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Even though I haven't gone through all my handouts and typed all my notes
like I promised I would, I thoroughly enjoyed the State, Regional, and
National/International Conferences.
Even though the conference was highlighted in our last newsletter, I just
want to say that the whole event was a very positive experience for me.
First of all, I worked with the best group of people imaginable. I also
loved being involved in the planning process; this was a first for me, and
it was such a great learning experience. And believe it or not-the Board is
already making plans for the State Conference in the year 2001! We're
putting together a notebook documenting every aspect of the past state
conference. So we'll be ready in a few short years to put on an even bigger
and better conference. Any suggestions and comments you have will be
welcome.
What a treat! For those of us who attended, we were all jazzed and
motivated by what Cinthia Salinas had to say-or rather-what we all had to
say since Cinthia got us all immediately involved. Cinthia set up the
discussion by having us brainstorm in small groups about the multiple
hats-all large and distinctive-that we wear as ESL educators. We have
accepted a huge responsibility to serve our varied student populations, a
responsibility that goes well beyond teaching them grammar and communicative
skills. Parents expect us to not only teach their children but often to
provide them with life-saving information about drugs, AIDS, and personal
safety issues. Starting in the fall of '98, the administration will require
that all teachers, including ESL instructors, to implement TEKS (Texas
Essential Knowledge and Skills) standards. I think what really hit home was
when Cinthia informed us that past and current legislature did not and does
not involve input from teachers, despite the fact that we're the real
experts in the field. The main focus of her presentation was to create an
awareness that we, as educators, need to take a more active role in shaping
political decisions that will affect us all.
After the workshop ended, we all enjoyed a nice luncheon "spread" while
we visited and picked up lesson plans and activities from the Shop & Shop
table. Several lucky raffle winners left with either a $50 gift certificate
to buy educational supplies and a voucher to be used at the upcoming TESOL
Academy to be held in San Antonio in July.
I thought I'd died and gone to heaven. The conference was as exciting and
diverse as I had expected. I congratulated myself on getting up early enough
to attend a couple of 7:30 AM sessions, only to discover that the rooms were
packed. Even though there was often standing-and-squatting-room-only, people
seemed to enjoy the workshops, presentations, and panel discussions.
Whenever I had reached my learning-capacity limit, I enjoyed strong Seattle
coffee to help my mind re-group. And since fish is supposed to be brain
food, I forced myself to eat salmon every evening-all in the name of
learning. Not a bad way to spend Spring Break...
Susan Murphy
TexTESOL III President
March/April 1998 Table of Contents
In August 1998 the Texas Essential Knowledge and Skills (TEKS) will go
into effect in Texas public schools. For information about the reading and
language arts TEKS and tips on how to implement them in your classroom,
contact:
Your Regional Service Center
Texas Center for Reading and Language Arts
SZB 406 UT-Austin
Austin, TX 78712
(512) 232-2320
Curriculum and Professional Development
Texas Education Agency
1701 N. Congress Avenue
Austin, TX 78701-1494
(512) 463-9581
The following websites:
http://www.tenet.edu/teks
http://www.tea.state.tex.us/teks
March/April 1998 Table of Contents
by John R. Schmidt, Texas Intensive English Program, Austin, Texas
TESOL 1998 Convention earlybirds had an opportunity to start their days
in Seattle at Breakfast Seminars, which combined a continental breakfast
with an informative session on a topic relevant to TESOLers. Dr. Adelaide
Parsons of Southwest Missouri State University very capably orquestrated the
23 early-morning seminars conducted over four days of the TESOL Convention.
I had the opportunity to coordinate and chair a lively breakfast seminar
featuring Drs. Janet and Milton Bennett from the Intercultural Communication
Institute, entitled, "Developing Intercultural Competency".
Following conferees' trips to the breakfast buffet and informal
discussions among the TESOL early risers, the Bennetts provided considerable
food for thought in their discussion of Milton's developmental model of
intercultural sensitivity, ranging from the ethnocentric to ethnorelative
poles of the model's spectrum, covering the following six stages: denial,
defense, minimization, acceptance, adaptation, and integration.
The same afternoon the Bennetts presented at TESOL a complementary paper,
"Teaching Intercultural Competence," in which they presented a rationale for
incorporating culture-general competencies into the language curriculum to
prepare language learners to communicate across cultures. An audio recording
of this presentation and over 140 other ones conducted at the 1998 TESOL
Convention are available from
Audio Transcripts, Ltd. at 3660-B Wheeler Avenue; Alexandria, VA 22304
(tel. 703-370-8273; fax 703-370-5162; e-mail
atltapes@aol.com )
.
For an intensive and invigorating training course in intercultural
communication, I heartily and enthusiastically recommend the Summer
Institute for Intercultural Communication (SIIC), co-directed by Janet and
Milton Bennett. Conducted during the second half of July in the Portland,
Oregon area, the institute offers 41 different workshops, each ranging from
three to five days in duration. A first-timer at SIIC in 1997, I enrolled in
the survey course, Foundations of Intercultural Communication. For more
information on SIIC, which is extremely relevant to one of TESOL's newest
interest sections, Intercultural Communication, call 503-297-4622, fax
503-297-4695, e-mail ici@intercultural.org
or write:
SIIC at 8835 SW Canyon Lane, Suite 238; Portland, OR 97225.
Textesolers are very fortunate that Milton Bennett will be the keynote
speaker at the 1998 TEXTESOL State Convention in Arlington this November.
****
In the exhibit area of the 1998 TESOL Convention in Seattle, the TESOL
Central Office featured an advocacy booth, which had information on current
issues related to TESOL, as well as information on other advocacy and
sociopolitical activities of TESOL. The main feature of the booth was the
letter-writing campaign to the U.S. Congress. To prepare for the campaign,
TESOL learned which issues are most timely from its legislative consultant
who drafted a sample letter, along with a brief description of the issue at
hand. At the booth John Segota, Project Coordinator from the TESOL Central
Office, provided forms for TESOLers to complete with their names, members of
Congress, and comments on the issue. John Segota expediently incorporated
the personal comments into a computerized boilerplate of the letter, while
the letterwriters addressed the envelopes provided by TESOL. In minutes he
printed out letters to both of the letterwriters' U.S. senators and their
U.S. representative and offered to stamp and post the letters.
This year one of TESOL's letters urged members of Congress to support the
President's proposed budget, which generously funded bilingual teacher
training, adult ESL education, and the Hispanic Agenda. The second letter
was for members of the House, urging them to defeat the proposed amendment
of Rep. Frank Riggs (CA) to the Higher Education Act which would prohibit
schools that use affirmative action guidelines in their admissions processes
from using federal financial aid.
Having participated in this valuable civic letterwriting campaign at the
TESOL Convention, I was pleased to receive a written reply within a few
weeks from U.S. Senator Lloyd Doggett, in which he confirmed his agreement
with my position on these issues. He added, "My wife Libby worked for
several years as a bilingual educator in Austin. Based on both her
experiences as a teacher and my own experiences growing up and living in
Texas all my life, I am convinced that preserving native languages and
learning English, through education and other means, are powerful tools in
building and strengthening community...I will seek opportunities to address
your concerns as the appropriations debate continues." (To date I have not
received a reply from either Texas senator.)
Others from the TEXTESOL III Board are familiar with the impressive and
significant Congressional letter-writing campaign that John Segota ably
facilitated on site at the TESOL Convention. At our most recent affiliate
board meeting, it was agreed upon that TEXTESOL III would strongly encourage
TEXTESOL V, the host affiliate of the 1998 TEXTESOL State Convention, that
Mr. Segota be invited to the November convention to provide a similar
service for TEXTESOLers from around the state to voice their opinions in
mass to the U.S. Congress regarding current issues that are critical to both
our profession and to the populations that we serve.
For further information and input regarding TESOL's legislative
initiatives, contact
John Segota, Program Coordinator, TESOL Central Office, 1600 Cameron St.,
Suite 300 Alexandria, VA 22314-2751; Tel. 703-518-2513; Fax 703-836-6447;
e-mail john@tesol.edu or on the web at
http://www.tesol.edu
March/April 1998 Table of Contents
Teacher: Give me a sentence with the word I in it.
Student: I is . . .
Teacher: No, no, no! You must say 'I am'.
Student: Okay. I am the ninth letter of the alphabet.
March/April 1998 Table of Contents
SEEKING: Heinle & Heinle Publishers seeks an established
independent commissioned sales representative to carry selected ESL product
to the Adult Education market, for programs funded through local Boards of
Education. Please contact John McHugh at 800-237-0053 ext. 8165 for details.
POSITIONS: Austin Community College has the following ESL paid
opportunites: ESL Teachers at $15.00-18.00/hr.; Teaching Assistants at
$8.69/ hr. Volunteer and internship positions also available. All positions
are part-time. For more information please contact:
Marianne Dryden, Interim Refugee ESL Coordinator, Austin Community
College, 5930 Middle Fiskville Road, Austin, TX 78752
or call 517-6770.
Please send resumes for paid positions.
NEEDED: Substitute teachers for subjects and part-time Spanish
teachers needed by MSD. Contact Michael Hydak at 414-4212 for more
information.
March/April 1998 Table of Contents
Educational Testing Service has announced the annual TOEFL Doctoral
Dissertation Research Award of $1,500 for doctoral dissertation research
that makes a significant and original contribution to knowledge about and/or
the use and development of second/foreign languages tests and testing.
Deadline for the fellowship is May 15, 1998.
The research must have been completed as part of the requirements for a
doctoral degree, or its equivalent, at a university within or outside the
United States. Although the dissertation submitted for award consideration
must be in English, the research may be related to the second/foreign
language testing of any language. For more information visit the TOEFL
website at: http://www.toefl.org/raward.html
March/April 1998 Table of Contents
by Joann Rishel Kozyrev (University of California, Santa Barbara)
Published by Houghton Mifflin Company
Reviewed by Harriet Hoffman
Instructor, Texas Intensive English Program Austin, Texas
Talk It Up and Talk It Over is a two-part series aimed at intermediate
and advanced ESL learners. Each book includes listening, speaking, and
pronunciation activities. The books' stated goal is to allow students to
work on both accuracy and fluency.
In both books, each chapter is organized around a topic. The Introduction
to each chapter focuses on speaking fluency, allowing students to talk
personally about each topic and make predictions about what they will listen
to. Each chapter then has two or three listening activities related to the
chapter topic, and one pronunciation section with several different
activities. Interspersed throughout the chapter are various other speaking
activites.
Talk It Up is the first book of the series. It begins with an
Introduction to the Students explaining some of the basics of pronunciation
and includes consonant and vowel charts. Next is a Fluency and Pronunciation
Pre-Test that students can take to evaluate themselves and chose problem
areas to focus on. In these tests, students look at a picture, record a one
minute description, then listen and score themselves for fluency. Students
then record themselves reading a passage that has been provided. Each
student listens with the teacher and chooses one or two pronunciation
problems to focus on. At the end of every two chapters, students test
themselves again. A chart provided at the front of the book enables students
to record how they did on each test, and to note both progress and problem
areas.
The unit topics in this book are: Friends, Feeling at Home, Making
Connections, The World of Work, School Choices/Life Opportunities, Money
Matters, Help, and Consumer Decisions. Each chapter has three listening
passages related to the topic with exercises to practice both listening for
main ideas and for details. Speaking activities include group discussions,
interviewing classmates, role plays, and interviewing a guest speaker. The
pronuncation sections begin with some introductory material such as
strategies for improving pronunciation, symbols for sounds, syllables, and
unstressed syllables. Most of the pronunciation activities focus on specific
vowel and consonant sounds. The sounds are presented first in a list of
words, then a list of sentences. Then students practice in pairs, saying and
recognizing the sound in sentences.
Talk It Over is the second book in the series. It continues the practice
of student self-evaluation, but in a different form. AT the end of each
chapter, students fill out a chart about notetaking, speaking, and
pronunciation. The students writes comments about himself, and the teacher
adds comments.
In general, the listening passages in this book are more appropriate for
the stated target audience than the first book. The two passages on the demo
tape were longerand presented more complex ideas. The speakers spoke rapidly
and naturally, but quite clearly.
The Unit topics are, as in the first book, topics of general interest:
Living in Two Cultures, Entertainment, Environmental Activism, The Sounds of
Language, Biotechnology, Making it Work, Alternative Medicine, and
Television. However, the activities to go along with them are of a somewhat
more academic nature. For The Introduction there are such activities as:
reading a chart, reading a passage related to the topic, or learning a
necessary list of idioms or vocabulary. Each chapter includes two listening
passages and a different method of notetaking. Speaking activities include
group discussions based on a reading, interviewing classmates, strategies
for answering and asking questions, role plays, small group presentations,
persuasive speaking, and formal presentations with fact and opinion.
The pronunciation sections of this book are also quite different from the
first book. Some of the topics covered are intonation, syllable stress,
rhythm and sentence stress, and thought groups.
In general, the books do a good job of integrating listening, speaking,
and pronunciation practice. However, they do not seem to be aimed at the
same audience. Talk It Up, the first book, presents listening passages that
are too easy for the targeted group of intermediate to advanced learners.
The passages are very short, with simple language about daily topics such as
a friend who is late for an appointment, or calling the fire department. The
activities are communicative and do not have an academic emphasis. As
already stated, Talk It Over seems more appropriate for the targeted level
and is somewhat academic in its approach, although there is also plenty of
communicative practice. Perhaps these two books should not be marketed as a
series, but as separate books with different audiences.
March/April 1998 Table of Contents
On Tuesday, March 30, the House of Representatives passed the 1998
Emergency Supplemental Appropriations Bill (H.R. 3579) by a margin of 212 to
208. The primary purpose of the bill is to provide funding for emergency
expenses resulting from recent floods and other natural disasters. To pay
for the emergency appropriations, the House version of the bill proposes to
rescind funds from various other federal programs, including a $75 million
rescission from Bilingual Education. The Senate version of the the bill,
which passed on March 31, does not propose any rescissions for education
programs. A conference will be scheduled to reconcile the differences in the
House and Senate versions of the bill after Congress reconvenes from recess
on April 21, 1998. You can access the full text of this bill or track its
status through the Library of Congress Legislative Information site at:
http://thomas.loc.gov/ H.R. 3579's
website can be found at:
http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/bdquery/z?d105:h.r.03579 For more
information regarding issues pertaining to bilingual education, visit the
National Clearinghouse of Bilingual Education's webpage at:
http://www.ncbe.gwu.edu For the
information on the rescession of Title VII visit their webpage at:
http://www.ncbe.gwu.edu/majordomo/newsline/1998/march/news0330.html
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