The 6-Step Mission Breakdown

[himalayanna]

Mission Plans – བསྒྲུབ་བྱའི་འཆར་འགོད།

For every A1-B1 mission topic there is one listening-and-speaking focused plan, and one reading-and-writing focused plan. Mission Plans take three hours to complete. Each hour is divided into two steps (6 steps in total). Every 25 minutes step is designed to give you, the learner, the tools you need to accomplish the mission—the final, communicative goal.

1. དྲིས་ལན་དང་བསྐྱར་སྦྱོང་། Preparation
   The Q&A and Review section comes at the beginning of every mission. This is the learner’s chance to ask for clarification about prior missions. The first few minutes of this step should be spent attempting the final creation of this mission for the first time in front of teacher (initial creation). This will help the teacher clearly understand what they need to focus on for the rest of the mission. This is followed by feedback and discussion about the previous mission or the homework of this mission. The best time to ask questions about the current mission is during the review section of the following lesson! Finally, this preparation will include the dictation of key vocabulary related and useful to the topic of this mission.

2. དཔེ་མཚོན་མཉམ་བལྟ། Looking at Examples
   

   
   ཉན་རྩལ། /
   
   ཀློག་རྩལ།
   Your mission will begin with an “input” exercise that serves as a model for later language production. The material you listen to or read is an example of the kind of language you will be speaking or writing later in the mission. Your input content might be audio or video; a dialog, news report, or short story or text; or any other material for you to practice listening or reading. You may only get the gist of the content at this stage; that’s okay, the rest of your mission will add clarity to this new content!

3. 
   བཤད་འབྲི་གྲ་སྒྲིག Focus on Key Language
   
   
   ཚིག་གསར། /
   
   བརྡ་སྤྲོད། /
   
   སྒྲ་གདངས། /
   
   གཏམ་གླེང་། /
   
   དག་ཆ།
   After receiving input, the next step in your mission is learning the new language that was introduced. This can take the form of new vocabulary, grammar, pronunciation, spoken iteration, or spelling. You will get the chance to practice and explore, and gradually gain an understanding of the language through a variety of activities (rather than explanations), such as: matching; fill-in-the-blanks; jumbles; or word searches. The goal is to prepare you to begin producing the language in the next step.

4. ལག་ལེན་ཚོད་ལྟ། Rehearsal
   

   
   བཤད་རྩལ། /
   
   འབྲི་རྩལ།
   Your output activities support the chance to produce language in a structured setting. It’s like a practice-run for the final mission. This step focuses on speaking or writing—using the new language you’ve learned in the previous steps—and might be an activity like debating, talking or writing about a topic, or role-playing.

5. བསྐྱར་སྦྱོང་ཡང་སྦྱོང་། Drilling Key Areas
   

   
   ཉན་རྩལ། /བཤད་རྩལ། /
   
   ཀློག་རྩལ། / འབྲི་རྩལ།
   Step 5 is aimed at improving fluency and precision with the new language. Repeating the same language you’re learning in either a controlled context or a varying format strengthens the new neural links you are forming in your brain, as well as the inner voice you are developing (your ability to think in Tibetan). Skills are improved through practice, and so repetition is essential to these processes. Activities may focus on any combination of the four language skills; reading, writing, listening, or speaking, such as listen-and-repeat; retelling; dialog drilling; or a similar exercise.
   There’s actually a lot going on “behind the scenes” in this step, so asking questions and getting new information are prohibited during this time.

6. བསྒྲུབ་བྱ་དངོས་གཞི། The Mission
   

   
   བཤད་རྩལ། /
   
   འབྲི་རྩལ།
   The goal of the Mission is making a shareable creation in a real situation. It is publishable and something the learner can point to and say, “Here is the evidence that I can do this in Tibetan now”. Your final mission might be something like recording a short video or audio clip or writing a small blog post about the topic you studied in the previous steps, using the language you learned during the lesson.

Esukhia students are now required to produce 24 Missions completed in A1 in order to advance to level A2. Be sure to document each of them carefully, and remember to upload them to your student folder.

PITH INSTRUCTION:

Be comfortable with uncertainty & go with the flow.

Understanding does not go directly from 0 to 100%.

Keep Calm. Stay Happy. Speak Tibetan!