[ola] Follow up Comment

From: Arnold Bleicher <arnoldb@xxxxxxxx>
To: OLA Listserve <ola@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Date: Tue, 03 Dec 2013 10:10:49 -0800
Good day - 

Sorry for the extreme lag in responding to this but travel and holidays keep
me hopping. In addition, I needed to somewhat clarify my role here.

A while back there was a thread about performance at the Novice and
Intermediate levels. With regard to the following, if I may be so bold, I
would like to elaborate on a few recent comments.

POSTED: "When I think about the novice level, I associate it with ³me, me,
me². As the students move into the intermediate, it¹s my understanding that
they begin to talk more outside of themselves and the immediate ³here and
now².

I might point to the ACTFL proficiency guidelines here. Indeed, the Novice
is all about the self. As s/he merges into Intermediate, s/he begins to
expand the content to her/his life: my day, my family, my school, my
friends, my likes, etc. As the Intermediate begins to emerge into the
Advanced, s/he will then expand into topics outside of self. The Advanced
level includes topics about their community and what is happening in it. The
realm of the world and abstract thought/opinion is that of the Superior
level. 

This is not to say that an Intermediate can¹t have an opinion of a world
issue. It is that they will address it in language that is at the
Intermediate level, with perhaps even a marker or two at the Advanced level.
It is one thing to string together a few sentences saying that you don¹t
like a point of view and something altogether different than that of
defending an opinion in the abstract, in extended discourse (multiple,
cohesive paragraphs). One area of confusion I often encounter is the
perception that the imperfect subjunctive plus the conditional make a
superior level speaker. ³If I had a million dollars I would buy a house² is
nothing more than an Intermediate-level response. It is a sentence.

I agree that Novices should be pushed to the Intermediate. We should expect
them to struggle, and accept it for what it is: progress. If you teach for
Novice, you will end up with Novice. If you teach for the next higher level
without penalizing learners for being in partial control of the next higher
level, then you will help students grow their performances. The big hangup
is one imposed upon you by those who need help in understanding that giving
grades every quarter, and even worse every few weeks, is completely,
utterly, and futilely counterproductive to your teaching and student¹s
learning of languages.

Keep up the great work.

All my best wishes.

Arnold
[ola] Follow up Comment

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