Notes on Interview with Spanish Teacher

The focus of the interview is on pair and small group activities in language learning but other subjects are also touched on.

The teacher teaches Spanish at UCL language centre and also in a secondary school. She has not been involved in the ReLaTe project, but was shown the interface (not the system in action) in order to explain the interviewer's interest in group and pair activities. She preferred not to have the interview recorded. This is a summary based on. the interviewer's notes.

What is the ideal size for a language class?

Not as small as four - because you don't get as many ideas generated. Even numbers, ideally, so they can work in pairs. Really big groups (as in schools) are harder to organise. Maybe about 8 is ideal for language learning.

Why get students to work together?

Learning a language is about communicating - so you want to encourage communication with as many people as possible. Also some people tend to be afraid of making mistakes when asked to talk in front of a class; they are less inhibited working with just one other person. I tend to start by getting people to work in pairs and then as they get more confident I ask them to work in bigger groups.

At the start you want to get them to get to know one another, too, so you try to get them to swap partners, work with different people.

Do you have favourite kinds of group activities? For example, are there certain things you always do - in a first lesson, perhaps?

Yes. Games are good. These three activities always seem to work well:

• Talk in pairs telling one another about yourselves (practise first and second person verb endings). Then report on what you learned about your partner to the whole group (practise using the third person). People do a lot without realising it and seem to enjoy it.

• Pin up pictures (photographs, paintings) on the wall. Get people to give opinions/reactions to the pictures. They have to get up and walk around to look at the pictures.

• You take some labels with names of famous people on them. You pin one onto the back of each person. They have to ask one another questions until they find out who they are. Games like this work well.

There are lots more. I could make a list.

What other kinds of teaching materials do you use?

I use pictures a lot. For the students to describe, or put in order, or to match up. Activities where people have to find things out or find out what to do from the others they are working with.

What sources do you use? Where do the materials come from?

Some things are photocopied from text books. Or things are from El Pais (using the web) - or magazines. Some I draw myself. Some activities I devise and some are ready-made from books.

Do you have a checklist of ingredients for a language lesson? Are there any things that you think a good lesson must include?

It isn't written down - but yes. Something like this:

Begin with an introduction - a little bit of text or a picture (something ready set up) that shows whatever you are teaching. Maybe you present something, like a verb. Some will know it already so that's good - they can explain it to others.

Then some practice, eg a dialogue/situation, in pairs. Maybe something to fill in, in pairs.

Then perhaps some listening. Then a group activity.

Then personalize it by getting people to have a real conversation in pairs - to talk about the things they would really say if they were talking to a Spanish person. This is good because it generates questions like, "How do you say . .?" People are thinking about what they really want to say in the language.

Then maybe something else - eg using pictures, doing something active that also gives an excuse to talk. Timing. How can you tell how long to keep an activity going?

I don't time it. People work at different speeds so you can't get it exactly right. You can tell just from experience.

Can you use the same activities with adults and school students?

You can use the same materials. In a school, with a much bigger group you have more organisational problems and discipline can be a problem. And if you get them all talking in pairs there is just too much noise sometimes - so the actual activities may have to be changed.

W hat can students do working by themselves? Writing, reading, reading aloud, practise saying things. Other points mentioned

"You have to know the people". If you know something about them, what they're interested in, their hobbies, they are happy to talk about it. You can bring that into the lesson, tailor it a bit to fit the students. You can ask them to make a list of things they're interested in.

"You need to create a relaxed atmosphere". This was in response to a question about whether you ever get groups that just sit there in silence. The answer was that it hadn't happened yet - but the atmosphere was important and that the teacher can do things to generate the right kind of atmosphere.

There was also a brief discussion of ways to approach a lengthy literary or other text; how much reading would be done in the class? This question arose because not everyone likes reading extended pieces of text from a conputer screen. The answer was that she would only read short extracts in class and then use the rest of the lesson to discuss the text.