On the way to #ACTFL25! Come see us on Friday at 4:30pm in room 213 for “Cutting It Out: Curating Diverse Classroom Libraries.”

On p 256 is a rubric to assess ourselves. One of my glowing points is "I can identify patterns of errors and patterns of strength in student work in order to provide growth-oriented written corrective feedback." In fact, I did that today as I graded letters students had written. #SLAyyy #LangChat

On page 226, the authors write "You may have also noticed that this feedback is in English." WHAT? After admonishing us to teach grammar in the target language, now we're giving feedback in English? I mean, yeah, that's how *I* do it with my novices in levels 1 and 2. #SLAyyy #LangChat

If you're heading to #ACTFL25, I hope to see you there! In the podcast, I give the wrong time for my ACTFL presentation. I'll be presenting with Esme Mora and Kristi Lentz of @languageboard.bsky.social on Friday at 4:30 in room 213. Our topic: Curating Diverse and Inclusive Classroom Libraries.

What an honor to be invited to the SLAyyy podcast with Ben and Bill. We had a lot to say about the book Teaching Grammar for Proficiency. It was fun hanging out and chatting with friends about something we are all passionate about -- becoming the best language teachers we can be.

i am familiar with the idea of a 'glow and grow' comment bank for use by teachers. I have even used one occasionally. What i haven't done is put this in the hands of students to use for peer feedback. I will use it this week as students finish their letters to their pen pals. #SLAyyy #LangChat

Ooh this is brilliant!

I’m a fan of Duolingo. I think it’s a good tool for language learners. I’ve spent 90% of my time on this app learning Korean, except for a few weeks spent learning Catalan and Hawaiian.

This episode inspired me to use more TL than usual with my students today. It was good for them. It was good for me. It was only partially effective. 😅 But I got better at it as the day went on. 3rd hour stared at me blankly, but I gave 4th hour better scaffolding and we managed to communicate. 🙌

My biggest TA is that I need to give students more structured opportunities to talk in Spanish. I HATED the information gap speaking activities that my textbook required, and they were one of the first things I dropped. But I hadn't found a way to replace them. Until now. #SLAyyy #LangChat

They say we shouldn't tell students our goal is to use certain grammar. I get that "Write a letter and ask 5Q in the preterite" is a bad task. But I think it's appropriate to say that one of our goals this unit is to be able to express things that happened in the past. Am I wrong? #SLAyyy #LangChat

I'm still struggling with the SCRAP and SPEAKING models of setting the stage for communication. "You are a student leader / traveler / camp counselor / etc." feel so FAKE to me. Didn't BVP talk about authentic contexts for communication? Do any of my mutuals remember? #LangChat #SLAyyy

Scaffolding: sentence starters, chat mats, and providing examples. I use these all regularly. I added a graphic organizer to my current unit on writing letters to pen pals. I started with it last Friday and will continue with it on Monday. It's working great! #LangChat #SLAyyy

On pages 210-211 the authors describe a Latin lesson that involves a storytelling game. My margin notes say "This is brilliant." I fully intend to use this game when I teach my storytelling unit to Spanish 2 in the third quarter of this year. #LangChat #SLAyyy

Ch. 6 describes a speaking task where students work in groups of 4 to talk, then the group chooses 1 student to share out to the whole class, and the whole class votes for the best 2 students. I could use this with Weekend Chat. Who had the most interesting/stressful/busy weekend? #SLAyyy #LangChat

I appreciated a deep dive into HOW, exactly, to format a lesson with a pre-task activity, a speaking task, and a post-task activity. I use chat mats regularly, but chapter 6 helped me see what to do before and after the turn-and-talk. #LangChat #SLAyyy

Strongly feel that adults learning a new language should be treated like babies doing the same thing. Look, I'm going through a developmental leap this week, so I'm just going to be more cranky, hungrier, cry a lot at night etc.

Will you be at ACTFL? I have so many freebies at booth 823!

i haven't listened to this episode yet, but I want to give a shoutout to @senorwooly.com because as I was reading Ch.5 of the Grammar book, I got to the Interpretive Comprehension Tasks on p.139 and my notes say "Very useful. Señor Wooly is good at this."

Very clear takeaways from this chapter. 1. Learners try to get meaning from content words (lexical items) before grammatical markers. 2. Learners pay more attention to what comes first in a sentence. Easy to use rules to make my input more valuable for students.

On p. 142 the authors give a sample unit. The proficiency target is Intermediate Low. But the grammar focus is present tense verbs, third person singular. I was surprised because I thought that would be an early acquired structure. Shows I'm still partially back in the old days of textbook grammar.

I do a good job of leading students from referential to affective questions (those are new terms to me, but the distinction is not). I.E., when I introduce a new form in Weekend Chat, I start with MY weekend, and my Qs let them show they understood. Later, I ask them to talk about THEIR weekends.

"Learners pay more attention to what comes first in a sentence." This is clear and easy to implement. I can use this.

I know I'm a week behind, but I've been sick. I had both a sinus infection and bronchitis. Dear teacher, please accept my homework late just this one time... 🙏 I really do enjoy reading this book, thinking about big ideas in teaching, and discussing them with you all.

Creativity. I used to end each novel with a project that allowed for creativity. Kids love it, but honestly it's hard to scaffold, hard to grade, hard to keep them from using Google Translate and AI, and not great as far as language acquisition vs. time invested. But, KIDS LOVE IT. Time to revisit.

Erica Peplinski-Burge has so much to share. I attended her session on Addressing Teacher Burnout at #MiWLA. We can’t fill up out students if we ourselves are running on empty. I ❤️ her resources to learn more about sleep, glucose, and the gut microbiome. I want to share this info with everyone I love

It’s always good to see @justinslocumbailey.bsky.social present. I’ve learned about Brain Breaks from him before, but I went back for more at #MiWLA25. Now added to my toolkit: 4 Quadrants with Pictures, Image Imitation. My students will love these. Danke, Justin.

Happy to see @mmegoodenough.bsky.social in real life at #MiWLA25. Her session on social media made me think about why I have professional and personal accounts for Twitter and Bluesky, but only 1 for Facebook. As I have left X and engage more with teachers on FB, maybe I need separate accounts?

I loved Erica Peplinski-Burge’s session on Top Tips for Talking With Students at #MiWLA25. I am feeling low energy today, and I appreciated that she offered a sitting option for the fun “obstacle course” brain break. I should give my students that option too.

Thrilled to see Meredith White @techmewithyou.bsky.social give the keynote address at #MiWLA25. As always, she gives a spoonful of sugar (her sense of humor) to make the medicine go down: teachers need to set boundaries to protect our time.

Tonight I’m working on my presentation for #MiWLA25 on the topic of teaching culture in the language classroom. This session is based on the work of Cécile Lainé. She quoted Cathline Tanis and I’m delighted to rediscover she’s here on 🦋 @tanisleads.bsky.social

Oh man, if I were still teaching French…

Update: currently working on SHORTENING the presentation I wrote yesterday for #MiWLa25. 😅 Luckily, my wife is an editor and I get in-home consultations. 🥰

Up early for a bike ride to the best bagel shop in metro Detroit. Now full of bagel and coffee, working on my slide deck for #MiWLA25. Today’s topic: Grading in the 21st Century Language Classroom. @miwla.bsky.social

Student: Miz Witkowski! Someone wrote in this book! Me: Yes, of course they did. 😮‍💨

Nation-wide Adderall shortage

Love seeing reviews from LLLAB, which is a reliable source on how different identities and issues are represented in language learner literature. Leveled readers convey more than just comprehensible input, and it’s important for us to know what messages we are sending our learners!

Ángel Ángel learns the surprising truth about his family and himself in this advanced fantasy novel. The text requires readers to unpack stereotypes and discuss themes of consent, Latinx identity, neurodivergence, and asexuality.

Brandon Brown versus Yucatán Brandon Brown versus Yucatán invites readers to explore cultural sites in Mexico along with Brandon. Teachers may wish to discuss Brandon’s prejudices and inappropriate tourist behaviors.

Das Haus Nummer 13 Das Haus Nummer 13 is a story of a teen girl living in a haunted house while grieving her father. The story explores processes of grief and access to mental health resources while opening up opportunities for intercultural discussions on these themes.

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The authors describe several models; I feel comfortable choosing the bits & pieces I like from each, without saying I follow a specific "model." Honestly, there's not much difference between them. I might do one on Monday and a different one on Thursday. The kids won't notice. #LangChat #SLAyyy

My biggest takeaway from reading this chapter: Before reading, I was intrigued and wanted to learn more about the PACE model. Now, I think I have learned enough and I am no longer interested. #LangChat #SLAyyy

On p. 96 the authors say, "after a thorough discussion with students, asking them to share and probing their thinking, the teacher shifts their role to summarize". My Q: "this doesn't get a different letter?" It seems different than the other part of the PACE phase. #LangChat #SLAyyy

I wrote another ? on page 95 when the authors describe the "Attention Phase" of the PACE model and then contrast it with the "Co-construction Phase." My comment: "wait, isn't this the same?" #SLAyyy #LangChat

Okay, no lie, I wrote a question mark in my book on page 91 when the authors describe an IPA in which they ask students to imagine "You want to comment on their post, but first, you..." 😆 lol. My question: Who pauses to gather information before commenting on a post? #LangChat #SLAyyy

Another reason I love teaching middle school kids: I only have one Ava in this class 🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣

Today when the students walked in the song on my playlist happened to be Ella Baila Sola. Next thing I knew a boy (a band kid) was swaying and shaking his shoulders. And then he and several boys were waltzing around the room together. Days like this I remember why I like teaching middle school. 😄

On p. 107 the authors write “We should no longer be focusing on learner’s ability to conjugate a list of verbs in the imperfect tense, but rather that they can communicate using those verbs in context.” Yep, that’s exactly what I do. 💅🏻 #LangChat. #SLAyyy