Foreign Language in the Homeschool :: Making a Skype Tutor Work for You!

Outsourcing comes up every time I speak or write about foreign language, and I think it's a tool we as homeschooler don't think through thoroughly enough! After all, it can come in lots of different forms: using an audiobook (instead of reading it aloud myself), having a family friend or freelancer help prepare lesson scripts (instead of writing them myself), asking someone to share in the teaching of a language program I have built (instead of implementing it all myself).

It has been freeing for me to think about the ways I can be in charge of the principles behind our foreign language studies while still taking advantage of resources and support that make the practices more attainable.

One of the wonderful resources for the Charlotte Mason mother who isn't fluent herself is a site like italki.com, which connects people who want to learn or grow in their knowledge of a language with native teachers throughout the world. We started using Italki this spring, and I wanted to share with you some tips for finding and utlizing a tutor in your Mason-style language studies.

Disclaimer: This is going to sound like a sponsored post, but it's not. I just really appreciate the wonderful resource italki can be for the non-fluent mother! :) But they DO offer referral codes, so if you would like to sign up through my link, we'll each get a $10 credit for lessons. ;)

A bit about our history with language learning...

The review I have shared here is based on my experience using Italki weekly for the past nine months for my three oldest children, ages 12, 12, 9, in 7th and 4th grades. At first, I thought I would enroll my third grade son as well, but his facility with the language is too far below the 12yos that he wasn't getting much out of it. I plan to start a separate lesson for my Form I kids once they are both in Form 2.

My oldest two have been doing bits of Italian slowly but surely with me since kindergarten. They were at the point where they could understand a decent amount, knew a lot of vocabulary about everyday objects, and could use those words in present-tense sentences. My 9.5 year old has been doing some Italian for a couple years but at a lower level than her siblings.

Our approach so far has been entirely based on Charlotte Mason's methods, which I have researched, written, and spoken about in various places. (I have a webinar planned for this winter too! More info to come.)

I know some Italian because it is my family's language and I took a couple years in college, but I am not at all fluent. So I am able to prepare our resources and implement mostly on our own, but I am usually just a few steps ahead of my children.

Defining your goals

Before contacting anyone, I thought through my goals for lessons. My aims were to...

:: Add an element of novelty to our lessons. A native speaker outside the family is great inspiration to learn, just as an upcoming trip would be. It also injects the "cultural interest" that Mason recommends.

:: Give the children a chance to do more questions and answers in a conversational format. I rely heavily on scripting during our lessons, which works wonderfully for building fluency slowly and thoughtfully. But at their age in particular, I thought they could benefit from more "chat" in Italian, which it is hard for me to provide.

I think it's very important before getting started to define your goals for lesson time -- what role do you want your tutor to fill in the overall scheme of your foreign language studies? Having this clear in your mind will help you state this up front to any prospective tutors and save a lot of time and effort in the long run.

Finding a tutor

Some things our family was looking for:

:: Clear accent in Italian and in English. Each tutor has an introduction video, and I selected potential tutors whom I could understand in both languages. They also have ratings for their fluency skills that can help you narrow this down. I wanted a speaker whose native language was Italian but who also had high facility in English. Had the lessons been for me, I would not have been so picky, but I knew for my children, a strong accent when speaking English would be challenging for them to follow.

:: Willingness to work with children and in a group. Some tutors are open to this and some are not. I emailed five prospective tutors to see if they would be willing to tutor my elementary-aged children all at once. Not only did I want it to be time-effective and cost-effective for me, but I also knew that if they did the lesson together, they would be more likely to continue that practice together between lessons. Three of the five that I emailed were open to this arrangement; the other two weren't.

:: Open to Mason methods. I had intentionally shaped our language lessons for years in ways that I thought built good intellectual habits rather than worked against them. I wanted someone who would be willing to chat with me about methodology and not work from a standard curriculum. Each teacher chooses the style she wants to offer. Some are flexible and some want you to follow a progression of lessons from a text. You can select the kind of tutoring you want to help narrow it down: Formal or Informal. I only searched Informal lesson providers.  I will say that if you are starting with NO knowledge in the language, tutors may not be willing to go the informal route. We were starting with some understanding, a good amount of vocabulary, and ability to form sentences to say things -- so there was enough there for our tutor to have conversations about. Some are more particular about this than others, so you can always ask!

:: Price. No brainer. :) There are tutors at all price points. Since there were so many to choose from, I set a limit and let that be part of my search criteria.

:: Calendar. Some tutors are very busy. And they are on the other side of the world, which greatly reduces how many hours we both have available; my kids are not taking classes at 10pm. ;) If you already know the general slot you want these lessons to fit into, you can scan their calendar in advance to see if they even have space that fits your needs.

Trial lessons

We did three half-hour trial lessons, which Italki offers at a discounted rate. This was a great way to feel out a tutor, which I think is more important when working with children than if I were scheduling lessons for myself.

Since Italki offers tutors of all kinds, some are far more comfortable and experienced than others. We found this to be obvious during the trial lesson! The first lesson we had was with a tutor with fewer reviews and less hours logged, yet I really liked her introduction. As soon as we started, I could tell she must have had lots of experience off-line teaching and working with kids. She was upbeat, knew how to help them track and follow the conversation without being heavy-handed, and had some conversation topics and games ready to go.

The second tutor was far less prepared and far less adaptable. She seemed like she didn't really know what to do and suggested afterward that the kids should be signed up for formal lessons instead of conversational time if they wanted to move forward with her. We could all tell right away that it wasn't a good fit.

The third was fine and open but relied on much more English than the first did. She wasn't able to move as flexibly through their time together.

So there is the option to consider style, pacing, comfort, and personability during these trial sessions. I don't sit in on their regular lessons, but I sat in on these so I could assess.

We went with the first tutor and have had weekly sessions with her for months now, and it has been a great match so far. Some weeks we skip; other times we do twice a week. I love that it is customizable and doesn't take us out of our home. It has been so simple to fit into our schedule.

Weekly lessons

My main goal for their lesson time is conversation, and that is what I told our tutor. So they do a lot of back and forth during the lesson, asking and answering questions. As conversation fodder, she has them tell about what they have been doing since last time they chatted, shows pictures and has them describe and discuss, asks them to narrate to her the stories they have read with me, talks about likes and dislikes, and so on. She has them ask her and one another questions and keeps the conversation moving along. Often they will play games like 20 Questions. She will also sometimes tell a simple story or describe a picture and then have them narrate.

I told her up front that I didn't want to use multimedia, and she was fine with that. I also told her that my focus was aural/oral and that I didn't want her assigning written work just yet. She often types in the Skype chatbox or sends a link to a Google Doc with words/phrases they worked on for my use, and that is very helpful! But she doesn't engage with the children in writing.

She probably gives about 90% of her instruction in Italian, occasionally moving to English when they ask for her to clarify or when she is describing a task or activity.

Some last thoughts

First, there are a lot of teachers! It is worth trying out several to find a good match.

Second, be clear about what you are looking for. The teachers appreciate the guidance so that you all walk away happy with the process.

Third, try taking a class yourself! I have done just one lesson so far with the same tutor and chatted with her (in Italian) about educational philosophy. I would love to do more! It is great for both of us: she gets clear direction about her client's needs, and I get some extra practice.

All in all, this process was MUCH simpler than I thought it would be. I had it on my to-do list to try out Italki for several years, but I never got around to it...and now I did and I wish I had done it sooner.

Hope this is helpful!

If you end up clicking over and signing up to try out this service, I would love to hear what you think and whether you enjoy it as much as we have. I think it is an untapped resource in the homeschool community!

Learning Languages the Charlotte Mason Way - Designing a Course of Study for Italian (Part 3)

This is Part 3 of studying foreign languages in a Charlotte Mason homeschool.

In Part 1, I discussed Francois Gouin, whose Series approach Miss Mason recommended in Home Education.

In Part 2, I highlighted some of the learning activities suggested by Parents' Review articles, the PNEU programmes, and Miss Mason herself in Volumes 1 and 6.

This time, I want to share how we'll be putting those suggestions into action this year with my second graders.  

As I have mentioned before, since we're learning a less-common language (Italian), the open-and-go resources for children's learning are few.  I'm trying to see that as a benefit--I have the opportunity to design my own course of study that both (1) meets what I see as some essentials of a Charlotte Mason-style program for young children and (2) works for our family.

As for the first point, we have talked about those in length over the last couple posts.  On the second point, I want to add a note or two.  When I say "works for our family," I have in mind a few things:

:: The size of our family.  I have lots of little ones, which means we keep home quite a bit.  It's not feasible for me to corral the younger four while my two "big kids" take class after class, so I prioritize our extracurriculars schedule.  If I only had the two older children, I would likely enroll them in a course taught by an Italian teacher, as this is a subject I wouldn't mind outsourcing. ;)  But right now, I have piano lessons and nature study on our "fall outings" schedule, and that's about all I can manage at this stage in life.

:: Our location.  Speaking of an Italian teacher: if we lived a half hour or so north, there's a good chance I could actually find an Italian tutor to come to the house.  Where we live, that's not possible right now.  

:: Our preferences.  We don't "do screens" for our children, so I need something that isn't DVD- or computer-based.  Later on, I plan to utilize these kinds of learning tools, but not with in the early-elementary years.

:: My own limitations.  For one, I'm not fluent in Italian.  I have taken some Italian classes and I'm trying to refresh those language skills, but obviously, my plans would be different if I were a native speaker.  I also have a limited amount of time, so our schedule has us doing our language lessons during mealtimes.  Which means that whatever I choose has to be doable over the din of toddlers. ;)

And so on.  What I want to point out is that all of us have particular needs when we're assessing what will work.  The plan I have listed here isn't my ideal.  It's what I think will work at this stage in our home.

So what would my ideal look like?  Probably something like Miss Mason suggested in Volume 1: an Italian tutor coming to my home for a few hours a week to work with the children (and me!), using picture lessons, Gouin series, and lots of conversation.  She could drop off prepared assignments and discussion starters for me to use with the kids through the rest of the week on my own.  And maybe she could cook me some lasagna and bring a nice bottle of red wine along?  You know, learning about the culture and all.  And didn't Clara Daniell's article mention something about international travel...  

Yes, so ideals are sometimes less than helpful. ;)  So I have tried to discern here what I think will actually work in our home rather than what I wish would work.

Our Plans for Italian - Second Grade

Last year we took a couple resources (Pimsleur for listening/speaking and Teach Me Everyday Italian CDs for songs) and worked through them in order.  This year, I organized our studies into thematic units.  My goal is to cover one unit every 3-4 weeks, but we will slow down if necessary.  

To plan the units, I chose a "spine" of sorts--a book that would give me a progression of topics to cover and some vocabulary/grammatical ideas for each topic.  This spine is for me--the children will never see it.  This year, I'm using Italian in Ten Minutes a Day.  I picked it because it was at my local library; if it hadn't been, I would have picked another one.  I want to emphasize that this book does not use a CM-ish study method.  I'm simply using it as a organizing tool.  Any user-friendly textbook that isn't too grammar-heavy would do.  I'm using the units in roughly the same order, with a few adjustments for age-appropriateness (we're not using the Italian currency chapter, for example) or length (I'm stretching a few units into two).

Here are the other resources we're using for this year:

:: Teach Me Everyday Italian, volumes 1 and 2 - These are great.  We used them last year with success and are happy to continue with them.

:: Filastrocche Italiane - A bare-bones book that I already had on my shelves.  It doesn't have that many rhymes, but it's sufficient for a year of lessons.

:: Italian for Children - I picked this program from the library.  It is a compilation of worksheets and pretty twaddly activities, and though it has an accompanying CD, I'm not even using it because I was very unimpressed.  All that said, I pulled a couple of the little board games from here rather than drawing them from scratch, and I adapted some of the conversation ideas to do on my own.

:: Italian Picture Word Book and Let's Learn Italian Picture Dictionary - I'm using these children's dictionaries from my shelves to pull my vocabulary from.

:: Kids Stuff Italian.  More on this later. :)

(Just as with our spine book, my children aren't actually seeing any of these resources since we're doing it all orally.  So we're using these as teacher's helps rather than as an actual curriculum.)

From these various resources, I compiled the materials for each unit that I would actually use with the children.  So for each unit, we have:

:: The theme (such as Animals)

:: Songs (using the Teach Me Everyday Italian series)

:: Rhymes (using Filastrocche Italiane)

:: Games or activities (pulled from Italian for Children and my own brain ;))

:: Conversation prompts

:: A Gouin series or a set of picture lessons

:: Vocabulary for me to introduce (mostly through conversation or games)

Here's an example of our current unit's outline:

Unit	Italian in Ten Minutes a Day	Teach Me Everyday Italianvolumes 1 and 2	Filastrocche Italiane	Other Activities
2- ANIMALS	Unit 3 - Odds and Ends Forming plurals Noun endings	Andiamo allo zoo (2. 9) conversation (2. 8) Casimiro (2. 17) All fattoria del nonno (2. 20) Nella vecchia fattoria (2. 21) Agnellino bianco (2. 21) C'e un topolino (1. 25)	Fillastrocca della lana	:: Picture Lesson - A Day at the Farm :: Game: Che animale sono io? :: Game: animal charades :: Game: Quanti animali hai? (with animal cards) :: Game: Go Fish (with animal cards) :: Practice: counting animals (plural endings) :: Conversation: Ch'e il tuo animale preferito? :: Songs: continue Nella Vecchia Fattoria with other animals :: Songs: continue Andiamo allo zoo with other animals :: Game: I Spy with zoo/farm scene :: Game: Chi dice?  (using Italian sounds for animals)

(A note: This unit is actually a little different from most of the others because Italian in Ten Minutes a Day doesn't have an animal unit, but I knew I wanted to include one.  I used this chapter, which is basically an extended grammar lesson dealing with plurals, and made animals the content.  Coincidentally, describing barnyard and zoo scenes provides a good opportunity to practice how to change a singular noun to a plural.  Not that my children are ever hearing those grammatical terms or getting any sort of grammar lesson!  They're absorbing the rule through songs and through conversation with me.)

In addition to these notes, I also have a (currently handwritten) sheet with a list of vocabulary to cover, question-and-answer prompts, and other little conversations we can have using the material from this unit.  As usual, I prefer to plan weekly rather than daily, so I like working off a master sheet like this rather than trying to handle daily lesson plans.  Our aim is 10-15 minutes of Italian, four days a week.  We usually do it over dinner so that the little ones can listen in too.

In addition to that dedicated time, we're also incorporating Italian in other ways:

:: Daily calendar work.  We have been doing our calendar in Italian since my oldest two were little.

:: Memory work.  I have moved the songs, poems, and series we have learned into our Memory Work binder so that they'll be practiced without cutting into our daily Italian-learning session.

:: Non-"school" conversation.  I'm taking a note from Gouin's discussion of "subjective language" and adding in conversational idioms through, well, conversation.  That means that I'm memorizing phrases to use with the children and expecting that they'll eventually pick up on them without having to add them to our formal curriculum.  For this, I'm using a (strangely-titled) gem of a book: Kids Stuff Italian.  It's a thorough compilation of the kinds of things one might say to or talk about with children.  There are sections for different ages and scenarios (bedtime for babies, cooking with older children, bathtime with toddlers, etc.), and in the back, there are lists of vocabulary words by theme (animals, in the kitchen, clothing) that make it a great reference.

Other Elementary-Age Ideas

I don't want to plan too far in advance because I want to see how this year goes first obviously!  But I have a general idea of some things I would like to incorporate in the next couple years:

:: More complicated picture lessons

:: Continued Gouin series

:: Reading and narration from familiar picture books, folk tales, fairy tales, and fables

:: Memorization of proper Italian poems (rather than nursery rhymes)

:: Plays (I'd love to arrange for the children to do a nativity play at Christmas or something similar)

:: Songs, including not just children's selections but also Italian folk songs

So that's that!  I hope to come back at the end of the year to share how things worked and what progress we made.  I can also share more specifics for others doing Italian in their homes--just let me know what you'd like to see!  

And do you have any great resources for learning Italian you think we might enjoy?  Please do share.

Learning Languages the Charlotte Mason Way - Parents' Review, Programmes, and Miss Mason Herself (Part 2)

In Part 1, I went through Francois Gouin's suggestions regarding foreign language study.  As we know from the programmes, Miss Mason did use his series in her schools, and she approved of many of his methods--particularly in the ways they took a sharp detour from the contemporary approach.  Just to touch on a few points from my last post, I think we can take from Gouin some basic principles of language study for young children; for example,

:: an emphasis on listening and speaking before reading and writing

:: the use of copywork and recitation to cement knowledge

:: the use of narration and visual memory to assimilate the language

:: learning in the context of sentences and series of sentences rather than simple words

:: the delay of grammatical explanations and rules

:: the importance of accent and conversational ability

Now, his prescriptions are very particular: though he did encourage teachers to adapt his content to match their students' experiences (it was very important to him that the series learned be actions the student had personally witnessed or experienced), he did not encourage them to use his methods in ways other than he specified--at least not if the teacher expected the results Gouin promised.  We can understand why, I think, from this passage from "When and How To Begin Modern Languages" by Clara L. Daniell:

"A slight amount of gesture and action will help to give life and stimulate imagination, but to go through the whole series of actions is apt to make the lesson ridiculous. A big girl learning German on the Gouin method, and taking the series "Walking," was balancing herself with great difficulty on one foot while struggling through the sentence 'Ich hebe den rechten Fuss auf.' 'Ich hebe den rechte (hop-hop) das rechtes (hop-hop) die rechten (hop-hop, hop). . .' Of course, she felt tired, disgusted, humiliated, and fully convinced that, for her, at all events, German was an impossible language. I think Gouin might justly exclaim 'Save me from my followers,' for some extraordinary teaching has been inflicted in his name by those who have quite failed to grasp his psychological reasoning or his method."

(As a sidenote--if you look up modern usage of Gouin, you'll find something similar.  Lots of gestures, not a lot of content.)

Of course, we are free to use Gouin's methods however we please in our homeschools, adapting as needed.  BUT we don't want to lose sight of his principles in doing so.  I think we Charlotte Mason homeschoolers can understand this well.  How many parents come to Miss Mason's work super excited about it all...but then soon they're creating unit studies to go with Our Island Story (forgetting narration entirely), having their child memorize chronological lists of artists and composers (forgetting music and art appreciation entirely) and keeping their children so busy with timeline cards and even living books that they rarely have time for free play outdoors or a simple nature walk? We are free to be as CM-ish as we want, more so or less so depending on our family's needs--there are lots of different ways to homeschool!  But if we expect the results Miss Mason promises, we should attempt to understand both her methods and the principles behind them.

So--how can we adapt Gouin in a way that suits our needs yet still grasps his "psychological reasoning" and avoids the "ridiculous"?  I think that's precisely what the PNEU did, and by reading their suggestions, along with Miss Mason's thoughts from Volume 1 and 6, we can gather a host of examples as to how we might do that as well.

I'm going to be referencing the following articles:

:: "When and How To Begin Modern Languages" by Clara L. Daniell

:: "On the Teaching of Modern Languages" by A.S. Tetley

:: "How to Learn a Language" by Rev. Henry Bell (I'm actually not quoting him here--his is simply an enthusiastic endorsement of Gouin a year after the work was published into English.  If you want to understand the benefits of Gouin's method, I would suggest this article.)

:: "Nursery French" by Frances Epps

:: As well as Miss Mason's suggestions in Volume 6 (pg. 210-213 and pg. 276) and Volume 1 (pg. 80-81 and pg. 301-307)

It's obvious from reading the Parents' Review articles by teachers (I'm thinking particularly of Daniell) that they had read Gouin's work personally, and the programmes for the years following the publication of his book into English list several pages from Gouin lesson books on the syllabus each term.  For example, the programme for Term 44 includes "The Gouin Method: French Lessons on the Gouin Method, by F. Themoin, Part I., for children (Hachette, 1/2), pages 11-20. Make new sentences with the words learnt in the Series."  So these educators were familiar with "the Series" and had experience with how to use it as one tool among several.  The articles do not agree completely with one another (for example, Daniell suggests starting a second language as young as possible, while Tetley suggests thoroughly grounding the children in English study before starting a second language in later elementary years, and so on), but they agree in most of their suggestions, and I found them to be very useful in thinking through our studies here at home.  So here is a look at some of the other kinds of assignments PNEU teachers were using in their classrooms.

:: Picture lessons.  By this, they refer to a certain activity: a picture is shown to the class, and the teacher describes the scene.  The children do the same, so it becomes a form of narration.  This is a very basic type of narration and was very popular in the early Forms.  

"There is a real comprehension and not mere parrot mimicry in these lessons. For instance, with a class of little girls of seven or eight years of age, the teacher tested the reality of the impression produced by her words in this way. There was a snow scene depicted, and after a few phrases about people and animals walking in the snow, the teacher said in the same tone "L'eglise marche dans la neige." Not one child repeated this in parrot-fashion; with twinkling eyes and a burst of merriment, they enjoyed the absurdity of a church walking in the snow." (Daniell)

But not all picture lessons are created equal:

"Picture lessons are very good for this oral work, but they want to be treated skilfully. Some of the pictures specially prepared by Hoelzel for the teaching of languages are, in my opinion, too full of incident; one cannot be sure that the eyes of the pupils are so excellently under control as to look only at the parts given in the lesson. Even if they were, there is a temptation which the teacher finds hard to resist—that of giving the children too much at a time. For small classes the coloured plates of Christmas numbers of the illustrated papers often serve very well if judiciously selected—scenes that illustrate home-life, with children, dollies, animals, and so on." (Daniell)

:: Literature.  After picture lessons comes literature lessons: the teacher reads a short literary work (first, sentence by sentence, later whole fables or fairy tales), and then the children would narrate in the foreign language.

"Books with plenty of pictures and short tales should be chosen first; then a continuous story of simple words. Division into syllables is very puzzling and makes reading very slow and pronunciation choppy. A book that can be finished in one term is better than a more lengthy one. Stories of French or German history, handled in a skilful manner, can be utilized as the pupils advance, they will respect themselves and their work more if their foreign lessons are not all in story-book form. Conversation is easier about real events, and seems better worth spending time upon." (Daniell)

and from Miss Mason herself:

"Children in Form IIB have easy French Lessons with pictures which they describe, but in IIA while still engaged on the Primary French Course children begin to use the method which is as full of promise in the teaching of languages as in English, that is, they are expected to narrate the sentence or paragraph which has been read to them. Young children find little difficulty in using French vocables, but at this stage the teacher should with the children's help translate the little passage which is to be narrated, them re-read it in French and require the children to narrate it. This they do after a time surprisingly well, and the act of narrating gives them some command of French phrases as far as they go, much more so than if they learnt the little passage off by heart." (Volume 6, pg. 211)

:: Poetry.  

"Poetry should be learned by heart from the earliest lessons. It helps the child to appreciate and understand the sound and rhythm of the language more than anything else; and of course can be made the medium for numberless questions." (Tetley)

:: Vocabulary through conversation.

"In the picture lesson, care must be taken to avoid merely naming the objects represented—the actions must all be brought out vividly, and thus the verbs of every-day use are practised." (Daniell)

"Now, here we must insist on the answer repeating, so far as possible, every word of the question..."Each sentence is followed by a question to which the sentence itself supplies the answer; or, if in question form already, answers must be suggested at first and will soon occur to the children.  In this way the form of each kind of sentence becomes so fixed in the mind that it is reproduced automatically and without conscious effort. Adverbs, prepositions and conjunctions fall into their right places. There is no casting about for "quand," "ou," "pourquoi," "comment"—no thinking in the mother tongue to be translated word for word into the foreign speech." (Tetley)

"Again, the child's vocabulary should increase steadily, say, at the rate of half a dozen words a day. Think of fifteen hundred words in a year! The child who has that number of words, and knows how to apply them, can speak French. Of course, his teacher, will take care that, in giving words, she gives idioms also, and that as he learns new words, they are put into sentences and kept in use from day to day. A note-book in which she enters the child's new words and sentences will easily enable the teacher to do this. The young child has no foolish shame about saying French words––he pronounces them as simply as if they were English." (Volume 1, pg. 301)

And for the younger student--and the older too!--this conversation can and should take place out of doors:

"The French lesson may, however, be made to fit in with the spirit of the other out-of-door occupations; the half-dozen words may be the parts––leaves, branches, bark, trunk of a tree, or the colours of the flowers, or the movements of bird, cloud, lamb, child; in fact, the new French words should be but another form of expression for the ideas that for the time fill the child's mind." (Volume 1, pg. 81)

:: Games and fingerplays.  Used for fun, but used sparingly, for "children soon think it very much beneath them to play at lessons, they are quick to feel the pleasure and dignity of work."  At the start, however, games can "help to practise the ear and tongue."  (Daniell)

:: Songs, particularly those with actions.  Songs in the foreign language were a standard part of memory work/recitation, with students learning one or two per term.

"Songs bringing in some of the words learnt in the picture lesson help to vivify the impression, and are a reward for good repetition." (Daniell)

"With regard to songs, they can be made useful sometimes to fix more firmly the lesson of the picture. Following a farm picture, "Il etait une bergere" might be taken...A delightful little pastoral play can be made out of it for little children, too. Other songs in which the actions bring into play the various parts of the body, as in "Savez-vous planter les choux?" or in which the different musical instruments are named, or birds, etc., etc., may be chosen." (Daniell)

:: Grammar through copywork.  According to Daniell, reading and writing should be deferred until age eight (which, incidentally, is about the time a student would be beginning written narrations as well).  Once they have reached that age, though, written work would commence in the Gouin style:

"the blackboard will be wanted, and the sentences referring to the actions in picture or song can be written down...The next step will be to copy the sentences for themselves in writing. Soon they will begin to ask questions about plural endings and agreement of adjectives (not, of course, in that grammatical way, but they are almost sure to notice the differences in spelling), and with skilful leading they can find out reasons and rules bit by bit and will remember them because the joy of discovery will be theirs." (Daniell)

:: Conversation with a native speaker.  The common use of a French governess to teach the little ones isn't practical for most of us, but I wonder whether an hour conversation session weekly with a native speaker might be possible.

"It is not often advisable that young English children should be put into the hands of a French governess or nurse; but would it not be possible for half a dozen families, say, to engage a French lady, who would give half an hour daily to each family?" (Volume 1, pg. 302)

:: A careful emphasis on pronunciation.

"When reading is begun, the greatest care must be taken for the first year that the child should not attempt to pronounce the words till he has heard them from the teacher. First impressions are wonderfully strong, and prevention is better than cure. Even after two or three years' practice it is better for the teacher to read first." (Daniell)

:: Plays.  Francis Epps has some delightful suggestions on how to implement play-acting in a foreign language, including even some charming examples!  (Angela--you need to take a look! :))  She also describes her reasoning behind such assignments:

"It is difficult to find anything more delightful to children than all "pretend" games, in which they have the bliss of "being" someone else. This love of impersonation may well be turned to account to help on the Nursery French, by arranging little plays in which the mother takes a leading part, and also prepares the little actors before they begin, prompts them during the performance, and by thoughtful as well as playful repetition fixes the new words or sentences in their memory." (Epps)

and others suggest such activities as well:

"Plays are useful to counteract that excessive shyness in speaking a foreign language which seems part of the heritage of a free Briton. A good deal of effort and concentration will be wanted to master the parts, but I have known this concentration to be amply repaid by the real hold the phrases have taken, and the consciousness of knowing something has given an immense impetus." (Daniell)

:: Travel.  Would that we could all jet off to a foreign locale for a little real-life conversation... :)

"Help at home in conversation is most valuable, and something might be done in the holidays. There are many delightful spots in Brittany or Normandy where summer holidays might be spent." (Daniell)

Lots of great suggestions, no?  I think that a combination of these methods will keep us plenty busy over the new few years!

Speaking of, before I wrap this up, I want to touch briefly on what Miss Mason's schools were assigning to and expecting of their older students.  Here's a section from Volume 6 that gives some insight into what a high schooler's lesson might look like:

"The French mistress gives, let us suppose, a lecture in history or literature lasting, say, for half an hour. At the end the students will narrate the substance of the lecture with few omissions and few errors. Here is an example of the sort of thing Mr. Household heard, on the occasion of a short visit to the House of Education, Ambleside,––

'A French lesson was given to the second-year students by the French mistress, a native of Tournal, who came to Ambleside in 1915. She had been teaching in England for some years but had not previously come into contact with Miss Mason's methods. Those methods were exactly followed during the lesson. There was the book of recognised literary merit, the single reading, and the immediate narration––of course in French. The book was Alphonse Daudet's Lettres de Mon Moulin, and the story read was 'La Chèvre de M. Seguin.' Before the reading began, a few––a very few––words of explanation were given––of course, in French. Then nine pages of the story were read straight through by the mistress, without pause or interruption of any kind, at the same pace that one would read an English story. The students followed by ear only: they had no books. As soon as the reading ended, on the instant, without hesitation of any kind, narration began in French, different members of the class taking up the story in turn till it was finished. All were good; some astonishingly good. To all French was a tongue in which they could think and speak with considerable facility. Yet the time given to French is two hours and three quarters a week only. Such results compel attention. It may be added that last year the writer heard a history lecture on the reign of Louis XI given in French by the same mistress to the then senior students, and the content of the lecture was narrated in a similar manner, with the same astonishing success.'" (Volume 6, pg. 212-3)

and from earlier on:

"Each Form has its own texts to read and narrate, so students are building on their skills from the early years and applying them to literatures in the foreign language: Thus Form II is required to 'Describe in French, picture 20.' 'Narrate the story Esope et le Voyageur.' Part of the term's work in Form III is to 'Read and narrate Nouveaux Contes Français, by Marc Ceppi.' Form IV is required amongst other things to "Read and narrate Moliere's Les Femmes Savantes.' Forms V and VI are required to 'Write a résume' of Le Misanthrope or L'Avare,' 'Translate into French, Modern Verse, page 50, 'Leisure.'" (Volume 1, pg. 211-212)

So narration remains the main method of learning--this is the listening/speaking portion of the studies.

According to the programmes, the reading/writing portion usually takes the form of tried-and-true traditional grammars and exercises:

"I have hardly touched on the question of grammar—of writing exercises—of composition—of translation. There is no doubt that, however much we may try to clear away the thorns and nettles, there will still be a pretty thick hedge to be struggled through—still a considerable amount of rules and difficulties that nothing but sheer grind can conquer. One of the most ardent of the reformers of modern language teaching was asked, "What do you do about French irregular verbs?" "You must ram them in," was the reply." (Daniell)

And literary readings form a large component as well: in the case of Italian, the task of students in Form IV and V (high school) might be, for example, "Read three cantos from Dante's Il Purgatorio and compare with Longfellow's translation."

This certainly gives me something to aim for!

Soon I will be back with Part 3: our Italian plans for this year (second grade), as well as some resources I'm hoping to include in the future.  In the meantime, please do share if you have suggestions--I would love to hear them!

Update: here's Part 3 - Designing a Course of Study!

Learning Languages the Charlotte Mason Way - Volume 1 and Francois Gouin (Part 1)

"There is hardly another civilised nation so dull in acquiring foreign tongues as we English of the present time; but, probably, the fault lies rather in the way we set about the study than in any natural incapacity for languages." (Mason, Home Education, p. 301)

"Let us state it as impressively as we can: the incapacity of the child is the incapacity of the teacher and the defectiveness of the method. To learn to speak no matter what language is a thing as natural and easy to a child as learning to fly is to a bird. For ourselves, however serious may seem the engagement, we would undertake to make ourselves responsible and to guarantee the development and real progress in a foreign language of any child, however backward, who 'loves a game and knows how to play.'" (Gouin, The Art of Teaching and Studying Language, p. 128-9)

We are getting ready to start our new school year next week, and I'm also going through the last few sections of Volume 1 of Home Education.  The timing is perfect because just as I am thinking through our Italian plans (a subject I'm hoping to give a greater emphasis next year), I'm revisiting Miss Mason's thoughts on foreign language study for young elementary students.  

Since I have chosen a less-common language for our home study, I have the challenge each year of hunting down appropriate materials for my little Italian-learners.  Obviously, this means some extra work for me...but the benefit is that it gives me the opportunity to build a program from the ground up, piecing together exercises and resources on my own to ultimately devise something that both addresses Miss Mason's suggestions AND fits the particular needs of our family.  So I have been reading quite a lot on this topic over the last month, thinking about the goals of foreign language study and the principles that should direct it.  As you might guess, Miss Mason has much to say on both counts. ;)  I found as I began to read and write on the subject that there is so very much to say that I'll be breaking this down into a few posts.  Today I want to talk a bit about her thoughts in Volume 1 and the work of Francois Gouin, whom she references in this section.

The quote at the top, from this section of Volume 1, really encourages me to really take a thoughtful approach to our language lessons.  Does the method of study matter so very much to success in studying foreign language?  She certainly thought so--particularly when it comes to elementary-aged children, which is who she's talking about here.  By the time she wrote Volume 6, Miss Mason thankfully seems a bit more optimistic about language learning for British schoolchildren:

"This hitherto unused power of concentrated attention in the study of languages whether ancient or modern appears to hold promise of making us at last a nation of linguists." (Volume 6, p. 276)

So why the change?   What does the "concentrated attention" she mentions look like?  What methods has she put to use with her students, and what kind of study does she suggest?

I want to start with her thoughts in Volume 1, her first thoughts on foreign language, which are less her own ideas than an endorsement of the work of Francois Gouin.  He was a French educational theorist who, frustrated with the methods of language learning that had been used so extensively in that time (including by himself, with very little success), developed his own method based on the way we learn our mother-tongue as children.  His programme is very orderly and his suggestions very specific, and he claimed great success in teaching both students and adults in this fashion.

I read Francois Gouin's The Art of Teaching and Studying Language, the book she references in this section, and I can see why she agreed so heartily with his educational principles--most of them sound quite a lot like her own!

But first--a look at the Gouin method:

His general method is based on "Series," which are the series of steps in a common action or event (for example, the steps by which an acorn grows into an oak tree, or the steps by which one opens a door).  These steps are written out as a list of sentences, narrating the action from start to finish.  These series are read by the instructor and then understood and recited by the students, with an emphasis on careful listening so as to develop a pure accent.  It is essential that this oral/aural step not be missed, as to neglect proper pronunciation at the start does great damage to the student's ability to speak well later on.  

Once the child has assimilated the series and is able to narrate it himself, the sentences are copied by hand out of the student's exercise book or from memory.  Various iterations would be introduced to add vocabulary (the acorn is changed out for another kind of seed, for example) or to practice grammar (the sentences are re-narrated with a new subject or tense, for example).  In the course of the series, the student learns a very wide range of both nouns and verbs, conjugation, syntax, proper pronunciation and spelling, and much more.

And more than that: as the instructor leads the student through a recitation, he adds in various comments and questions that introduce students to what he calls "subjective language," which includes idioms, common phrases, judgments, commands, and other conversational elements.  For example, after each "step" of a series, the instructor might say, "Good job!  Please go on."  During the next recitation, he might substitute another phrase, "Wonderful--and next?"  In so doing, the student easily adds this relative language to his arsenal simply by hearing it repeated again and again.  The goal is for the student not just to learn to speak, read, write, and translate well--but even to think in the language.  The whole method is quite engaging and very carefully thought out by Gouin.

I want here to think through Gouin's principles and how they line up with Miss Mason's educational theories.  I see much in common between the two of them, and I think examining how they agree will allow me to pull from his work the principles that might underlie our family's course of study:

:: Seeing children as persons.  He insists that if we look at how a child learns, how Nature functions in the child, what powers the child's mind has been gifted with, we can use those same powers for efficient learning.  The child's mind does not work in a lesser fashion that an adult's; indeed, a child is fitted by Nature to learn most efficiently.  Consider how very much a child learns in just the first three years of life--particularly as regards language, as Gouin observes first-hand!  Gouin draws the example of a biologist wandering through a forest.  He seems to chart an erratic course, but his wanderings are actually an orderly system of examining only those specimens that are new to him while bypassing those with which he is already familiar, and thus are a truly efficient path.  Similarly, the way a child learns may not seem methodical or practical, but he has been fashioned to take, in the most efficient way possible, what he needs from a lesson.  Learning a language via an immersion method might seem haphazard, but it is in reality quite efficient in that the mind will assimilate what it needs to, as long as the proper mind-food (in this case, language spoken well) is presented.

This extends to trusting that the child will be delighted by learning, provided that the learning is challenging and engaging:  "But the irregular verbs! some one will exclaim. The irregular verbs, by our process, far from frightening the child, interest him even more than the other verbs. And this ought to be so; for in itself the regular verb is monotonous; now the genius of childhood is the enemy of monotony." (202)  Gouin does not assume that foreign language learning will be drudgery, and the teacher need not use bribery or other methods of influence to coerce the student into completing his work.

::  The importance of visualization.  "Seeing in the mind's eye" is essential to his series because by visualizing the steps as they happen, Gouin believes the student assimilates the words much more effectively.  As he recites the series back to the instructor, he is not simply parroting back the words but narrating the scene as he sees it.  We know what an important role visualization plays throughout Miss Mason's approach, but this reminds me in particular of her suggestions for poetry memorization and recitation for young children--she maintained that much could be learned with very little effort if the child were to rely on visualizing the poem.  The words shouldn't be learned devoid of their meaning; they should take root in the child's mind in a visual context.

:: Scaffolding new information.  Guoin talks about a "web of language," wherein phrases and sentences already studied mix with new vocabulary and constructions to constantly reinforce previous lessons in a way that holds pleasure for the student: "Language appeared to me under the form of an embroidery, where the same thread ran from end to end, always identical in itself, yet nevertheless creating constantly varying designs by combining with its neighbors" (47).

His series allow for never-ending iterations on the theme, so the child takes and learns what is new while practicing what is known.  As he puts it, "to express each new perception, it was necessary, so to speak, to employ the whole of vocabulary already acquired." (47)  But rather than a manufactured style of workbook learning, the kind of continued practice he describes involves the repetition that naturally occurs in the course of conversation.

Beyond scaffolding via a naturally-spiral approach to vocabulary, Gouin also believes that memory and assimilation are aided greatly by the logic of succession or time: "a picture whose details arc logically linked together, linked together by the most natural of all relationships, that of causation, or rather that of succession in time, a relationship that the feeblest mind can grasp, and which becomes the all-powerful auxiliary of the memory." (134)

:: Learning in context.  In Gouin's method, phrases and sentences are highly privileged over isolated words.  There are no lists of vocabulary words to learn.  There are descriptions of actions, composed of whole sentences only.  His reason for this is, once again, based on how the child learns: "The child of three conquers and assimilates the mother-tongue not word by word, but phrase by phrase, sentence by sentence." As he says later, "Each isolated word is an abstraction; the child does not comprehend by abstractions." (45)  This reminds me of Miss Mason's insistence on learning spelling through copywork, dictation, and literature; learning reading by sight words and word families rather than through isolated phonograms.  Context is so important, both for effective learning and for piquing the student's interest.

:: Short lessons. Like Miss Mason, Gouin encourages teachers to strike when attention is most focused and move on when it wanes:

"After the twenty-fifth sentence involuntary nervous move ments begin to show themselves. Legs begin to shift, feet scrape on the floor, papers rustle, and faces lengthen. Evi dently the wits are wandering in quest of other things. The human patience is at an end ; the intellectual force is over loaded ; the limit of voluntary effort is overstepped. The bow bent to excess is relaxed. In fine, the souls have flown else where." (95)

The goal is to hone those powers of attention in an effort to use time wisely, work more independently, and make more rapid progress. 

:: But the lesson must be long enough to introduce real mind work.  Short lessons do not mean easy lessons.  A student should be trained to give his full attention to his work, and his work should be pleasantly challenging:

"In order that an intellectual effort may become fruitful, the mind must take this effort seriously; it must work upon itself, must become heated, must bestow pains to produce a result; in a word, this intellectual in order to be hatched, to an incubation of a determined period of time. Experience has proved to us, and continues to prove every day, that an exercise which contains less than eighteen sentences fulfils but ill the conditions which result from the preceding principle. The pupil disdains and despises it as being too far beneath his power. He does not stay thereat the time desired; he is not sufficiently interested; he does not ponder over or 'incubate' it, and therefore he does not assimilate it." (95-6)

If a child is not challenged, if he is made to endure dumbed-down assignments or is not respected as a person, his interest will fail and he will not learn.

:: The role of masterly inactivity.  I found his description of masterly inactivity to be so very interesting in light of Miss Mason's recommendations.  He encourages teachers to step back and allow the language work the students have done to brew:

"All intellectual development, to be durable, must be submitted—we repeat it once more—to a species of 'incubation.' The mind must brood for a certain time over each one of its morsels of knowledge. This is a law of Nature which pedagogic science will have to inscribe at the head of its code. This mental incubation is an essential condition of all real progress. It is not enough, in fact, to acquire knowledge; it must be 'taken possession of.' Our work, to be entirely 'in accordance with reason and with Nature, must count two distinct moments:—First, conquest —and that by active force; Then, thinking over and taking possession." (132)

:: The use of narration.  Truly, Gouin's series are not narrations in Mason's sense of the word; the student does not compose them himself.  Gouin's goal, though, is for them not to be mere recitations either.  He wanted the students to visualize the action while speaking the steps so that it is almost as if the narration is indeed composed by them--the students are describing something as they see it, and that description becomes theirs.  (This is why Gouin so strongly argued that the series used are actions the student has done or seen done so that the visualization is more natural.)  That difference--between simply memorizing/reciting the steps and describing a visualized scene--was absolutely essential to his approach:

"The process followed has permitted (and this is not one of the least of its merits) the thought of the master or the expression of the book to become the personal work of the pupil." (135)

versus

"Indeed, change the order, and begin by the writing, or even by the reading lesson, as is now everywhere done, and the lesson ceases to be fruitful.  The pupil no longer thinks — he translates; he no longer assimilates — he dwells upon the written word, the written line. The visualising faculty is no longer brought into play to look at the fact itself taking place before it, but is content to notice the place of the expressions of this fact in the book, to remark if this expression is to be seen on one page or over-leaf, at the top of the page, or at the bottom, or in the middle." (133-4)

The difference between the first instance and the latter is the difference between true mental assimilation and mere recitation.  This brings his form of narration a bit closer to Miss Mason's version than it might otherwise seem.  And his confidence in its efficacy is very much like hers. ;)

:: Copywork as a way of knowing.  Part of a Gouin lesson involves copying out the steps in an exercise book.  In so doing, the student internalizes the words:

"Now, our exercise has been confided to the ear by the lesson given by the teacher, and is graven upon the imagination. It should now be confided to the eye by reading, then to the touch by writing. Each pupil should now open his book and read, then open his exercise-book and write." (133)

:: High standards.  What a child is exposed to determines what he will be able to produce:

"The child speaks with a good accent, pronounces correctly, when his nurse or his mother speaks with a good accent and pronounces correctly. Where, indeed, can he acquire a bad accent if he never hears any other than a good accent: How should he be likely to pronounce badly when he has never heard anything pronounced other than well?" (136)

Similarly, he claims, an improper accent may "falsify pronunciation" for good. (58)  As Miss Mason would say, a word spelled incorrectly creates an incorrect visual image in the mind that may never be undone. Better for a child to listen, listen, listen until he is ready to speak correctly:

"Talk yourself, talk continually. At the commencement let the pupil speak as little as possible; it is in his ear and not on his tongue that it is important to fix the word or the phrase. When the spring is abundant it will flow of itself, and the liquid supplied by it will have the advantage of being pure. Let us not forget that the little child listens for two years before constructing a phrase, and that he has possession of both the sound and its idea, that is, the spoken word, long before attempting to produce it himself." (140)

So, Gouin and Miss Mason shared many of the same principles and methods, and she approved of his series when she writes of him in Volume 1.  But she doesn't stop there--she talks more about foreign language in her later volumes, and the PNEU schedules and Parent's Review articles shed further light on Miss Mason's suggestions for foreign language, which incorporate but go beyond series--especially as it relates to teaching at home.  More on that soon!

P.S. Has anyone used Gouin Series in teaching their own children?  I'd love to hear about it!  There is a CM-friendly version for Spanish-learners available, but nothing for Italian yet.  I do, however, have a Inter-library loan request out for a Italian Gouin lesson book from the turn of the century that I'm hoping to have the chance to peruse and maybe incorporate bits of.  Otherwise, I'll be stuck creating my own!

Update: here's the rest of the series!
Part 2 - Parents' Review, Programmes, and Miss Mason Herself
Part 3 - Designing a Course of Study

First Grade in Our Home: Italian

I'm Italian, and I took Italian classes in college and graduate school, so I love that we're doing Italian together at home--being a less common language to learn, it's not offered at most schools in this area, so it's nice to be able to offer it for my own children.  That said, because it's a less common language, there are far fewer resources out there than there are for Spanish, French, or the other more popular options, and I had some other criteria when looking for a curriculum:

:: I wanted a course that was not DVD-based, as I don't prefer that method of learning for my littles at this age, but

:: in Charlotte Mason fashion, I wanted a program that was entirely aural/oral for these early years--no writing or reading component.

And I'm certainly not proficient enough in my knowledge of Italian to teach the children on my own!  So I was pleased to find this combination of resources that are working really well for us so far this year:

Pimsleur 

The Pimsleur learning program consists of audio CDs and relies on a listen-and-repeat method to teach conversational skills.  It is geared toward adults--no bells and whistles, no songs or gimmicks, just simple phrases and practice.  Some might call them boring. ;)  But my children don't mind at all--they have a lot of fun going through our lessons together.  As I said, the lessons are conversational, not teaching difficult grammatical concepts, so they're definitely doable for a child.  Our library has all four levels of the Complete Course, so we are using 1A this year, which has fifteen 30-minute lessons.  We cover just one lesson every two weeks, giving us plenty of time for review before moving on.  We used to listen to the lessons at home in 10-minute segments, but lately I have been playing the current lesson on our long car rides and it has worked perfectly.

Teach Me Everyday Italian

This is the "kiddie" element of our Italian program. :)  Part of the way Charlotte Mason suggested teaching children to speak a foreign language was through simple songs and games, and this CD-book combination fits into that category.  Each track usually has a classic children's song in both English and Italian, as well as a bit of related conversation.  We're working through Volume 1 right now and will probably move on to Volume 2 later this year; we usually cover one track a week.  I play the new track plus all the former songs during meals or play time, and the children pick up the words.  My toddler especially enjoys singing along!  I use the book to read the lyrics a bit more slowly to my first-graders so that they can hear the words more clearly, and I read the translation for them as well.

Calendar Work

We started this in Kindergarten last year and continue this year to say the day, month, date, weather, season, and so on in both English and Italian every morning.  A very simple way to keep those bits of the language in constant use.

I would love to hear about other resources for teaching Italian to young ones!