Student-Centered Immersion Curriculum

Glue Language is as critically important as the textbook for teaching a second language. The elements in Glue Language (“glue drops”) are the supportive filler words, phrases, and sentences required to “glue” the main teaching topics together in target language during a textbook lesson.

These glue drops are essential in an immersion class, exposing students to vital words, phrases, and sentences far before they are addressed in a textbook. Glue Language thus supplies the “missing link” in second language learning and teaching.

Under the teacher’s guidance, students acquire the general glue drops on a daily basis and then acquire the scenario-specific glue drops before a related textbook lesson is taught. As the glue drops accumulate and are repeatedly practiced, the cumulative effect is that students are able to immerse themselves in the target language. In addition, students are able to assume the teacher’s role in classroom practice and role play to effect student-centered learning. This heuristic technique may further extend to textbook lessons.  Glue Language is thus a powerful and enabling tool for creating a successful student-centered immersion environment and developing a winning student-centered immersion curriculum.

How do I use Glue Language to conduct a successful immersion class?

There are two main components in conducting a successful immersion class using Glue Language:

1. Routine Tasks

a) The teacher chooses the desired general glue drops from each of the categories in Section I of Glue Language for daily/weekly assignment for acquisition and learning.
b) The teacher facilitates application of both new and previous glue drops in class.
c)  Each student must keep a record of the assigned glue drops as the basis for progress assessment.
d) In class, teacher and students create their own glue drops for impromptu applications to enrich the immersion experience.

2. Scenario-specific Tasks

a) Before teaching the textbook lesson, the teacher chooses a scenario in Section II related to the textbook lesson and presents the scenario-specific glue drops in an interactive manner, priming the students for the textbook lesson.
b) The students should ‘acquire’ and ‘learn’ the glue drops via interactive activities such as imitating, role play, question and answer, and other prompted responses, and non-interactive activities such as listening to the teacher, studying the book, and memorizing the glue drops.
c) It is recommended that the teacher assesses student’s language acquisition to evaluate quality and progress.