Making EFL Matter Pt. 5: Prolepsis, Debate, and Benny Lewis

image of man reading a book As a young man, I was part of a legion of English teachers working in Japan. A large number of us “teachers” working day in and day out at language schools and colleges were actually travelers trying to save money for their next trek through Nepal or to live on a beach on Boracay or Koh Samui  (very different in 1986) for as many months as possible before they had to work again. At least some of these people, in order to be able to stay in Japan and teach/work, pretended to be in the country for the purpose of studying something–flower arrangement, karate, or Japanese language, for example. One guy, ostensibly studying Japanese, dutifully went to the immigration office each year to renew his visa. And each time, he struggled greatly with the rudimentary questions the officer asked him in Japanese. At the end of the conversation, the immigration officer would kindly offer him encouragement because “Japanese was a hard language” to learn.

That same sentiment–that you are just studying the language and can’t really use it yet–is still surprisingly common in many institutional programs for learners of many languages. I have often heard college students say that they want to go to the US “after my English is good enough.” The opposite of this “not yet” concept is  prolepsis, “the representation or assumption of a future act as if presently existing or accomplished” (from Merriam-Webster). It is a lovely little term I came across in Walqui and van Lier (2010). They recommend  treating students proleptically, “as if they already possess the abilities you are seeking to develop” (pg 84). In other words, throw them in at the deep end, and both support and expect their success. High school and college in Japan are perfect places for putting this approach into practice. Why? Because learners have already had somewhere between 4 and 10 previous years of of English exposure and learning. It’s time to stop pretending that they can’t use it. Right Benny?

People like Benny Lewis are not usually taken seriously in the TESOL world, but they should be. Watch the video and see how many things he gets right. Polyglots learn languages successfully, he says at one point, because they are motivated to “use it with people” and they go about doing so. That is some good sociocultural theory there. He also dismisses five of the barriers that people so often accept to explain their own lack of success with language learning, and addresses the growth mindset and time and resource management that he and his friends have found a way to make work for themselves. But what I find most amazing about Mr Lewis and others like him is that they are living examples of acting proleptically with language learning. They learn it, use it, love it, and  repeat. They don’t stop to worry about whether they are “ready.” They don’t let things like having few resources around, or no interlocutors nearby, to interfere. They challenge themselves to learn what they can and then actively seek out opportunities to use that, monitoring their progress by continually testing it out. I admire their passion. I  borrow strategies and techniques from them to pass on to my students. If we are not helping our students make use of Skype or Memrise or Quizlet or any of the many other tools available, we are doing a great disservice to our young charges.

But not only should we be introducing websites, we should be expecting our learners to use them and to push their learning. You can do it. No excuses. Of course you can handle basic conversations in the language. I expect nothing less than that. And let’s see what you can really do when you push yourself. I expect success. I assume it and design my activities around it. Prolepsis. We sometimes hear the word rigor used to describe education. We can also talk about holding higher expectations for our learners. Without a curriculum designed with the idea of prolepsis, however, it is likely empty talk. It sounds good, but is not actionable. Van Lier and Walqui list these three directives if we are serious about really making our curriculum, well, serious:

  • Engage learners in tasks that provide high challenge and high support;
  • engage students (and teacher) in the development of their own expertise;
  • make criteria for quality work clear for all

We can see immediately that some of the things Mr. Lewis is suggesting get learners to do these things. I’ve talked before about rubrics and portfolios and making the criteria for success clear in other blog posts, but today I’d like to finish up this post by talking about an activity that does all these things, and it gets students to perform proleptically: debate. Now debate has a bad reputation in Japan. Many teachers think it is too difficult for students. Some teachers think it focuses too much on competition. These points may have some validity, but they should not prevent you from doing debate. We do debate, like JFK said we should go to the moon, because it is difficult. And if we have students debate both sides of issues, what begins to emerge is a keen sense of examining any issue–for looking at what is important and how important, and questioning and explaining that. Debaters behave proleptically, because they have to. Debating adds critical thinking structure to discussions about plans. Debaters learn to consider the status quo. They learn to evaluate plans in terms of their effect and importance. They learn to write speeches describing these things, and they learn to listen for them and consider them critically. Because there is a set structure, we can support and scaffold our learners. But we cannot hold their hands all the way. Debate forces them to go off scripts at times, while never going off topic. There is also time pressure, and the debate takes place with other  people, an on-stage performance that is intimidating for everyone, and thus spurs learners to try harder. Yet, like scrimmaging with feedback, there are multiple opportunities to fine tune performance (and get repeated input). Every time I read about techniques to promote high standards, rigor, etc. , I always think to myself: That sounds an awful lot like debate, or Yup, debate can do that.  To me, it seems that debate is one technique that should not be left out, especially policy debate where learners research topics to come up with arguments for both sides in advance. Not only do we get four-skills language development, but we also get research skills, organization skills, and critical thinking skills development.

Show me another activity that does that.

This post is part of a series considering ways to add more focus and learning to EFL classrooms by drawing on ideas and best practices from L1 classrooms.

Part 1 looked at the importance of goals. Part 2 looked at using data and feedback. Part 3 looked at the challenges and benefits of academic discussions Part 4 looked at portfolios and assessment

Making EFL Matter Pt. 4: Portfolios and Assessment

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In principle, a portfolio is an easy to understand and intuitively attractive concept: students keep the work they produce. The real challenge of a portfolio is what you do with it. Without a clear vision of how the tool will be used, it can easily end up being a little like a child’s art box of works produced in art class in school over the years—just a repository of things we hold on to for no specific reason other than sentimental attachment. We might pull these works out to look at them from time to time, but they are not a clear record of achievement, nor can they help inform future learning decisions. The central function of a quality portfolio is to clearly provide evidence of growth and to “…engage students in assessing their growth and learning” (Berger, Rugen & Woodfin, 2014, pg. 261). Specifically what growth depends on the goals of the course or program. When a course or program has clear goals, a portfolio can have a formative or summative role in demonstrating a learner’s achievement or progress toward achieving those goals. There are also practical/logistical constraints on portfolio deployment. What artifacts should be included, how many should be included, where should the artifacts be stored, and how will the portfolio be assessed and by whom, are all important decisions. The results of these decisions can greatly impact the success of a portfolio as a learning tool.

 

Conceptualizing a portfolio

A portfolio is not simply a repository file. It must serve as a record of progress that is used to assess learning by the learner him/herself or by others. All decisions on its structure and deployment must start with this basic understanding. The design of the portfolio itself, and its integration into the syllabus (i.e., how it will be used on a regular basis) must aim to make it as easy as possible to record progress/achievement, to make visible evidence or patterns progress/achievement in the collected data. For this reason, not only student-produced academic work (essays, presentations, tests), but also documents that make progress and achievement salient should be kept in a portfolio. Such documents may include introductory statements, target-setting plans, records of times on tasks, assignment rubrics, progress charts, and reflection reports.

 

The importance of goals

In order to be effective, the portfolio must be closely aligned to the goals of the course or program and be able to show progress toward or achievement of those goals. In other words, it must be able to provide specific evidence of progress in achieving the target competencies in a way that is clear and actionable. It must also do so in a way that makes the most effective or efficient use of time. These goals can include knowledge goals, skill goals, or learning goals for constructs such as responsibility, autonomy, revision, collaboration, service and stewardship (to name a few). Without clear goals (usually arranged in a clear sequence), effective use of a portfolio cannot be possible. Without clear goals, the formative and reflective functions of a portfolio cannot be leveraged in a clear and actionable way. However, if students know what they are aiming for and can compare their work in how it meets the target competencies (using the descriptions and rubrics that define the goals/competencies), portfolios can be a powerful tool for reflection and formative feedback.

 

The importance of regular portfolio conversations

“In order for portfolios to be a tool for student-engaged assessment, including formative and summative assessments, they must be a regular part of the classroom conversation, not a static collection of student work” (Berger, Rugen & Woodfin, 2014, pg. 268). The portfolio must be a tool of measurement, like a bathroom scale, and can only be effective if it is used regularly. Students must regularly enter data into it (more on what kinds of data in the next section), and they must use it to look for patterns of success and gaps in learning/performance and strategy use. For this reason, providing clear guidelines and time to enter data into portfolios, facilitating the noticing of patterns and gaps, and giving opportunities for students to discuss their progress in groups, are all necessary. This will require classroom time, but also some scaffolding so students can understand how to work with data. Student-led conferences (mini presentations on progress done in groups in class) can be a useful tool. In groups, students can practice talking about learning, but also compare their progress and efforts with those of their classmates. Counselor conferences can also make use of portfolios, and if students have practiced beforehand in groups, time with counselors can be economized. Finally, to truly leverage the power of portfolios, passage presentations (public presentations where students explain and defend their learning accomplishments to groups of teachers, parents, or other concerned parties) can be particularly powerful since they are public and official. If a passage presentation system is in place, it will serve to make the portfolios more meaningful, greatly enhancing the effort students will put into entering and analyzing data and the amount of time they spend analyzing and practicing explaining their learning. Passage presentations and counselor conferences can transform student-led conferences into the role of practice for “the big games.”

 

Portfolio contents Pt. 1: What are we trying to develop?

Let us review our key points so far. It must be easy to enter meaningful data into the portfolio and notice trends or gaps. Noticing the trends and gaps in performance requires an understanding of the goals of the course/program, so they must be clear. The portfolio should be used regularly: students should use it to monitor their learning; and students should be able to refer to it when explaining their learning to others (groups, counselors, or others). These points are all concerned with usability, making the experience of using a portfolio as simple and smooth and effective as possible. What we actually put into the portfolio must be concerned with our learning targets. As mentioned earlier, any program or course will have multiple targets for knowledge and skill acquisition, but also for constructs such as digital literacy, critical thinking, problem solving, responsibility, autonomy, revision, collaboration, service and stewardship, and possibly others. Therefore, it is important for portfolios to contain finished work and evidence of the process of improving work through working with others, checking and revising work responsibly, and helping others to do so, too. Portfolios should also contain records of learning activities and times on tasks as evidence of autonomy and tenacity.

 

Portfolio contents Pt. 2: Portfolios for language learners

As part of English language courses, there are usually weekly classroom assignments for writing and presentation. There may also be other writing assignments, or other speaking assignments. As for other constructs, the following have been shown to be important for successful language learning and therefore should be part of the curriculum:

  • Time on task
  • Time management (efficient use of time)
  • Commitment to improvement/quality (accountable for learning)
  • Critical evaluation of learning strategies
  • Collaboration (accountable to others)
  • Seeking feedback and incorporating feedback (revision)

 

If we try to build these into our portfolio system along with our language and culture target competencies while still managing the volume of the content, I believe that we must include the following elements, in addition to a general goal statement:

  1. Drafts and final products for a limited number of assignments, including a reflection sheet with information about the goals of the assignment (and a copy of the rubric for the assignment), time spent on the assignment, attempts at getting feedback and comments on how that feedback was included;
  2. Weekly reflection sheets (including a schedule planner) in which students can plan out the study plan for their week before it happens, and then reflect upon the results afterward. There could also be sections where students can reflect upon strategy use and explain their attempts to reach certain goals;
  3. Self-access tracking charts in which students list up the reading, listening, or other self-access activities students engage in. Several of these charts can be made available to students (extensive reading charts, extensive listening charts, TOEFl/TOEIC test training, online conversation time, etc.) and students can include the charts relevant to their personal goals (though extensive reading will be required for all students).

Finally

As you can see, there is much to be decided: specifically which assignments and how many will be included; also the various forms need to be designed and created; and, for the English classes, whether completing the portfolio and discussing learning is something that we want to scaffold learners to be able to do (something that I personally think is very important).

 

This post is part of a series considering ways to add more focus and learning to EFL classrooms by drawing on ideas and best practices from L1 classrooms.

Part 1 looked at the importance of goals.

Part 2 looked at using data and feedback.

Part 3 looked at the challenges and benefits of academic discussions

 

References

Berger, R. Rugen, L., and Woodfin, L. (2014). Leaders of their own learning: transforming schools through student-engaged assessment. San Fransisco: Jossey-Bass.

Greenstein, L. (2012). Assessing 21st century skills: a guide to evaluating mastery and authentic learning. Thousand Oaks, CA: Corwin.