Day 6

TPR
My students seem to be enjoying the hands on learning associated with TPR.  One issue I have noticed is that I like to review sometimes so much that by the time I get to the new words, I have a hard time coming up with chain commands with the new things.  Maybe it's not necessary to do so many chain commands every day because the novel commands can become more fun and those can help the students to bind the information.

I would like to practice some more chain commands with my students though for the days to come.

What I like about TPR and TPRS so far is the minimal planning involved.  However, the more that you get into the commands, it might help to plan out a few possible situations (with novel commands).  Today, on the fly I was able to create little narrations about a book dancing with a paper. The book kissed the paper.  The book kissed the paper with tongue.  The paper hit the book.  The paper cried.  The paper ran away.

Although some students were confused about paper crying, this just sets the students up for the rest of the year with TPRS.  The goofier the novel commands are, the better off we will be for tapping into their creativity later.  I want to prep their minds and start them off before we tell stories in such a way that they are prepared for goofiness and they can get further out of their shells.

Some of them do not do all the commands.  I do try to coax them into doing them.  But I feel more confident about TPR each day that we do it because I can see how what we are doing can be built on later.

I am not sure about the book I chose though (TPR stories for Paso a Paso by Karen Rowan).  Rowan did an excellent job of coming up with stories and mini-situations throughout the book that capture the vocabulary from the book.  Nevertheless, a lot of it is forced because she is trying to use a textbook.  I would like to try this book the rest of the year.  But some of her stories try to force too many things artificially instead of naturally.  I could be wrong though.

I admit that this is my first year trying these strategies so I am hardly the expert.