Input Modes v. Output Modes: An interesting Observation

During my first semester using TPRS, I made an interesting observation.  Because it exposes students to more "natural" language and grammatical forms (whether or not they know it), I decided to go ahead and tell my stories in past tense.  However, I didn't feel like I was working enough present tense situations into my input for students to acquire that part of the language.  So, at some point during the semester, I decided to have students read in present tense to get a nice balance.  This produced an interesting result when it came to their output....

The students spoke in past tense.  However, they wrote in present tense.

Hindsight is 20/20 and this only seems logical now.  Still, I'm only just beginning to understand what the implications of such a phenomenon might be.

First, it showed me just how much output that is heard (speaking) is learned by input that is heard (listening).  Similarily, output that can be seen (writing) is learned by input that can be seen (reading).  Again, it only seems logical, but it's easy to forget we're fluent in the language - to me, it all goes together, especially since Spanish is generally written exactly how it sounds (unlike English).  Maybe I never noticed because English is my native language and doesn't seem to follow any rhyme or reason when it comes to spelling, though I never experienced this when I was learning Spanish (probably because I was more focused on the grammar-based curriculum that was used to teach me).

Second, I realized that something is just not clicking when it comes to the way words sound and the letters used to spell them.  They must be just writing what looks familiar without thinking about the way they sound - we touch on this idea when we refer to speakers speaking based on what feels and sounds right- from this experience, I have to assume that students also write what looks right.  Again, it only seems logical!  I have to assume that students are "saying" the words in their head as well, but there was still a disconnect between the spelling and the way it sounds, so looking right must be more important at this stage whether or not they realize it.  I'm not sure that this is really a problem at the moment because students will learn with time how the sounds match the spellings, but it does have one more critical implication for when we do read: students need to hear what they are seeing, and they need to hear it correctly.  It's tempting to allow students to read silently and independently, especially if they're understanding what they're reading, but this prevents them from connecting the correct sounds to the letters.  Think about how often we were read out loud to as children by parents, teachers, librarians - I'm sure the list goes on.  Then, as we advanced, we were asked to read out loud as well.  Whether or not this actually fostered comprehension is a different argument that I won't get into here, but it did give educators the opportunity to double check that what we hear is truly connected to what we read.

In the true spirit of TPRS, it only seems logical at this point to be sure we're following a pattern of "natural" acquisition through read-alouds (first by me to model correct pronunciation, then by students ready and comfortable enough to read to their peers) and ensuring that students are continually exposed to all forms of the language in through both listening and reading.  I'm sure most of my students had no idea what they were doing, but the insights it gave me were priceless.