Diane Larsen-Freeman

60 The Silent \Va)'
then picks up a no ther; sma ller rod . Another students says, 'c ha ir.' The
teach er ind icates that the student should tell him where to put the chair.
Th e teacher works wit h her, using the charts to int roduce new words until
she can say, ' Put the cha ir in the dining room at the head of the ta ble.' Th e
lesson continues in this way, wit h the teacher saying very little, and the
students practicing a great dea l with complex sentences suc h as ' Put the
table at one end of the sofa ncar the outside wall of the living room:
THINKING ABOUT THE EXPERIENCE
Since the Silent Way ma y not be familiar to many of you, let us review in
detail our ob servations a nd examine its principles.
Observations
5 O ne student says, '1\
esquerda; to help another.
6 T he teacher works with
gestures, and sorneri mcs
instruc tions in the students'
na tive langu age, to help the
students to produce the target
lan guag e sounds as accurately
as possible.
Principles
The Silent \Va)' 6 1
Students sho uld learn to rely on
each oth er and themselves.
Th e teacher works with the
students while the students work
on the language.
Observations
1 The teacher points to five blocks
of color without say ing
anythi ng. T he bloc ks of co lor
rep resent the sounds of five
English vowels dose to the five
simple vowels of Portuguese.
2 T he teacher points again to the
five bloc ks of co lor. When the
students say noth ing, the
teacher points to the first block
of color and says la/. Several
students say leI, iii, 10/, lui as the
teacher points to the other four
blocks.
Principles
Th e teacher should Start with
someth ing the students already
know a nd build from that to the
unknow n. Languages sha re a
number of feat ures, sounds being
the most basic.
Language learners are intelligent
an d bring wit h them the
ex per ience of already learning a
lan guage. Th e teacher should give
only what help is necessar y.
7 T he students learn th e sounds
of new blocks of co lor by
ta ppi ng out the nam es of their
classmates.
8 T he teacher points to a rod
and then to three blocks of
color on the sou nd-color
chart. T he students respond ,
'rod:
9 Th e teacher points to the
words 'a' an d 'ro d' on the
word cha rt.
Th e teacher makes use of what
students al ready know. The more
the teacher does for the stu dents
what they can do for themselves,
the less they will do for
themselves.
Lea rning involves tra nsferring
what one knows to new contexts.
Reading is worked on from the
beginning bu t follo ws from what
students have learned to say.
3 T he teacher docs nor model the
new sounds, but rather uses
gestures to show the smdcnrs
how to modi fy the Portuguese
sounds.
4 Students take turns tapping ou r
the sounds.
Language is not learned by
repeating after a mod el. Students
need to develop their ow n ' inner
criteria' for cor rectness-to trust
a nd to he responsible for their own
production in the target language.
Students' actions can tell the
teac her whether or nor they han'
learned.
10 The teacher sits down at the
ta ble an d is silent. After a
minu te, a girl po ints to a rod
an d says, 'A rod.'
Silence is a tool. It helps to foste r
autono my, or the exercise of
initiative. It also removes the
teacher from the center of
attenti on so he can listen to and
work wi th students. The teacher
speaks, but only when necessa ry.
Otherwise, the reacher gets our of
the way so that it is the stude nts
who receive the pract ice in using
the lan guage.