good teaching strategies: using prior knowledge and retrieval practice

A very practical piece of research highlighted in the EL Gazette looks at common teaching strategies and procedures:

The importance of prior knowledge
BY Carol Lethaby
Educational research shows us how essential prior knowledge is to learning new things. The average correlation between background knowledge and achievement is meaning that students who have a lot of background knowledge on a topic will learn new information on that topic better and more easily than students who do not have good previous knowledge of the topic.

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Retrieval practice
By Russell Mayne
One of the most robust findings in educational research is that retrieval practice is important for learning. That is, asking students to try to recall items previously studied will help them to retain the information.

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elgazette.com/exploring-the-evidence

With a bit more here:

PRIOR KNOWLEDGE:

New learning is constructed on prior knowledge. The more we understand about what students already think, and the more we help them engage their prior understandings, the more likely they are to learn well – and the less likely they are to misinterpret the material in our courses.

hampshire.edu/ctl/2017/09/14/the-importance-of-engaging-prior-knowledge

Videos:

strategiesforspecialinterventions.weebly.com/activating-prior-knowledge

If we don't ignite the prior knowledge of our students when we teach, we may fall prey to what the late Brazilian educational theorist Paulo Freire referred to as "the banking concept" in pedagogy -- treating students as if they are empty vessels waiting to be filled with the knowledge of the teacher. Basically, taking on a view that the kids have very little to offer to the classroom learning and discussions.

edutopia.org/blog/prior-knowledge-tapping-into-often-classroom-rebecca-alber

Assessment:

teaching.cornell.edu/spring-teaching-resources/assessment-evaluation/assessing-prior-knowledge

We do not always consciously make use of what we already know when we try to learn new information. But evidence is piling up that suggests this is a smart thing to do. So how can you make the most of your prior knowledge to prepare for acquiring – and retaining – new knowledge?

theguardian.com/education/2016/jan/09/what-you-already-know-is-the-key-to-learning-new-things

RETRIEVAL PRACTICE:

Let's focus on getting information "out" of students' heads.
Retrieval practice boosts learning by pulling information out of students’ heads, rather than cramming information into students’ heads.

www.retrievalpractice.org/why-it-works

Podcast:

cultofpedagogy.com/retrieval-practice

(see diagram)

Video:

academicaffairs.arizona.edu/l2l-strategy-retrieval-practice

More techniques:

teacherhead.com/2019/03/03/10-techniques-for-retrieval-practice

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bouba/kiki

 An interesting piece in today's EL Gazette:

What shape are the words ‘bouba’ and  ‘kiki’, pointy or round? 

The shape of words | elgazette.com

The first research was carried out in 1929 - and repeated in 2001:

This picture is used as a test to demonstrate that people may not attach sounds to shapes arbitrarily: American college undergraduates and Tamil speakers in India called the shape on the left "kiki" and the one on the right "bouba".

Ramachandran and Hubbard suggest that the kiki/bouba effect has implications for the evolution of language, because it suggests that the naming of objects is not completely arbitrary.7  The rounded shape may most commonly be named "bouba" because the mouth makes a more rounded shape to produce that sound while a more taut, angular mouth shape is needed to make the sounds in "kiki".

Bouba/kiki effect | en.wikipedia.org

The EL Gazette shows the most recent research:

Co-author Dr Marcus Perlman, Lecturer in English Language and Linguistics at the University of Birmingham, commented: “Our findings suggest that most people around the world exhibit the bouba/kiki effect, including people who speak various languages and regardless of the writing system they use. “Our ancestors could have used links between speech sounds and visual properties to create some of the first spoken words and today, many thousands of years later, the perceived roundness of the English word ‘balloon’ may not be just a coincidence after all.”

And there are some great videos which show how it works:

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speaking english is not always so good...

Sometimes, speaking English is not necessarily going to help you - as this piece from Liz Granirer writing in the E L Gazette shows:

English  a barrier

In a twist on the usual assumption that speaking and understanding English is a bonus, English-speaking families in Canada’s Quebec Province are concerned that their children will be disadvantaged,

In particular, almost 50% worry that their child won’t be understood at daycare and won’t understand what is being said to them there. Further, the parents have issues themselves around being understood and understanding what staff might be telling them about their children.

According to CTV News, the Quebec Community Health and Social Services Network (CHSSN) surveyed nearly 1,800 English-speaking parents in the province and found that 62% had difficulty finding early childhood services available in English, 67% had a hard time finding daycare with English-speaking staff and 80% had trouble finding specialist services in English for their child.

CHSSN Executive Director Jennifer Johnson told CTV News that English-speaking families are disadvantaged in other ways too: “Census information tells us we have higher levels of unemployment, higher levels of people living below the lower income cut-off [and] we have higher levels of single-parent families.”

It seems in this case, English is not so good.

English a barrier | elgazette.com

There are other situations when speaking English is 'not so good':

Native English speakers are the world’s worst communicators | bbc.com

What are the disadvantages of being a native English speaker? | quora.com

On the other hand - speaking English can bring you all sorts of 'privileges':

Language privilege: What it is and why it matters ! | linguisticpulse.com

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being bilingual

Our 'natural state' is to be at least bilingual:

we are by nature multilingual | jayjaydoubleyoudoubleyou.blogspot

Most people in the world are bilingual:

What is the percentage of bilingual people in the world? | researchgate.net

As a piece on the BBC asks:

Most people in the world speak more than one language, suggesting the human brain evolved to work in multiple tongues. If so, asks Gaia Vince, are those of us who speak only one language missing out?

The amazing benefits of being bilingual | bbc.com

And which the Washington Post asks:

Half of the world is bilingual. What’s our problem? | washingtonpost.com

Here's a programme from BBC Radio on being bilingual:

Axel Kacoutié explores living between languages and finding yourself in the gaps

A Mother Tongue | bbc.co.uk

Here's the transcript:

A MOTHER TONGUEBY AXEL KACOUTIÉ

This is the Twitter feed on the programme:

https://twitter.com/AxelKacoutie/status/1460355488969854987

Axel is originally from the Ivory Coast in West Africa - and speaks French and English as 'a mother tongue':

axelkacoutie.com

And here he is with his regular Today in Focus podcast:

Axel Kacoutié | The Guardian

Finally, it really is a good thing to become 'bilingual':

34 unobvious benefits of learning a second language - Jay Doubleyou

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the tyranny of positive thinking

There's been a lot of questioning about the 'power of positive thinking':

Jay Doubleyou: the power of positive thinking, norman vincent peale and donald trump

Jay Doubleyou: optimism - our enemy

Jay Doubleyou: you can't get success and happiness through positive thinking

Jay Doubleyou: smile or die: the power of positive thinking

Jay Doubleyou: mindfulness: "too many people are avoiding using their brains"

Jay Doubleyou: "smile or die": the false promises of positive thinking

A lot of it is actually about how lucky or unlucky we are:

Jay Doubleyou: don’t think you’re lucky? think again

Jay Doubleyou: meritocracy

Jay Doubleyou: the tyranny of merit: we are not self-made or self-sufficient

And so we have the tyranny of positive thinking...

Sian Ejiwunmi-Le Berre argues against the tyranny of positivity which forms part of a culture of "performative wellness", which she says sees illness as a form of personal failure. When extrapolated to other aspects of human life, this attitude is a "poison to society".

Four Thought - The Tyranny of Positivity - BBC Sounds

It’s hard to scroll through your social media feeds without being bombarded with motivational quotes. Bonus points if they are spelled out on a letter board.
Good vibes only. Choose happiness. Find the rainbow in the rain.
As a psychologist (and as a human), these quotes kind of irk me. They make us think that life should be all roses and rainbows; we just need to choose the right state of mind. And, by extension, if you are struggling, you aren’t trying hard enough. You just need to change your mindset.

The Tyranny of the Positive Attitude | Psychology Today 

Think happy, be happy? Maybe not. Harvard psychologist Susan David examines the backlash effect of forced positivity in our lives.

The tyranny of positivity: A Harvard psychologist details our unhealthy obsession with happiness - Big Think

You're Doing 'Happy' All Wrong, A Harvard Psychologist Weighs In

(20+) Watch | Facebook

It is no surprise that “think and grow rich” should blend the notion of positive thought with the accumulation of material wealth. Hundreds of self-help books since the start of positive thinking have talked about how the right thoughts can “attract” money. They’ve also framed practical problems such as world-wide unemployment, low wages, or medical bills as “excuses.” If you can free your mind of the “real” obstacle to wealth—such as the harboring subconscious revulsion for “filthy lucre” or deep resentment/jealousy of the rich, you can have it all. It is not social class or larger institutional structures that limit the average person’s success but “negative self-talk” that impede your progress toward wealth accumulation.
Consumer capitalism is, according to Ehrenreich, “congenial to positive thinking.” It promises that we deserve more, and can have it, if we really want it, and if we are only willing to make the effort to get it. While she agrees that the notion of perpetual growth is absurd, a belief in positive thinking makes ‘having it all’ seem, “possible, if not ordained.” p.8. Think –the right way–and growing rich is yours.
Happy shoppers, according to Les Slater, spend up to 20% more, and therefore one avenue to making customer’s happy is to have happy salespeople. During the last Great Depression, workers were expected to ‘fake it ‘til they make it.’ Today, it is no longer enough to simply act happy. Employers now expect their workers to be happy.

The Tyranny of Positive Thinking - Resilience

I think this whole positive thinking thing, and you guys alluded to this a little bit, really does fit into the conservative ideal because it puts the onus on the individual. If you’re not successful, it’s because you’re not being positive enough, that it’s somehow your fault. It totally fits into that whole conservative model. So I just want to get your comments on that.
EHRENREICH: I completely agree on that last point, that this is, I think I referred to it earlier as almost like a form of political pacification when you tell people who have been victimized in some way that they should be grateful for it. That’s a powerful form of social control. I want to, as a fellow breast cancer sufferer, say you hold on to your feelings, you respect your feelings. What I hated about all that positivity when I was being treated for cancer was that there seemed to be no room for me to express my personal anxiety or anger. We have to take those feelings seriously. I think that’s the biggest thing I learned from the feminist movement, for example.

The Tyranny of Positivity – P U L S E

The success of positive psychology has given rise to contrarian books with titles such as Stop Smiling, Start Kvetching and The Positive Power of Negative Thinking. Such books denounce “the tyranny of the positive attitude.” The book Bright-Sided by Barbara Ehrenreich (Seligman’s most formidable critic) is acid and incisive. She mocks Seligman’s happiness formula and the smile studies done by other positive psychologists that purport to prove that changing facial expression can trick our brains into happiness. She criticizes the profiteering from corporations and Seligman’s support from the conservative Templeton Foundation with its attachment to the status quo.
Seligman believes the world is getting better and learned optimism will make its inhabitants flourish. Citing the optimism preceding the Iraq War, the irrational exuberance causing the Great Recession, income inequality, and the upbeat propaganda that supports dictators, Ehrenreich argues that in an unfair, still dangerous world, realism and defensive pessimism are necessary. Today, in a pandemic paralyzing the globe, Seligman’s optimism might even seem facile, his defense of it suspect..

Martin Seligman and the Rise of Positive Psychology | The National Endowment for the Humanities

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issues around sport

Breaking News English has lots of lessons around sport:

Sports Events - ESL Lesson Plan - Breaking News English Lesson

Sports - ESL Lesson Plan - Breaking News English Lesson

Team Sports - ESL Lesson Plan - Breaking News English Lesson

Sexism - Breaking News English Lesson - ESL

AND:

Manny Pacquiao - ESL Lesson Plan - Breaking News English Lesson

De-stressing - ESL Lesson Plan - Breaking News English Lesson

Paralympics - ESL Lesson Plan - Breaking News English Lesson

Pink - ESL Lesson Plan - Breaking News English Lesson

There are lots of 'issues' around sport:

Jay Doubleyou: team gb... or uk?

Jay Doubleyou: atelic activities

Jay Doubleyou: bread and circuses today

Jay Doubleyou: football and poetry

Jay Doubleyou: sport and politics mix badly

Jay Doubleyou: sport and politics

Jay Doubleyou: the english and the germans

Jay Doubleyou: coaching v mentoring: what works best for teachers?

Jay Doubleyou: sport and history

Jay Doubleyou: bread and circuses

Jay Doubleyou: sport on the radio - in english

Jay Doubleyou: bbc radio 5 to help you with your english...

Jay Doubleyou: speaking english at the olympics

Jay Doubleyou: stimulating discussion: the politics of...

Jay Doubleyou: sport as poetry in motion... ?

Jay Doubleyou: winning or losing?

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english is weird

There's so much in English that makes absolutely no sense whatsoever:

67 Hilarious Reasons Why The English Language Is The Worst | Bored Panda

This explains why:

Why is English so weirdly different from other languages? | Aeon Essays

But maybe it isn't so weird?!

5 reasons English is (supposedly) weird - YouTube

Here's a bit more fun:

When a Frenchman calls an Indian Call Center : The iRabbit - YouTube

Jay Doubleyou: Search results for crazy

And how we love (not) ambiguity:

Top 10 Movies with Ambiguous Endings - YouTube (spoilers!)

Top 10 Movies That You Have To Watch Twice - YouTube (no spoilers!)

Jay Doubleyou: ambiguity

And how language has to be ambiguous because humans communicate that way:

Jay Doubleyou: steven pinker - and language

RSA ANIMATE: Language as a Window into Human Nature - YouTube

And it can be confusing:

Garden-path sentence - Wikipedia

20 Garden Path Sentence Examples | Apartment Therapy

Syntactic ambiguity - Wikipedia

Jay Doubleyou: ambiguous newspaper headlines

And if you want to sound 'English', it's the... sound:

Adriano Celentano - Prisencolinensinainciusol - YouTube

Jay Doubleyou: how english sounds to non-english speakers

And there are lots of 'false friends':

Jay Doubleyou: why is english so different from other languages? part one: vocab

Finally:

Time flies like an arrow; fruit flies like a banana - Wikipedia

Jay Doubleyou: why is english so different from other languages? part two: grammar

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learning styles are a myth

It's very standard stuff when teaching and learning that "we all learn differently":

Jay Doubleyou: visual, auditory, kinesthetic learning styles

Jay Doubleyou: students and teachers prefer different activities when learning english...

And there are lots of similar approaches:

Jay Doubleyou: multiple intelligences in the classroom

Jay Doubleyou: multiple intelligences: shown in a clever way

Jay Doubleyou: learning theory: a short guide

However, there is more and more evidence suggesting that much of this is a myth: 

There is no evidence that designing lessons that appeal to different learning styles accelerates student learning.

The Stubborn Myth of “Learning Styles” - Education Next

A broader approach that invites students to reflect on their learning, rather than narrow their style down:

Learning Styles as a Myth | Poorvu Center for Teaching and Learning

In the early ’90s, a New Zealand man named Neil Fleming decided to sort through something that had puzzled him during his time monitoring classrooms as a school inspector. In the course of watching 9,000 different classes, he noticed that only some teachers were able to reach each and every one of their students. What were they doing differently?
Fleming zeroed in on how it is that people like to be presented information. For example, when asking for directions, do you prefer to be told where to go or to have a map sketched for you?
Today, 16 questions like this comprise the VARK questionnaire that Fleming developed to determine someone’s “learning style.” VARK, which stands for “visual, aural, read/write, and kinesthetic,” sorts students into those who learn best visually, through aural or heard information, through reading, or through “kinesthetic” experiences.

Are ‘Learning Styles’ Real? - The Atlantic

Many people, including educators, believe learning styles are set at birth and predict both academic and career success even though there is no scientific evidence to support this common myth, according to new research published by the American Psychological Association.

Belief in learning styles myth may be detrimental

Instead, it's really all about memory strategies and about how they are thinking about the material which is presented - and about multimedia approaches:

The Biggest Myth In Education - YouTube

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do the english speak english the best?

The Dutch are 'the best' speakers of English - according to rankings of 'students':

English Speakers in the World – Who Are the Best and Worst Students?

The Dutch are the best non-native English speakers in the world (again!) – DutchReview

In fact, it's now part of life in Holland and many other countries not part of the former British Empire:

English is no longer a foreign language in NL, but it has a unique character here - DutchNews.nl

There is of course 'international English' or English as a Lingua Franca:

Decades of research show that when a native English speaker enters a conversation among nonnative speakers, understanding goes down. Global communication specialist Heather Hansen tells us that's because the native speaker doesn't know how to do what nonnative speakers do naturally: speak in ways that are accessible to everyone, using simple words and phrases.
And yet, as Hansen points out, this more accessible way of speaking is often called "bad English." There are whole industries devoted to "correcting" English that doesn't sound like it came from a native British or American speaker. Try Googling "how to get rid of my accent," and see how many ads pop up.
It turns out that these definitions of "good" and "bad" English may be counterproductive if our goal is to communicate as effectively as possible.

Why Nonnative English Speakers Actually Speak The Best English : Goats and Soda : NPR

And you could also pick up the 'bad English' spoken by 'native speakers':

When we compare standard, correct English to what native speakers usually use in everyday life, there are plenty of discrepancies! Most people in the United States do not speak perfect English; in fact, many common mistakes are actually accepted forms of speech nowadays. Many native American English speakers break grammar rules, they use incorrect sentence structure, and they use vocabulary in what most people would consider the wrong way.

HOW TO SPEAK ENGLISH BETTER THAN MOST NATIVE ENGLISH SPEAKERS 😃 | Go Natural English - YouTube

Finally, a nice little piece from Liz Granirer writing in the latest EL Gazette - with the latest research:

It will come as no surprise to anyone that in Europe, the country that speaks English the best and the most is the United Kingdom, though it’s not the only language here. Immigration has brought many other languages, so that, alongside other local languages such as Welsh and Cornish, 8% of the population speaks a language other than English (though, of course, they may speak English as well).
However, on the continent, the number one spot is taken by Sweden where, according to novinite.com, 91% of the population is fluent in English. The Netherlands is close behind with a whopping 90% of the population who can speak English. Proof of how fluent they are here is that English-language films aren’t shown with subtitles – which may go a long way in explaining why their accent leans towards North America.

Who speaks English best? | E L Gazette

bilingual teaching today

You can learn anything through English or any other language:

Content and language integrated learning - Wikipedia

CLIL has come a long way over the last decade:

Jay Doubleyou: clil: content and language integrated learning

If you google 'clil' today, most of the news pieces are in languages other than English:

clil - Google Search

It is of great interest all over the world - and an issue for great debate: 

Bilingual Taiwan By 2030 – Doable? Necessary?

Under the push of CLIL (Content and Language Integrated Learning), the three hours of English class per week would extend learning English through other subjects, calling into question whether or not students could absorb comprehensive knowledge – of the subject matter being taught – through the language being used.

Bilingual Taiwan By 2030 - Doable? Necessary? - The Taiwan Times

Language experts and teachers in primary and secondary schools discuss the pros and cons of a system that many feel has failed to provide the desired skills

In recent years, an educational trend has gained new traction, one that holds that a pure British accent – the Queen’s English – no longer has to be the one that prevails when teaching, learning or using English to communicate. This trend, known as ELF (English as a lingua franca), favors a more neutral pronunciation where the goal is to get the message across.
“The important thing now is being able to communicate; the purity of the accent is a thing of the past,” holds María Luisa Pérez, a professor of English studies at Jaén University and a leading researcher on this issue.
This line of thinking bears a relationship to the debate on whether the bilingual Spanish-English education model used in some public schools in Spain is really up to par, considering that some regions – which have devolved powers over education – ask teachers for a B2 level, indicating fluency but not proficiency as defined by the Common European Framework of Reference for Languages (CEFRL). Other regions require teachers to prove a C1 level, for proficient users of the language.
In recent years, nearly 90 centers have dropped out of the bilingual education system, viewing it as ineffective. But Pérez, just like other experts, warns that many people simply have the wrong idea of what a bilingual model really does. “It’s a mistake to think that children will end up speaking English just like they speak Spanish; the goal is for them to achieve a functional level that will let them communicate and work in the future,” she explains...

Learning English: Defenders of bilingual education in Spain: ‘It’s a mistake to think that students will speak English like they do Spanish’ | Society | EL PAÍS English Edition

More US schools teach in English and Spanish, but not enough to help Latino kids

Classes taught in both languages help students from various backgrounds, but many districts have fought to keep Spanish out of schools.

The programs can be tough to implement. Hurdles include a debate over the best way to teach English learners, public hostility against those who speak a native language other than English, shortages of bilingual teachers and even the fact that dual-language programs often grow fastest in areas where upper-income parents ask for them. That's good for children who participate, but it worries advocates who want to see language-minority students have equal access.

More US schools teach in Spanish, but not enough to help Latinos

A lot of language schools in the UK are offering specialist classes:

Overseas Teachers of English | Sidmouth International School

CLIL Courses for Teachers: Specialized TEFL/TESOL Certification in Content and Language Integrated Learning

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english as a post-colonial language

This is from a very interesting piece from the latest issue of EL Gazette:

Can we disentangle TEFL from its colonial past?

By Alice Rodgers -28th September 2021

... it was actually during the historical period after colonialism (so-called ‘post-colonialism’, although the idea that there has ever really been a ‘post’ period to colonialism has been hotly contested by scholars and writers alike) that the spread of English as a lingua franca really flourished. Post-colonial theory maintains that this was a time during which empires were looking for methods of conserving the subservience of previously colonised countries (see Postcolonialism: An Historical Introduction by Robert JC Young, 2016). As Suhanthie Motha explains in her book Race, Empire, and English Language Teaching (2014), this is what is stamped on the profession that we, as TEFL teachers, occupy today.

This idea that English is a tool for the enlightenment and civilisation of certain uneducated people still persists. A great deal of research has gone into analysing the prevalence of this sort of neo-colonialist thinking within TEFL materials (see Linguistic Colonialism in the English Language Textbooks of Multinational Publishing Houses by Jairo Eduardo Soto-Molina and Pilar Méndez, 2020, for example). It is common to see the reproduction of old colonial notions of Self and Other (a concept developed by Gayatri Spivak in her essay Can the Subaltern Speak?, 2010). We see presented a modern, forward- thinking, educated (English-speaking) society, which is contrasted with a society that is static, conservative and uneducated. One acts as an active transmitter of knowledge and the other a submissive receiver of knowledge. There is little room for interculturality and English is presented as the dominant, most economically useful global language.

Within this we see the glorification of the native speaker who, regardless of educational or professional experience, is appraised as the worthier teacher. This is something that Robert Phillipson famously discussed in his book Linguistic Imperialism (1992). He looked at how ‘native-speaker supremacy’, as well as English- only policies within the classroom and the idea that using other languages in the classroom reduces English standards contributes towards the hegemony of English...

Can we disentangle TEFL from its colonial past? | E L Gazette

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With links to the books here:

Amazon.com: Race, Empire, and English Language Teaching: Creating Responsible and Ethical Anti-Racist Practice (Multicultural Education): 9780807755129: Motha, Suhanthie, Banks, James A.: Books

Linguistic Imperialism - Wikipedia

Linguistic Imperialism (Oxford Applied Linguistics): 9780194371469: Business Development Books @ Amazon.com

Linguistic Colonialism in the English Language Textbooks of Multinational Publishing Houses | HOW Journal

Postcolonialism: An Historical Introduction | Wiley

Postcolonialism: An Historical Introduction: Young, Robert J. C.: 9781405120944: Amazon.com: Books

Can the Subaltern Speak? | Columbia University Press

Amazon.com: Can the Subaltern Speak?: Reflections on the History of an Idea: 9780231143851: Morris, Rosalind: Books

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And more here:

Jay Doubleyou: empire 2.0 and the 'imperial nostalgia' driving the british culture war

Jay Doubleyou: what's a 'native speaker' of english? part two

Jay Doubleyou: othering

Jay Doubleyou: challenging white supremacism in australia and new zealand

Jay Doubleyou: "we need to insist on english as our language in this country."

Jay Doubleyou: racial issues

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a critique of psychology

Everyone likes to see 'history' in a certain way:

Jay Doubleyou: rewriting history

THE DATE 1917:

Of course a lot of dates are 'significant', but let's look at 1917:

The Windsor Family:

House of Windsor - Wikipedia

Britain’s King George V changes royal surname - HISTORY

British royal family change their name to Windsor - archive 1917 | Monarchy | The Guardian

Russian Revolution:

Putin Likes to Pretend the Russian Revolution Never Happened - The Atlantic

Putin, wary of political tumult, shuns Russian Revolution centenary | Reuters

Revolution, what revolution? Russians show little interest in 1917 centenary | Russia | The Guardian

Balfour Declaration:

More than a century on: The Balfour Declaration explained | Middle East | Al Jazeera

The contested centenary of Britain’s ‘calamitous promise’ | Israel | The Guardian

Britain's true motivation behind the Balfour Declaration - Opinion - Haaretz.com

Zionism, anti-semitism, and the Balfour Declaration | openDemocracy

USA entering WWI:

7 Ways U.S. Entry Into WWI Changed the World – Foreign Policy

The first world war helped shape modern America. Why is it so forgotten? | First world war | The Guardian

At A Hefty Cost, World War I Made The U.S. A Major Military Power : Parallels : NPR

Here's a little more on that last date:

Jay Doubleyou: the first world war: triumph and pride ... or ... tragedy and sorrow?

Jay Doubleyou: how is world war one seen in different countries

FREUD:

In particular, the psychology behind it:

Jay Doubleyou: propaganda, public relations and manufacturing consent

Freud transformed the way we think:

Curtis ends by saying that, "Although we feel we are free, in reality, we—like the politicians—have become the slaves of our own desires," and compares Britain and America to 'Democracity', an exhibit at the 1939 New York World's Fair created by Edward Bernays.

The Century of the Self - Wikipedia

The Century of the Self - Top Documentary Films

'It's much too easy really just to claim the old democratic patrician culture was better,' he says. 'People in a consumer society probably have more fun, certainly have more things, and we find those things comforting, enjoyable, and who is to say there is anything wrong with that? But we have also, perhaps, become trapped by an idea, and it has got into every corner of our lives.'

If you look around you, it is hard not to agree with this observation. The sovereignty of the Self is reflected back on us from every angle. Apart from the fact that the purchase of every canned drink or deodorant requires us to locate the hero inside ourself, our television, for example, is increasingly dedicated - from Trisha to Changing Rooms to Pop Idol - to Self-help and Self-improvement and Self-creation. We find collective comfort in celebrity; we like to colonise another Self, and treat it like our own. Our bestseller lists, from Harry Potter to Bridget Jones to A Boy Called It, reflect different kinds of wish-fulfilment.

Business culture, which expects more and more of its employees' time, also spends more and more money on making those employees feel self-empowered and self-motivated.

In this respect, the genie of the Self has already escaped the bottle. One logical conclusion of Curtis's argument is that business will eventually take over the functions of government, since it is much better, more effective, at simply satisfying people's desires than any politician ever was. This is something that Bernays predicted. In an interview when he was 100, the father of public relations allowed that he may have created something of a monster.

'Everyone has a press agent now,' he said, 'or a media consultant or communications director or whatever you want to call it. Sometimes,' he suggested, 'it seems sort of like having discovered a medicine to cure a disease, and then finding out that so much of it is being administered that people are getting sick from the overdoses.'

How Freud got under our skin | Education | The Guardian

He gave us the 'Third Revolution':

BBC Radio 4 - A History of Ideas, Historian Justin Champion on Francis Bacon, The Fourth Revolution

He definitely changed how we think - as this English lesson from the VOA shows:

How Sigmund Freud Changed What People Thought About the Mind

WE ARE ALL INDIVIDUALS:

Indeed, some would say he 'atomised' people:

Atomized individualism - definition of Atomized individualism by The Free Dictionary

Atomism (social) - Wikipedia

Individualism - Wikipedia

Microsoft Word - Individualisation

(PDF) Freud as an example of amplifying the individualistic view of the self | Qixiu Fu - Academia.edu

To what extent, then, are we responsible for our own problems - that we only have ourselves to blame?

Michael Sandel: The tyranny of merit | TED Talk

Jay Doubleyou: the tyranny of merit: we are not self-made or self-sufficient

Jay Doubleyou: meritocracy

Jay Doubleyou: don’t think you’re lucky? think again

THE MEDICALISATION OF LIFE'S PROBLEMS:

Perhaps one of the strongest criticisms of modern medicine, including psychiatry, is that it has 'medicalised' problems:

In the 1975 book Limits to medicine: Medical nemesis (1975), Ivan Illich put forth one of the earliest uses of the term "medicalization". Illich, a philosopher, argued that the medical profession harms people through iatrogenesis, a process in which illness and social problems increase due to medical intervention. Illich saw iatrogenesis occurring on three levels: the clinical, involving serious side effects worse than the original condition; the social, whereby the general public is made docile and reliant on the medical profession to cope with life in their society; and the structural, whereby the idea of aging and dying as medical illnesses effectively "medicalized" human life and left individuals and societies less able to deal with these "natural" processes.

Medicalization - Wikipedia

Medicalization of Social Problems | SpringerLink

When it comes to psychiatry, there's a whole list over what is 'normal/abnormal behaviour':

DSM-5 - Wikipedia

Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders - Wikipedia

Jay Doubleyou: how normal behavoiur becomes a mental disorder

BEHVAVIOURISM:

How can you 'engineer' people?

HUMAN RESOURCES Social Engineering In The 20th Century HQ FULL - YouTube

Jay Doubleyou: human resources as social engineering

By observing their behaviour - and predicting, and so controlling, their behaviour:

Behaviorism | Simply Psychology

Behaviorism - Wikipedia

Although it's been replaced by other therapies, behaviourism is still very influential:

A June 2002 survey listed Skinner as the most influential psychologist of the 20th century.[17]

B. F. Skinner - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

It's all rather creepy:

5 Creepy Ways Video Games Are Trying to Get You Addicted | Cracked.com

Jay Doubleyou: behaviourism >>> krashen... pinker... skinner... chomsky

And it's how education works today:

Researchers like Edward L. Thorndike build upon these foundations and, in particular, developed a S-R (stimulus-response) theory of learning. He noted that that responses (or behaviours) were strengthened or weakened by the consequences of behaviour. This notion was refined by Skinner and is perhaps better known as operant conditioning – reinforcing what you want people to do again; ignoring or punish what you want people to stop doing.

In terms of learning, according to James Hartley (1998) four key principles come to the fore:

• Activity is important. Learning is better when the learner is active rather than passive. (‘Learning by doing’ is to be applauded).
• Repetition, generalization and discrimination are important notions. Frequent practice – and practice in varied contexts – is necessary for learning to take place. Skills are not acquired without frequent practice.
• Reinforcement is the cardinal motivator. Positive reinforcers like rewards and successes are preferable to negative events like punishments and failures.
• Learning is helped when objectives are clear. Those who look to behaviourism in teaching will generally frame their activities by behavioural objectives e.g. ‘By the end of this session participants will be able to…’. With this comes a concern with competencies and product approaches to curriculum.

infed.org | The behaviourist orientation to learning

Jay Doubleyou: behaviourism >>> and learning objectives >>> and the common european framework

So, what are your 'learning objectives'?

Jay Doubleyou: a critique of learning objectives

Jay Doubleyou: 'learning by objectives' vs 'process-based learning' vs 'open-ended learning'

Jay Doubleyou: metrics, targets and measuring everything

PSYCHOLOGY IS EVERYWHERE TODAY:

It looks as though neuroscience, or 'neurobabble', is here to stay:

Jay Doubleyou: cognitive science and developmental neuroscience

Finally, psychology really is everywhere today:

Jay Doubleyou: how to define masculinity

Jay Doubleyou: is there a link between adhd and creative thinking?

Jay Doubleyou: paulo freire and the tabula rasa

Jay Doubleyou: the psychology of lies and why we fall for them

Jay Doubleyou: psychology at work

Jay Doubleyou: power, prison and punishment: the stanford experiment

Jay Doubleyou: the wave: lessons in manipulation

Jay Doubleyou: you can't get success and happiness through positive thinking

Jay Doubleyou: mindfulness: "too many people are avoiding using their brains"

Jay Doubleyou: milgram experiment

Jay Doubleyou: "smile or die": the false promises of positive thinking

Jay Doubleyou: the men who made us spend

Jay Doubleyou: the men who made us spend

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english literature in the south west of england

The South West of England has many literary associations:

South West England - Wikipedia

Jane Austen:

Jay Doubleyou: archaic language part four

Thomas Hardy:

Jay Doubleyou: the man who sold his wife

Arthur Conan Doyle: Sherlock Holmes:

Sherlock Holmes - Wikipedia

Hound of the Baskervilles 1959 Original Trailer - YouTube

Agatha Christie:

Murder, She Said (1961) - Trailer - YouTube

Jay Doubleyou: archaic language part 2

Daphne du Maurier:

Kermode Uncut: My Top Five Daphne du Maurier Film Adaptations - YouTube

Jamaica Inn (1939) Alfred Hitchcock- Adventure, Crime Full Length Movie - YouTube

Rebecca - 1940 (subtitrat) HD - YouTube

John Fowles:

Scene on The Cobb, Lyme Regis - from The French Lieutenant's Woman (1981) - YouTube

The Collector (1965) - I Know All About You - YouTube

Richard Doddridge: Lorna Doone;

Lorna Doone - Wikipedia

Lorna Doone 1951 - YouTube

Rosamunde Pilcher:

Culture - South West Coast Path

Rosamunde Pilcher Land @ Sidmouth - Vision Group for Sidmouth

Welcome to Rosamunde Pilcher Country - Vision Group for Sidmouth

Hilary Mantel:

Hilary Mantel - Wikipedia

WOLF HALL Trailer | Season 1 | Damian Lewis - YouTube

There's more:

Revel in England's literary landscapes | VisitEngland

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the bildungsroman in english literature

In Czech literature we famously have a story about someone who makes it through the system - from war's beginning to the end:

The Good Soldier Švejk - Wikipedia

There are similar stories in English literature:

The History of Tom Jones, a Foundling, often known simply as Tom Jones, is a comic novel by English playwright and novelist Henry Fielding. It is a Bildungsroman and a picaresque novel. It was first published on 28 February 1749 in London and is among the earliest English works to be classified as a novel.^[1] It is the earliest novel mentioned by W. Somerset Maugham in his 1948 book Great Novelists and Their Novels among the ten best novels of the world.^[2]

The History of Tom Jones, a Foundling - Wikipedia

Vanity Fair is an English novel by William Makepeace Thackeray, which follows the lives of Becky Sharp and Amelia Sedley amid their friends and families during and after the Napoleonic Wars. It was first published as a 19-volume monthly serial from 1847 to 1848, carrying the subtitle Pen and Pencil Sketches of English Society, which reflects both its satirisation of early 19th-century British society and the many illustrations drawn by Thackeray to accompany the text. It was published as a single volume in 1848 with the subtitle A Novel without a Hero, reflecting Thackeray's interest in deconstructing his era's conventions regarding literary heroism.^[1] It is sometimes considered the "principal founder" of the Victorian domestic novel.^[2]

Vanity Fair (novel) - Wikipedia

The Personal History, Adventures, Experience and Observation of David Copperfield the Younger of Blunderstone Rookery (Which He Never Meant to Publish on Any Account), commonly known as David Copperfield,^{[N 1]} is a novel in the bildungsroman genre by Charles Dickens, narrated by the eponymous David Copperfield, detailing his adventures in his journey from infancy to maturity. It was first published as a serial in 1849–50, and as a book in 1850.

David Copperfield is also an autobiographical novel:^[2] "a very complicated weaving of truth and invention",^[3] with events following Dickens's own life.^[4] Of the books he wrote, it was his favourite.^[5] Called "the triumph of the art of Dickens",^[6][7] it marks a turning point in his work, separating the novels of youth and those of maturity.^[8]

David Copperfield - Wikipedia

Great Expectations is the thirteenth novel by Charles Dickens and his penultimate completed novel. It depicts the education of an orphan nicknamed Pip (the book is a bildungsroman, a coming-of-age story). It is Dickens's second novel, after David Copperfield, to be fully narrated in the first person.^{[N 1]} The novel was first published as a serial in Dickens's weekly periodical All the Year Round, from 1 December 1860 to August 1861.^[1] 

Great Expectations - Wikipedia

Kim is a novel by Nobel Prize-winning English author Rudyard Kipling. It was first published serially in McClure's Magazine from December 1900 to October 1901 as well as in Cassell's Magazine from January to November 1901, and first published in book form by Macmillan & Co. Ltd in October 1901. The story unfolds against the backdrop of The Great Game, the political conflict between Russia and Britain in Central Asia. The novel popularized the phrase and idea of the Great Game.^[1]

Kim (novel) - Wikipedia

With more here:

What Is a Bildungsroman? Definition and Examples of Bildungsroman in Literature - 2021 - MasterClass

What Is Bildungsroman | Its Origin & Plot Outline | Literary Term ( English Literature ) - YouTube

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everyman in literature

Czech literature has its everyman:

The Good Soldier Švejk - Wikipedia

It started in English literature with morality plays in the Middle Ages:

Everyman (play) - Wikipedia

This Wikipedia article

Everyman - Wikipedia

... gives some good examples:

Winston Smith (Nineteen Eighty-Four) - Wikipedia

Dr. Watson - Wikipedia

> Sherlock and John's First Meeting | A Study In Pink | Sherlock | BBC - YouTube

Arthur Dent - Wikipedia

> MARTIN FREEMAN Funny Scene of Hitchhiker's Guide To The Galaxy🤣 - YouTube

> Arthur meets Trillian - YouTube

> Martin Freeman is the English Everyman | Comparative Geeks

Leopold Bloom - Wikipedia

> BLOOM FILM - EXTRACT 05 - YouTube

The Narrator (Fight Club) - Wikipedia

> Fight Club: Narrator's Weekdays (1999) [HD] - YouTube

Again:

The Everyman

Summary: The everyman character archetype often acts as the stand-in for the audience. This character archetype is just a normal person, but for some reason, he or she must face extraordinary circumstances. The everyman can be the protagonist or a supporting figure. Unlike the hero, the everyman does not feel a moral obligation to his or her task; instead, these characters often find themselves in the middle of something they have barely any control over. Unlike the hero, the everyman archetype isn't trying to make a great change or work for the common good: these characters are just trying to get through a difficult situation.

Examples of everyman archetypes in literature: Dr. John Watson is the epitome of the everyman archetype. Sidekick to the infamous Sherlock Holmes, Watson is perfectly content being Holmes' right-hand man. His plainness contrasts Holmes's eccentricities, and he is assumed to be on the same average level as the reader. Another example of the everyman archetype in literature is Arthur Dent of The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy. He's just a regular guy minding his own business when he's suddenly saved from the destruction of his entire planet. Normal dude, extraordinary circumstances.

5 Common Character Archetypes in Literature | Scribendi

Back to Czech literature:

Franz Kafka - Wikipedia

Here's a lesson plan:

Everyman Hero Definition | Everyman Examples

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english easy readers - audio books

We love stories - especially if someone else is reading them to us.

There are some great audio books online to listen to - and at all sorts of different levels.

LEVEL ONE:

Jay Doubleyou: on-line stuff for a1 and a2 levels - reading

LEVEL TWO:

Learning English through story: White Fang 01/08 - YouTube

Learning English through story: White Fang 02/08 - YouTube

LEVEL THREE:

Jay Doubleyou: oxford graded reader and bbc film: hard times by charles dickens

Learn English through story | Graded reader level 3: Frankenstein - YouTube

PUBLISHERS:

Jay Doubleyou: graded english readers

ACTIVITIES AND MORE:

Jay Doubleyou: practical dictation > online texts and audio

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gerald hüther

Gerald Hüther is not well-known in the English-speaking world, but According to German magazin Manager Magazin, Hüther is 'the most famous neuroscientist in Germany'[10]

Gerald Hüther - Wikipedia

More than that:

Hüther is a sharp critic of the current school system in Germany, thinking the schools there treat children like objects.[15][16][17][18][19][20][21][22] He is of the opinion that schools in Germany are deliberately so bad that they produce as minor voters as possible and thus the needs of as many people as possible are disregarded, whereby they seek as many substitute satisfactions as possible, ("[...] so that we have enough customers for the rubbish that we want to sell them here [...]").[19] He thinks that schools are a waste of money because they are too inefficient.[23]

Hüther is also against the Schulpflicht (a German law forcing young people to go to a school) because it is 'the most terrible thing that can ever happen to you'; if you ask young people why they go to school and their only answer is "Because I have to".[19] He thinks that children want to learn[24] and supported the 2019 feature film CaRabA #LebenohneSchule, initiated by Bertrand Stern, which introduces unschooled, free-educated people.[25][26]

Gerald Hüther - Wikipedia

His ideas as a neuroscientist and as an educationalist come together:

Gerald Hüther is neuroscientist at the University of Göttingen and strongly believes that our brains need some other input than straw. He is member of the expert group for the future of learning in the Federal Chancellor's Office and the council for cultural education in Germany.

Every child begins his life like a hero's journey: brave and confident, open-minded and capable of building relationships, with an urge to discover and to create, equipped with a brain in which we find as many networking options as are needed to learn anything relevant to a healthy and fulfilled life at any place of the world. And then, we send them to school, where their desire to learn rapidly changes into witless frustration. Neither genetic dispositions, nor their brain, but the inopportune learning experiences at school, cause this significant change. Instead of searching for their hidden talents and strengths, teachers would teach, test and select them, as if their brains were barrels meant to be stuffed with knowledge. Instead of reminding of encouraging eyries, most schools equal crammed hen coops. That must change!

How schools can be changed to base camps for heroes' journeys: Gerald Huether at TEDxKoeln 2013 - YouTube

Some of his books have been translated into English:

Co-Creativity and Community: Amazon.co.uk: Huther, Gerald: 9783525462300: Books

How does the brain learn? – Prof.Dr. Gerald Hüther | Educare alla libertà

The Compassionate Brain by Gerald Hüther - Penguin Books Australia

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