Sat, 07 Nov 2009: Tough love is good for children
“Confident, skilful parents adopting a ‘tough love’ approach to parenting, balancing warmth with discipline, seem to be most effective” in terms of generating “qualities such as application, self-regulation and empathy.” This from a U.K. study, which also found that these qualities made "a vital contribution to life chances, mobility and opportunity".
How should we respond to this?
Sat, 26 Sep 2009: Sounding Right
Why did Earl Stevick recommend that a beginning language teacher read The Inner Game of Tennis, by Timothy Gallwey?
Sun, 30 Nov 2008: Methods meddling by amateurs
Don’t you wish politicians and preachers (and amateurs like Wes Groleau) would mind their own business and leave pedagogical theorizing to the experts?
I find that both Churchill and St. Augustine have tried to stick their noses in the teacher’s business …
Sun, 19 Oct 2008: The Miracle Worker?
The movie Stand and Deliver shows how one skilled and motivated teacher can work a miracle in just one year. “Based on a true story??I guess that means it’s not really true? ?
Fri, 27 Jul 2007: Standards?a parable
In second grade (1961), I put “Wes? on paper in cursive and was reprimanded:
?We learn cursive in THIRD grade.?
Mon, 18 Jun 2007: Krashen vs. grammar?
Is Stephen Krashen a grammar-hating extremist? Dozens of web pages by both supporters and opponents seem to say so?
Mon, 28 May 2007: The lesson
How does Homer Smith give an ESL lesson?
Thu, 01 Mar 2007: Fuggedaboudit !
A while back, Pat posted something about an in-service where there was some good advice. I recommend the article, but the presenter said that we should forget about some things. Easier said than done, ......
Mon, 08 Jan 2007: HOW to teach grammar ?
In Jan 2007, "Miss Profe" wrote (on FLTEACH):
So, Pat? Wes? Would either/both of you give us some insight with
respect to how to teach grammar?
Pat’s answer is probably better, but .....
Mon, 08 Jan 2007: A provocative quote
There’s really no way to speed up (to any significant degree) mastery of a foreign language, right? Certainly the arguments I’ve read recently are persuasive. But a tantalizing comment from 1990 tempts some investigation.