Here is what I skimmed from the conversation I had. Oh — Elka also said that I’m a good writer but that I write too much; I’m too wordy. That pissed me off. Critique my teaching, but don’t critique my writing, unless I ask, thank you very much, goddamn it. I suspect that this is one of those passing comments that will be a thorn in my side till I die, like when Zeese said my eyes were too close together and my singing voice was strident. Until then I’d thought I had good eyes and a good voice. No more.

Here, then, is the commentary that I did stand ready to receive and do value.

• More choral repetition
• Other ways of saying the word the want (strategic competence)
• Peripherals (can delegate take-down and put-up to Ss, and recycle during the process)
• Model more. Include more drawing
• Break every twenty minutes
• Expand words to phrases and expressions, to make it sound more like real conversation.
• Work on transitions. E.g. listen quietly to a song.
• Tasks! We listen differently if we have a task, e.g. to answer a question or write a word.
• Randomize in calling on students, and engage them more as a group.
• Insist on them taking notes so they have references at home.
• Engage all senses: hearing, seeing, feeling, (smelling?), touching
• Use all four skills

Here are some things Elka and I noted as being effective in the song segment of the class. She suggested I try to figure out how these elements can be applied to other activities:

• Being in a group
• Choral repetition
• Visuals
• Movement
• Tangible/concrete
• Humor
• No one put on the spot
• Everyone generated language
• Recycling of known language
• Modeling
• No ambiguity