Quotes from teachers that have attended TPRS Workshops:
“TPRS has done to foreign language what the forward pass did to football.”
“This is my first TPRS Workshop and I’m convinced!”
“After the workshop, I have used TPRS the last two days in class. The students LOVE it! They are engaged and speaking using the past tense. I can’t wait to see the writing. Thanks for teaching me this. My students are benefitting!”
“I wanted to drop you a line and tell you how much your workshop changed my way of teaching, the kids’ way of learning, and probably all of our lives! I’m only 1.5 days in, but already the lightbulbs are lighting up above the heads of the kids I thought had checked out permanently. I am delighted by this, and am shifting gears to do much more storytelling, and little, if any, bookwork. Thank you so much for your guidance and for doing what you do.”
“I learned more in this 3-day workshop about teaching languages than I learned in all of my Masters program.” — 2012 Workshop attendee. Heidi Mitzelfeld
“I just wanted to thank you for such an engaging, quality conference! I’m so used to being inundated with ideas and strategies, but never having enough time to actually see them modeled and then practiced. On Thursday (the day after the conference), in about 15 minutes I wrote down three target sentences as well as different circling questions to prepare for a 5th grade class. I was able to do it with confidence, and the kids had a grea time. They caught on so quickly, and now I’m planning the embedded readings, followed by a retell, and I have to say, I’m so excited to see how they do! Since then, I’ve been using TPRS in 4th grade as our “review” portino of class. They think it’s a game, which is how I like to teach most of the time anyway. Thanks for this wonderful gift!”
“I attended the August workshop in Newark, NJ and I just had to write to tell you how wonderful the workshop was. I have jumped off the diving board and am doing the TPRS with my kids and it is just great! I have always done portions of it but never completely. My principal is behind me and the kids seem to be responding. This method is so freeing and it gives me new life. When my first Spanish 3 student gave a three minute summar of my Spongebob / Lady Gagy story I was astounded. You could have heard a pin drop in the room. The kids were amazed too. Thanks again for your workshop! I will be back!”
“The TPRS training in Newark was an amazing, empowering learning experience. I laughed more while learning German using this approach, and I found the process to be fun and effective. At the end of the three days I was thinking in German as I fell asleep at night and was able to write a story of 90 words in five minutes. I began using TPRS with the 5th grade and have found it to be very generative. I have given informal assessments where the students translate a story into English that we have told. It is working marvelously. Everyone scored at least a 90%. Hurray! I have more recently begun using it with all of my age groups in some form. I am using the written support as low as second grade and the kids are eating it up! Thanks again for this wonderful gift.”
“As I write this, I am joined in class by Elvis, Lady Gaga, and Rihanna. In the past few weeks, I have met President Obama (who grew out his hair and dyed it blonde) and Britney Spears, and have learned about Chad Ochocinco’s teddy bear. In three years of our Spanish program, this is the most engaged I have consistently seen our kids. They are smiling, laughing, and having fun AND learning. Today when the bell rang, I actually heard a few of Berta’s kids groan because they wanted to write more in their summary of the story. Our second-year language students are speaking and writing more than they ever have before, and it is due in large part to the creativity and joy of TPRS.
This evening, I received the following email from one of my Spanish 1 teachers about her unit exam results. The Unit 1 tests are pre-TPRS and Unit 2 tests are after we integrated more TPRS framework into the last unit:
I AM SO EXCITED I MIGHT PEE MY PANTS!!! Check out these scores:
(student a) Unit 1 Test – 67 / Unit 2 Test – 90
(student b) Unit 1 Test – 66 / Unit 2 Test – 93
(student c) Unit 1 Test – 71 / Unit 2 Test – 90
(student d) Unit 1 Test – 42 / Unit 2 Test – 79
(student e) Unit 1 Test – 49 / Unit 2 Test – 90
The students that she mentions here are some of our students who struggle the most. I am so happy to see how much our team and our students have grown. Thank you for sharing with us and we continue to grow in our practice of TPRS every week!”
“I am so grateful that I was fortunate enough to attend your conference. I have had German on my mind since I left! I want to learn more! I have always been intimidated by other languages due to the fact that I have no yet mastered Spanish. You showed me that more languages are a blessing, not a chore. I loved learning that nouns in German start with a capital. I loved learning that there is no past tense in Mandarin. I want to learn more! I loved that we had to break into groups in order to practice the method. Fun fact: if you act something out, it becomes internalized and you learn it easier. I am going to put my heart into next semester in order to “sell” TPRS so that my school will consider a new and better approach. I have never been this motivated or excited about teaching in a long, long time, and for this I sincerely thank you.”
Reflections from a TPRS student. “My name is Jack. I am a 17 year old student at Tamanawis. For the last two years I’ve been taking Spanish classes. I’m glad to say I did quite well because of your program. The first year I arrived to Surrey from my native Quebec, I signed up for Spanish classes. The class was very different but I enjoyed it thoroughly because I love languages. The only problem is that it didn’t feel natural, it felt like a struggle regardless of my teacher’s efforts. I found it hard, as did everyone else in my class. The first year I did average, getting around a 70%. The next year I took Spanish again, but this time something was very different. My teacher’s whole approach on the subject was different. It felt natural. As the semester progressed I learned a lot more than I ever thought possible. In the end, the class sparked an interest in languages that I didn’t know I had. I am very grateful because now I want to get a minor degree in Spanish. My teacher insisted on me thanking you personally for your program, because it actually helped a lot of people, including me.”
