Original source: Teaching English without Teaching English | Roberto Guzman | TEDxUPRM
Original title: Teaching English without Teaching English by Roberto Guzman
Summary by: Luis Francisco Montero
This suggestions is dedicated for those students that pass the exams in writing but have troubles in speaking.
You’re going to go into a work environment in which is expected to think at higher levels of cognition: To Analyze, to synthesize, to evaluate, and have to do it in English.
So this system is learning English, without learning English.
Let’s move away from the grammar.
System of three stages:
#1. BS Detector:
#1.1. Critical thinking skills: Ask a number of specific questions of anything that you see, read or hear.
Is the speaker being specific?
Is the speaker comprehensive?
Is she looking at all the available evidence?
Is the speaker looking at the burden of proof?
Is the speaker talking about a scientific topic?
Is there replicability?
Is there experimental data to support that claim?
#1.2. Detect logical fallacies
Logical fallacies are mistakes people make in the reasoning process.
A False cause and effect: A succeed, B succeed, then A case B. Maybe yes, but maybe not.
Ad hominems: When the person gets personal, instead of attacking your arguments, the person attacks your person.
Argument from authority.
#1.3. Is the speaker really a deep thinker or is he only repeated ideas?
With BS Detector you: analyze, synthesize, and evaluate.
We need to change our minds constantly, because the world change and we need to change our minds with the world.
“Progress is impossible without change and those who can not change their minds can not change anything” - George Bernard Shaw
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#2. Watch TED Talks, Youtube videos, read essays, read newspapers, and we don’t use text books, instead we use text about the real world, that fosters an atmosphere of conversation in classroom.
#1 Ad hominems are not allowed, not offend, not attack. You must respect everybody’s freedom to differ from you.
#2 Ideas are not people, ideas do not have rights: if somebody say something that is questionable you should feel free to question that idea. It’s an ethical responsibility.
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#3 Reading and writing.
If you want to learn a language you must be willing to make mistakes.
That is how you know the boundaries of linguistic rules.
Feel complete confortable to say whatever you want to say, however you want to say.
You must want to take part of an interesting conversation.
Realize that you can make mistakes.
Mistakes are part of the language acquisition process.
Form is secondary to content.
Get your ideas, get your evidence, get your feelings on paper or in speaking, then, let’s correct the paper.
First, focus on content, not form, and then you focus on form.
Content is more important than form.
You can’t fake passion or content.
There’s nothing wrong with asking questions.
You should be an intense question asker.
Growth and maturity come from out ability to question.
