Pronounce, Speak, Listen, Read, Write, Spell, Translate - and Sing!!

Submitted by Paul Rogers on Thu, 03/22/2018 - 06:20
  • 1533 Views
  • 5 Comments

Susan and group members: Below is a pomotional essay I wrote in an effort to sum up my bilingual ESL program:

-Pronounce, Speak, Listen, Read, Write, Spell, Translate - and Sing!!

These eight skills are necessary in order to learn a language well. This Method I call the Bilingual, Phonetic - Whole Language Method.

TEACHERS: Do you teach with a boring textbook or do you teach with a dynamic whole language way?

Do you teach one lesson at a time or do you show all the interconnections and answer all the students questions and doubts?

STUDENTS: Do you learn from a textbook just one lesson at a time? Or do you learn the 8 skills way, singing and laughing your way to success with English?

My course “teachers” the Whole Language Way and provides many lessons on the internet including websites, videos, audios and textbooks – for FREE!!

Why do we learn better the Whole Language Way? The answer is - when we want to learn a language the first thing we try to do is to pronounce it!!!

We automatically want to know how to say - Hello, How are you, How much does it cost?....etc.

Plus pronunciation helps you to read the foreign language and also to understand it better when someone is speaking.

But English is very difficult to pronounce – as you all know!!!!

So I always include pronunciation lessons with phonics especially in Beginning classes.

Then the students begin to read out loud, slowly but surely.

The first book is called Vocabulario Basico.

In my course I also offer many texts to read - Readers / Lecturas. These usually include a bilingual vocabulary at the bottom to  increase vocabulary and practice pronunciation and fluency.

Grammar and verb tenses then can be studied more easily.

Songs are also very important for Whole Language learning!!

So - please look at my two free websites: pumarosa.com and inglesconprofepablo.com.

Thanks!!

 

Comments

 

I like your bilingual phonetic - whole language method.  I can't say that I always incorporate all 8, but I definitely try.  I often talk about how speaking is a little bit like singing–to get the rhythm and intonation fine-tuned.  I have always been a big fan of music with lyrics for learning language, but recently I encountered a group of muslims who were of the belief that music is haram.  While driving the bus to pick up some of our students, I thought playing the radio would be good English immersion.  I had NPR's classical music on, but they asked if I would turn it off because they are Islamic and for them, music is not good. It was a cultural eye-opener for me.  I went home and researched it a bit and found music is a contentious issue in Islam.  I'd be very interested in hearing others' experiences with music and students of Islamic faith. Personally, I couldn't imagine life without music.  I love to sing and play guitar and drum and shake the tambourine, and play a little piano, too.  I believe wholeheartedly in the idea of making joyful noise!

 

Lorraine, your experience is very ineresting and also informative. I imagine that people from Arab countries like poetry, though, and maybe The Rubayat of Omar Kayam would be interesting to try. Below is an excerpt in English from an essay about songs which I wrote for my students:

"......The best way for me to explain my 'theory' is to compare learning to speak a foreign language to learning to sing.
...

I will use myself as an example.


I used to sing terribly.


Everybody told me to shut up at birthday parties, for example.

When I was a kid in school the teacher told me to just open my mouth and pretend to sing when the class had to perform songs for Christmas.


Well when I was 35  I decided to take singing lessons.

My teacher, Janice, was very patient, and would give me exercises to do during the week.

I had to vocalize the scales and do breathing exercises etc., as well as practice singing a song …correctly.
 She could tell if I did my “homework”.

And she would always say: “Paul, you are doing well. You can sing! Just keep doing the exercises and some day your voice will sound nice.”


And that day came. At one point I was singing some song at work and a friend said: “Paul, that sounds ok. You used to sound like a frog!!!”


So all I can say about learning to speak a foreign language is ….it is necessary to learn proper pronunciation and breathing and the student needs to do the correct exercises every day!
 Or at least in class."

 

Hello Lorraine, Since a lot of us are working with learners who are Muslim, there are surely many cultural issues we need to learn about. Could you say more about what you have learned about music? Are there some online resources you can link us to?

If any other members have insight into cultural issues that are important for teaches and programs to be aware of, please let us know.

Cheers, Susan Finn Miller

Moderator, English Language Acquisition CoP

I have very little information about it, except from some things that I found through a brief google search, and the recent input I hS received from my Muslim students from Somalia which I mentioned in my previous reply to Paul.  I have had other Muslim students in the past, but ideas of music had never been talked about.  I was surprised to find that there are many in the Islamic faith who follow the teaching that considers music to be Haram.  From what I've read, they distinguish a cappella from instrumental, as well as music that is spiritually uplifting v. music that is perverse or base in any way, and consider nearly all American modern music to be dirty.  Here are a couple of the sources I found:  https://islamqa.info/en/5000, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YDrPbgE9h58, and https://www.al-islam.org/articles/status-music-islam-shaykh-saleem-bhimji.