CHARTER for Where Are Your Keys?

Language Fluency Game Workshop

February 20th and 21st, 2010, Portland, OR
VISION We see a world of diverse and collaborative learning communities uent in the WAYK mentoring language, able to uently transmit and vitalize the skills relevant to their lives as individuals and whole communities. We see the emergence of this network of learning communities turning around the world crisis of endangered languages. At present, one endangered language dies on average every two weeks, and at least 20% of the world!s languages are in imminent threat of extinction. We see these struggling languages revitalized and thriving. We see a world uent in sign language, so that rich communication can occur between the hearing and the deaf, those challenged with hearing loss, and those just learning language for the rst time. We see the emergence of the twenty language child; a child of a culture of learning so rich, that both the parents and other community members effortlessly pass on their uent prociency to this child. We see the normalization of excellence in teaching, learning, and collaboration. MISSION We will use this workshop as an experimental laboratory, improving and brewing new techniques and structures for how we run workshops, accelerating the rate at which we can create a WAYK learning community here in Portland, wherever we hold workshops, and everywhere we in the learning community play games. SUCCESS INDICATORS If... -Everyone plays in the lunatic fringe and in the inner circle -Everyone has at least one Full moment -Everyone has at least one How Fascinating moment -3/4 of this workshop!s attendees can run the game to want/have/give/take after this weekend ...then we will feel pretty good about what we!ve accomplished in this workshop.

Where Are Your Keys?, LLC

http://www.whereareyourkeys.org

VALUES We value, above all, seeing the rapid emergence of uent prociency in a learning community.

PRINCIPLES AND PRACTICES We achieve uently procient learning communities, by teaching uent prociency in a language of mentoring itself. Like any language, this mentoring language creates a culture of interaction through a lexicon of teaching and learning techniques. Each of these techniques individually, and in tandem, accelerates the transmission of uent prociency amongst the learning community members. Foundational techniques: Fluent - We observe that speedy ease, under moderate pressure, indicates skill competence. Therefore we always prioritize the acquisition of uency as we climb up the ladder of prociency in any skill. Travels with Charlie - Though born from the ACTFL (American Council on the Teaching of Foreign Languages) language prociency scale, this technique addresses the overarching understanding that every competency comprises a set of nested levels of complexity. To acquire "mastery!, one must start with the smallest, most accessible level and work one!s way outward. We usually refer to these levels of prociency (i.e. complexity of skill) as four broad categories; Novice, Intermediate, Advanced, and Superior. Prociency differs from uency; prociency indicates complexity of performance, uency indicates performing with speedy ease under pressure. We!ll all get there together - Nobody wins the learning/teaching game alone. We only truly acquire competence in a skill once we can self-sufciently work on mastery through interaction with those more (or differently) skilled than us, and uently pass the skill on to those less (or differently) skilled than us. At any one time all levels of prociency (Novice, Intermediate, Advanced, Superior) must exist in a learning community for anyone to have full competency, because only then do players get to work on accessing and engaging with the full variety of prociencies, fully working their teaching and learning skill. Everybody plays all the time - If we all get there together, and owing to the current understanding of cognitive science (and our experience) that suggests play indicates the highest learning state, therefore we constantly look for ways to engage others in the transmission of uent prociency through play. The mentoring language essentially becomes a series of nested rules of the game of teaching and learning. Obviously! - High-speed acquisition of uent prociency requires almost absurdly clear learning environments. We go to ridiculous lengths to make teaching and learning clear, effortless, and instantaneous. Bite-sized pieces/Next easiest step/Baby steps - Human beings acquire uent competence most quickly by limiting in number and scope the chunks of complex skill they work on, and working them one at a time, in order.

Where Are Your Keys?, LLC

http://www.whereareyourkeys.org

ROLE OF WORKSHOP ATTENDEES Though the vision and mission arrive born from Evan Gardner, Willem Larsen, and the current WAYK community, everyone here has come to collaborate on the success of our mission together. By showing up at this workshop, you drive the principle that we all get there together, and to the extent that you wish to, you all become members of the WAYK learning community. THE WAYK LEARNING COMMUNITY Wherever we run workshops we purpose to create local learning communities that can connect with each other. We work with communities that have endangered languages (Squamish country in Vancouver B.C., Confederated Tribes of the Grande Ronde, Chinook Nation). We also work with communities struggling to transmit important yet dying skill-sets, and communities that merely wish to reclaim responsibility for their own teaching and learning. We ask you to consider the possibility of: -Who might be affected by your learning here this weekend? Understanding the vision of WAYK, who might this affect amongst your family, children in your life, relatives, friends, workmates? -What communities (work, recreation, other) do you belong to? BOUNDARIES The technique Limit embodies a key principle of the mentoring language; when we set out to learn or do something, we begin by limiting the scope of what we do. Throughout this workshop, whenever topics emerge tangential to our work at that moment, we will mark this by indicating limit. Though we probably will need to address the topic eventually, according to bite-sized pieces we limit when and how we will tackle it.

Where Are Your Keys?, LLC

http://www.whereareyourkeys.org