Breaktime!

Lorikeet · Post by **Lorikeet** » Wed Sep 01, 2010 4:59 pm

Rp wrote:I'm sure what you say is true. For my part I have found texts for ESL to be quite poor and certainly not student centred. Not matter what method they think they employ it still comes across as GTM to me. That is why I'm doing my Masters on a Freirean approach to ESL.

Hmm you might want to start a thread on this instead of having it buried here. As one who retired without using a book for the last twenty years, I can certainly agree on your comment about texts. Also, I had to look up GTM and the closest I could find was "General Text Matcher". Is that what you meant?

fluffyhamster · Post by **fluffyhamster** » Wed Sep 01, 2010 5:25 pm

I'm guessing GTM = Grammar-Translation method.

Sally Olsen · Post by **Sally Olsen** » Wed Sep 01, 2010 5:50 pm

Friere's approach worked really well for Spanish or Portuguese or any language where there are 25 or so politically charged words you could use to learn to read all other words but it is harder in English because our phonetic system is so bizarre. Not that the learning of meaningful words won't work eventually but one professor said that it was learning stories in English that was more effective in the long run. There are all those strange sight words to conquer. It never hurts to have relevant material though but not everyone is willing to be so political in their approach and in some places it is pretty hard to do and remain in your position or in the country or even free.

Rp · Post by Rp » Wed Sep 01, 2010 6:01 pm

Sally you are right there. However I teach in Canada so the political issue is not as potentially lethal here as other places.

My study is not entirely based on the Freirean literacy method. But I do intend to use much of his delivery approach, coupled with Wenger's Communities of Practice. That said, I do intend to develop the modules to recognise social issues. I think Freire is much misunderstood, especially here in North America. To many, he is a one trick pony and the transference of his "method" here is gapped both politically and linguistically. Freire never intended to develop a universal method that could be replicated by jurisdiction to jurisdiction ..... In North America we seem to be method driven, and unless you can easily copy it, it is marginalised.

As for GTM, Fluffy you are correct it is the Grammar Translation Method.

Sally Olsen · Post by **Sally Olsen** » Sun Sep 05, 2010 11:34 am

I don't know where you are in Canada Rp but at the University of British Columbia they have been inspired by Friere and recommend his approach. He visited there many times and inspired the older professors at least. They have many students from Spanish speaking countries who were taught by people who read his books.

But at the same time, Carleton University in Ottawa doesn't follow a "method" either so I don't know where you are doing your Masters.

I always found that teachers did what they were taught when the doors were closed and included some of what the more vocal students were demanding.

fluffyhamster · Post by **fluffyhamster** » Sat Nov 20, 2010 7:49 pm

The following Language Log thread (in which Geoffrey Pullum uses a point raised by a Guardian reviewer to rip even further into Simon Heffer's Strictly English: The Correct Way to Write...and Why It Matters ; Pullum's previous dissing of Heffer's "work" can be found here > http://forums.eslcafe.com/teacher/viewt ... 3145#43145 ) would seem relevant to the Q2 I posed back at the start of the first page ('Is this a dangling participle? Having said that, here's another problem!'):
http://languagelog.ldc.upenn.edu/nll/?p=2790