The original planning strategies had included
a variety of methods supported hy researeh
and experience:
1. songs
2. pictures to stimulate conversation and writing
3. word poems
4. creative dramatics, including enactments of
stories.
In every case, I met with problems I had not anticipated.
The Area Director of Schools was very
supportive of the use of music; however, some
of the teaehers were less enthusiastic, proclaiming
that any lyrics beyond those with four words,
sueh as "Head and shoulders, knees and toes,"
stretched their English vocabulary beyond its
limits.
A key writing problem for
both teachers and students was their
insatiable desire to write every word
perfectly. A white-out pen was in
constant use, so little progress could
be made in the writing process. In addition,
discussions were often limited
beeause the teachers, even pooling
their knowledge of English, could
not find the words and sentence
structures needed to write even three
or four sentenees about what they
saw in the magazine photos used as
a prompt for writing. This example
based on an underwater photo of six
porpoises illustrates the difficulties:
"This is porpoise. Its skin is blue color.
It have some fins and tail fins for
floating and it also like to floating in the sea. It is
very happy."
Using dramatic activities seemed to be a
promising teaching technique. Teachers gradually
developed their own dramatic skills through
pantomime, improvisation, enactment, and
scripted plays. Moving from large group to small
group to individual activities also served to relax
the teaehers and helped to eliminate fears of appearing
foolish or failing to understand.
The pantomimes were successful; teachers
could work in large and small groups with
real objects and then without them. Throwing
balls or using pieces of cloth were simple but
effective strategies. However, adding speech
complicated the process, and, for many teach-