awesome fit for me," he says.
grades, and says, "The research points to the
fact that with learning languages, the best time
is before puberty because the brain is much
more receptive." He engages his young stu-
dents with an approach focused on fun.
the reasons was because it wasn't fun. I do my
best to make the kids enjoy themselves and
learn through play. For example, drama is such
a powerful teaching tool for literacy skills and
language production. When a child writes their
own script, rehearses their lines, and performs
in front of an audience or a camera, they are
practicing and reinforcing language skills.
When we did a unit on clothing, one of my first
grade classes made a short film in which they
taught others how to use verbs that are related
to clothing--like ironing, washing, drying.
Every time the students watch the film they cre-
ated, which they love to do, they are reinforc-
ing that language skill that they displayed in
the film. By placing their films on our blog, kids
can access them from home and hopefully
study and practice their Spanish when they're
not in school. I love that Shorecrest is a place
where we're allowed to be creative."
class in which you get to play the role of
game, The Werewolves of Miller's Hollow, to
facilitate learning in his fifth through eighth
grade French classes. The game is so popular,
it has found its way into his eighth grade Latin
classes as well.
kind of jealous, so I had to let them play every
once in a while, in English, since it is difficult to
`communicate' in Latin," he explains. "I use it
as an incentive...if they work well all week, I let
them play one round on Friday. Obviously the
game has more pedagogical value when done
in the target language, but for my Latin stu-
dents, at least it motivates them to work hard!"
A teacher for 11 years, the French native is in
his second year at Shorecrest. He studied
English, German and Latin in middle school
and Russian in college; and obtained his
degree from Lumiere University Lyon 2. Next
stop New York City.
moved to New York City for a year, where I tried
to survive waiting tables and tutoring people in
French. Then I decided to go back to France to
take French as a Second Language to be more