Articles
From Alexandria to Salamanca: La Profesora va a su primera conferencia
Janet Beckmann, Bishop Ireton High School, Alexandria, Virginia
Last night was the first snowfall of the year here in the Washington area; it’s a good time to curl up with a cup of tea and think of warm nights in Salamanca, Spain.
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That was the site last July of the American Association of Teachers of Spanish and Portuguese 88th Annual Conference. I teach high school Spanish here in Virginia, and this was my first AATSP conference. Spending a week in Salamanca is wonderful, any month of the year, but I wanted to finish these six conference days energized, eager to implement in the classroom what I had learned.
And that I did. So here are some strategies to make a conference work for you. |
- Most important are the people you meet. Talk to everyone; what you glean from speaking with fellow attendees over a cup of coffee in the morning or a glass of wine in the evening helps put personalities and interests to names in the official program. And this is key when you survey the list of workshops.
- Workshops! There are hundreds! Imagine eleven offered simultaneously; how do you choose? Ask all those people you meet (point 1) what sessions they recommend. Often the program précis indicates which workshops are geared to particular teaching strategies and/or provide handouts. Some presentations are readings of published articles; is the subject one that intrigues you?
- The plenary sessions are important because they give substance to the names and the issues you read in your official publications. Your organization is more than its individuals; the meetings helped me feel connected to AATSP. And also, when you meet your officers later (point 1), you’ll have some topics of conversation.
- Prowl the displays. Sign up for further information, collect promotional pieces. Posters are obvious magnets for teachers, but I was even more excited by novel real-language resources.
- Often excursions are offered with the conference. Arrive in time to be a tourist. Partly you are fulfilling point 1 (your seatmate on the bus, the people across from you in the restaurant), and partly you are seeing a city or a museum that’s new. We encourage our students to travel; this is teaching by example.
- Look and listen to everything with the idea of what you can immediately bring to your teaching. Ask the clerks in the music stores what is hot, and buy these CDs for your classroom. Collect local magazines and menus. I used one camera exclusively for photos of me, and I created a display using vocabulary of prepositions and place words with these pictures. Here is "Teacher in the lavender garden" and there is "Teacher under the hand of the statue."
- Find time to be outdoors, to walk, to be alone. You know your own rhythms.
- Talk. Talk a lot. We language teachers can become trapped in the language levels of our students. Use these days as a chance to bring forth the language you love.
- And, finally, include plenty of moments to share meals with other conferees. These serendipitous encounters can give unexpected pleasures (e.g.. the source of the best alpargatas in Madrid), and I think you’ll come home awed by the expertise of fellow teachers (point 1 yet again!) and energized by ideas.
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New Standards Expected to Impact Foreign Language Teacher Preparation
By Eileen W. Glisan Dept. of Spanish & Classical Languages, Indiana University of Pennsylvania
Dr. Glisan is the author of the textbook: "Teacher's Handbook: Contextualized Language Instruction", and co-chair of the NCATE Foreign Language Teacher Standards writing team. She is nationally recognized for her numerous achievements in the field of foreign language education, and for exemplary service to the profession.
With the imminent release of the newly designed ACTFL Program Standards for the Preparation of Foreign Language Teachers, foreign language teacher preparation in the U.S. could be entering an exciting new era.
Approved by t he National Council for Accreditation of Teacher Education (NCATE*) in October 2002, the standards are the product of a collaborative project between American Council on the Teaching of Foreign Languages (ACTFL) and the National Foreign Language Standards Collaborative. Two drafts of the standards were released to the profession over the past eighteen months with a call for dissemination and feedback on each draft. The final draft of the standards appears on the ACTFL website, http://www.actfl.org/.
Once approved, the new standards will be used by NCATE in reviewing curricula of foreign language (FL) teacher preparation programs for national recognition. They consist of six content standards and sixteen supporting standards that describe the knowledge, skills, and dispositions that foreign language teacher candidates should demonstrate in order to be effective beginning teachers. These standards may be used by any institution seeking to evaluate its program in terms of current expectations for FL teacher candidates. The six content standards are:
- Language, linguistics, comparisons
- Cultures, literatures, cross-disciplinary concepts
- Language acquisition theories and instructional practices
- Integration of standards into curriculum and instruction
- Assessment of languages and cultures
- Professionalism
The standards are expected to have a significant impact on teacher preparation programs in three key areas:
1. Collection of Candidate Performance Evidence
FL teacher preparation programs in institutions seeking NCATE accreditation must submit evidence that their teacher candidates have the necessary knowledge, skills, and dispositions to help students in grades P-12 learn. The evidence that these programs submit must be performance-based and include multiple assessments.
This approach stands in stark contrast to NCATE's traditional system that required institutions to make a case for accreditation based on their course syllabi and faculty vitae. FL teacher preparation programs will now need to develop an ongoing assessment system through which they gather candidate performance evidence such as portfolios, lesson plans, case study reports, presentations, papers, examinations, interviews, projects, and P-12 student work samples.
2. Development and Assessment of Candidates' Oral Proficiency
Programs must develop candidates' proficiency in all areas, with a special emphasis on oral proficiency. Candidates should have opportunities to communicate in the target language outside of class and to participate in structured study abroad or immersion programs. Upper-level courses, including literature and culture courses, should be taught in the foreign language and place an emphasis on "growing" and assessing candidates' proficiency. Programs must develop a system for assessing candidates' proficiency and providing diagnostic feedback in an ongoing manner. Oral proficiency expectations should be established for benchmark points in the program (e.g., entry to the program, mid-way through the program, prior to student teaching).
The new standards require programs to verify that their teacher candidates have attained a minimum proficiency level in speaking and writing at the "Advanced-Low" level as described in the ACTFL Proficiency Guidelines-Speaking (1999) and the ACTFL Proficiency Guidelines-Writing (2001); the level is "Intermediate High" for candidates teaching target languages such as Arabic, Chinese, Japanese, and Korean.
Candidates' oral proficiency levels must be verified by a test that is administered by a central testing service such as Language Testing International (LTI) or the Texas State Board for Educator Certification. Tests such as the official OPI and the TOPT ensure reliability of the rating because the testing services have procedures in place to validate the ratings.
Although exit oral proficiency ratings must be reported using the OPI or TOPT, programs are encouraged to assess candidates' oral proficiency at various points in the program as a form of "prescreening" and to give diagnostic feedback to candidates. This type of testing may be done through informal means such as the advisory OPI or the Simulated Oral Proficiency Interview (SOPI), both of which are based on the official OPI but are not administered by a central testing service that validates the ratings.
3. Collaboration between Colleges of Education and Departments of Foreign Languages
Colleges of Education and Departments of Foreign Languages will need to collaborate in order to enable their teacher candidates to attain the standards. All instructors in both foreign language and education courses should model effective instructional practices, including the integration of technology. Course work and field experiences should be closely integrated. Candidates must take a methods course that focuses on the teaching of foreign languages and is taught by a faculty member whose expertise is foreign language education. Field experiences, including student teaching, must also be supervised by a qualified foreign language educator.
It is anticipated that the new ACTFL Program Standards for the Preparation of Foreign Language Teachers will serve as a catalyst for opening dialogue among the various stakeholders in the teacher preparation process, for improving preparation programs, and ultimately for ensuring that entering foreign language teachers have the knowledge, skills, and disposition to be effective professionals.
* NCATE (www.ncate.org) is recognized by the U.S. Department of Education and the Council for Higher Education as a professional accrediting body for teacher preparation. NCATE determines which colleges of education meet rigorous national standards in preparing teachers and other classroom specialists.
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Teacher Education: Still the Heart of the Matter
By James E. Alatis Co-director, NCLRC
Dr. Alatis has had a long and distinguished career as a foreign language educator. He is the Senior Advisor for International Language Programs & Research, and Dean Emeritus of the School of Languages & Linguistics at Georgetown University. As Chief of the Language Research Section (NDEA) for the U.S. Office of Education, he was instrumental in determining priorities for the U.S. government's funding of language programs. Countless linguistics and language students have benefited from his mentoring, teaching, and guidance.
Language teachers are the often unsung heroes and heroines of our society, frequently under appreciated in some circles, and often rewarded only with the tremendous psychic benefits afforded by the service-oriented satisfactions, with which this noble profession has long been associated. As paragons of virtue and self-sacrifice, language teachers are models worthy of emulation by their students and colleagues, and the cornerstone of our democratic society. It is to these legions of teachers to which this article is dedicated. I congratulate you and applaud you, as a teacher myself, and wish you continued success in your careers.
Let me state at the outset that I use the word "education" in my title advisedly. I have been known to say somewhat humorously: "Training is for dogs, education is for people." Behind the humor, however, is a serious point: The preparation of quality teachers of any subject, but especially teachers of second or foreign languages, requires a special kind of competence, based on academic principles, practical experiences, and personal attributes, that result in truly remarkable professionals.
First, in common with that of all teachers, the preparation of language teachers is based on sound general education courses or experiences, which have helped them become well-educated persons with a strong background in the liberal arts and sciences. Second, language teachers have had academic specialization courses or related experiences, which have helped them become proficient in their area of concentration. Mere knowledge of the language they teach is not enough. They are not drillmasters in the replicative sense, nor do they engage in mindless repetition of regurgitated knowledge.
To such enlightened teachers, the study of language and linguistics involves more than mere mastery of mechanics. Instead, they are committed to a dynamic and intellectual environment that stimulates thought, discussion and analysis. Third, the vast majority of language teachers have been exposed to professional education courses or experiences, which have helped prepare them to become the master teachers that they are.
Some years ago I wrote an article entitled, "Toward a Lapse Theory of Teacher Preparation" aimed at providing guidance for prospective teachers and administrators in English as a Second or Foreign Language. The word "LAPSE," however, did not refer to "lapsus linguae" or slips of the tongue, but rather, served as an organizing acronym for the kind of courses or experiences that should be included in any teacher education program in English for speakers of other languages. While this article referred to the TESOL Guidelines for the Certification and Preparation of Teachers of English to Speakers of Other Languages in the United States, these attributes were equally, though conversely, applicable to teachers of the "other" foreign languages in the U.S. or abroad.
With this as a background, let me spell out the broad, basic principles upon which such preparation has been based: The L, in LAPSE, stands for linguistics and includes introduction to linguistics, phonetics and phonemics, morphology and syntax, semantics (i.e., sound, form, and meaning) and contrastive linguistic and cultural analysis of both the source language (i.e., the student's home language) and the target language (i.e., the language being learned). The L also stands for the language of the student, and may also be extended to the study of Literature.
The A stands for anthropology, or anthropological linguistics, and is well covered by general courses on cultural anthropology or specific courses entitled 'Language and Culture.' The P stands for Psycholinguistics, or the psychology of language acquisition in general. It includes behavioral, cognitive, cooperative, and associative psychology and their interaction with linguistics and language teaching and learning in general. It also includes learner strategies, of which Dr. Anna Uhl Chamot, my co-director, is universally recognized as one of the world's leading experts and proponents.
The S stands for sociolinguistics (i.e., language in culture and society), and refers to the social, regional, functional, and historical varieties of language. It also includes pragmatics, or language use in context of situation, and discourse analysis, or language beyond the sentence in all forms and modes. My Georgetown colleagues Dr. Deborah Tannen and Heidi Hamilton are among the world's leading scholars in this rapidly expanding field.
The E stands for professional Education, and includes all things pedagogical. It includes Foundations of Education, Human Growth and Development, Bilingual Education, and Developmental Reading and Writing. It specifically refers to methodology courses on approaches, methods, and techniques of language teaching and learning. Ideally, such courses are broken down into two components: a) theory and practice, and (b) materials preparation and techniques. Here also are included the indispensable Education practicum, supervised practice teaching, and such important activities as demonstrations, observation, and peer teaching in live classroom situations.
Frequently, one component of the course includes an experience in learning another language, usually an uncommonly taught language, as a "shock language." This is normally the case where there is no time for a separate course, in which the language laboratory, or more recently, language-learning technology, including the use of computer-aided instruction, is covered. Also, if there has been no special, individual course available, the equally indispensable field of foreign-language assessment, or Language Testing is introduced. Here, my Georgetown colleagues David P. Harris, and the late Robert Lado have been the earliest pioneers. More and more attention is now being given, in such methodology courses, to special techniques of developmental reading and writing as they relate to second-language acquisition.
The list of courses and the resulting competencies which they imply, of course, were never intended to be exhaustive or limiting, but only broadly suggestive of the content of a comprehensive foreign- or second-language teacher-education program. The competency objectives suggested are overlapping and are those which are normally included in courses and education whose primary objective was to help prospective and in-service teachers understand the nature of language and language systems, the process of language learning, and the interrelationship between language and culture. They also included courses, education, and experience whose primary objective was to provide theoretical and methodological foundations and practical experience leading to competence in teaching situations.
In short, the knowledge implied consists of an interdisciplinary, multidisciplinary, applied linguistics approach, based on the most recent research on first- and second-language acquisition, anthropological linguistics, psycholinguistics, sociolinguistics, and, most recently, discourse analysis and language-learning strategies. Thus, language teachers are not merely trained, they are educated in the broadest sense of the word.
To conclude, good teaching and learning takes place when competent teachers with non-discouraging personalities, cherish their pupils and use non-defensive, learner-centered approaches, methods, and techniques. They approach their students with an attitude of unconditional positive regard. But they must be competent, and have undergone the kind of preparation, either through formal education, or sheer practical experience, implied by the Guidelines formulated by our leading professional organizations and now reflected in the various Standards statements presently under preparation in a large spectrum of educational fields. Qualified language teachers are thus among the most widely knowledgeable and broadly educated professionals in the community of scholars.
There are thousands of such qualified teachers in our schools today, who, through membership in honest professional organizations, are engaged in a kind of perpetual self- improvement and dedicated service that marks the true professional. They are "willing to go the extra mile." They keep up with recent research and communicate regularly with such organizations as their Language Resource Centers, including the joint GW/GU/CAL National Capital Language Resource Center. They belong to their professional organizations and participate in their activities, read and publish in their journals, and serve on their committees. Once again, I salute you, and dedicate this article to you. As they say in Spanish-adelante!
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Research Criteria for Tenure in Second Language Acquisition: Results from a Survey of the Field
Bill VanPatten & Jessica Williams, The University of Illinois at Chicago
Bill VanPatten is Professor of Spanish and Second Language Acquisition at the University of Illinois at Chicago. His research interests include the role of input in acquisition, input processing, and the effects of instruction. He does stand up comedy as a sideline.
Jessica Williams teaches in the M.A. TESOL program at the University of Illinois at Chicago, where she also directs the ESL composition program. She has published on variety of topics in second language acquisition, including second language writing, lexical acquisition, and the effect of instruction.
One of the vexing professional problems for language departments involves the criteria for evaluation of an assistant professor for tenure and promotion when the field of research is second language acquisition (SLA). The problem is vexing for the junior faculty member who struggles between what drives the field of SLA research, and what drives the field of traditional literary studies. The problem is equally vexing for department administrators who oversee the tenure process. On the one hand, these administrators suspect that traditional criteria don't (or shouldn't apply), and on the other hand, given that they themselves are typically not members of the SLA research community, they have no first-hand knowledge to use.
In such tenure cases-and indeed during the mentoring of the junior faculty member prior to tenure-questions such as the following arise: Does the tenure candidate "need a book"? If not, what is expected in terms of scholarly research? Which presses are important and which journals hold prestige? Should joint publications count? What will the outside reviewers be looking for in the tenure profile and does it match what we are expecting of the junior faculty member?
To begin addressing this problem, we conducted a survey of over 70 tenured SLA specialists at major research universities in the United States and Canada. Respondents have appointments in a variety of departments, including English, Linguistics, Foreign Languages, as well as departments dedicated specifically to the field, (e.g., Second Language Studies). The purpose was to ascertain their views of appropriate criteria regarding scholarship for promotion and tenure in SLA. Our article first presents the quantitative findings of the survey and then presents a discussion of key issues as raised by the respondents. We review current practices for evaluation of scholarship of SLA faculty in departments whose primary focus is on literary and cultural studies. In our discussion, we offer recommendations for establishing a set of standards for the review of junior SLA faculty. We also present the respondents' general evaluations of major journals and presses in which SLA scholarship is regularly published.
The basic findings of this survey include the following points.
- A single-authored book is not an expected accomplishment for tenure.
- Journal articles are the expected venue for publication in the field for junior scholars.
- Approximately 7-8 articles or book chapters in respected venues are an estimate of generally accepted standards of quantity for tenure and promotion.
- SLA scholars demonstrate strong consensus on the quality and relevance of journals and academic presses in the field.
- Joint authorship should be encouraged.
- Textbook authorship may be considered in the tenure portfolio, if the audience for the book is graduate students and if it demonstrates expertise in SLA, not just pedagogy.
- The workloads of language coordinators must be taken into account in evaluating performance.
- Mentoring of junior SLA faculty who are isolated in literature departments should be a departmental priority.
- Language and literature departments need to be educated as to what constitutes research in the field of SLA.
It is clear that there is concern among those in SLA research that the field is not as well understood by colleagues in humanities as it could be. The result has been some tension between what scholars in SLA expect out of a junior colleague and what those in literary studies view as appropriate expectations for the same person. We hope that these results will help departments determine appropriate research expectations of junior faculty in SLA and develop specific standards for promotion and tenure. We should note that the findings here pertain primarily to research, rather than the other two standard tenure consideration categories: teaching and service. The full text of the study is available at: http://www.uic.edu/depts/sfip/news/slatenurestudy.html.
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