Questions about Affective Language Learning

During the course that I recently gave, one of the last assignments I proposed the group was for teachers to write ten questions that they still had about affective language learning. My idea there was to spark teachers' curiosity about different aspects of affective language learning and to help them choose future paths of research. I was also very curious about which questions would come up as these would give me important course feedback as well let me understand a little about what was happening inside their minds. 

I was thrilled to read their questions and wanted already to start answering many of them. I am happy to share these interesting questions here with you. I am going to group them and my plan is to have them also as a list of areas that are important for me to address here in the blog. In other words, I am going to learn a lot based on my learners' curiosity. I feel great about it! 

Understanding the concept of affective language learning

Why didn't I hear about affective learning before?

What is the history of affective learning? When and where did it come from? 

Is there any research regarding affective language learning?

Has there been much research in to the effectiveness of affectiveness in the classroom?

How different / similar is it to building a good rapport with students? 

Is affective learning an approach / method? 
When did it start?  Where did it come from? How much is it related to psychology?

What is the relationship, if any, between affective learning and positive discipline?

Shouldn't all teaching be affective by nature? 

Aren't many teachers affective but they just don't know about it?

Is affective learning exactly the same as humanistic learning or are there any differences?

What's the difference between an affective and a humanistic language teacher?

Are there hard 'don'ts' in an affective learning approach? What are they?

Can I say that in the school I work we promote affective learning thru affective teaching skills?

Does affective language learning have any possible relation with positive reinforcement? 

Affective language learning and the curriculum 

Is there an affective language learning framework for lesson planing? 

How do I default to an affective style for planning a lesson for YL whenever possible?

Most course books are still organised around a grammar type syllabus if you produced an affective coursebook series for ESL how would you organise it?

How do I balance the dual and mostly opposite demands of affective learning planning, delivery vs. curriculum completion?

Is affective learning as we know it only applied to teaching a foreign language?

Affective language learning in the classroom

What are the 5 most important activities to implement in a classroom to show affective language learning?
Can affective learning help teachers involve new students joining the course late (after having built an affective kind of atmosphere in class) ?

Can affective learning be particularly helpful with certain skills (like speaking) or it's just a classroom management tool that generally helps set tasks and get the best of them ?
What are the best ways to carry out proper differentiation with slow and fast finishers according to affective learning?

How can affective language learning be applied to stop bullying?What to do to stop name-calling?

How do I make finding/identifying the moments in delivering a lesson when an affective approach would be the best?

What can you do when students get frustrated because they can't perform in the language?

Affective language learning and assessment

Should there always be evaluation in affective learning?

How do I assess learners when using an affective learning approach?
How can we use a Needs Analysis at the beginning of a course to decide what kind of affective learning we need to adopt?

How long does it take to see the result of affective language learning in students?

In compulsory education, would an affective learner fail his/her students or envisage doing without the pass/fail system?

How is affective learning perceived by parents?

How can we turn evaluation into an affective stage of the lesson too? I know that we cannot skip testing, so how do we make it affective too?

How do you counter the argument from the parent who says this is just lovey-dovey crap you need to be teaching my child grammar and how to pass tests!

Affective language learning around the world

How to go about showing affection without being able to speak their mother tongue?

How can affective learning help us get learners of different nationalities engaged in a course more?

Is affective learning included in the curriculum in any country?

Why most private language schools around the world are looking for native speakers (ONLY) and don´t care about affective language learning?

How popular is affective learning and where is practised, by who and in what kinds of environments and institutions? 

Is affective teaching embraced in many countries at a national level and integrated into the curriculum of all schools?

Education systems around the world are shifting towards more tests is this at odds with affective teaching?

Affective language learning and adults

How do I use affective learning with older YLs i.e 11+?

How would an affective teacher best deal with a teenager who rejects English altogether ---as I have found during my practicum?

How different can affective language learning be with adults ?

Is Dogme: Teaching Unplugged written by Thornbury and Meddins a adult version of teaching affectively?

Affective language learning and technology 

Is technology an appropriate tool to use in the affective classroom?

Where do reward systems such as Classdojo sit in an affective classroom?

Teacher development on affective language learning

Were we affective teachers before this course?

Speaking a language perfectly doesn't mean we are going to teach effectively, does it?

How can we feel the difference between an affective teacher from a regular teacher?

What might make some teachers better than others in affective language learning?

How can I motivate my co -workers to be affective teachers? by telling them? By acting like one?

How do you help teachers feel comfortable teaching affectively, in particular using puppets in the classroom? 

How can I create a training session on affective language learning? Which areas/ what kind of content? 

Wow, so many questions! 

How was it reading a post with only questions? 
Was there any that you wanted to start answering straight away? 
Would you like to add any other questions? 
Which ones would you like to answer first here in the blog? 

I would love to hear you! 

Sending you all a huge hug,

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Thank you! 

Teaching Young Learners Affectively

During the month of April I lived an amazing experience!
I gave my very first online course on Teaching Young Learners Affectively!

Everything started when Chuck Sandy kindly offered me to teach an online session on affective language learning at iTDi's Summer Intensive last August. I rapidly accepted it and got ready for my online debut. I was a little nervous at first, but slowly I got more and more comfortable with this means and I was overjoyed at the end. The marvellous feedback I got showed me that I had an opportunity to pursue!

Last December in talks with Barbara Sakamoto I told her I was interested in giving an advanced course on affective language learning. She agreed and we scheduled it for April of this year.

This was one of the banners used to promote my course:

I had four weeks to share my 20-year journey learning and discovering affective language learning with young learners and I decided on the following program:

Week 1: Introducing Affective Language Learning concepts to get you started. 

Week 2: Empowering resources for you and your learners to learn affectively.

Week 3: Unleashing creativity and fantasy through storytelling and puppeteering.
Week 4: Making grammar and writing enjoyable and meaningful.

We started advertising the course and slowly participants from many different countries started enrolling. In the end there were 31 participants from 13 countries. The countries were Argentina, Brazil, Costa Rica, Egypt, Japan, Mexico, South Korea, Spain, Thailand, Turkey, United Kingdom, and the USA. Wow, what a privilege to be able to learn and share with such an audience!

Then the first day was getting closer and closer. In the previous week Steven Herder gave me a course on how to use the Adobe platform and also gave precious hints to make the course run smoothly. Here are some of these:

My computer was on boxes for me to be better on screen.

I had a lamp with a sheet of paper to difuse the light.

I had earphones to avoid echo.

I had all my slides printed in a list I had by my side.


Each session lasted an hour and sessions happened on Sunday mornings in Brazil and that worked fine as most participants could watch the session live without having to be awake in the middle of the night. Participants also the opportunity to watch the recording of the sessions or even watch these again to get more details.

This is the screen that I had in front of me while delivering the course. I had to manage time to cover all the planned content in one hour and also to keep an eye on the running chat box to comment on and answer the questions that were coming from the participants.


Affective learning has to do with responding to students' demands, so my challenge was set there!

I was very happy by the end of the first session that I even cheered on screen. Facebook feedback was also great. Then I was ready for the second component of every session: the google community forum. Every session I present three tasks from which students had to choose two to share their views on the forum. One of the first tasks was to take a picture that represented affective language learning for them. Their pictures and the motives were brilliant. Check some of these below:

One area that we had in the Adobe platform that I like very much is the lobby. The lobby is a customizable area where I welcomed participants while they were waiting for each session to start. 

One affective strategy that I used was to display there some of the pictures that participants had shared in the forum the previous week as a way to validate their work and celebrate our learning. 

I could clearly notice how teachers were excited to see their pictures in the lobby. I will certainly do this again in my next courses! 

Another important moment was circle time when we shared about what we had thought since the last session. It was also a great way to acknowledge the great work that was done in the discussion forums. 

Throughout the course we explored how to foster affective language learning through everyday objects, storytelling, and puppeteering. In the last session we focused on how to engage young learners in writing and grammar in meaningful and creative ways.

Participants also recorded lovely videos of how they would present puppets to their students. Here I would like to share here a special video made by Damien Herlihy from Thailand in which he even used chroma key. Check it out! 

Every week I had the most adorable time engaging in dialogue through the participants' discussion forum posts. There I was able to bond individually with each teacher validating their dedication and commenting on their ideas. A highlight were the puppets that teachers made and their sharing of how they introduced them to their students using the techniques learned in the course. 

The ending was a very special moment that I will always remember. We turned on our cameras and we were able to see each other around the world. Many of us got emotional, including me, and we were all very excited to celebrate these four intensive weeks in which we share our experiences, lives, and dreams. I feel that lots of the affective learning seeds are already germinating!!!

I am certainly going to give many more online courses as I simply loved this experience. I met lovely teachers all around the world, discovered online tools, and learned a lot about affective language learning.

I would like to thank iTDi for this amazing possibility and in special to Barbara, Steven, Chuck and Gareth for all the all the support and attention!

There are always great courses, given by passionate teachers, happening at iTDi .
Check here iTDi's advanced skills courses and choose the next one you will join!



Sending you all a big hug,

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Thank you!

Interviewing Affective Educators: Jason R Levine

"Love yourself and your expression, you can't go wrong"

KRS-One

This last August I had the great pleasure of meeting Jason R. Levine, also known as Fluency MC, and working with him during one week in the Gallery Day Camp in Italy. During this week I was able to see Jason promoting learning through rap and I discovered that Jason and I are artisteachers in our own ways. I couldn't have let him go without interviewing him first. Here is our chat: 

Juan: I am really happy that we are working together here in Italy as I had heard a lot about you, but only being here makes me able to better understand your work. Have to tell you that I am your fan.


Jason: Likewise, I follow what you are doing as a teacher and as a teacher trainer around the world. It is interesting to see how my work and your work complement each other. It's really exciting. It's a great feeling to be here.


Juan: I will start our interview by asking the classic question: Who is Jason R Levine?  But don't go thinking that this interview will be an easy one!

Jason: It's funny, there are a lot of Jason Levines out there and I put my middle initial  R to differentiate myself. I do both content creation and also training. I have this persona Fluency MC that I use for the music and the videos.  For me Jason Levine is more the trainer, what is left of the academic side of me.  Fluency MC is the guy that is out there on the ground as well as into content creation and materials design.

Juan: I believe that I identify with you as I believe that I am also a mixture of an artist and a teacher. I can clearly see your very developed artistic side in your teaching. Please tell me how this integration has happened in your life.


Jason:  Glad you see it that way because it hasn't been that long that I have been doing what I do with music. I was a pretty traditional English teacher during the first part of my career. It wasn't really until nine, ten years ago that I really started bringing music and video into it. From the start I was into creating material, in this sense I might be an artist, but what you see me doing is pretty recent. During the first years I was pretty shy.

Juan: I can't imagine you being shy!


Jason: I have a video to prove it, but I am not at the point that I am ready to show that video to people yet! My students used to tease me and they have certainly helped me discover my talent. This is a beautiful thing about teaching, when both students and teacher support and encourage each other in the process.

Juan: What do you take into account when you write your raps?

Jason: I am a big corpus linguistics guy, a collocation guy, and definitely for me what sparks me and gets me going is the lexical side of what I am working with. So if I receive a unit with certain vocabulary, certain structures, I love what I can do with these. I am also very motivated when I see what frustrates teachers and students, such as boring or difficult grammar structures, things that even with a lot of studying and learning students usually do not make much progress with.

Jason: I enjoy thinking about the acquisition, the repetition, and the humour in the songs. It's definitely the linguistic side that moves me in the beginning, but then as I write the songs I often get into storytelling.

Juan: I can see you put a lot of humour in the pictures you choose as well as in the lyrics.

Jason: Humour absolutely! I think that every good artist in some level does something with humour.

Juan: I really like the secret messages that you put in your raps. How do you go about these?

Jason: Thank you. I'm always moved by social messages in art, whether about inequality or about the environment or other important issues. I believe that the subtle messages are the ones that strike you, if it's a comedian who sneaks it in a joke or a singer that inserts it in a song. I don't like it when the message is explicit and  hits you in the head as it is hard to reach people that way. I want people to discover it themselves. To tell you the truth, I don't always notice myself doing it. The other day a teacher pointed it out to me. I can say that I am really influenced by many singers and authors and I like to do it that way.

Jason: Stick, Stuck, Stuck is the first song that I wrote and it is still the most popular song. People point out that there is a message within it and when you listen to other songs the messages are definitely more out there.

Here you have the famous Stick, Stuck, Stuck by Fluency MC :

Juan: I follow your career and I see that you have been travelling a lot and you have been in contact with lots of students around the world. How do you make sense of all this? How has this experience touched you?

Jason: I've been thinking a lot about this lately. The other day I saw some pictures of when I was with students in Palestine and it seems it was such a long time ago. I'm sure you also have this experience of feeling time in a different way when you travel and you have lots of intense encounters. On the other hand, I feel it is strange sometimes as I have had these intense encounters but I haven't seen these people again and I'm not sure what they are doing. As fun and as interesting it is to travel, it can also be hard.

Jason with students in the Palestine!

Jason: What grounds me is the fact that we are all connected through social media, like one student from Palestine can write me tomorrow and say "Hey I watched your video and I remember when you were in Ramallah". I feel really lucky about it. In the past, without this new media, it would have been tougher. I feel lucky to be teaching at this time in history.




Juan: I heard you are coming to Brazil next year, tell us about it.

Jason: I have wanted to come to Brazil for a really long time. Mainly because many Brazilian encouraged me when I taught in New York and also because I have many loyal followers from Brazil. There is certainly a musical connection between American and Brazilian hip hop and I believe the idea of practicing with music appeals a lot to Brazilian teachers. People tell me all the time to come to Brazil so I've got to do it. And it is great to be connected to you and also to other teacher trainers who supported me.


Juan: You are going to have such an amazing time in Brazil, Jason. By the way, I know that you have created an innovative language learning program. Please tell us how the Weekly English Workout Program works and how you have come up with this idea.

Jason: Thank you for asking about the Weekly English Workout. I'm very excited about it as it's a new project.  It's a speaking practice program based on Video Workouts, live classes, and a private Facebook group. It provides intensive practice to enable you to use English in your everyday life. This practice, I believe, is the missing piece for most people. It's been a lot of fun and I'm excited about getting the program into schools around the world so that students can use it out of class to improve their English fluency.

Juan: What message would you leave people that have a talent and would like to fuse it with language teaching?

Jason: That is a wonderful question. Just get out there and do it.

Juan: Any message for the students?

Jason: Wherever I go, I meet one or two students that are really fluent, really excited about English. Some people would assume that they have lived in the country where the language is spoken, that they must have had these great lessons, or that they have the gift for learning another language. But nine times out of ten it is because they really got excited about English from media, they watch a lot of movies, they listen to a lot of music, they read a lot of comic books... The best use of time for teachers is to get their students excited to get out there and go for things that they really enjoy.

Juan: Thank you so much for this interview!  It's been great working with you here at the Gallery Day Camp.

Jason: That was fun!


Do you have a special talent you have incorporated in your classes?
Let me know and you can be the next teacher  interviewed here in the blog!


Sending you a big hug from Hokkaido in Japan,

Juan


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Follow my Playing to Learn column!

Hello! 

It's with great pleasure that I share some good news. I have a column of my own!

It is entitled "Playing to Learn" and it is published twice a month with Gallery Teachers and iTDi. My very first column will have 12 posts and there I invite you to explore practical ideas and playful activities that can make your classes memorable, engaging, and fun. More than that, my intention is to awaken and strengthen your playfulness and empower you to create and live play with your group. 

On galleryteachers.com  you will be able to learn with amazing ELT bloggers and writers such as Barbara Sakamoto, Shelly Terrell, Luke Meddings, Christina Rebuffet, Jason Levine, and Chuck Sandy among others. Topics range from culture to critical pedagogy to cooking and there's something for everyone. Each column post comes with a downloadable PDF full of ideas, activities, or a lesson plan that you can take into your classroom or use for your own development. 

Do pay me a visit and leave your comment giving me feedback on how you liked it and what you would like to talk about next. I write it for you. 

Hope you have enjoyed these news as much as I do. It's really exciting!

Send you all a big hug from Seoul, South Korea!

Juan

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My first webinar on Affective Language Learning!

"One of the most important areas we can develop 

as professionals is competence in accessing and sharing knowledge." 

Connie Malamed

Hello!

I am here to share about something I am really proud of being part: iTDi. 

I love iTDi because it has made the cutting edge of ELT knowledge available to teachers around the world in a very democratic way through free and affordable online courses and webinars. 

One of iTDi's initiatives, together with Gallery Teachers, was the Summer Intensive for Teachers, an online free series of speakers sharing their views on issues that they are passionate about. And I was invited to be one of them!

Due to my travelling and course schedule the only day I could present was July, 31st which was even before the official opening on the next day. I hosted my very first webinar and guess what? I loved and it was great fun! 

Buddy and I were super kindly hosted by Chuck Sandy and Jason Levine with the great theme song that made all of us full of energy. I was a little bit lost at first, but with time I got more and more comfortable with this new webinar format. I would like to thank everybody who made the effort to attend it live. You guys rock! 

You are probably saying "Come on, Juan, where is the link?". Right here, without further delay.
It is very easy to watch my first webinar. Just click here and sign up for a free account with iTDi. Then just log in and find the Summer Intensive for Teachers. My webinar is the very first one.

Get yourself some coffee, tea, or lemonade and enjoy the course with Buddy the Frog and me.

It was a great experience and I look forward to hosting another webinar. I am then officially open to invitations!

Which part did you like the most?
Do you have any hints for my next webinars?

Sending you a big hug, 

Juan

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Interviewing Affective Educators: Sosô Uribe Conti Ranzi

I am very happy to present you an interview with an educator, and an entrepreneur I deeply admire: Sosô Uribe Conti Ranzi, who happens to be my sister, my partner, and the General Director at Juan Uribe Ensino Afetivo, the school we both founded here in São Paulo, Brazil.

But how could I interview her if I know pretty much what she will answer? In order to make the interview more natural and revealing I decided to invite my dear friend Naoko Amano to interview Sosô. 

Naoko is the founder of Yellow Banana Kids English in Kishiwada, Japan. She was a fantastic host when I visited her school in 2013. Naoko is also part of the iTDi family and I am grateful to Barbara Sakamoto for having introduced us to each other. 


It is with great honor that I have connected these two lovely educators and here I present this interview: 

Naoko: Congratulations on the 20th anniversary of your school! I saw the great pictures of your special flea market. Could you please tell me more about your feelings about this anniversary?

Sosô: Oh Naoko! It’s a feeling that is really hard to put into words! It was a great pleasure to see kids speaking English spontaneously and confidently. Families were together and everybody was communicating and having fun in English!

Naoko:Yes! I was able to see that all the families are so happy to be there! That's wonderful, Sosô. What are some of your unforgettable memories of these twenty years?

Sosô: There are so many! It's rewarding to see that people that worked here left their mark and have made this school a better place. It's beautiful to know that students that studied here with us are starting their professional careers and that deep inside I  know that our English classes have contributed to their success! Another lovely memory was when we rented this house we are in right now! Moving to this new house was a big step for us, because we grew 4 times in size!

 Naoko: That's really inspiring, Sosô. I've heard about you a little bit from your brother Juan, whom I always meet in congresses here in Japan. But I'd like to know more about you. How did you start teaching English to children?

Sosô: Wow….that was a looong time ago…. I started my first class on May 10^th 1996… 19 years ago. I was only 17 years old then! I started teaching a 2-year-old boy called Christian and I fell in love with teaching as I saw that I was much more able and creative that I thought I was. As a result, Christian learned much faster that I could imagine.

Naoko: Oh! That is a very interesting story. Can you recall any of the classes you had with him? 

Sosô: I used to spend the whole afternoon with him and we did everything together - we cooked, played outside, we made projects, played with his power rangers, watched movies, and sang songs. He liked hunting treasures and playing with his wild animals figures. I remember that once we made a huge cardboard boat and played there for hours!

Naoko: That must have been fun. But how did you go from teaching this very first student to opening the school with Juan? 

Sosô:  As I started teaching more and more students, Juan and I had a turning-point conversation in which we decided to open our own school. At the age of 17, I was reading Brazilian laws concerning hiring people.

Naoko: You were so young then. How many students are learning English at Juan Uribe Ensino Afetivo now?

Sosô: Currently there are 252 students from two to twelve learning English with us. We have 102 students having classes at their homes while 150 come to our school. 

Naoko: That is a lot! I am sure you have 252 students, parents, and teachers smiling. That’s wonderful!

Sosô: Thank you, Naoko. I love teaching and I also love managing the school!

Naoko:What do you currently do at Juan Uribe Ensino Afetivo?

Sosô: Today I am the General Director, which includes thinking about our growth, envisioning new challenges, checking the quality of our classes, and learning about families' satisfaction. 

Naoko: I saw in many pictures that you always have a puppet with you. How did you start using them to teach English? 

Sosô:  In 1996  Juan and I bought six hand puppets which later became our logo. We always had them with us and they called everybody’s attention. Today we have more than 80 puppets here at school. The educators who work with us learn how to use puppets in our initial course, but they are not supposed to use them every class. We are always watching many puppeteers, taking courses, and getting better and better at it. 

Naoko: Eighty puppets!? That's a lot! I saw your fantastic and heartwarming DVD in which you also use puppets. What made you film it? How did you film it?

Sosô: That was a dream-come-true project! In 2008 Juan filmed me telling "The Gingerbread Man" and we put it on YouTube. Many families watched it and told me that I had talent telling stories and that I should record a DVD. I let this dream rest for almost 4 years until I met the Cama family in October 2012. Together we decided to pursue this dream and we came up with different storytelling techniques to teach English to children through fairy tales. After 18 months, the DVD was finally released and now kids from all over Brazil can learn English with us!

The DVD was filmed in a cinema studio with professional microphones and movie cameras. I had my “actress” day starting the first story at 7 am and finishing with the tenth one at 9 pm. By then I was exhausted, but really happy!

Naoko: It sounds that must have been both exciting and hard work! What were some of the most difficult aspects while shooting the videos?

Sosô: I guess it was during the shooting of “The Three Little Pigs” when I had to make the second pig look down to the camera (I was behind a wall - and I couldn’t see where the camera was). Editing Hansel and Gretel was also a challenge as we had to make the narration match the scenes. :)

 Naoko: I love your warm voice and your friendly way of telling stories. I immediately felt drawn to your story. Is there anything in special you pay attention to when telling stories with puppets? 

Sosô: Oh Yes! Besides the story itself, I pay attention to the voices, movement of the puppet’s mouth and body, and  possible jokes or charades I will tell. While storytelling in the classroom, I make sure to take into account the comments of the students too! It’s really fun! You should definitely try it too!

Naoko: Wow, it seems to be very difficult and I certainly need some training myself, but I’m interested in it. On the DVD, your puppets are really alive and we felt as if we were in the story!!

Naoko: What are you doing in the picture you look like a ninja?

 Sosô: Just posing for the picture! We had to use this outfit, so our hands and heads wouldn’t appear in the video. 

Naoko:  I was also very excited to see you using kamishibai in your storytelling. It is a beautiful Japanese technique we rarely see here in Japan.  How do you like telling kamishibai stories?

Sosô: Kamishibai stories are really different and everybody loves them, as they do not exist here in Brazil. I always have a great time telling them!

Naoko: I am glad to hear that people love our tradition. Here in Japan, we usually tend to look for new techniques from overseas, but we definitely should reconsider our work in the light of our own Japanese tradition.

Naoko: Thank you very much for taking the time to talk to me.  You have inspired me a lot.  I was able to feel your passion for teaching as well as your gentle and beautiful heart. I’d also like to thank Juan Uribe for giving me this wonderful chance. 

Sosô: Same here. It was really nice “talking” to you and telling you a little bit about the school, myself and the DVD! :) Come visit me here in São Paulo!

Naoko: You too here in Kishiwada! 

Wow! What a great interview! 

Thank you so much Naoko and Sosô.
I sincerely hope that your families can meet each other some time in the future. 


Would you like me to interview any educator you admire? 
Tell me and I will give my best as always! 


Sending everybody a kamishibai hug from São Paulo, 

Juan

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