Starting, and Building, a Compelling Conversation

How do start and build a satisfying conversation?
There are a million ways, but here's a simple slogan.
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You can create compelling conversations by asking simple, yet deep, questions like:

What brings you here? How did you hear about this class (party/event/movie)? What do you like to do online? Where were you born? How many miles do you think that is from here? Where are you in your family's birth order? What makes you smile? What have you been reading recently? Can you recommend any movies to see or rent? What's the most beautiful place you've seen? What qualities do you look for in new products? What do you look for in jobs? Which issues are important to you? How did you decide to live here?

Who chose your name? Why? What music inspires you? Where are you coming from? Where are you going? Where do you feel most comfortable? Why? How do you release stress? What do you appreciate about living here? What did you learn at your last job? What do you do to stay healthy? What TV shows would you recommend to a visitor to your country? Why? Have your habits changed in the last year? What changes have you seen in __? How would your friends describe you? What would you add?

So who do you want to talk to today? Who will you meet? What will discover about your new conversation partner?

“Colors fade, temples crumble, empires fall, but wise words endure.”
- Edward Thorndike (1874-1949), American psychologist

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More Ideas for Using Videoclips in English Lessons

Are you looking for more excellent videoclips for your English classes or private lessons?

As blog readers know, I'm a huge fan of encouraging students to find their own materials to summarize for homework on particular topics. For instance, students in my high intermediate oral skills found and reviewed videos offering advice on job interviews. Students emailed me their recommended clips with a short descriptive paragraph and a few sentences evaluating the video. Then I edited their writing, combined their reviews into a single document, and emailed the entire class the videoclips.

"Use or lose" was my comment. "Viewing these videoclips is an opportunity, not an obligation. Enjoy!" Almost every student chose to watch the videos and our 10-15 minute mock job interviews were quite strong. Allowing students to select their own materials lead to more authentic, student centered learning both in and out of the classroom.

Yet sometimes both students and teachers lack time. It's a real pleasure to have someone systematically collect and sort through potential video materials for class.
Hall Houston, the author of The Creative Classroom: Teaching Languages Outside the Box, recently posted about Jamie Keddie's excellent website TEFLclips.com on his blog:

Hall writes, "This website ( http://www.teflclips.com/ ) contains over 30 clever lesson plans for using video clips in the TEFL classroom. The lessons are well-written and contain teacher's notes and handouts. I am looking forward to using some of these lessons in my classes this year (2009)." As so often, I share Hall's tastes and concerns for creating a dynamic, creative classroom where students learn English and critical thinking skills.

By the way, Hall recently wrote a long, very positive review of Compelling Conversations: Questions and Quotations on Timeless Topics for English Teaching Professional. (Here's a shout out to Hall. Thanks for the review and tip on videoclips!)

We live in a wonderful time to teach English. The technology allows us to gently cajole students to become autotelic, or self-directed, in their studies. Teaching with videoclips, both as homework and in class, adds visual information and builds rapport with our 21st century English students.

Use it or lose it. You choose. Will video work in your class?

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English Teaching Professional Reviews, Recommends Compelling Conversations!

Consider my global soul satisfied this morning!

English Teaching Professional, a glossy magazine for ESL teachers and language school directors, gave a glowing review and strong recommendation to Compelling Conversations: Questions and Quotations on Timeless Topics. "In sum, Compelling Conversations is a recommended resource for teachers who want to make their conversation classes more learner-centered," wrote reviewer Hall Houston. "It should be especially appealing to those who who to escape the confines of the Presentation-Practice-Production approach and do without a formal grammatical or functional syllabus. It reflects the authors' considerable professional experience, and would be a notable addition to any English teacher's bookshelf." The review also features a large copy of the book cover. Wow!

Houston also writes, "In my own teaching, I have found questions and quotations to be highly effective in promoting student discussion." The review continues. "Questions are useful in that they require a response from the listener. Asking them also helps students master the tricky rules of the interrogative."

"Quotations are brilliant flashes of wit expressed in the shortest space possible, often just a sentence or two," observes Houston. "The authors have compiled a formidable collection of quotations by famous people from Napoleon and Aristotle to Tom Cruise and Sylvester Stallone. Some will have the students roaring with laughter 'My movies were the kind they show in prisons and airplanes because nobody can leave.' - Burt Reynolds), while others require careful introspection ('Love is not just looking at each other; it's looking in the same direction.' - Antoine de Saint Exupery)."

The reviewer goes on. "The authors also add some wise proverbs here and there. My two favourites were 'Recite "patience" three times and it will spare you a murder' and 'When money talks, truth keeps silent', which are from Korea and Russia."

My co-author Toni Aberson appreciated that Houston, an English teacher and writer in Luzhu, Taiwan wrote the review in a British magazine about a book self-published in the United States. This international element adds a special delight to a long, three column review. "I just love it!", exclaimed Aberson. We certainly live in a wonderful time to be English teachers.

While I my copy of English Teaching Professional two days ago, the January 2009 issue has been out for at least a week. The review appears on p.44 in Issue 60. Subscribers can access the full review at www.ETProfessional.com .

This positive book review might help explain the recent surge of class set orders. It also helps explain the sudden collection of emails and calls from Vietnam, Russia, Italy, and Canada in the last week about Compelling Conversations and possible collaborations. The appreciation of fellow ESL professionals gives me additional confidence, joy, and popularity. Sweet!

Today, the sun is shining and life is good.


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Another Five Star Review for Compelling Conversations on Amazon

Allow me to brag for a moment. Another five-star review for Compelling Conversations: Questions and Quotations on Timeless Topics showed up on Amazon. Consider me pleased!

Here's the entire Amazon review:

5.0 out of 5 stars A wholesome learning resource!, December 4, 2008
By Erika Villafane "Erika" (Miami, Florida USA) - See all my reviews
When compelling conversations got into my hands I couldn't help but to think: I wish I had this book when I was learning English!

As English as a second language speaker, I can really tell the difference that compelling conversations has with other ESL text books: topics richness that takes learning at a higher level.

Not only you will feel motivated to improve your language skills, but you will have a rich-provoking theme about life to discuss and share with your tutor or classmates. That in turn makes you grow personally and you certainly will remember the discussed matter here when need it to apply into a situation out of the classroom. You will appreciate American culture as well as other's point of view.

The book is very well structured into four sections totaling 45 chapters. Each one of them is organized into conversations starters followed by vocabulary, proverbs and the indispensable quotations. One that really caught my attention was the Arab proverb "he who has health has hope and he who has hope has everything"

I recommend it to anyone who wants to learn while enjoying the process.

Erika Villafane
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This makes 14 positive Amazon
reviews - all four and five stars - that various ESL teachers, writers, English language learners, and other fine folks have written. Not bad for a self-published book!

Three other bits of positive news about Compelling Conversations. A private language school in Chile made a large order, another community college in California adopted the conversation book as the course textbook, and Compelling Conversations has been added to an adult education center in Rwanda for advanced English class. Whether due to changes in the TOEFL test that require test-takers to actually speak, a strong word-of-mouth campaign, or just the belief that conversations should go beneath the surface, sales of Compelling Conversations have gone up. These successes may seem small, but they all make me smile!

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Easy English Times Publishes "Reading Pleasures" as Conversation Activity

Easy English Times, an adult education newspaper for English language learners published in California, adapts a chapter from Compelling Conversations each month. The editors selected "Reading Pleasures", one of my favorite chapters, to run in their November-December issue. Since Easy English Times focuses on the needs of beginning and intermediate ESL students, the editor selects the most accessible sections and adds dictionary definitions, creating a satisfying instant conversation activity.

Here is the Easy English Times Instant Activity for November-December.
Instant activity: Conversation
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Reading pleasures and tastes

The activities below come from a book for English as a second language learners by Eric Roth and Toni Aberson. The title is "Compelling Conversations: Questions and Quotations on Timeless Topics." (See ad on this page.)

Exchanging views: Reading is a solitary* activity, yet it can bring people together in conversation. Interview your partner and exchange reading experiences.

1. What are some books that you have read and enjoyed?
2. Have you ever re-read a book? Which? Why? How many times?
3. Do you have a library card? Do you like to browse* in bookstores?
4. Have you ever been in a book club? What kinds of books do/did you read in the book club?
5. Did your mother or other family member read to you as a child? Did you have a favorite story? What was it?
6. Where did you first learn to read? At home? At school?
7. What were your favorite books as a child? Who was your favorite author? Why?
8. As a teenager, did you have any favorite books, comics, or magazines? Can you describe them?
9. Which magazines or newspapers do you scan now*? Why?
10. Who are some famous writers from your country?
11. Can you think of some movies that are adapted from novels?
12. Do you prefer reading fiction or non-fiction? Why?
13. Do you have a favorite writer or poet? Who?
14. Did you have to memorize any poems in school? Which?
15. Have your read any good biographies? Memoirs*? Self-help books?
16. Are you reading a book now? What is it? Can you describe it?
17. Do you think books and magazines make good gifts? Why?
18. What book are you planning to read in the near future?

Quotations: Memorize your favorite quotation and author's name. Share it with someone.
1. "Reading is to the mind, what exercise is to the body." --Richard Steele (1672-1729), Irish writer
2. "No entertainment is so cheap as reading, nor any pleasure so lasting*." --Lady Mary Wortley Montagu (1689-1762), British author/critic
3. "The pleasure of all reading is doubled* when one lives with another who shares the same books." --Katherine Mansfield (1888-1923), short story writer and poet
4. "However many holy words you read, however many you speak, what good will they do you if you do not act upon them?" --Buddha (563-483 BC), founder of Buddhism
5. "Read the best books first, or you may not have a chance to read them all." --Henry David Thoreau (1817-1862), essayist
6. "I would rather be poor in a cottage* full of books than a king without the desire to read." --Thomas B. Macaulay (1800-1859), historian
7. "A book should serve as the ax* for the frozen sea within us." --Franz Kafka (1883-1924), novelist
8. "Any book that helps a child to form the habit of reading, to make reading one of his deep and continuing needs, is good for him." --Maya Angelou (1928-), American poet
9. "A truly great book should be read in youth*, again in maturity and once more in old age, as a fine building should be seen by morning light, at noon and by moonlight." --Robertson Davies (1913-1995), Canadian novelist

On your own: Bring in a book which is important to you. Show the book to the class. Tell them the author, the title, and the reason why this book is important to you.

VOCABULARY HELP*
ax - An ax is a tool for cutting wood.
browse - If you browse in a store, you look at things in a casual way, in the hope that you might find something you like.
cottage - A cottage is a small house, usually in the country.
doubled - When something doubles or when you doubled it, it becomes twice as great in number, amount, or size.
essays - Essays are short pieces of writing on a particular subject.
lasting - You can use lasting to describe a situation, result, or agreement that continues to exist or have an effect for a very long time.
memoirs - A person's memoirs are a written account of the people who they have known and events that they remember.
scan - When you scan written material, you look through it quickly in order to find important or interesting information.
solitary - A solitary activity is one that you do alone.
youth - Someone's youth is the period of their life during which they are a child, before they are a fully mature adult.

*Definitions from the Collins COBUILD Intermediate Dictionary of American English, published by Heinle, a part of Cengage Learning © 2008 and the Newbury House Dictionary of American English 4th edition, by Rideout. © 2004 Monroe Allen Publishers. Heinle, a part of Cengage Learning enjoys an exclusive license with respect to the copyright and all the exclusive rights comprised in the copyright in the work and all revisions thereof.
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I love these monthly columns because they keep me connected to adult education and my decade of teaching immigrants and refugees in Los Angeles and Santa Monica. The atmosphere in those classrooms, where everyone volunteered and no one worried about grades, is something quite special. We were just adults sharing our experiences, insights, and languages.

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How Democratic is Your English Classroom? How Democratic Do You Want it To Be?

Who gets to speak in class? Whose ideas count? Who chooses the assignments? How do students receive feedback? Do students have a chance to conference with their instructors? Can YouTube be a valuable source for homework assignment? Do you want your students to become self-directed - or autotelic - in their studies?

Here’s a quick checklist that ESL teachers that I created for a recent LA CATESOL regional conference workshop called “Techniques for a More Democratic Classroom."

My core assumption remains that giving students more opportunities to literally speak, write, and share their insights leads to a more engaging, dynamic, and valuable classroom experience. I will write more on this topic in a few days, but here are some questions to consider.

1. Who do you currently teach? How would you describe the students?
2. What are some of their personal interests?
3. How can student interests be better incorporated into the curriculum?
4. Which assignments do students currently choose? Which seems most successful? Why?
5. What are some benefits of greater student participation?
6. What are some risks of greater student participation?
7. Do you want to increase the number of choices students make?
8. What critical language skills can be taught by tapping into their interests?
9. How can you tweak current material to better individualize instruction?
10. What internet resources can you use to augment the current curriculum?
11. Which exercises or activities do you find most successful in your classroom?
12. What decisions do you keep as your prerogative as the instructor?
13. Will your students become self-directed learners?
14. How can you encourage that possibility?
15. How can you create a more democratic classroom?
16. What are some obstacles to a more democratic classroom?
17. How does technology encourage a more democratic classroom?

“Education is a kind of continuing dialogue and a dialogue assumes, in the nature of the case, different points of view.” Robert Hutchins (1899-1977), former President of University of Chicago and educational philosopher

Do you agree? Disagree? Why? Feel free to let me know.
I’ll post an article in a few days outlining some of my thoughts and sharing some materials.

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Amazon Rates Compelling Conversations #3 in Adult and Continuing Education

Let me enjoy this brief moment of personal satisfaction.

Amazon lists over 5 million books on its website – and continues to overlook many fine self-published books. Naturally, as a self-publisher, Amazon represents an important outlet for my ESL conversation textbook, Compelling Conversations: Questions and Quotations on Timeless Topics. Besides, numbers add precision and ratings can become addictive.

Today Amazon has Compelling Conversations listed at 6,198! That’s my highest overall rating yet – and far better than my usual top 35,000 rating. The book is also rated #3 in the category “adult and continuing education”. Consider me satisfied and surprised.

For a small self-published author, selling a book around the world – and collecting favorable reviews from customers in Australia, Japan, and Spain is a simple pleasure. Amazon’s customer reviews have certainly helped promote the unusual conversation book aimed at sophisticated adults who want to bring their insights, wit and humor into more and deeper English language conversations. Besides my website, www.CompellingConversations.com that offers free sample chapters, Amazon remains my principal promotional tool. So the Amazon ratings and category rankings provide a way to measure success.

Of course, I remain curious about Compelling Conversations finding more success in adult education ESL programs than the flexible private language programs, university programs, and conversation clubs. Private schools, focusing on student desires and needs, usually provide smaller classes with more speaking opportunities. Further, the academic vocabulary appeals more to university bound or university trained adults. Compelling Conversations usually ranks higher in categories like “English as a Second Language”, “English as a Foreign Language”, “Teaching Methods”, “TOEIC”, and even “Quotes” than “Adult and Continuing Education.”

The increasing popularity of Compelling Conversations also reflects a growing awareness that adult education students want and need more speaking opportunities. Adult education programs, sometimes narrowly focused on a so-called life skills curriculum and preparing students for fill-in the blank mandated tests, offer few conversation classes. Why? Mostly because of the funding structure which doesn’t encourage specialized language classes. The large class sizes also limit the chances to speak – even in intermediate and advanced classes. Creative, dedicated adult education teachers have to make exceptional efforts to provide students with speaking skills – and many do so. Compelling Conversations helps busy adult education teachers supplement life skills lessons with energetic conversation activities.

Amazon updates their numbers every hour, and no doubt Compelling Conversations
will soon return to its usual ranking. Reaching the top 10,000 on Amazon may not sound like much to people who reduce all experiences to dollar signs. I made more money teaching Thursday than on my exceptionally successful Friday as a publisher. Yet I’m counting this milestone as a personal victory, counting my blessings, and smiling.


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Watching the Olympics and Starting Conversations

How often do a billion people share a smile, a sigh, or a televised event?

Have you been watching the Olympics? What has surprised you the most? Why? Who has inspired you? How?

The Olympics reminds us of heroism, sacrifice, excellence, and beauty. It can also spark many conversations.

Although I have not had the pleasure of teaching a conversation class recently, talking about sports always sparked many enjoyable exchanges - even among non-sports fans. This lesson, an except from Compelling Conversations: Questions and Quotations on Timeless Topics for Advanced ESL students, remains a favorite.

Feel free to use it in your English classes. Let the conversations begin!

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PLAYING AND WATCHING SPORTS

“The game is my wife. It demands loyalty and responsibility.”

Michael Jordan (1963- ) NBA superstar

Chatting: Talking about sports can be a great ice-breaker. Just do it!

1. Did you play any sports as a child? Which ones? Which was your favorite?

2. Do you play any sports now? Which ones? Which is your favorite? Why?

3. Do girls and women play sports in your native country? If so, which ones?

4. What is the most popular sport in your native country?

5. What equipment or uniform is needed for this sport?

6. How is the game scored? How is a tie decided? What is considered a high score?

7. How long is a game? Are there referees? How do fans usually behave?

8. Which athlete is best known in your homeland? Which sport does he or she play? What do people admire about this athlete?

9. Does your native country participate in the Olympics? In which sports are your countrymen most competitive?

10. What are some team sports? Which do you play?

11. What are some individual sports that you know? Which do you play?

12. Do you prefer to play team sports or individual sports? Why?

13. Which is your favorite sport to watch? Do watch any annual televised sporting event? Have you ever gone to a sporting event? How did the fans behave?

14. Are you a fan of any special team? What do you like about them?

15. What is their nickname e.g. Chicago Bulls, New England Patriots?

16. What does their nickname hope to convey about the team?

17. Does your favorite team have a main rival? Why? Is there a team mascot?

18. Which American athletes are well known in your native land? Which ones?

19. What are some of the ways that athletes train for competition?

20. What do you think is the difference between a game and a sport? Is chess a sport? Is weight lifting a sport? Is golf a sport? Is politics a sport?

21. Who is your favorite athlete? Why do you especially admire this athlete?

22. Do you buy a certain brand of shoes or clothes because of an athlete’s endorsement? If so, which brand? Which athlete?

23. Can you name some sports that involve animals?

24. Is there any sport that you don’t play now, but that you’d like to learn?

25. Do you think any sport rules should be changed? Why?

26. If you could, would you outlaw any sports? Why?

27. Are there any sports which are legal in your homeland, but illegal in the United States? Why? Do you think these sports should be legal?

28. What are the differences between the way athletes are treated in your native country and the way athletes are treated in the U.S.? Which ways do you think are preferable?

29. Are there any disadvantages to playing sports? Examples?

30. What are some advantages to playing sports? How do you feel while playing?

31. If you could play against any athlete in any sport, what sport would you choose?

32. If you could go back in time and attend any sporting event, which would you pick? Why?

33. What makes a great athlete? Who do you think is the greatest athlete of our time? Why?


Vocabulary: Do you know all these words? Can you add 4 more words to this list?

athlete score mascot equipment competition referee nickname rival

endorse endorsement fan brand

Idioms: Try to guess the meanings of these idioms with your partner.
She’s a team player. She knows the game plan.

The biology test was a slamdunk.
The price you’re asking is in the ballpark.
When I caught Bob’s finger in the car door, he was a good sport about it.
You dropped the ball.

Quotations: Which quotations do you like? Can you add one more?

1. “Sports do not build character. They reveal it.”

Heywood Hale Broun (1888-1939), American sports journalist

1. “If you don’t try to win, you might as well hold the Olympics in somebody’s backyard.” Jesse Owns (1913-1980), American with 4 Gold Olympic medals

1. “Sports is the toy department of human life.”

Howard Cosell (1918-1995), sportscaster

1. “Sports is like a war without the killing.” Ted Turner (1938- ), founder of CNN

1. “It ain’t over till it’s over.” Yogi Berra (1925- ), American baseball coach

1. “Whoever wants to know the heart and mind of America had better learn baseball.” Jacques Barzun (1907- ), American historian

1. “The less effort, the faster and more powerful you will be.”

Bruce Lee (1940-1973), film star

1. “Golf is a good walk spoiled.” Mark Twain (1835-1910), humorist

1. “Aggressive fighting for the right is the noblest sport in the world.”
Theodore Roosevelt (1859-1919), U.S. President, sportsman

1. “…no boy from a rich family ever made the big leagues.”

Joe Dimaggio (1914- ), American baseball player

1. “Friendships born on the field of athletic strife are the real gold of competition. Awards become corroded, friends gather no dust.”

Jesse Owns (1913-1980), 4 time Gold medalist in 1936 Olympic Games

1. “Good teams become great ones when the members trust each other enough to surrender the ‘me’ for the ‘we.’” Phil Jackson (1945- ), L.A. Lakers’ coach

1. “How can you think and hit at the same time?”

Yogi Berra (1925-), baseball player and coach

14. “There is no “I” in team, but there is in win.”

Michael Jordan (1963- ) NBA superstar

EXTENSION: Find a picture of an athlete, professional or amateur, playing your favorite sport. Cut it out, bring it to class, and describe the picture and its context.

WWW. Compelling Conversations.com
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A New Issue of Easy English Times Makes Me Smile!

The “Summer Fun” issue of Easy English Times arrived yesterday, and it made me smile. It’s another wonderful issue of ESL student essays, teaching tips, and classroom exercises for English language learners.

The Easy English Times (EET) editors also generously added seven photographs to the monthly “instant activity: conversation” column written by Toni Aberson and myself. This month’s topic is Enjoying the Beach. The beautifully illustrated excerpt from Compelling Conversations, modified for beginning and intermediate ESL student readers should be popular. The column also inspired me to take a long walk on Santa Monica beach with my dog to celebrate. We must practice what we preach!

The summer issue also lead me to revisit the Easy English Times website. Unfortunately, the EET website doesn’t include the entire current and past issues so the conversation column isn’t online. The clean website, although in need of an update, includes several valuable chunks of information for ESL educators and people teaching in adult literacy and prisons.

The section titled Immigration Issues features first person essays from immigrants and refugees and an evocative photo essay by Betty Malmgren that documents the intense passions and political symbols used at immigration protest marches. Malmgren deserves credit for showing both sides of this heated and very American debate in a fair, nuanced manner. I’m also fond of the section titled internet resources which includes archived columns from Andrea Uram for teachers of beginning ESL students and Susan Gaer’s columns on using the internet in ESL classrooms.

Yet my favorite part of the Easy English Times website remains student writing where you can read first person stories from immigrants and refugees who have created new lives in the United States for themselves and their families. This short essays and poems, written by adult ESL students living and working across the country, provide a riveting glimpse into our often troubled world. The range and diversity of writers and writings is quite impressive. I can’t help but be moved and proud to be an English teacher while reading this section.

Website visitors can request a free copy of Easy English Times newspaper, and subscribers can access the entire adult education newspaper online for $15. It’s a good buy, especially for American ESL teachers working with beginning and intermediate adult ESL students. In a far better world, there would be fewer refugees from wars, famines, and persecution – and more than enough money to buy class sets of this ESL newspaper for more adult schools.

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