Paradox, serendipity, fluency and extensive reading
These are some of the key words that come into my mind when I try to put down some impressions after the Fisher conference held in Bucharest on the 3rd - 4th September 2010.
The conference took place at Rin Grand Hotel and the facilities were excellent. I don't think that anybody could complain about the conditions the Fisher team offered.
On the 13th floor there was the Paradise – at least for us, English teachers – a corridor of books, Cds, dictionaries, flashcards – all the important publishers – old and new – trying to present their products. There's nothing new in all this. We have all seen bookstalls so far and of course you need lots of money to really enjoy walking from one publisher to the other.
So, what was so extraordinary about this conference? I really do not know where to start. Could it be the fascinating moment when Jeremy Harmer – yes, the Jeremy Harmer whose books we all study for our exams – confessed that he himself is bothered by dilemmas that won't let him sleep at night. The paradox he spoke about regards us. Isn't that a paradox that we, Romanian teachers are so fluent and good at English even though we were taught this language by the old audio-lingual (non-communicative) methods?
Making a clear distinction between communicative and non-communicative language teaching he made us remember the great figures that marked our experience as learners of English. We all have somewhere, at the bottom of carton boxes books written by Georgiana Galateanu Farnoaga, Andrei Bantas, Leon Levitchi. And, yet, we always make a good impression wherever we go as almost perfect speakers. We did not have the, by now consacrated listening and speaking classes. Instead, we used to read and to translate a lot besides doing the well-known grammar exercise.
So, back to the old methods? Definitely NOT. The message and the conclusion of all the English course writers and teachers that delighted us with their lectures was that we do need to use the communicative approach, that we must try to get the best out of our students' creativity, that we do need to guide them through the magic land of reading, that we must encourage them to play with words and that from time to time – maybe too often – we do need to apologize in front of our teacher colleagues because our classes tend to be noisier.
And yet the question was still there. What is so special about us Romanian English teachers? We grew up with old methods and we master the language as if taught by modern techniques.
The answer came from all the corners of the conference hall. We practiced a lot individually, we participated at different courses, we learnt step by step along with our students, we wanted, we had to, it was and it still is a powerful intrinsic motivation.
Obviously, we do not have such students in our classes. Who would need us with so highly motivated students?
(Un)fortunately, our educables are far from being motivated in any way. Therefore, much of our teaching depends on our creativity, flexibility and on the way we bring variety to the classroom. We should make our students aware of the fact that they are extremely lucky – at least from the perspective of learning a foreign language nowadays. We had little and we got this far. They have a lot. How far could they get in their language performance and knowledge if they wanted?
If we could make them ponder over this, they might appreciate more all the effort we do to help them master English better than we used to do it at their age. It is important that they consciously use all the given opportunities to absorb English piece by piece.
It is impossible to put into words all I learnt in these two days of intensive courses about HOW to be more Effective by being at the same time Affective, about how to believe in ourselves and in our students, about how to handle mixed ability classes or about how to keep both primary and advanced students focused. We all studied about these issues in their books, but nothing can be compared to actually facing these teachers and listening to lectures based on many, many years of experience.
It would be a naivety not to notice that this conference also had a commercial purpose. In fact our lecturers do have connections – in one way or another - with one or more of the publishing houses represented by Fisher. But one thing is undisputable. Nobody can question the high quality of every second we spent there. All the sessions had been thoroughly prepared and we had the opportunity of being students again. I’ll just name some of the courses we had:
• Language play and creative language learning – David A. Hill
• The practice of extensive learning – David A. Hill
• Creative thinking – David Evans
• The power of narrative – David Evans
• Teaching an learning – grammar: yesterday, today, tomorrow – Gary Anderson
• The Fluency paradox – Jeremy Harmer
• Motivation – the inside story – Mark Hancock
• Keeping advanced students motivated – Tim Herdon
• Music makes the world go round – Vanessa Reilly
Both the plenary lectures and the workshops made us forget about the reality that waited for us outside those walls: unmotivated students and low salaries – the worst combination. But it was worth all the financial and time effort. It was quite exhausting at a certain moment since we had sessions from 9 am to 7 pm. Nevertheless, we were also spoilt with a luxurious lunch at the Boemian Restaurant on the 1st floor of the hotel.
What else could a teacher ask at the beginning of the new school year?
Quite nothing. And still the cherry on the cake was to come: a one hour concert that can't be described in one word. Imagine Jeremy Harmer reciting poems about love, marriage, breakups, engagement and playing the guitar accompanied by Steve Bingham who played both electric and classical violin.
So, besides the rucksack of free sample books, grammar books, catalogues, besides the enriching teaching experience we also had part of an amazing artistic moment, called „Touchable Dreams.”
Nobody can expect a teacher to start school optimistically and positively under the given circumstances in Romania so I simply consider myself lucky to have been given this opportunity of starting even this school year with positive energy.
Cristina Nedelea
Colegiul National „Mihai Eminescu”
Baia Mare, 05 09 2010
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