After a reconversion, I'm doing my first year as a full-time english teacher in a lycée. I have to write a thesis and the subject will be bilingual children. I have to make a survey for it, which I would need bilingual kids (collège and lycée schoolchildren) to fill in, so that I can find out how well they reckon their needs are taken into account. There will also be one for parents of those kids, and one for other English teachers in France who might have had bilingual pupils. Would you be willing to take part and let your children answer my questionnaire? It will be ready in a few weeks time. In terms of children, the target "audience" for the questionnaire is anybody aged 10/11 to 18 who speaks (and potentially reads/writes) English (UK/US/Austr,CAN, etc.) and French, and who is in a normal school in France (private or not, it doesn't matter).
This subject is important to me, both in professional and personal terms as I am also a mother of four bilingual kids who don't always find a sympathetic ear in the English classroom, as well as the teacher of one particularly talented anglo-english kid who is way beyond the level of my other pupils... there are more and more children (and teachers) faced with this situation and nothing is done about it, there are no solutions or suggestions, whether it's for the pupils or the teachers...
Thanks in advance, I'll let you know when it's ready.
You bet. I was so bored, even when being taught by 'famous' people who walked in the room, talked like a wall for an hour then left. University teachers still do it today. As soon as I started to do seminars then later some lectures, in the former I discussed things with them on our topic and in the latter spoke for a maximum of half of the lecture then opened it to questions, comments and discussion.
Before moving here I had two hour sessions on an MA. I also did half an hour then opened the topic. Rather than a single wall of sound, I got to do longish sound bites throughout the time and then almost too many of the students chose me to supervise them. I wonder why? Other academics were horrified that I did that.
There is simply no need to do it Tracy. Some of them may be brilliant, knowledgeable people but it is hard work for those following their 'speeches', even becoming boring because of lack of interaction. Interaction is the litmus test of content, knowing if and how students follow the subject and how to clarify points, then build up as one goes along. It is also far more relaxing for the teacher as well as testing if we really know what we are saying or have we simply learned it parrot fashion? It is a question of breaking conventions which few people are even willing to try. That is very sadly worldwide as well.
Makes me wonder what our kids will do left to their own devices. I purposely didn't go to university because it was what was expected of me!
Reminds me of the saying 'by the time you have you are old enough to realise that your mother was right after all, you have a daughter saying you are wrong'
I am doing a Diplome Universitaire, Vin, Culture et Oenotourisme'. The hardest part is simply sitting still listening to fantastically knowledgeable people tell us lots of what they know without caring if we understand! It makes me realise how important it is to ensure my guests 'get' what I am talking about.
We had hot and cold running bow locks with a broad Scots accent at our place. Runs to the extent that I can outdo Billy Connolly with a fair wind behind me.
Come on Véro. I think choosing dead languages is brilliant. Nobody to pick you up on those small slip ups when you mutter Assyrian to yourself in the LeClerc check out queue :-D
My mother was born in the UK, and only had very distant relations in France, so I didn't have the full on French en-famille experience. However she feels French, and even though she has never lived here, gets very grumpy when Tim and I bitch ocassionally about life in France .....
I did find French language easier than my English fellow students - after all I knew about 'trucs' and 'machins' but the literature element really got me down. Have set myself the challenge of re-reading my set texts - really enjoyed les Lettres Persanes without constant analysis, with age and historical context was less annoyed by Mme Bovary, now steeling myself for Germinal ....
My mother is French too & I spent my life in France when not at school so I just thought it would be a bit of a swizz doing French... having been bored rigid by the French I did at A-level the idea of another 3 or 4 years of pretty much the same thing didn't appeal. So I became an Orientalist (when in fact I rather fancied Natural Sciences, specifically chemistry ;-) )
It was my only decent 'a' level grade, and my mother is French, so it seemed logical. I really wanted to train as a chef though, but was informed by my grammar school headmaster that catering was for dimwits ..... Still regret it 33 years later!
Maybe you should have done something other than French ;-) I had to explain (a lot) why I didn't read Fr & German... & always squirmed answering the truth which was that I could do them at home thank you & wanted to something a bit more challenging. I am sure people thought I was a pretentious arse, still, sounding like a pretentious arse never killed anyone :-)
Pity. Our daughter's English teacher has put her on other stuff entirely. At the beginning of this week I told her that despite oral and reading skills she has a lot of grammar to learn. Teacher smiled and told me out of range that immediately after Christmas she will go into that immediately and see that our lass keeps apace of the others who are mainly learning basic grammar at present. Wonder if I can join in. After four fails of 'O' level English it is the one language I think I ought to catch up on.
OK, Marina, distraction aside. PM me before I get into trouble :-(
Well I didn't finish Uni (bored the pants off me, and I was doing French - hmmmm), and I ask constant questions (but I do a little research first so I don't appear to be a complete numpty). Anyway, I volunteered my children in their absence (they were at collège at the time), but if we are asked to participate, and if they have any major issues (other than laziness, bovvered etc etc), I would not insist, but I would expect a considered, well-construed refusal - well it's all practice for the world of work! And there could be some value for the research in their refusenik responses .....