I love the MELS program in many ways. I find it great that we try to get the students to communicate very early, that we are supposed to speak only English and that we are supposed to be encouraging them to dive right in to talking. But the problem I see is this: due to so few hours of teaching time, it is simply IMPOSSIBLE to do this properly. The program is based on the assumption that the students: 1) Are angels who actually LOOK at the teachers actions and facial expressions (as opposed to the reality which is that they are often distracted or just plain rude and no amount of singing, dancing and rewards will help the 4 or 5 off-taskers who ruin the classes for everyone) because they know there are no real consequences for them not studying/paying attention/ being rude/not learning English 2) Care to learn (as opposed to the reality that many parents come right out and say: My kid will be doing NO homework in English because it is too low on our priority list. They will not even do the kind of homework that is very easy like watching a show on TV or listening to English radio or playing online games on an iPad...) My experience is that some will do homework/studying consistently and try to watch English TV etc and that these very French kids can succeed if they really try. But contrast this to the same kid who sits beside him/her who does NOTHING to follow up at home and the results are very very varied. The kids who do nothing at home simply cannot pass the tests and parents refuse to acknowledge this or accept it. I tell parents this: If you pay for your kid to take piano lessons, you expect them to practice every day in between lessons, right? Learning English is the same! You simply cannot go to piano lessons once a week and return a week later without practicing and expect to learn any piano piece. You just cant. You need to follow up at home to move forward.
Posted on: Mon, 26 May 2014 15:30:35 +0000
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