Olivet School of Language and Education (OSLE) Riverside campus recently implemented the narration method in teaching ESL, which has been proven to be efficient and productive.
The narration method is a multi-step learning process. First, students listen to the audio recording of an article or a book without seeing the text. Then, students will listen for a second time along with the text to identify the vocabulary that they are not familiar with. They will also look up the meaning of each new word that they learn and create a sentence using that word. In the third step, students will try to transcribe the text while listening to the audio. Lastly, students should record an oral narration to summarize the content of the article or the book that they have read.
Starting from this quarter, ESL students have been using this new method to practice English in class and in individual studies. They have all shown significant improvement in their English comprehension, writing, and oral skills.
"The cumbersome and exquisite grammatical instructions may satiate the learners and mortify their courage, but the method of 'narration' kindles their natural and inborn curiosity and love for knowledge. Instead of passively receiving information with little mental work, students must actively and attentively engage in class in order to give oral narration precisely," said the ESL instructor.