HICPR: Mi Coursa; Su Coursa! (NEW KINETIK "GE-T-UP" course!)

Saturday, November 19, 2022

Mi Coursa; Su Coursa! (NEW KINETIK "GE-T-UP" course!)

GE-T-UP - Gesture-enhanced-teaching-up-take (pronounced: Get-T-up! as in "Giddup!") Custom-made, "memorable" pronunciation course, using your course content.

Enhanced memory for course content, especially vocabulary and story.
Improved speaking clarity and pronunciation

Here's how it works. Basically, you share with us one or more brief excerpts in the form of stories or written dialogues from any speaking, listening or reading course that you'll be teaching. We'll provide you with a video-recorded KINETIK lesson for your students. There are potentially 10 possible lessons, presented (basically) in this order, but it can be further customized for your class:

Rhythm 1 (syllables and stress)
Fluency 1 (basic)
Vowels 1 and 2 (tailored to your students' L1s)
Consonants 1 and 2 (tailored to your students' L1s)
Intonation 1 and 2
Rhythm 2 (spontaneous speaking)
Fluency 2 (spontaneous speaking)

Here's what those lessons look like:

Students view and move along with a 15 to 20-minute training video

Video begins with brief training in a GE-T-UP haptic movement, tone and touch technique (MT3)
That technique is then used in an augmented embodied oral reading (AEOR) of the text from "Su coursa" that you provided. (We may have to add some additional text, along with annotation as to how to gesture along with the text as it is spoken.)
The homework assignment is explained and practiced.

Students practice the 5-minute haptic exercises in the homework assignment (ideally) 4 times per week
Student work with the lesson is always better if they have earlier already been engaged with the text from your class earlier. The lesson also helps students remember that content as well!
(Ideally) teachers also use the GETUP MT3 in class anytime from then on to:

Help students remember vocabulary or new terms or phrases
Help students improve their pronunciation (and remember it!)

The cost per custom-made module begins at about $200, depending on how many we do together. If you'd like a (free) estimate and demonstration video made with your material from "Su Coursa," get in touch: wracton@gmail.com

(If you are new into the impact of gesture on memory, check out this piece from the Scientific American last year.)

Spring 2023 we will also be again offering the online 12-week haptic basic pronunciation course through Trinity Western University, and along with that, a 12-week KINETIK Teacher Training course. If you'd like to offer either one of those through your school or some other venue . . . get in touch, of course!

8 comments:

Bill ActonNovember 21, 2022 at 3:24 PM
The course itself is 10 scaffolded lessons. In general, the lessons do not stand on their own but are based previous work. We can, of course, create a lesson based on just one problematic sound or sound process, based on your text that includes a few examples of the issue. The format and the AEOR (augmented embodied oral reading) will be somewhat longer, requiring some introductory lead up to haptic learning and teaching.
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Bill ActonNovember 21, 2022 at 6:09 PM
What is most exciting about this development is the idea that the KINETIK work occurs AFTER students have engaged with a text of some kind, ideally one they have a good understanding or appreciation of. The haptic (gesture + touch) work then functions to enhance memory for that material and the work on pronunciation is strongly contextualized in a text that should be remembered!
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Bill ActonNovember 21, 2022 at 6:12 PM
Just got a question on how long it would take me (Bill) to create the 20-minute video. Typically about 90 minutes, in toto. The MT3 training clips and homework assignments are usually ready to go. The AEORs are generally very straightforward to create and should connect well to the course they are part of.
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Bill ActonNovember 23, 2022 at 6:56 AM
Homework component is usually/ideally in three pieces. It should be done at least every other day for about for two weeks, 20 minutes; 30 minutes, max: (a) Practice the MT3 (haptic technique) along with the video at first and then from "body memory," (b) Do the AEOR, three times, and (c) applying the MT3 to some other text or list of words that the student or teacher identifies.
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Bill ActonNovember 23, 2022 at 3:23 PM
How does this work? The two main innovations are: (a) gesture and touch are used systematically in enhancing memory, establishing strong rhythmic foundation, teaching pronunciation and augmenting oral reading texts taken from either course materials or narratives that students understand and (best case) find intrinsically interesting, and (b) the KINETIK method is highly scaffolded such that each lesson and follow on homework builds upon previous lessons. With moderate practice, students make good progress and develop unusual confidence in their spontaneous speaking ability. In part that is achieved by helping them consolidate what they "know" already. The result is speech that is a bit more formal than informal, but more comprehensible and pleasing to ear of the listener.
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Bill ActonNovember 25, 2022 at 9:44 PM
Can you create these KINETIK "post hoc" lessons, yourself? (post hoc, literally after the fact, or in this case, after the students have studied the section of text or story or dialogue) YES, absolutely! The key is to be able to train the students in the use of these gestural techniques or some like them--and then use them in class later in providing feedback or correction or assisting students in remembering something. Another great way, of course, would be to sign up for the KINETIK Instructor Training Course! (email me: wracton@gmail.com
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Bill ActonNovember 26, 2022 at 2:12 PM
Why is this a better mousetrap? It is designed for teachers in almost all contexts with (a) little or no experience with pronunciation teaching (b) little or no in-class time for pronunciation work, (c) limited web access, and (d) limited funding. (The modules can also be delivered as downloads or even on USB, if necessary.) And those who would just LOVE to outsource some pronunciation work and help students get better at remembering what they learn--using the KINETIK gesture system.
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Bill ActonDecember 4, 2022 at 11:21 AM
Good question from a student this week: What is the future of KINETIK and pronunciation, in general. Depends on far out you are looking. In one sense, KINETIK IS the future, that is the merging (or re-emerging" pronunciation work with the body, especially as it relates to enhancing memory for content and expressiveness. In the longer term, in augmented reality systems, language learning becomes a "merger" of learner and machine, with human instructors as complements to process . . .
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What is haptic pronunciation teaching?

Basically, it is using gesture, touch and movement to teach pronunciation of English (or any language). What makes this method unique is that it is based on controlled and systematic use of gesture in doing that. (Often the problem with gesture use in language learning is that it can be "crazy" or random or intimidating or inconsistent, or not well-developed and tied to clear outcomes.)

The earlier "Essential Haptic-integrated English Pronunciation (EHIEP) approach," now KINETIK, does a better job of enhancing presentation, modelling, feedback and correction. The method is simple and easy to follow. Once a 30-minute module is finished, teacher and students have a set of techniques to use in class anytime a pronunciation problem or opportunity comes up!

Haptic Preliminaries

I often begin workshops or papers with the comment that in about 40 years in the field I have had just one idea: that the systematic use of body movement is essential to effective and efficient pronunciation instruction. That has never been more relevant than today, with the general deemphasis on pronunciation and introduction of technology into the field. From both perspectives, the "haptic" perspective approach developed here offers great promise. I can at least promise you a "moving" experience!

What is the KINETIK Method?

KINETIK is the name of the new v6.0 haptic pronunciation teaching system. About six years earlier we were using the acronym, "Haptic Integrated Pronunciation for Other/Extended Circle English Speakers" (HIPOECES)--still there in the url of this blog!

Haptic-integrated clinical pronunciation is:

A different way to learn pronunciation, based in part on Arthur Lessac’s notion of “Training the body first.” It is also based on research in the use of movement and touch in learning and training. It:

Looks somewhat like a combination of aerobics, sign language and Taichi

Provides a basic foundation for continued, self-directed pronunciation learning and classroom instruction

Designed for use by relatively untrained teachers but appropriate for all teachers (and learners) of all levels

Focuses on pronunciation used in conversation (not all words in English)

Is a highly “brain-and-body-friendly” system that promotes efficient learning of integrated tasks in general

Designed to promote integrated classroom pronunciation instruction and enable integration of conscious pronunciation work into spontaneous speaking.

Introduction

This blog was formerly named: HIPoeces (pronounced 'hI-pƏ-cIs), basically an approach to teaching English pronunciation to speakers of "outer and expanding" circle Englishes (including that population commonly termed: non-native speakers) but also compatible with the use of local models other than simply Standard" American" or RP. Using Kachru's "Inner, expanding and outer circles" model to characterize the breadth of Englishes and speakers of those, HIPoeces (now HICP) systems focus on developing haptically-centered pedagogical models and methods which can be adapted for teaching the pronunciation of various Englishes as they are spoken and taught by "owners" of those varieties.

In theory, the underlying principles can be applied to teaching the sound system of any language. Most language instructors intuitively use a great deal of movement and tactile anchoring in the classroom. The essential question is how to use that resource systematically, especially so that those learners who are less "haptic" in nature are also "moved" by the method.

Simply put, the HICP model/method is based on the idea of speaking along with arm and hand movement, not all that different from that used in sign languages. Most movement patterns are taken from either typical classroom pronunciation instruction practice or from related fields, such as psychotherapy or sports.

Most blog posts link to research that relates to the general HICP model, that is studies dealing with the role of gesture, touch, movement, learning modalities, learning in output, use of the visual field in learning, and experiential learning.

DEFINITIONS:

"Haptic" techniques- procedures that involve both movement and touch (Obvious examples include clapping hands, tapping feet, or holding an object and shaking it to the rhythm of a poem.)

"HICP techniques" - procedures that are haptic and also explicitly coordinated with phonological structures and/or discourse prosody (For example, clapping hands on primary stressed syllables in multi-syllable words, or doing a dance step on key words in conversational turns.)

"Haptic integration"- The haptic dimension probably functions as much to anchor visual and auditory material as it does to assist the learner in getting the "felt sense" of the sound or sound process. Lack of integration into spontaneous speech being such a serious potential shortcoming of instruction, haptic engagement seems a promising bridge to more accurate fluency.

"Visual field" - in HICP extensive use is made of the visual field in front of the learner. (For example, a modified version of the IPA vowel chart is anchored haptically in the imagination of the learner, directly in front of the upper body, and used for several purposes throughout the program.)