Word: moffett
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Dates: during 1971-1971
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...MOFFETT'S alternative curriculum is based on the belief that a child can learn most and best when he is allowed to follow his own needs. He should do what he wants, not what he has to do. Moffett believes verbalthinking and self-expression are natural desires which a student will satisfy if he is given the opportunity to do so. They should be encouraged, not stifled by demands to classify and repeat what other people say, in the first four grades of school. Even if a child can successfully complete the assigned language exercises, his language ability...
...student's first language activity in Moffett's curriculum is non-verbal dramatic action. The child "limbers" his body and expresses free associations of feelings and impulses in solitary play with toys and in movement to music. Pantomime, substituting the stimulation of an idea for music or a toy, is the first mode in which a student attempts to converse with another. After choral pantomime Moffett proposes organizing students in small groups, six or less in each, to enact short scenes from stories for their own group and eventually for the whole class. Verbal dramatic activity naturally evolves as students...
...discovered a treasure buried in the ground. Other members of her group ran to her; one boy answered, "I picked it up." The other members of the group insisted it would be best to split it up among everyone. The girl agreed, but still added, "I get the most." Moffett advocates the formation of small groups of students like this to read, discuss and improvise among themselves. The desire to interact with peers provides the motivation to increased verbal ability and solve language problems. It also continually tests the effectiveness of a student's expression; if he is successful...
...dramatic activities are further elaborated, reading and writing are introduced into the curriculum. Moffett chooses the "decoding" over the "meaning" approach for initial reading instruction. The latter method introduces words as incarnations of specific meanings to be memorized. Moffett thinks this approach confuses decoding and transcription with the much more complex skills of comprehension and composition. He advocates the use of the "decoding" method, which is based on the teaching of correspondences between spoken sounds and letters. Reading becomes just a translation between an articulated and written symbol system. Spelling is taught as different arrangement of phonetic elements, and punctuation...
...novelty of a student-centered language arts curriculum imposes difficulties which "How Can I Tell You" has helped to overcome. Anne McNamara is in charge of the language curriculum at the Loker School, which has followed Moffett's teaching proposals for two years. "It would have been great if there were a show last year," she said. "We would have known what we were supporting. Kids follow the program and it loosened up teachers. Last year we had to write out pantomimes and plays...