Kevin Ryan in Tokyo

Year: 2021

  • TBLT Prep: Planned Serendipity?

    Is it really serendipity if it’s planned? By starting prep so early (6 months before), it allows time to find things as they cross by during my daily info-grazing sessions.

    Four things have come across my desk last week that will improve the course I am teaching in May/June.

    The first is a discussion group for a previous iTDi course on Dogme. Maria from the Ukraine, our community builder, set up a Facebook Group after the course, and now every couple of weeks 6-8 of us gather to discuss teaching. Last week it was about feedback. Elena (Russia) brought some new perspectives, Andreea (Romania) brought her critically incisive examples, Bistra in Sicily brings her solid background in teaching (I want to assign her blog posts about language learning to my students), Fabio (Italy) is a natural teacher, Jorge brings his perspective from Mexico, Renata her energy and stories from Macedonia and the Middle East, and Priscila, a school owner from Brazil. We discussed CR (Corrective Feedback) in all of these locations, a real sampling of worldwide situations.

    A former JALT-er (Japan teacher) Jim McKinley co-authored an article on oral corrective feedback. A substack newsletter by “The Educationalist” talks about feedback in a wider educational sense, giving perspective on language feedback. And finally, a TBLT-adjacent topic has a new book on Evidence-based language teaching. Out soon.

    So with all of these filtering in (and a solid note-taking/organizing/archiving system), I can take advantage of all of these.

    Reading (Yesterday 1:08 Ch. 12, Today 0:48 Ch.13) and Blogging (0:47)

    Previously: Announcement. Book. Selection 3Readings. FirstRead. BloodBrainBarrier.

    Background: I’m preparing an 8-week course about TBLT for iTDi as part of their Great Minds series (not mine, the ones in the book). I am blogging about the process of preparation mostly for the fun of it. I was inspired by Cory Doctorow, an SF writer that does this with all his books. But it also helps me focus. This is even more exciting than teaching a grad school course. I’m looking forward to it and hope this might spark an interest.

  • TBLT Prep: Blood-Brain Barrier between Theory and Practice

    The blood-brain barrier in physiology is a lot like the “barrier” between theory and practice. In language teaching, research and teaching oftentimes are not linked. This book (note the title) sits right at the barrier and attempts to straddle it. But we should all note that one (theory) cannot exist without the other (practice). Another reason I have chosen this book.

    As I move into the second reading (next post), I want to acknowledge one of the most basic questions in research. TBLT has been wrestling with this since its inception, and rightly so. It is wonderful to see the contortions of both research design and teaching practice. There is a need to maintain that barrier in some places, to maintain a fealty to design, or to the practicalities of teaching. All the while, attempting to bring the two together, to increase the permeability of the transfer. Not just from research to practice, but to recognize that it goes both ways, something both good teachers and good researchers recognize.

    I am delighted to read about Action Research and Exploratory Practice as a way to increase permeability by shortening the feedback cycle. These are just two examples of how design and practice work together.

    Today Reading (1:29 Ch. 12) and Blogging (0:2)

    Previously: Announcement. Book. Selection 3Readings. FirstRead.

    Background: I’m preparing an 8-week course about TBLT for iTDi as part of their Great Minds series (not mine, the ones in the book). I am blogging about the process of preparation mostly for the fun of it. I was inspired by Cory Doctorow, an SF writer that does this with all his books. But it also helps me focus. This is even more exciting than teaching a grad school course. I’m looking forward to it and hope this might spark an interest.

  • TBLT Prep: First Reading

    The first reading has a few purposes. I note feelings I get when discovery is delightful or difficult. I make a deck of jargon flip cards. I highlight as if I were a grad student. I note down which studies get mentioned more often than most.

    The first, fast, reading helps me with subsequent readings. It builds empathy with the participants. I am assuming they will come in reading only a chapter ahead. I can see which ones to warn participants about, and indicate which ones will take longer.

    I start to build a glossary, and since the digital version has a flip-card function, I use that for jargon or acronyms, just in case.

    Keeping an eye out for the more important studies will help me in my second (deep, slow) reading along with some of the studies.

    And finally, my notes will help me develop materials to aid participants in reading three. I will know when to move fast and when to slow down.

    Today Reading (1:01 Ch. 10) and Blogging (0:21)

    Previously: Announcement. Book. Selection. 3Readings.

    I’m preparing an 8-week course about TBLT for iTDi as part of their Great Minds series (not mine, the ones in the book). I am blogging about the process of preparation mostly for the fun of it. I was inspired by Cory Doctorow, an SF writer that does this with all his books. But it also helps me focus. This is even more exciting than teaching a grad school course. I’m looking forward to it and hope this might spark an interest.

  • TBLT Prep: Three Readings

    I read the text for each of my courses three times. The first is the most exciting, but least interesting. The second is the hardest, but most interesting (I get to dive deep). The third is the most fun, as I get to create materials to facilitate participants

    I learned how to read academically from a girl. It might have been in the 6th grade (Jennifer Green, never Jenny), or maybe it was Terri Dalrymple in the 8th grade, or Laura Rosenberger in the 9th grade. Inspirations all.

    She taught me that I had to read anything 3 times. Fast, slow, fast. I still use this format, but have developed for my grad school courses. First, read it quickly and superficially, like a graduate student (wink), highlighting, maybe even with multiple colors.

    The second (researcher) read is in the library, with the catalog at hand, downloading the most important articles. I usually pick one for each week of the class, but for this book, I am guessing about 30 to cover all contingencies. I read, or at least browse them, all the while adding to my notes and comments. Meta-studies are at the top of the list. If a study is described in detail, I will note the n-size, measurement instruments, and note the discussion. I build a database of these articles in Zotero to organize the research.

    The third (teacher) read is to pull all of this together into something I can field questions about and point people to. Then I write/create/construct materials and activities for each session of the course.

    Right now, I am just finishing up the first reading. I’ve snuck in a little second reading as well. More on each of these in days coming.

  • TBLT Course: The Book Part 2

    I’ve already written about the choice of the book and its place in the course, but wanted to say a few more things. Most of these reflect what I do in my graduate classes, and how I will modify those for this course.

    When I pick a book for a course, I want one that I can discuss on different levels. Not just theory and practice. What struck me in this book was that we were talking (yes, I talk with my books) about teaching and learning, linguistics, and SLA. But there is another element. It is wide-ranging and historical enough that we can see the science of SLA. I love science, even though I am not very good at it. When people ask me, “What is the greatest human invention?” some may answer the wheel, or fire, or even currency. I think the height of human evolution is in a process. The most important human invention is the scientific method. Humanity would be so much poorer without it. Indeed, we may have shuffled off or been subsumed without it. Handling the breakneck progress is another skill we are working on.

    I studied Psychology undergrad, and in those days it was trying to shake off the mantel of armchair science (ethnography, introspection) to become a real, “hard” science. When I studied Linguistics in grad school, we were at a similar point, moving away from anthropology to hard science. I am happy see here how far linguistics and SLA have come, and where exactly the bare areas are that need filling in. This is a very fulfilling feeling.

    The second reason I chose this book was because of my personal journey. A fresh graduate with my psych degree I returned to Barcelona, where I had made many friends on Junior year abroad. I was there from Franco to Felipe, during the development of democracy. I studied at the International House for a certificate of teaching and began my career at the IEN (North American Institute) with 70 other faculty and 3,000 students. I think a left just about when Scott Thornbury got there.

    I got a scholarship from IEN in Barcelona for a TESOL Summer Institute at Northwestern. I picked a lawyer turned linguist because he was said to be the toughest. Michael Long had us reading hundreds of pages of research every day, pounding it in every morning. He needed a tennis partner, so I got to be humiliated every afternoon for two weeks. It changed my life. He was getting ready to move to Hawaii and worried about it.

    Living in Tokyo has its advantages, but when I landed here in 1984 I never realized it was also so central to SLA and linx. My boss, Kaneko-sensei, and my colleague, Robson sensei were in the first TESOL cohort at Temple Japan. Rod Ellis was a key faculty member. Kaneko-sensei got him to fly in from New Zealand twice a year for intensive courses at our university graduate school, so he was often available for questions. I like questions.

    Peter Robinson is (was?) at Aoyama, I’ve lost track. But I will always remember the night we missed the last train and had to drink Hobgoblin until the first train. He went over the research implications of moving to the University of Maryland versus some other university in the UK. Our talk never really touched on his research, but I did get to see a very sharp mind, even after quite a few brews.

    Living in Tokyo meant that I got to regularly see the leaders in area like vocabulary acquisition, statistics, testing, and too many others to mention. I’d have to say that the common denominator among those is a great and bustling energy. I wish I could hold a candle to them, but have contented myself to a measured slog with a long horizon to prepare things like this class.

    Tomorrow, Reading 1 (of 3), the second step in the process.

    Today Reading (0:27 Ch. 9) and Blogging (0:39)

    Previously: Announcement. Book.