Submitted for possible publication. ********************************************************************** Education is used here in two senses: the teaching of foreign languages (FL) and what the purpose of learning a (Continue Reading)
Pat’s Polemics
On-going brilliance
a path from learning to acquisition?
12/02/2018 Pat Barrett Add CommentUsually it is best to put these tidbits into a larger piece but I wanted to get this onto the blog before I forgot it. (Continue Reading)
An astute approach to the pros and cons of tprs
06/19/2018 Pat Barrett 11 CommentsTaken from a post to a listserv. An astute laying out of pros and cons: My serious issues with TPRS as a complete methodology can (Continue Reading)
How much do you read in your language(s)
11/29/2017 Pat Barrett Add CommentOn a listserv for fl teachers I posted that I have 25 literary novels in Spanish. I got three inquiries. For some reason, all three (Continue Reading)
Transitioning aka switching horses in mid-stream
10/24/2017 Pat Barrett Add CommentI’ve tried to address these issues, as I told Eric, on my blog, but it’s not organized well. In particular, your mid-stream point of entry (Continue Reading)
What Makes a Good FL Teacher?
09/16/2017 Pat Barrett 3 Comments7 This is an article I wrote for the Sept. issue of Le Canard Dechaine, a journal for French teachers. If I can get a (Continue Reading)
The Thirteenth Warrior immersion
09/14/2017 Pat Barrett Add CommentThe sequence showing the Arab, Ahmed, gradually picking up Norse in an immersion situation. Often shown to fl classes (incl. mine).
corrected version of Writing and SLAM response
04/27/2017 Pat Barrett Add CommentRecently, April 25, I responded (Re writing and SLAM) to a post that asked about the efficacy of error correction. I made a hash out (Continue Reading)
Note to accompany post to moretprs re LingQ
04/17/2017 Pat Barrett Add CommentI wrote in a post to moretprs that stories became the heart of tprs via “going back to Blaine Ray’s feeling TPR fell short and (Continue Reading)
Review of thread on moretprs re CI
04/02/2017 Pat Barrett 7 CommentsRESPONSE TO LONG THREAD ON MORETPRS RE CI My take on this thread is that it continues the discussion labeled “drift” that started a couple (Continue Reading)
One word response to my critics
03/04/2017 Pat Barrett Add CommentOver the years on listservs for fl teachers and on some unrelated places like blogs and columns, someone has criticized me for including discussions of (Continue Reading)
An early British head mistress recommends reading for enjoyment
02/17/2017 Pat Barrett Add CommentThe other day I found a little book, Helen Waddell’s A Book of Medieval Latin for Schools (1931, that I had set aside. I opened (Continue Reading)
The thread on moretprs re CI and tprs
01/28/2017 Pat Barrett Add CommentMy granddaughter is taking first year Spanish in high school. Nothing but verb sheets and memorized phrases and testing. No Spanish spoken by the teacher (Continue Reading)
Response to a teacher feeling down
11/13/2016 Pat Barrett Add CommentA CI Latin teacher described an annual down period and wondered about switching jobs. He puts out a terrific blog on CI methods, so I (Continue Reading)
Communicative lesson plans I typically used
08/27/2016 Pat Barrett 6 CommentsCommunicative lesson planning is what I call what I am placing on my blog here. It was used daily by me when I was doing (Continue Reading)
Response to Terry’s “Beginner’s Question”
05/01/2016 Pat Barrett Add CommentTerry says, “We don’t do “units” that are finished in TPRS — we do language, which is never finished, and keeps spiraling again and again (Continue Reading)
Advanced tprs reading?
03/06/2016 Pat Barrett 2 CommentsTerry has written that at the advanced level, i.e. once basic structures have been acquired, internalized, then continued input builds vocabulary, collocations, etc. What I (Continue Reading)
What do we do when we disagree?
01/26/2016 Pat Barrett 2 CommentsI read Grant’s post and find I disagree with him on a number of points. My question is: how do we handle diversity of perspectives (Continue Reading)
Admin overreach and joining prof org
01/06/2016 Pat Barrett Add CommentThis is very a propos to the thread on joining organizations. If ACTFL or some organization were powerful enough to lay down the law on (Continue Reading)
Naive question re a language
12/28/2015 Pat Barrett Add CommentWhen to use “РоÑÑии” and when to use “РоÑÑиє? Thanks in advance for any answers or tips. I am using Duolingo to begin my learning (Continue Reading)
The first three days of my career
12/09/2015 Pat Barrett Add CommentMy first year teaching I started with a fl, Russian. Having no idea about CI and being a lover of grammar and having studied tons (Continue Reading)
Do students need to review? Response to Lori
12/09/2015 Pat Barrett Add CommentAbsolutely right, Lori. One stalwart on flteach once told me that a teacher who did not announce tests and give out review packets was not (Continue Reading)
Laughable criteria
12/02/2015 Pat Barrett Add CommentFrom Tasks and Communicating in Language Classrooms by James F. Lee: hilarious Lee lists criteria for successful L2 acquisition in the classroom. See how many (Continue Reading)