Joyful Fluency: Brain-Compatible Second Language Acquisition

Rating:
Summary: Old hat - expensive new coat!
Review: "Joyful Fluency" is a visually beautiful book, and it would need to be to make up for the fact that there is not one unique or new idea in it! The content is merely a rewording of material you will find in books by Colin Rose and Ostrander and Schroeder, at a fraction of the price I might add! If you are looking for a book with lots of fuzzy ideas that avoid the subject of tackling a language head on, then this book is for you! It is ideas such as these that, in my opinion as a self-made polyglot and experienced language teacher, that have devalued effective and exacting language education and left us with ideas that can only really lead to pidgin fluency. I have seen it happen! The idea that language acquisition will just "happen" of it's own accord is a very common one in language education today. Any linguist worth his salts, or any language teacher - any REAL language teacher who has matered his or her language, that is, will tell you that the only way you become excellent at a language (as an adult) is to study it! The "learn as you did as a child" premise is nothing more than a gimmick! But because it smacks of the easy path to success it is welcomed with open arms. It doesn't work. Period.
The author states things such as, "The wonderful irony is that by making accuracy secondary, you'll end up with greater language competency,..." (pp138) Wrong! By paying attention to grammar and idiom etc, and by drilling language patterns thoroughly you will reach a higher level of language competency. If you think that playing with puppets and wearing wigs is a way to go about learning a new language then be my guest! Finally this book is meant as a guide for teachers, not for self-language learners. Teachers may gain some benefit from some of the ideas therein, if combined with a real language course, but I'll say it again - 32US is a lot to pay for information that is second hand, not only that, it's also second rate! I have made many purchases at Amazon.com but I have never before been inclined to return a book, but it looks like this one is going to be on the way back to the depot very soon.

Rating:
Summary: Update on a very misunderstood area of pedagogy
Review: Jensen, Dhority et al. are pioneers in a horrendously misunderstood and largely ignored area of pedagogy that is loosely based on the work of Georgi Lozanov and used to go by the awful name of "Suggestopedia" (no, not a disease!). This book is a very fine distillation of their generation of experience in teaching and training. It preserves the best of the old and certainly can revivify any teacher's interest in Humanistic AND accelerated education for the new century.

Don't miss it!

John Driscoll University of San Francisco

Rating:
Summary: Rediscover your love of teaching and learning
Review: When you see "The Brain Store, Inc.", you can expect a handsome, very readable, practical and somewhat expensive book, with illustrations, charts, and captivating sidenotes. At the beginning of each chapter of this book, there is a pie-chart of key ideas. Just flip through these 14 charts, the summaries, and "Guiding Assumptions" on p. 33, you get a good over-view.

This book contains much more than Lozanov's Suggestopedia, which is mentioned specifically in Chapter 2, with 3 other approaches. In fact, this is an excellent book on general brain-compatible principles that are applicable to all teaching and learning. Topics include: paying attention to the environment, use of materials, music, good relationship and facilitation skills, maximizing first impressions, lesson planning, active learning... There is much clear and useful material for creating joyful and meaningful learning. Teachers are even taught to use suggestions and metaphors, along the tradition of Milton Erickson.

I like the quote from Jensen: "...humans are designed to learn complex languages effortlessly. The reality is, therefore, that language fluency ought to be a joyful process." Also what Dhority says in the Preface: "who we are" - the beliefs and attitudes with which we identify - is inextricably intertwined with how we teach.

Readers would appreciate details, such as "The optimal time for learning a second language is from age five to ten years." (p. 5) "...crescent seating patterns are far more preferable to conventional rows." (p. 85)... The discussion on the place of grammar, homework and error correction in the last chapter is timely and helpful.