MSI Press Blog

Excerpt from Practices That Work by Thomas Jesus Garza.  Be Sensitive to Learning Styles   Betty Lou Leaver (Defense Language Institute Foreign Language Center) Madeline Ehrman (Foreign Service Institute) Teachers working with language learners at all levels have for some decades now recognized that learners have specific sensory and cognitive preferences when it comes to learning and specific ways of interacting with classmates. These individual differences can be very important both in positive and negative ways in the language process, the significance of which may change as one progresses up the ladder of proficiency. One phenomenon that has been observed by language teachers and their learners over time is the “tortoise and hare” syndrome. Learners who are painfully accurate—and therefore slow— in the beginning of language study often outdistance their faster peers who can plateau at the Advanced/Superior threshold because they have become comfortable with being

    Peek into the future! Wait just a bit. Coming up some time this year is the publication of  The   E&L Cognitive Styles Construct . by  Dr. Betty Lou Leaver  and  Dr. Madeline Ehrman .  At last, a book devoted to the topic that has been bandied about in the literature since 2002. Watch for upcoming excerpts. For more posts about the E&L cognitive styles construct, click  HERE . Sign up for the MSI Press LLC newsletter Follow  MSI Press  on  Twitter ,  Face Book , and  Instagram .   Interested in publishing with  MSI Press LLC ? Check out information on  how to submit a proposal . Planning on self-publishing and don't know where to start? Our  author au pair  services will mentor you through the process. Interested in receiving a free copy of this or any MSI Press LLC book  in exchange for  reviewing  a current or forthcoming MSI Press LLC book? Contact editor@msipress.com. Want an  author-signed copy  of this book? Purchase the book at 25% discount (use coupon code FF25)

    Peek into the future! Wait just a bit. Coming up some time this year is the publication of  The   E&L Cognitive Styles Construct . by  Dr. Betty Lou Leaver  and  Dr. Madeline Ehrman .  At last, a book devoted to the topic that has been bandied about in the literature since 2002. Watch for upcoming excerpts. For more posts about the E&L cognitive styles construct, click  HERE . Sign up for the MSI Press LLC newsletter Follow  MSI Press  on  Twitter ,  Face Book , and  Instagram .   Interested in publishing with  MSI Press LLC ? Check out information on  how to submit a proposal . Planning on self-publishing and don't know where to start? Our  author au pair  services will mentor you through the process. Interested in receiving a free copy of this or any MSI Press LLC book  in exchange for  reviewing  a current or forthcoming MSI Press LLC book? Contact editor@msipress.com. Want an  author-signed copy  of this book? Purchase the book at 25% discount (use coupon code FF25)

    Peek into the future! Wait just a bit. Coming up some time this year is the publication of  The   E&L Cognitive Styles Construct . by  Dr. Betty Lou Leaver  and  Dr. Madeline Ehrman .  At last, a book devoted to the topic that has been bandied about in the literature since 2002. Watch for upcoming excerpts. For more posts about the E&L cognitive styles construct, click  HERE . Sign up for the MSI Press LLC newsletter Follow  MSI Press  on  Twitter ,  Face Book , and  Instagram .   Interested in publishing with  MSI Press LLC ? Check out information on  how to submit a proposal . Planning on self-publishing and don't know where to start? Our  author au pair  services will mentor you through the process. Interested in receiving a free copy of this or any MSI Press LLC book  in exchange for  reviewing  a current or forthcoming MSI Press LLC book? Contact editor@msipress.com. Want an  author-signed copy  of this book? Purchase the book at 25% discount (use coupon code FF25)

    Peek into the future! Wait just a bit. Coming up some time this year is the publication of  The   E&L Cognitive Styles Construct . by  Dr. Betty Lou Leaver  and  Dr. Madeline Ehrman .  At last, a book devoted to the topic that has been bandied about in the literature since 2002. Watch for upcoming excerpts. For more posts about the E&L cognitive styles construct, click  HERE . Sign up for the MSI Press LLC newsletter Follow  MSI Press  on  Twitter ,  Face Book , and  Instagram .   Interested in publishing with  MSI Press LLC ? Check out information on  how to submit a proposal . Planning on self-publishing and don't know where to start? Our  author au pair  services will mentor you through the process. Interested in receiving a free copy of this or any MSI Press LLC book  in exchange for  reviewing  a current or forthcoming MSI Press LLC book? Contact editor@msipress.com. Want an  author-signed copy  of this book? Purchase the book at 25% discount (use coupon code FF25)

  Peek into the future! Wait just a bit. Coming up some time this year is the publication of  The   E&L Cognitive Styles Construct . by  Dr. Betty Lou Leaver  and  Dr. Madeline Ehrman .  At last, a book devoted to the topic that has been bandied about in the literature since 2002. Watch for upcoming excerpts. For more posts about the E&L cognitive styles construct, click  HERE . Sign up for the MSI Press LLC newsletter Follow  MSI Press  on  Twitter ,  Face Book , and  Instagram .   Interested in publishing with  MSI Press LLC ? Check out information on  how to submit a proposal . Planning on self-publishing and don't know where to start? Our  author au pair  services will mentor you through the process. Interested in receiving a free copy of this or any MSI Press LLC book  in exchange for  reviewing  a current or forthcoming MSI Press LLC book? Contact editor@msipress.com. Want an  author-signed copy  of this book? Purchase the book at 25% discount (use coupon code FF25) a

  Peek into the future! Wait just a bit. Coming up some time this year is the publication of The   E&L Cognitive Styles Construct . by Dr. Betty Lou Leaver and Dr. Madeline Ehrman .  At last, a book devoted to the topic that has been bandied about in the literature since 2002. Watch for upcoming excerpts. For more posts about the E&L cognitive styles construct, click HERE . Sign up for the MSI Press LLC newsletter Follow  MSI Press  on  Twitter ,  Face Book , and  Instagram .   Interested in publishing with  MSI Press LLC ? Check out information on  how to submit a proposal . Planning on self-publishing and don't know where to start? Our  author au pair  services will mentor you through the process. Interested in receiving a free copy of this or any MSI Press LLC book  in exchange for  reviewing  a current or forthcoming MSI Press LLC book? Contact editor@msipress.com. Want an  author-signed copy  of this book? Purchase the book at 25% discount (use coupon code FF25) and c

  Today (October 24) is the anniversary of Madeline E. Ehrman' s death in 2015. It seems difficult to believe that seven years have passed since she was sitting with the MSI Press editor, talking about what would be her last (still unpublished, but posthumously planned publication) book, The E&L Construct -- an  instrument , copyrighted at the US Library of Congress in 2002,. The E&L instrumnt identifies neurodiversity preferences that she (the E) designed and validated with Betty Lou Leaver, MSI Press managing editor (the L), when they both worked for US government institutions. The E&L Cognitive Styles Construct is not the first posthumous book that MSI Press has published, nor is it likely to be the last. It is a tribute to Madeline, however, that interest in the instrument has grown and become such that a posthumous book is considered viable. Madeline worked her entire career at the Foreign Service Institute. After she died (from stomach cancer, likely resulting fr

  Achieving Native-Like Second Language Proficiency  (Speaking) by Betty Lou Leaver is a research-based catalogue of factors that would seem to predict ability to reach the highest level of foreign language proficiency and is based on common characteristics shared by more than 200 near-native speakers, identified by self-report, survey, and interviews by master testers. Contrary to popular belief, far from all the interviewees, including the polyglots, were good classroom language students. One remembers receiving a D in a college Japanese course and being told to give up on languages and take an easier course. In a bygone day (clearly), a French professor threw a book at a current Level-4 speaker of French in exasperation at her then very strongly non-Parisian accent. A near-native speaker of Russian got C after C in college Russian courses and was gently encouraged to consider other languages. Many of the interviewees reported frustration with their early language-learning experience