How To: Information Gap Activities

An information gap activity is any activity in which one or more participants have information that the other participants do not have and they must communicate that information to the others using only words.  This is helpful for language learning because it requires the participants to use language in order to negotiate for understanding.

Some ideas for information gap activities might be:

1. Picture Gap: One participant has a picture that he/she explains to the other participants who draw the picture according to the explanation.  At the end of the activity the pictures can be compared to see where mistakes in explanation or understanding were made.

2. Go Fish

Some Go-Fish cards.  There are two of each square, and many of the squares differ only by minute details, therefore, much explanation is necessary (as you will be able to tell from the video below).

The video below was taken during one of our language sessions in which we played a variation of "Go Fish" using the cards picture above.  My husband is on the left, and a language helper is on the right (I am taking the video :).

3. Guess Who

4. I Spy - can be played with busy books (where's waldo, or I Spy books, etc.)

Tips for Teachers: Correct Correctly

I posted about helpful correction a few weeks ago and I think it will be a helpful remind and follow up to yesterday's post.

Suggestions for Students: Welcome Helpful Correction

You may have lots of people around you who correct you, or you may not get corrected very often.  Either way, you may be able to improve on welcoming correction.  The goal in welcoming correction is not simply to get a lot of it, but rather, to get helpful correction.  The most helpful correction allows you, as the learner, the opportunity to observe your errors.

Below is a list of some activities that encourage this sort of correction:

1. Make a recording of yourself telling a story, listen to it with a native speaker and have him/her make corrections.  Record those corrections.

2. Read aloud to a native speaker and have him/her correct your pronunciation mistakes.

3.  Have a native speaker ask you questions, record your answers and the corrections from the native speaker.

4. Listen to these correction recordings in order to observe the differences between your speaking and the native speaking.

In Review: Eighth Week of French Language Learning

In Class:

• Reading Comprehension
• Hobbies
• Job Interviews
• Demonstrative Pronouns
• Ear-training and pronunciation: liaisons, consonants
• Oral Comprehension
• Storying with imperfect verb tense
• Adverbs
• Pronoun "y"

Language Sessions:

• Input flooding for rhyming words
• Input flooding for minimal pairs
• Categorizing pictures vocabulary items by grammatical gender
• Soliciting the vocabulary for describing daily activities in the present tense
• Comprehending description of daily activities in the past tense
• Soliciting the vocabulary for describing the process of making crepes
• Soliciting the vocabulary for describing the process of washing dishes
• I Spy with busy pictures
• Listening to self-recordings of ourselves describing our daily activities, language helper gave corrections to our mistakes
• Soliciting the vocabulary for situational dialogues (e.g. first meeting someone, accidentally running into someone, giving condolences at a funeral)

Note: all our soliciting of vocabulary happens through the use of pictures with the help of some negotiating in French; soliciting vocabulary should not be a translation exercise.

On our own:

• Guided tour of the historic district of our tour
• Watched the children's cuisine DVD (we understand more every time)
• Reviewed language session recordings
• Reviewed class recordings
• Self-recordings
• Attended a small group Bible Study
• Watched a children's movie twice
• Listened to children's songs

The Good and the Bad of Adult Language Learning

I am becoming more and more convinced that as adults we have real advantages in foreign language learning as compared with children.  In other words, I don't think it will take us 8-18 years to master a foreign language.  And I am more and more convinced that we can reach native-like fluency and cultural understanding...if we provide ourselves correct conditions, opportunities, and patience.

Children are developing in so many ways at the same time that they are developing language skills.  For instance, they are developing gross and fine motor skills, problem-solving, reasoning, abstract thinking, sequencing, differentiating emotions, numeracy, memory development, recognizing the sound of the human voice, etc.  These are all things we only learn once in our lives.

However, as adult language learners, we are like children in language development wrapped in an adult body.  This can be confusing for both ourselves and the society around us.  The people in our new culture don't quite know what to do with us or how to treat us.  We still have to pay our bills (even if we don't know what the fine print says), we have a wealth of knowledge that we can't communicate, and our peers expect us to be adult-like.  Even though we are making many of the same mistakes that children make while they are learning language, we often don't get the same patient, encouraging correction and patience from those around us as children do.  It is our responsibility to train those closest to us in this new culture in how to treat us.  I will address this issue next week with tips on welcoming correction.

Language Development in Children

Check out this chart on language development stages in children.  It has some specifics about the English language, but the majority of the information is true for language development in children around the world.

Especially take note of what the average child has mastered at each stage, as well as what the child has NOT yet mastered.

This tidbit from the chart was the most encouraging to me:

48 months: has MOST vowels well established

That means that it can take a child up to 4 years to master the vowels, and some consonants will take up to 8 years for mastery.  Maybe I need to give myself more than three months before I get frustrated with my inability to pronounce French vowels perfectly.  (See yesterday's post)

Tips for Teachers: Believe That Your Students Can Reach Native Proficiency

This doesn't mean that all adults will reach native proficiency.  But if we as teachers are already convinced that native level proficiency is impossible for adult language learners, then we will be more likely to use methods that will not take our students there.  We need to give our students the benefits that we give to first language learners: patience, time, encouraging correction, explanation, experience, etc.; and the dignity that goes with being a capable adult even if it be in another language.

Suggestions for Students: Be Patient

Language and Culture Learning takes time.  Especially as adults learning these new things, it is easy to become impatient.  So often, we look at kids and think how easily and how well they learn language.  Yet, there are two things we give kids a whole lot of when they are developing their language skills and those are time and patience.

Recently, I have felt particularly impatient in my pursuit to differentiate and produce the proper pronunciation of French vowels.  Then I was reminded that I have only been learning French for 3 months.  This got me thinking: how long does it take for kids to master pronunciation in their native language?  As I researched this question, I discovered some very encouraging information.  I will be sharing more about first language development in children later this week.

In Review: Seventh Week of French Language Learning

In Class:
Imperfect Verb Tense
Use of "il y a"
Use of "pour"
Pronoun "en"
Sentiments
Letter writing
Reading comprehension

Language Sessions:
Input flooding of person and number agreement for verbal conjugation in the present tense
Kitchen vocabulary
TPR with kitchen, living room, and basic verbs (with language helper giving lists of instructions which we then have to remember and follow)
Reverse Role Play: Welcoming guests into home
Dining Room Vocabulary
TPR acitivites - setting the table for dinner, clearing the table, etc.
Possessive Pronoun and noun agreement practice: language helper said "at my house I have my..." and we echoed "at your house, you have your..." 
Categorizing pictures of vocabulary items into groups according to grammatical gender

On our own:
Guided tour of an historical castle in our town
Guided tour of our town's courthouse
Guided tour of our town's library: specifically their process of rebinding historical books
Reviewed recordings from language sessions
Reviewed recordings from class
Listened to children's music

Vowel Comparison Posts

Yesterday, I posted some information about French phonemic vowels.  Today, I have posted several posts which compare the French phonemic vowels to those of other languages.  My hope is that these posts might be a starting point for French language learners from which they can research further in order to improve their comprehension and production of the French language.

1. English vowels compared to French
2. Spanish vowels compared to French
3. German vowels compared to French
4. Dutch vowels compared to French
5. Japanese vowels compared to French
6. Standard Mandarin vowels compared to French
7. Western Armenian vowels compared to French

Disclaimers: these posts are by no means exhaustive and I do not claim to have specific experience with all of the listed languages.  I am only passing on phonological information that I was able to find on the internet, as well as some of my personal experience concerning the English language as it compares to French.  Furthermore, I only dealt with monophthong vowels in order to simplify the discussion a bit.

French Vowels Compared to English Vowels

As in French, English also has a large amount of phonemic vowels: up to 16 depending on the dialect (see English vowel chart below).

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However, English speakers who are learning French will still have particular trouble with vowels because French has 6-8 phonemic vowels that are not used in English.  What this means is that those six to eight vowels are interpreted by English speakers as allophones of one of the phonemic vowels in English, or simply as a foreign sounds.  For example, my brain interprets the vowel /y/ as an allophone of /u/; /ø/ as an allophone of /ə/; and since the French /ɛ/ is raised, /ɛ/ as an allophone of /e/.  The French phonemes /ɑ̃/ and /ɔ̃/ and /œ̃/ and /ɛ̃/ and /œ/ are all interpreted as foreiɡn sounds that my tonɡue is not comfortable with and which my ear sometimes has trouble distinɡuishinɡ.


In this sort of situation ear-training is essential.  The tongue will follow the ear, but until the ear hears the differences between these vowels, correct comprehension and pronunciation will always be somewhat of a guessing game.

French Vowel Chart:

via

French Vowels Compared to Spanish Vowels

Spanish has the following 5 vowel phonemes.

via

That means that Spanish speakers will have to train their ears to hear up to 10 new vowels when learning French.

via

French Vowels Compared to German Vowels

German Phonology.  German Vowel Chart:

via

French Vowel Chart:

via

French Vowels Compared to Dutch Vowels

Dutch phonology.  Dutch vowel chart:

via

French vowel chart:

via

French Vowels Compared to Japanese Vowels

Japanese Phonology.  Japanese Vowel Chart

via

French Vowel Chart:

via

French Vowels Compared to Standard Mandarin Vowels

Standard Mandarin is said to have anywhere from 2-8 phonemic vowels.  The two nucleus vowels in the barest Mandarin phonology are /a/ and /ə/.  This is expanded by some to include some or all of the following: /e/ ([e ~ ɛ ~ œ]), /o/ ([o ~ ɔ]), /ɨ/ ([z̩ ~ ʐ̩]), /i/ ([i]), /u/ ([ʊ ~ u]), and /y/ ([y]).  The allophones are listed in brackets.


Compare these to the French vowel chart below.  

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French Vowels Compared to Western Armenian Vowels

Western Armenian Phonology.  Armenian Vowel Chart:

via

French Vowel Chart:

via

French Phonemic Vowels

The following chart shows the phonemic vowels of standard French.  In addition to those listed below, French also distinguishes three to four nasal vowels: /ɑ̃/ and /ɔ̃/ and /œ̃/ and /ɛ̃/ (although many speakers have merged /œ̃/ with /ɛ̃/.


For example: the following words each begin with the same sound /s/ and differ only in the vowel that follows (except soeur and sort which both end with /ʁ/): su /y/; sous /u/; ceux /ø/; se /ə/; c'est /e/; ses /ɛ/; soeur /œ/; sort /ɔ/; sein /ɛ̃/; sont /ɔ̃/; sans /ɑ̃/

via

If you compare the French vowel chart to the IPA vowel chart (below), you will see that French alters the normal place of articulation for several of these vowels.  The /ɛ/ is slightly raised, as is the /e/, the /ɔ/ is slightly fronted, and the /a/ is retracted to be more central/ low.

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Tips for Teachers: Understand Phonetic Articulation and Phonemics

Below is a chart of the International Phonetic Alphabet symbols.  These symbols represent all the sounds that have been found in languages around the world.  The chart also distinguishes the place of articulation and the articulators used for each sound.  Find out which of these sounds are phonemes in the language you are teaching and compare them to the phonemes of the languages from which your students come.

In the next couple of days I will be posting specifically about French phonemic vowels their comparison to the phonemic vowels of other world languages.

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Suggestions for Students: Understand the Mechanics of Your Mouth

The mouth is a very complicated and brilliantly designed machine used for many purposes: breathing, chewing, swallowing, coughing, kissing, and communicating, just to name a few.

When the mouth is used to articulate speech several muscles are used at one time and those muscles are trained over 6-8 years to make precise phonetic sounds in a person's first language.  When we learn other languages often times (depending on the language), we must retrain our articulators (see image below) to pronounce new sounds.

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When I learned Spanish, this was a very mild issue for me being an English speaker.  Spanish only has a couple phonemes that are not in English, and places of articulation change very mildly.  However, now that I am learning French, my mouth is facing a new articulation challenge.  I will touch on this more in the next couple of days as I compare French phonemic vowels to those of other languages.

In Review: Sixth Week of French Language Learning

In Class:

• article noun agreement
• reading comprehension through cultural journal articles
• common time related adverbs
• ear-training and pronunciation exercises for vowels
• past tense verbs
• expressions related to time

Language Sessions (with language helpers):

• Living room vocabulary
• basic action verbs 
• TPR activities with the living room vocabulary and basic action verbs
• Restaurant dialogue (arriving, being seated, ordering)
• Reverse Role Play Restaurant
• Hair Salon dialogue 
• Reverse Role Play Hair Salon
• I Spy with a living room picture
• Map and Town Vocabulary
• Information Gap activity with a picture of a town

On our own:

• Reviewed recordings of classroom vocabulary
• Reviewed recordings of language session vocabulary
• Watched Cuisine DVD
• Listened to children's songs (over and over)

Resources: Infomercials

Infomercials provide great opportunities for fruitful language comprehension and vocabulary acquisition because the speakers are demonstrating the very items and actions about which they are speaking.  

Tips for Teachers: Flood Your Students with Input

Input Flooding is a great exercise for language classrooms no matter the topic, whether it be grammar, culture, vocabulary, dialogues, pronunciation, etc.  Input flooding involves the teacher/native speaker giving hundreds of examples of the use of a certain word or phrase.

Example:
- The teacher/ native speaker introduces a word such as "in."  Instead of giving a rule for when that word is used, the teacher gives lots and lots of examples of phrases using "in" such as: I am in the room; we are in the room; the birds are in the air; the birds fly in the air; there is something in the water; when we swim, we get in the water; when I put my shoes on, I put my foot in the shoe; when I bake a cake, I put it in the oven; you are writing in your notebook, etc.  

Suggestions for Students: Don't Guess on Tests

Language tests are meant to evaluate what you have learned, and to determine your gaps.  If you guess on such tests, you risk skewing the evaluation, which in turn could work against your goal of learning the language well.

In Review: Fifth Week of French Language Learning

In Class:

• Conversation practice
• Verb conjugation review
• Cultural phrases
• Polite question asking skills
• Conditional verb tense
• Shopping vocabulary: prices, types of stores, services

Outside of Class:

• Re-watched a children's cooking DVD
• Relistened to children's CDs (over and over)
• Went to an interactive museum 
• Reviewed vocabulary recordings
• Spent an afternoon with a French couple who helped us review introduction vocabulary, and directional vocabulary