Improv Games for the ESL Classroom

This past Saturday, I attended the CFTESOL mini-conference at my homebase, the Center for Multilingual Multicultural Studies. It was short, sweet, and satisfying. Not only was I able to see familiar faces from my graduate program who are also CFTESOL members, but I was also able to learn from some fantastic presenters, including one who I had never met in person but only before on Skype while she was living in China as an English Language Fellow!

As per request, I am including a brief overview of my presentation "Improv Games for the ESL Classroom" which demonstrated techniques I integrate in my classroom utilizing the philosophy and affective barrier-lowering benefits of improv comedy warm-ups.

Inspired by the 2009 article by Berk and Treiber "Whose
Classroom is it Anyway" I decided to create a presentation with the following:

• Pass the Clap
• An easy way to establish attentive listening, trust, and spontaneity
• Rules:
• Gather in a circle and pass the clap from person to person.
• Each person must face the other person and clap simultaneously.
• You must establish eye contact!
• Notes:
• The clap can be reversed.
• It can also be sped up.
• Name Game
• A way to learn names and establish trust and acceptance
• Everyone says their name and a gesture, and you pass it from person to person.
• Rules:
• Every student must come up with a gesture to go along with their name.
• As you go around the circle, a student says their name and gesture and all students repeat it chorally. 
• Finally, you pass the names from person to person.
• Zip Zap Zop
• An improv staple that establishes attentive listening and can incorporate classification vocabulary into a game
• Rules:
• One person says “zip”, next person says “zap”, last person says “zop”.
• You must establish eye contact!
• Notes:
• A variation can be creating a group of three different things which belong in a category.
• Ex: If the category were animals, one person may say cow, another says chicken, the last says pig.
• Patterns
• Another classification game that requires each student to choose and memorize vocabulary from a given category
• Rules:
• Students stand in a circle.
• The teacher picks a category under which students must choose a component of that category, e.g. “movies” and a student says Empire Strikes Back.
• To choose the order of the pattern, have each student raise their hand, then point to another student who will go next in the circle.
• Works similar to the Name Game in that you pass the movie to the next person
• Notes: 
• Can have multiple patterns moving through a circle at one time
• Can adapt to use any vocabulary you are currently studying
• "Yes, and..." Stories
• The most classic demonstration of the “Golden Rule” of acceptance combined with storytelling for the ESL classroom.
• Rules:
• Students stand in a circle and the story moves around it.
• The teacher provides a topic and begins the story.
• The next person must say “Yes, and…” and add another sentence to the story.
• Example: 
• The teacher says, “My fifth birthday was my most memorable childhood moment.”
• The student says, “Yes, and I had the most delicious birthday cake ever.”
• You must say “Yes, and…” No buts!
• Notes:
• Can be completed as a whole class, as a group, or in partners
• Can also use one word 
• Can also be used in writing

I have moved into improv scene work with some of my classes and hope to continue the presentations at SSTESOL this May.

Finding something completely unexpected in your own backyard...

Where is this? It's honestly a little hard to tell from the picture. The cabins are octagonally shaped and look like they sprung from the hippie movement... so maybe the Pacific Northwest? But, the land doesn't look right, the trees are oaks... so maybe it's a commune somewhere near Asheville? Well, at least I know there aren't any elves so it can't be Lothlorien and there aren't any Ewoks so it can't be Endor.

Sometimes beauty is found in the most unexpected places, even an hour outside of Jacksonville. Because unless you already knew about the Hostel in the Forest, you'd would probably never guess it was in Brunswick, Georgia... about two miles from a Dollar General and a Harvey's Supermarket.

Walking into this place is like walking into a dream. Even though the hostel isonly a mile off of a major highway, it feels like a completely other world. The tree coverage obscures nearly all the light from the sun and only small gaps of light make it down to the forest floor. The rich smells of the earth eminate from the leaves and soil in the ground. The buzzing cicadas provides some sort of solace that though the surroundings are serene and unmoving, they are simultaneously full of life.


The people who stay at the hostel have an indescribably special quality as well. Warm, open, honest, smiling, giving lots of hugs, and wearing no shoes. Plus they make the best darn vegan lasagna I've ever tasted.

There's also a spring-fed lake open for canoeing and swimming. In late-August, the lake was a perfect temperature for swimming. And laughing. And floating to look up at the sky and wondering why it took you so long to find a place so beautiful.

I fell asleep Monday evening in a screened-in cabin in complete perfect darkness except for the tiny sporadic soft light of firefies.

Everything here reminded me of the importance of nature to human existence and how easy it can be to forget if time isn't taken to do so.

Learning from the first days of Ramadan...

I just finished grading a speaking assignment for my students on the importance of sharing customs with other cultures. The topic has largely been focused on the holy month of Ramadan, and the traditions associated with the month. One thing, among many, which I love about my job is that I don't only teach but constantly learn from my students. 

Ramadan is a very big deal at work because a large majority of the population of our students is Muslim. Obviously intrigued, about three weeks ago I began rapid-firing questions to everyone at work about the concept of fasting at Ramadan. The reasons for the fast seemed incredibly admirable. Many of my students cited that they fast to remind them of the people who are starving and to practice discipline and self-control from all things, not just food and water. 

However, I didn't quite conceivably understand how someone could go a 14-hour day without allowing anything to pass their lips... no food, no water, nothing. Given the length of the days in the summer time and the heat of a Floridian sun, even an explanation didn't make much sense. To my students in my speaking class, I asked  "How do you stay awake? What do you eat in the morning? How much do you drink? How do you focus during the day when you're hungry? Don't your eyes get dry?"

http://www.ctvnews.ca/health/keeping-ramadan-fast-during-summer-heat-adds-to-challenge-1.1359517

Eventually, the questioning hit a point where no further explanation could be offered without trying. So, last Tuesday, I decided to learn from Ramadan the only way I could: by partaking in the fast myself. Wednesday morning, I woke up at 5:15am and drank four glasses of water and ate two yogurts. I went back to bed until my normal wake-up time an hour later. The day at work was fine, until about 3:00pm at which time my head began to ache and I had to take a "Ramadanap". I woke up around 5:00pm, went out to get some food from one of my favorite restaurants, graded papers, even did some painting. The last hour before the breakfast I didn't even feel hungry, just focused. Then, at 8:30, I finally, slowly broke the fast some more yogurt... and then some very non-traditional pho.

The four following days have been equally challenging. The second day I had an intense throbbing headache, presumably from the the low blood sugar and I lost focus. I made it clear that I was inconvenienced to my co-workers, which in hindsight was a mistake. Acknowledging the pain, acknowledging the inconvenience was self-serving, and because I have chosen to take this journey on my own, garnered no sympathy from anyone who I told my head hurt. So, I went home and dealt with the headache the only way I knew how: on my own, with quiet, without idle talk, just thought. Pushing through proved once again rewarding and it made me worry less about things which had been bothering me at work and in my personal life. I think, at this point, while obviously still in progress, the abstaining from indulgences is empowering with a level of understanding that had not previously deemed possible. 

This week in my speaking class, discuss the sharing of the practices of Ramadan. We read an article about the principles of Ramadan and discussed it as a class. The insight and open-mindedness of both students who practice and don't practice Islam has been staggering. Overall, both they and myself agree that it is a valuable way to learn about another culture and that the process goes far beyond fasting, that it will clean yourself and allow you to give love to all people without judgment.

How beautiful is that?

Why Working at a University Writing Center is Awesome

This past Thursday was my final day at the University Writing Center. It was incredibly bittersweet. It has been one of the best jobs I've ever had for many reasons, primarily the main reasons anyone would love a job: flexibility, community, variety of work, and helping others. But leaving is also a means for celebration for any student leaving the Writing Center. As all tutors at the center are students, leaving means graduation and greener pastures in parts unknown. Even with the prospects abroad as a legitimate TESOLer,this coming August, it's hard to call leaving the UWC a draw.

Picture of Writing Centers, c. 1591

Most people, even students at the university, don't have a clear idea of a UWC because they've never been. Others think it's a storehouse of knowledge where you can drop your paper off to be checked for grammar (linked to Andrea Lunsford's Collaboration, Control, and the Idea of the Writing Center). Mostly, it's just an awesome place where people come in, talk about their papers, and get peer feedback from people who have been shown to have some competency in writing to learn some new tricks to add to their writing. You learn something new every time you come in.

For someone who has never worked at or been to a  UWC, it may be hard to imagine, so, here's a snippet from my final session. A preface: The whole session was a bit strange because I had just gotten back from the eye doctor on campus who had dilated my pupils to the size of saucers and severely impeded both my ability to read and my sensitivity to light, in addition to making me look like I was either on something or had a concussion. Sounds fun, no? Despite looking like a feral cat and being disoriented from the perspective shift, it went really well. On Thursday around 3:00 I greeted my appointment in the main office and walked him back to our workroom to sit at one of the tables. He was a graduate student working on a final paper for his negotiations course for an MBA. He graciously agreed to read his paper out loud (given my imposition). The premise of the paper was: use the negotiation strategies learned in the course and apply them to your own negotiation. Looking for an extra pickup truck for transport, the writer had gone above and beyond and solicited nine different people on Craigslist for the perfect truck. After meeting with his ninth seller, he came across the perfect truck that met his specifications and using a very humorous method of chewing down the price, i.e. walking around the car with scrutiny, acting uninterested, sighing audibly (I think the descriptions of his grumbles were my favorite) saying he had other cars to look at, and eventually knocked the price down from $2000.00 dollars to $1200.00. As someone

OBD Scanner and ODB: Not same same.

who royally fails at negotiation, it was a pretty insightful read. We chatted about the course, about graduation, about life, about grammar and the succinctness of his writing style, about using academic vernacular in lieu of more informal words, about places where additional examples would be helpful for clarification of certain concepts and about something called an OBD monitor which plugs into the car and reads diagnostics. It's all really cool stuff. However, I misheard what he said and thought he said "ODB", like the rapper, wherein we both shared in a 10-second dance party singing 'Shimmy Shimmy Ya'. Mm-hmm. Best job ever.

This final session was particularly fun for one of my favorite reasons: the writer left with constructive feasible goals by the end of the session, I got to learn on the job about cool stuff I'd never even thought about, and we both had fun. People from all over the university bring their papers to be looked at and offer all their best (or sometimes not-so-best) ideas for revision, so this dual-sided learning happens frequently on the job and it's one of the things that has made working at the Writing Center super duper awesome. My last session ended on a sweet, satisfying note, as have all of my adventures at the university in the 16 months I have been here. :)

English as a Language of the World, Jay Walker 2009

I find this quote incessantly facinating.

"English represents hope for a better future; a future where the world has a common language to solve its common problems."

TESOL 2013 Dallas, TX

TESOL International Convention 2013 Dallas, TX

…was amazing! As a green graduate student experiencing her first TESOL, I don’t think I could really imagine how many people “6,000” was until  a stampede of educators bustle through the halls of the Dallas convention center once their sessions released. The convention presentations were simply inspiring. Over 1,500 presenters from 100 countries shared their ideas at TESOL 2013. The TESOL program is THICK; nearly 240 pages. To give some perspective, from 7:30 to 8:00 each day, there were nearly 30 concurrent sessions at the same time. For the program, I was expecting a slender book with brief descriptions. However, when I was handed the program, I nearly dropped the 250 page behemoth from weight alone. ...Okay, I'm exaggerating, but the book is still big!

Critical Thinking with the World Peace Game

From before day one, my brain was exploding with information! TESOL was gracious enough to, Wednesday night, stream their plenary speaker John Hunter teaching critical thinking strategies with his amazing World Peace Game. Though the TESOL opening speech is not available any longer, his famous TED Talk is. His talk is an utterly inspiring motivator to get teachers to think outside of the box.

Comic Books in the ESL Classroom

For classroom use, I was able to find practical applications for free technology, and even comic books. Common core standards in the USA were a BIG topic this year at TESOL, as it has been for all education. "Reading as a Superpower" is a series of books designed to teach reading with subjects that all kids love-- comics, including Star Wars, Marvel, and DC!  Here is a quick write up of their awesome wares from the School Library Journal: http://www.slj.com/2012/11/webcasts/reading-is-a-superpower-comic-books-graphic-novels-literacy/



Research in NNEST
Research is a much more personal subject, and for myself I attended two research-oriented presentations on NNEST in TESOL, including the annual content-area meeting of the NNEST interest group in TESOL. Sitting next to George Braine was  unequivocally one of the nerdiest and most exciting moments of my time in TESOL and I won't soon forget it. Especially because my colleagues and I will be presenting this May at the regional SSTESOL conference on NNEST and NEST Perceptions in Asia, this was incredibly informative. http://nnest.asu.edu/

Corpora

There were also two very special presentations on corpora in ESL education. If you haven't used corpora, oh boy, are you in for a pleasant surprise! One was by Alison Youngblood, a PhD candidate from UCF as well as my former practicum director for the Soy Culto intensive English Program. Alison presented a history of corpora which was beyond mind-boggling. The amount of accumulated, searchable knowledge on the internet today is beyond staggering. Perhaps it comes as no surprise that researchers have accumulated very specific information, including the English language, in amazing databases called corpora. Corpora accumulate words from written articles, T.V. and radio broadcasts, books, and more. The other presentation was by both Alison and another student in my cohort, Christina Torres, who spoke on practical applications for integrating corpus in vocabulary lesson planning. Here is a link to the most used American Corpus, BYU's COCA: http://corpus.byu.edu/coca/

Job Marketplace
Another amazing aspect of TESOL 2013 was the job marketplace. Here, employers from around the world signed up to meet with hundreds of eager applicants. 45-minute interviews were scheduled online and then conducted in-person. It is an incredible opportunity for anyone seeking employment in the field, and even if you weren't at TESOL Convention 2013, they have a great online application as well! http://www.tesol.org/convention2013/job-marketplace

All in all, I feel incredibly fortunate and excited to be part of TESOL. As graduation looms above my head, I guess the best course of action next is to study for my comprehensive exam and get ready to experience even more amazing things in the field as I continue to develop as a professional. :)

Problems of Practice: ESL Students in the University Writing Center

Problems of Practice Inquiry into Tutoring ESL/NNS Students

Leah DeLorenzo and Charlotte Jones

Inquiry Question:

What perceptions do tutors have of non-native speakers and English and how might those perceptions affect teaching and learning in the Writing Center?

According to Thonus (1993) satisfactory scores do not always translate to college-level academic writing. To be admitted to the University of Central Florida as an International Student, students must get 80/120, or approximately 66.7%.. The following is a Level 3 (out of 5) Writing Sample, from the TOEFL iBT website.  

When we were children, we were taught to tell truth. Telling truth and being honest also become

the criteria of judging a person. I do think that most people prefer to live in a world of pure truth

and it is also the best wish of all kind hearted people. However, what we have to face is not the

dream land. Telling truth all the time could only exist in our dreams. In another word, lies could

not be avoided.

I will illustrate my opinion with the following facts. In the business world, always telling

truth equals to commit suicide. For example, when competitor company is asking the content of a tender or the cost of a major product, telling truth is nonsense. Furthermore, we could learn from old collegue that to keep the business secrete is to keep the position.

For those people whose profession is politics, lies is their favorite language. In order to

stablize the mood of anxcious people, some times president has to tell lies to comfort the peolple so that no more serious result will hapen.  Among friends, allways telling truth will also cause lots of avoidable confllicts. For example, when a 49 years old lady ask her froend whether she is beautiful or not. If the answer is No (truth for sure). We could imagine the accompanied results. This is why we are using the term white lie to find the suitable reason to use minor lies.

However, despite all these difficulties, we should always try to be honest and tell truth as

much as we could. In lots of situation, to tell truth can strengthen the relationship and deepen the

communication and understanding among people. Especially among family memers, telling truth

is quite necessary for every one. A family full of lie will bankrupt immediately. In a word, in

different situation, we should tell different words.

What does the research show?

Lyons, G. (1992). Validating cultural difference in the writing center. Writing Center

Journal,12(2), 145-158.

• Learn to understand where the writer is coming from
• Says to “ask tough, honest questions... about his or her own prejudices, commitments, and ethos.” (p. 157)

Blau, S & Hall, J. (2002). Guilt-Free Tutoring: Rethinking how we tutor

non-native-English-speaking students. Writing Center Journal 23(1), 23-44

• It is realistic to alter your practices (p. 29)

Thonus, T. (1993). Tutors as Teachers: Assisting ESL/EFL students in the writing center.

Writing Center Journal, 13(2), 13-26

• Repeat Sessions: Working with students in multiple sessions
• Ask good questions: “How would you write that in your language?” ( p. 20).

Volunteer Challenge: WE WANT YOU!

The University of Central Florida’s IEP program CMMS conducts a Conversation Hour open to students and volunteers who want to help international students improve their English. We challenge you to volunteer an hour of your time (Tuesdays, Wednesdays, or Thursday 1:00-3:00 at the Barbara Ying Building next to the Student Center).

Resources for Tutors

• A Guide to Tutoring Non-Native English Speaking Students, John Jay College of Criminal Justice
• http://resources.jjay.cuny.edu/erc/tutoring/worksheets.php
• Over 66 worksheets for tutoring ELLs
• Longman Dictionary
• COCA for advanced learners
• http://corpus.byu.edu/coca/
• Keys to Teaching Grammar by Keith Folse
• New Resource: "Articles, Prepositions, and Verb Tenses"
• https://docs.google.com/document/d/1URnzDAiz1dJtIJJ9TZC4NXTQzH1JhNsXH6XCvrWDJPk/edit

Calling all English Teachers in Asia!

Greetings all English teachers!

As some of you may know, I am currently working on my Master of Arts in TESOL back home in Orlando at the University of Central Florida. I’m nearly finished, but before my work here is complete I am being asked to conduct some research. My colleagues and I have been examining other areas on native and non-native EFL instruction and have devised a survey eliciting teacher opinions.

So, I am in need of your help! If you are currently (or have previously been) teaching English as a foreign language in Asia and could spare five minutes (at your desk) to complete this short survey, I would be incredibly grateful. The survey is fairly straightforward and, of course, completely confidential. There's a short section for you to add your comments as well. :)

Please share the survey with their native/non-native English teacher friends/colleagues as well. The link is provided below:

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/embeddedform?formkey=dFc5VmRURXlnQl80aWtBWTd4RHNTdGc6MQ

The more participants, the merrier, so tell a friend! Most of our respondents will have experience in South Korea, but if you know anyone with experience in Japan, China, Hong Kong, Taiwan or southeast Asia that would be very helpful as well.

Thank you so much, your responses are immensely appreciated!

All the best,
Charlotte :)

Playing with Geert Hofstede's Dimensions of Culture

Geert (Hassel)hofstede...

School is back in session, and my first assignment is due today: a paper on Geert Hofstede's Dimensions of Culture. The great news? It was actually fun!

While the highly essentialist nature of this model has its obvious limitations, this comparison tool provided by the website of The Hofstede Centre gives a surprising amount of general insight between cultures, dividing them into five dimensions and giving a nice explanation at the bottom page about what they all mean.

It's fun to play with too! Below is a screenshot of the United States and South Korea. The differences in individualism are incredible to see quantified.

The tool is here: http://geert-hofstede.com/countries.html

 

It's also interesting to look at the generalized differences between cultures like Sweden and Saudi Arabia, China and Canada. Some things are surprising!

However, while I see the value in such a  generalized view, I cannot also help but conjecture that a model like this downplays the complexity of individuals and of culture. What do you think?