China Holistic English » Oral English

SELF-DISCIPLINE

Theodore — Tue, 30 Nov 2010 20:37:55 +0000

The Oral portion of the final exam was given 4 weeks early. SURPRISE!!

The questions and answers were given on the first class day of the semester. Every student wote the questions and answers in their HE Workbook. An admonishment was given that the oral final exam required attention every day for the next 18 weeks and that China’s 3 day educational process simply would not work. (Day 1 – memorize everything from the 18 week semester; Day 2 – spit it all out on the final exam; Day 3 – forget, erase everything that was memorized.) It was also suggested that at the time of the final exam there would be students completely unprepared.

By giving the oral final exam 4 weeks early, the performance measured effort over a 13 week period rather than last minute memorization skills.

Those students with real intrinsic motivation and exercising self-discipline to properly schedule their time earned a grade of 80 and above on the surprise oral final examination. Only 11% of the students earned a grade of 80 and above. 89% of the students had done nothing for 13 weeks.

Those students who claim they did not have enough time for English are good at making excuses. (11% found the time.) They need to develop more self-discipline. They need to learn NOT to put off to tomorrow what can be done today because tomorrow has its own requirements.

There is a proverb on the HEL wall, “If you want to grow leaders, you can’t let explanations and excuses become a way of life.”

Without a change in attitude, those who were unprepared for the surprise oral final examination will also be unprepared for the surprises in daily life.

CLASSROOMS

Theodore — Fri, 29 Oct 2010 22:44:16 +0000

Oral English Classrooms

The course is called Oral English. It is usually conducted in a multi-media classroom with theater style fixed seating. Students are called upon to stand and recite memorized passages. This course should be called “Memorizing Useless Set Phrases.”

The course should be re-named “Conversational Chinglish” and it should be conducted in classrooms with movable desks. There should be real conversations in a relaxed non-academic atmosphere. This produces creative thinkers and speakers of understandable Chinglish.

Chinese vs. Foreign Teachers

Theodore — Fri, 29 Oct 2010 22:28:51 +0000

Chinese vs. Foreign Teachers

Chinese teachers lecture to a group, which happens to be made up of individuals. There is little or no individual eye contact and no attention paid to any individual student. There is no individualized attention paid to any student and there is no discipline administered. Students text message on their phones, play phone games, do homework from other classes, chat with each other and even sleep with their heads on their desks.

Foreign teachers teach interactively to individuals, who happen to make up a group. There is eye contact with each student, and great attention is paid to the needs of the individual student. Discipline is maintained.

This difference explains why Chinese teachers are able to teach 150 students in an oral English class yet foreign teachers scream bloody murder when given more than 40 students in an Oral English class.

Teachers vs. Facilitators

Theodore — Fri, 29 Oct 2010 22:25:50 +0000

Teachers vs. Facilitators

Teachers are the lord and master of their classroom. In many instances they are control freaks. They must be the star of their own show (classroom) and do most, if not all of the talking.

Facilitators create the atmosphere and circumstances for the students to be the stars of the classroom and do most, if not all, of the talking.

Holistic English requires facilitators not teachers. This is the greatest hindrance to Chinese teachers successfully using the Holistic English program, they simply can’t stop teaching. However, many foreign teachers suffer from the same limitation. They simply feel compelled to transfer knowledge from their brain to the student’s brain. Holistic English is about empowering students to think and speak and has little involvement with transferring knowledge. When students speak there is simply no right or wrong answer, just what they think and what they say.

CONSUMER POLL

Theodore — Sat, 30 Jan 2010 05:21:25 +0000

STUDENT/CONSUMER SATISFACTION SURVEY

HOLISTIC ENGLISH vs. TRADITIONAL ORAL ENGLISH

MARTIN WOLFF

Sun Yat-sen University

INTRODUCTION

Under the leadership of Dean XIA Jimei, PhD and Vice-Dean Wang Zhe, PhD, Sun Yat-sen University (Zhongshan), Guangzhou, a top tier university, arguably has one of China’s most innovative, progressive and successful English teaching programs (TEFL), having received numerous national English teaching awards.

In the pursuit of English teaching excellence, commencing in March 2009, Holistic English has been taught to post-graduate non-English majors. At the end of each semester the students/consumers are asked to answer an anonymous questionnaire indicating the amount of benefits they perceive to have received from the Holistic English program, ranking them from 1 – 10, with ten being the most beneficial. The areas of perceived benefits are:

Chart 1

Vocabulary

Reading

Oral

Writing

Listening

Chart 2

Motivation

Self-Discipline

Confidence

Creative Thinking

Autonomous Learning Skills

Chart 3

World View

The students’ questionnaire answers were then tabulated and depicted in graph form. The graphs in the following right hand column summarize the Holistic English students’ perceived benefits. (600 students for the spring 2009 term, 700 students for the fall 2009 term and 700 students for the spring 2010 term.) See graphs B, D, H, J, L, N, P, R T and X.

The Department of English Teaching administration selected a group of 3 classes for the March 2009 semester; 4 classes for the September 2009 semester and ____ classes for the March 2010 semester, to use for comparison of students’ perceived benefits. The control group classes of post-graduate non-English majors were taught a traditional oral English program, by some of the Department’s best teachers. At the end of each semester the students/consumers in the control group were also asked to answer the same questionnaire as answered by the Holistic English students. The students’ questionnaire answers were then tabulated and depicted in graph form. The graphs in the following left hand column summarize the control group students’ perceived benefits. (129 students for the spring 2009 term, 172 students for the fall 2009 term and ____ students for the spring 2010 term.) See graphs A, C, G, I, K, O, Q, S and W.

In the spring 2009 semester 10% of the students in the control group filled out the questionnaire in Chinese instead of English.

In the fall 2009 semester 14.5% of the students failed to follow the simple written English instructions causing numerous Questionnaires to be invalidated.

Class 22 - 6 Questionnaires invalid

Class 23 - 1 Questionnaire invalid

Class 24 - 6 Questionnaires invalid

Class 26 – 12 Questionnaires invalid

DOWNLOAD THE COMPLETE ARTICLE FROM THE DOWNLOAD PAGE.

Holistic English vs. Traditional Oral English