Whoever reads well, learns well

In between enjoying golf, food, wine, the countryside, and villages in Bearn, the French and Spanish Basque country and having the visit of my son and family from London and watching the rugby World Cup, I have been reading about education in France.

Much of the discussion resembles the discussion at home. New methods, old methods, declining standards, teachers and educators who think they alone can "educate" children, the overcomplicating pedagogues and the return to the classics nostaligics. Right now I am reading a book by Alain Bentolila called "urgence ecole" which is full of self-important bombast. I picked up another by Philippe Meirieu which seems better. I have also bought magazins such as Le Monde Education and  Sciences Sociales which had a special on education and more.

I will be commenting on this over the next little while.

An initial conclusion is that everywhere reading is key. Students who cannot read well cannot learn well, in any country. Many students cannot read well. What to do?

I believe that audio should accompany reading. Audio that is portable (MP3 player) and related to texts that the learners have selected.

The learners should have a great deal of choice in selecting what to read, from a suggested list of potentially interesting and useful content.

Learners need to keep track of their words, as they learn them. The words themselves and thte contexts where they found them, and the statistics of how many have been learned. It is motivating to see your vocabulary grow, especially when you understand that vocabulary is the key to success in reading, in listening and eventually in communicating.

Learners need to be encouraged to notice words and structures, and to become familiar  with them. This need not, but can include theoretical explanations.

Learners should write as their major creative act with the language. Their writing needs to be corrected and retained as a permanent log of their growth, and an ever available picture of their ability to communicate. They should also express themselves orally, as in an oral presentation. There should be a record of these oral exposes, a recording, a transcription. These should also be analyzed and studied, used as the model for improvement, and kept as a record of the learners gradual increase in communication power.

Just talking, saying whatever comes to mind cannot be a major learning activity, although it has its place in second language acquisition. It will not necessarily improve the ability to communicate, and it certainly will not improve the ability to read, listen, notice and understand.

Listening and reading are the keys! It is more than just listening and reading. It is reading, listening, noticing, creating and measuring as an integrated learner driven program of language discovery that will enable students to learn better, learn the language and anything written in the language.

That is our conviction at LingQ.