, she replied back to them in Spanish. She didn't say anything to them about speaking only Spanish, but many students chose to only speak the target language.
I want to know your takes on this subject. Is it better to be lenient about speaking the target language, or strict about enforcing it? How do you think the students respond to each method?
I know that in this class speaking just the target language, from both the teacher and the student, has been emphasized, but I still think that I would make a large exception for French 1, especially at the high school level. In French 1, I think a large part of my instruction would be in English, especially of grammar. And the students do not have much to work with yet, so I wouldn't them to only speak French. Of course during different activities in groups and such I would expect a lot of French to be spoken. I also think as the teacher you could make a decently easy transition to French-only by telling them in French 1 and on the first day of French 2 that in French 2 and beyond the entire class period is French only. I would still make an exception for grammar instruction, especially since I think comparisons between English and French grammar is helpful for both learning French and developing a better understanding of English grammar.
ReplyDeleteAnd to the questions: I think being more strict would be better, but the reward programs that you mentioned sound interesting and would be worth exploring other ideas too.
I would say that teachers should try to speak 90% of the target language in class but allow students to use some English if they have difficulty communicating ideas in L2. Believe me! It is quite possible to use the target language even the class is at the lower level - Krashen's theory has approved this point :)
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ReplyDeleteI think you and your teaching mentor are on track with with your incentives to the use TL. I think that a "french only" classroom is a good learning/immersion environment because students tend to become interested in learning new vocabulary so that they can express themselves. I feel that this method works more easily with intermediate/advanced students, but that as Lina says, even with beginners, it can be implemented, perhaps just with a little more leniency.
ReplyDeleteIn my Spanish 401 students are encouraged to speak Spanish but not discouraged from speaking English. I personally was not strictly prohibited from speaking English in a foreign language class until a few years into my Spanish education, in high school. For me, I would rather my students ask me good questions about Spanish in English than risk missing out on those questions because no one wanted to attempt to say it in Spanish. I've had really good conversations with them where I could tell they were thinking about the language, or that they had questions about culture, and where I also had the opportunity to show my enthusiasm for the language. Clearly there are simpler questions they could ask in Spanish, but I would hate to miss out on those exchanges by making them feel uncomfortable speaking English.
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