Piggy pedagogy
Friday, September 30, 2016
New readers
Since there have been some new readers recently, in the next few days I'm going to be reposting some older material highlighting aspects of this L2 project that have proven important and are ongoing.
Little conversation starters (first posted November 16, 2014)
If you speak to your child in the L2, and they understand and respond in the L1, that's good. We should never lose sight of the fact that this qualifies as L2 success and if it never gets beyond this, you have accomplished something major: Your child understands a second language!
However, if you speak to your child in the L2, and they understand and respond in the L2, that's obviously much better. It's awesome. It's huge. But it's so awesome that I think a lot of people consider it the very definition of L2 success. It isn't.
Best of all is when your child to speaks to you in the L2, and you understand and respond in the L2. That is, when your child actively initiates new L2 conversations of their own accord and in their own terms and about things on their own little mind.
Ideally, there should be no difference in the frequency with which they do this in the L2 compared to the L1.
A lot of very simple and concrete things can serve to empower children in this way. I'll have more on this later, but one thing that has worked for me from very early on is to seed daily interactions with spontaneous little conversation starters like the following:
Hey Kleiner, weißt du, was mir aufgefallen ist? ("Hey little man, you know what I've noticed?" Then I point out some—any!—funny or interesting thing I have observed, and we talk and/or laugh about it.)
Hey Kleiner, weißt du, was mir eingefallen ist? ("Hey little man, you know what's just occurred to me?" Then I describe some—any!—funny or interesting thought, etc.)
Hey Kleiner, weißt du noch, wie ...? ("Hey little man, remember how ... ?" Then I recall some—any!—meaningful experience, and we reminisce.)
Once I had modeled these enough (first with the puppets), my son began to use them himself, and he does to this day. In my experience, if you make a habit of keeping the thoughts that follow these intros quite short (one or two sentences), the child is more likely to use them.
However, if you speak to your child in the L2, and they understand and respond in the L2, that's obviously much better. It's awesome. It's huge. But it's so awesome that I think a lot of people consider it the very definition of L2 success. It isn't.
Best of all is when your child to speaks to you in the L2, and you understand and respond in the L2. That is, when your child actively initiates new L2 conversations of their own accord and in their own terms and about things on their own little mind.
Ideally, there should be no difference in the frequency with which they do this in the L2 compared to the L1.
A lot of very simple and concrete things can serve to empower children in this way. I'll have more on this later, but one thing that has worked for me from very early on is to seed daily interactions with spontaneous little conversation starters like the following:
Hey Kleiner, weißt du, was mir aufgefallen ist? ("Hey little man, you know what I've noticed?" Then I point out some—any!—funny or interesting thing I have observed, and we talk and/or laugh about it.)
Hey Kleiner, weißt du, was mir eingefallen ist? ("Hey little man, you know what's just occurred to me?" Then I describe some—any!—funny or interesting thought, etc.)
Hey Kleiner, weißt du noch, wie ...? ("Hey little man, remember how ... ?" Then I recall some—any!—meaningful experience, and we reminisce.)
Once I had modeled these enough (first with the puppets), my son began to use them himself, and he does to this day. In my experience, if you make a habit of keeping the thoughts that follow these intros quite short (one or two sentences), the child is more likely to use them.
Audiobooks and Hörspiele (fist posted November 15, 2014)
It would be difficult to overstate the importance of audiobooks for my son's L2 development. Since I am not a native speaker of the L2 and learned it in an academic context, my own L2 production was initially deficient with regard to the linguistic strata associated with childhood: specific idioms and euphemisms of all kinds, especially for bodily experiences and activities; language of concrete physical description, especially of how simple devices work; onomatopoeic words; animal sounds, etc.
German children's audiobooks made up for these deficiencies for my son and simultaneously taught me a great deal. Furthermore, audio materials, especially multicharacter Hörspiele, allow for regular exposure to a wide variety of different voice types, regional accents, and modes of oral speech, as well as to imitations of everyday communicative phenomena like mutiple people speaking at the same time, interruptions, voices from a distance, etc.
My son has been listening to audiobooks ever since he began German at age 2.2. For the past two years, between ages 2.8 and 4.11, he has been listening about 90 minutes per week. At the time I am writing this, he has done about 250-300 hours of listening to about 70 audiobooks and Hörspiele in the three years he has been learning German.
There is a major logistical qualification. I have found only one way to get my son to engage in sustained and concentrated listening: in the car, while strapped into his seat. All those hundreds of hours were logged on the road. In fact, much of this driving was for no other purpose than for listening to audiobooks.
I avoid busy roads and traffic, either cruising very slowly around local neighborhoods (usually in the very early morning) or else out in the country. Fortunately, we live in a small town within easy reach of hundreds of miles of rural roads. If we lived in or near a big city and had difficulty escaping urban or suburban traffic conditions, I would not undertake the risk of so much unnecessary driving. As it is, I only feel guilty about increasing my carbon footprint.
Weekly listening routine. Once per week we take long drive in the country, listening for 45 minutes to an hour. On two other weekdays, we get in 10-20 minutes of listening before I drop Jamie off at school or his grandmother's. The weekend is usually good for another chunk of 15-30 minutes. Then there are scattered bits of time here and there in the afternoon as we run errands or whatever. On longer drives or vacation roadtrips, Jamie will sometimes listen for several hours at a time.
Technology and method. I get all our German audiobooks and Hörspiele from Audible.de, downloading them via the Audible app directly onto an Ipod touch (a smartphone would work just as well), which plugs into an Ipod jack on a cord into the car stereo. While driving slowly in a residential area or on a country road with no traffic, I have my Ipod in my right palm with my thumb hovering over the icon that makes the recording skip back ten seconds. This is because Jamie likes to hear favorite bits over and over again, a desire I encourage and indulge, since repetition is pure language-learning gold. The pause icon is right there too, which we make liberal use of in order to talk about the story as we are listening.
Repetition and discussion are a fundamental part of the experience, and the technology makes a difference here: skipping back and pausing is not as quick and easy with a CD player as it is with an Ipod. Nor is it as safe, since you need to take your eyes off the road for a split second. With a bit of practice, this is not necessary with an Ipod touch (or a smartphone) using the Audible app.
Again, let me make safety issues clear: Only on residential streets and backroads do I do the Ipod-in-the-palm thing. If we're listening while running errands in suburban traffic, there are no pauses or playbacks until we are parked somewhere.
Primary materials. So far I have placed the greatest emphasis on stories I first read out loud to Jamie from books or e-reader. So the audibook is already a repetition. Our listening tracks our reading very closely; usually same or next day, and we listen only as far as we have read. I do this for three main reasons. First, I like to prioritize the written medium and the intimacy of reading out loud together as the primary literary experience. Secondly, I can make sure Jamie already understands everything before the listening begins, from plot points down to important words and phrases. Thirdly, since the audiobook or Hörspiel generally represents a performative enhancement of what I am capable (with great character voices by professional narrators and actors, catchy songs and soundtracks, cool sound effects), Jamie is less interested in reading a book together that we have first experienced as an audiobook.
For the first two years, the listening was dominated by four main groups of stories:
1) Nine Hörspiele based on Hans de Beer's Der kleine Eisbär (from 2.2-3.5 years)
2) Sixteen audiobooks from Ingo Siegner's Der kleine Drache Kokosnuss (from 3.6-4.3 years)
3) Fairy tales by the Grimms (2.5-years-present).
4) Bible stories (3.10 years-present)
Beginning at age 4.8, the focus has shifted to longer chapter books. We have been working our way through Otfried Preußler's stories (so far Der Räuber Hotzenplotz 1, 2, and 3; Das kleine Gespenst, and Die kleine Hexe) and German audio productions of Roald Dahl's Charlie und die Schokoladenfabrik and Sophiechen und der Riese. In the case of the latter, Jamie first reads the stories with my wife in the original English.
Other great serials we have dipped into for which great audio productions are avaliable include the Findus und Petterson tales by Sven Nordquist, Max Kruse's Urmel stories, and the endless Benjamin Blümchen Hörspiele. There are dozens more we have not listened to.
Secondary materials. There is also a massive amount of high-quality German children's non-fiction to be had in audio production. The Random House/cbj audio series "Ich weiß was" is fabulous, covering most areas of basic knowledge in a very entertaining manner. The science and philosophy-oriented Hörspiele by the German astronomer Harald Lesch are truly stellar, managing to broach deep existential and ethical questions in a manner understandable and entertaining for a four-year-old.
We usually listen to these sorts of things in shorter snippets, since as not-fiction they do not hold Jamie's attention for very long. We have also listened to a good deal of poetry and mythology.
Tie-ins to visual media. The more media through which a child can experience a story, the better for language-learning purposes. This factor also partly guides my choice of what we listen to. Of the above materials, many are available as films, television shows, or plays, either free via YouTube or at sites like Kinderkino.de.
In my experience, however, it is best to wait until one has read the book and listened to the audiobook before getting to the visual media. I have found that once J has seen the movie or show, he is less interested in a repeated reading of or listening to the story.
German children's audiobooks made up for these deficiencies for my son and simultaneously taught me a great deal. Furthermore, audio materials, especially multicharacter Hörspiele, allow for regular exposure to a wide variety of different voice types, regional accents, and modes of oral speech, as well as to imitations of everyday communicative phenomena like mutiple people speaking at the same time, interruptions, voices from a distance, etc.
My son has been listening to audiobooks ever since he began German at age 2.2. For the past two years, between ages 2.8 and 4.11, he has been listening about 90 minutes per week. At the time I am writing this, he has done about 250-300 hours of listening to about 70 audiobooks and Hörspiele in the three years he has been learning German.
There is a major logistical qualification. I have found only one way to get my son to engage in sustained and concentrated listening: in the car, while strapped into his seat. All those hundreds of hours were logged on the road. In fact, much of this driving was for no other purpose than for listening to audiobooks.
I avoid busy roads and traffic, either cruising very slowly around local neighborhoods (usually in the very early morning) or else out in the country. Fortunately, we live in a small town within easy reach of hundreds of miles of rural roads. If we lived in or near a big city and had difficulty escaping urban or suburban traffic conditions, I would not undertake the risk of so much unnecessary driving. As it is, I only feel guilty about increasing my carbon footprint.
 |
| Chandler Bridge Road, 7 min. from my house |
Weekly listening routine. Once per week we take long drive in the country, listening for 45 minutes to an hour. On two other weekdays, we get in 10-20 minutes of listening before I drop Jamie off at school or his grandmother's. The weekend is usually good for another chunk of 15-30 minutes. Then there are scattered bits of time here and there in the afternoon as we run errands or whatever. On longer drives or vacation roadtrips, Jamie will sometimes listen for several hours at a time.
Technology and method. I get all our German audiobooks and Hörspiele from Audible.de, downloading them via the Audible app directly onto an Ipod touch (a smartphone would work just as well), which plugs into an Ipod jack on a cord into the car stereo. While driving slowly in a residential area or on a country road with no traffic, I have my Ipod in my right palm with my thumb hovering over the icon that makes the recording skip back ten seconds. This is because Jamie likes to hear favorite bits over and over again, a desire I encourage and indulge, since repetition is pure language-learning gold. The pause icon is right there too, which we make liberal use of in order to talk about the story as we are listening.
 |
| (Classical guitarist fingernails!) |
Again, let me make safety issues clear: Only on residential streets and backroads do I do the Ipod-in-the-palm thing. If we're listening while running errands in suburban traffic, there are no pauses or playbacks until we are parked somewhere.
Primary materials. So far I have placed the greatest emphasis on stories I first read out loud to Jamie from books or e-reader. So the audibook is already a repetition. Our listening tracks our reading very closely; usually same or next day, and we listen only as far as we have read. I do this for three main reasons. First, I like to prioritize the written medium and the intimacy of reading out loud together as the primary literary experience. Secondly, I can make sure Jamie already understands everything before the listening begins, from plot points down to important words and phrases. Thirdly, since the audiobook or Hörspiel generally represents a performative enhancement of what I am capable (with great character voices by professional narrators and actors, catchy songs and soundtracks, cool sound effects), Jamie is less interested in reading a book together that we have first experienced as an audiobook.
For the first two years, the listening was dominated by four main groups of stories:
1) Nine Hörspiele based on Hans de Beer's Der kleine Eisbär (from 2.2-3.5 years)
2) Sixteen audiobooks from Ingo Siegner's Der kleine Drache Kokosnuss (from 3.6-4.3 years)
3) Fairy tales by the Grimms (2.5-years-present).
4) Bible stories (3.10 years-present)
Beginning at age 4.8, the focus has shifted to longer chapter books. We have been working our way through Otfried Preußler's stories (so far Der Räuber Hotzenplotz 1, 2, and 3; Das kleine Gespenst, and Die kleine Hexe) and German audio productions of Roald Dahl's Charlie und die Schokoladenfabrik and Sophiechen und der Riese. In the case of the latter, Jamie first reads the stories with my wife in the original English.
Other great serials we have dipped into for which great audio productions are avaliable include the Findus und Petterson tales by Sven Nordquist, Max Kruse's Urmel stories, and the endless Benjamin Blümchen Hörspiele. There are dozens more we have not listened to.
Secondary materials. There is also a massive amount of high-quality German children's non-fiction to be had in audio production. The Random House/cbj audio series "Ich weiß was" is fabulous, covering most areas of basic knowledge in a very entertaining manner. The science and philosophy-oriented Hörspiele by the German astronomer Harald Lesch are truly stellar, managing to broach deep existential and ethical questions in a manner understandable and entertaining for a four-year-old.
\
Tie-ins to visual media. The more media through which a child can experience a story, the better for language-learning purposes. This factor also partly guides my choice of what we listen to. Of the above materials, many are available as films, television shows, or plays, either free via YouTube or at sites like Kinderkino.de.
In my experience, however, it is best to wait until one has read the book and listened to the audiobook before getting to the visual media. I have found that once J has seen the movie or show, he is less interested in a repeated reading of or listening to the story.
Monday, September 26, 2016
"Habt ihr das können?"
J asked me this the other day. It's an Austrian way of putting it. In Germany one would say "Habt ihr das gekonnt?" I'm pretty sure I use only formulations of the latter type, so I'm not sure where he got it from.
Runic 3, L2 writing 3
This reads Finde die Runen / by [= bei] Jamie. This is also, I believe, the first time he has just sat down an written a German sentence entirely on his own without being asked or encouraged by me.
Friday, September 23, 2016
Runic 2
Reading some words and sentences in runic:
Below the line it's:
cat bat sat fat mat
the cat sat on the mat
die katze sass auf der Matte
Below the line it's:
cat bat sat fat mat
the cat sat on the mat
die katze sass auf der Matte
Wednesday, September 21, 2016
Runic 1
I work on old Germanic literature, and occasionally I get to teach runes. J has long expressed an interest in learning them, so we're going to start now.
Even though I know the runes pretty well, my runic has never been good enough such that I can just look at runic words and immediately "see" the phonology; I still always have to decipher to a certain extent. I'm excited that J, being so young, has an opportunity to really learn them. If he wishes!
Monday, September 19, 2016
Star Wars party
This evening J and I and the animals watched the rest of "Das Erwachen der Macht," which we had started over the weekend.
I like to have the animals make commentary and ask J questions during the film to get him to explain stuff. Later I read a bunch of quotes from various "Star Wars quotes" web pages in German and had him guess who said what. He got them all right.
I like to have the animals make commentary and ask J questions during the film to get him to explain stuff. Later I read a bunch of quotes from various "Star Wars quotes" web pages in German and had him guess who said what. He got them all right.
Sunday, September 18, 2016
Error correction
As a non-native speaker, I occasionally get word-gender wrong, and J sometimes corrects me. Today I couldn't spontaneously recall if it is das Gas or der Gas. So I asked J. "Das Gas," he said without the slightest hesitation.
Wednesday, September 14, 2016
Puppets and piano practice 9
It's a challenge getting J to keep his eyes on the music while he's practicing. When I nag him about it, he gets upset. Today I found a partial solution, which I should have thought of earlier: delegate the job to Thusnelda:
I told her to watch J like a hawk and make sure the eyes don't stray down to the keys, and that she's to give him a nasty look if they do. Thusnelda gives a good nasty look. Check this out. Normal:
NASTY:
It worked very well. Unfortunately it's only a partial solution, because of course I have to be right there.
I told her to watch J like a hawk and make sure the eyes don't stray down to the keys, and that she's to give him a nasty look if they do. Thusnelda gives a good nasty look. Check this out. Normal:
NASTY:
It worked very well. Unfortunately it's only a partial solution, because of course I have to be right there.
Monday, September 12, 2016
L2 reading 4
J has been having some trouble distinguishing ei from ie vowel combinations. We've gone over this numerous times. Today I started using an old strategy again, which is to have the puppets make mistakes (in this case pronounce incorrectly), eliciting correction from J. It seems to help. He loves correcting!
He's also been all about Friedel and Thusnelda again in the last several days, after Gustav has been at center stage for so long. I still love doing the piggies, though I must confess it took me awhile to get back into character.
Sunday, September 11, 2016
Gustav as friend and confidante
J was treated rather shabbily by a friend today. He was quite upset. On the way home, he asked that we "drive around for awhile and talk about it with Gustav." We had about a 20 minute, very interesting three-way conversation, and hashed it all out.
L3 learning with puppets 2
This morning we worked on Spanish numbers 1-20 and the days of the week. J really enjoys learning with Gustav. He especially likes it when I model pronunciation and he and Gustav reply in chorus.
Saturday, September 10, 2016
Selberfertiglesen 1
Behold the first German book J has read entirely on his own (with my support, i.e., not yet "by himself").
39 pages, large print.
L2 writing 1
J obviously does a lot of writing in school, so I haven't been having him do extra writing in German at home. We're starting that now, in a very limited way.
In order to make it enjoyable, J will be writing only one small thing at a time, any word, expression, phrase, or short sentence from his reading that he finds particularly good or funny. Today it is a sentence with the expression in die Zange nehmen, "to take somebody in a pincer movement."
In order to make it enjoyable, J will be writing only one small thing at a time, any word, expression, phrase, or short sentence from his reading that he finds particularly good or funny. Today it is a sentence with the expression in die Zange nehmen, "to take somebody in a pincer movement."
Wednesday, September 7, 2016
L3 learning with puppets 1
Last night and this evening Gustav and J started learning some Spanish:
At this point we're going to be taking it just a couple of words at a time. No hurry.
Monday, September 5, 2016
Star Wars quotes 1
One of the things I brought home from Austria for J is German dvds of Star Wars, episodes I-III and VII (we can borrow IV-VI from friends).
Today we watched some of Angriff der Klonenkrieger. I then realized that of course there are whole websites dedicated to Star Wars quotes in English, so why not in German? I've already worked these into conversation and plan on doing much more going forward:
„Ich hab da ein ganz mieses Gefühl.“
„Und versuche, das hier nicht wieder zu verlieren! Diese Waffe ist dein Leben!“
„Du willst nach Hause in dein Zimmer gehen und dein Leben überdenken.“
Saturday, September 3, 2016
Das Volk der Murinae 2
Today we also wrote more material for the new World of Warcraft mouse people, the Murinae. Here we are brainstorming:
The section we wrote today concerns whether the Murinae are Alliance or Horde. I used it as an opportunity to introduce a new idiom, beitreten + dative for "to join a group." All in all we read through this section 4-5 times.
The section we wrote today concerns whether the Murinae are Alliance or Horde. I used it as an opportunity to introduce a new idiom, beitreten + dative for "to join a group." All in all we read through this section 4-5 times.
Fraktion
Im Unterschied zu allen anderen Völkern außer der Pandaren gehört ein Murine-Charakter nicht vom Anfang an einer bestimmten Fraktion an, sondern er oder sie beginnt neutral. Im Unterschied zu den Pandaren haben Murinen die Wahl, ob sie überhaupt einer Seite beitreten wollen, denn sie können neutral bleiben. Wenn sie Level 10 erreichen, können sie diese Entscheidung treffen. Ein Murine, der der Allianz beitritt, wird ein “Lichtmurine” genannt. Ein Murine, der der Horde beitritt, ist ein “Schwarzmurine.” Die Entscheidung für eine Fraktion ist endgültig, man kann der anderen Seite nicht beitreten. Ein Murine hat aber die Wahl, wieder neutral zu werden, muss aber dann neutral bleiben.
Kochkünste 3
J has been asking me for the past two weeks to make marble cake again, so we did today.
This time I had him read more of the ingredients and recipe. Also I showed him how to do the celcius/fahrenheit and gram/milliliter to ounce conversions.
Friday, September 2, 2016
Idiom in focus 6: die Fassung verlieren, aus der Fassung bringen
It's been a year since I last did an "idiom in focus" post. They come up all the time, of course, but I want to start targeting them again.
Today in our daily conversation time at the start of the school day we discussed various things that faze, flap, and fluster us. J quickly had several examples to hand and used the idiom correctly right away.
Today in our daily conversation time at the start of the school day we discussed various things that faze, flap, and fluster us. J quickly had several examples to hand and used the idiom correctly right away.
Thursday, September 1, 2016
Künst des Übersetztens 2 / Art of translation 2
Little Miss Brainy is another of Roger Hargreaves's famous "Little Men and Misses" series that has not been translated into German. But J is on the job:
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