THE FUTURE OF LEARNING The Michel Thomas Method Freeing Minds One Person at a Time ... Marilyn. Woodsmall Ph.M. Wyatt Woodsmall, Ph.D. A selection of other works also by Marilyne Woodsmall & Wyatt Woodsmall People Pattern ™ Power: The Nine Keys to Business Success Red Alert: The Culture Crisis - Implications of the General Developmental Model Learning How to Learn ™: Cultivating our Children for the Future Motive: The Secret Key to Influence The Secrets to Motivation in the Workplace Behavioral Assessment Tools: Profiling Plus ™ - Hiring Right The Value Culture ™ Profile The People Pattern ™ Profile THE FUTURE OF LEARNING THE MICHEL THOMAS METHOD FREEING MINDS ONE PERSON AT A TIME.. COPYRIGHT © 2008 By Marilyne Woodsmall, Ph.M., and Wyatt Woodsmall, Ph.D. All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording or by any information storage and retrieval system, without written permission from the publisher. For information contact Next Step Press, P.O. Box 642, Great Falls, VA 22066. Printed in the United States of America Cover design by James Davidson Typeset in Arial ISBN 1-892876-11-6 DEDICATION We dedicate this book to the life, work and memory of our dear friend, Michel Thomas, with love and gratitude for being in our lives, for his invaluable contribution to this book, and for his steadfast commitment to engender our fundamental right to "Freedom of Mind." As Michel had requested, we also dedicate this book to his "two mothers," Freida, his biological mother, and his aunt Idessa, both of whom were his "Master Teachers of Life." It was their wisdom and love which inspired and molded Michel into the remarkable man that he was. THE FUTURE OF LEARNING THE MICHEL THOMAS METHOD Freeing Minds One Person at a Time ACKNOWLEDGEMENT We would like to convey our gratitude to our wonderful friends and students around the world for their continuing support of our work and research. We would also like to express a special thank you to particular friends for their involvement with this project: to Gail Levine, for her enthusiastic and dedicated contribution to the editing of the manuscript; to Shelly Wooldridge for her technical expertise and help with the formatting of the manuscript; and to James Davidson, for his assistance in preparing the manuscript and for the beautiful design for the front and back covers of this book, which reflect the essence of Michel's ground-breaking method, and capture the intensity of a young Michel Thomas, as well as the wisdom and dignity of the man he was to become. Most of all, our profound and heartfelt gratitude goes to Michel Thomas for his treasured friendship, for his unwavering support of and commitment to the success of this project, for his trust and for his candidly sharing both the secrets of his revolutionary teaching method, as well as the very depth of his being, to make this book what it is, a legacy of Michel's magnificent and unparalleled contribution to our world, one which represents the future of learning and the reality of freeing minds one person at a time to make this a much better world for all. ix THE FUTURE OF LEARNING THE MICHEL THOMAS METHOD Freeing Minds One Person at a Time CONTENTS DEDiCATION ....................................................................................... V ACKNOWLEDGEMENT CONTENTS ......................................................................................... x Forward ................................................................................................ 1 Chapter One MICHEL THOMAS: A REMARKABLE MAN WITH A GRAND MISSION ............................................................... 9 Chapter Two THE MESSAGE: THOSE WHO "GET IT" AND THOSE WHO DON'T AND THOSE WHO NEVER WILL. ........................... 13 Chapter Three MICHEL THOMAS: A BIOGRAPHICAL VIGNETTE. ...................... 23 Chapter Four EDUCATION AND DEMOCRACY: THE DELICATE LlNK ............. 37 Chapter Five THE MIND PRISONTM: THE FAILURE OF OUR CURRENT DIS-EDUCA TlONAL SYSTEMTM .................................................... 61 Chapter Six THE MICHEL THOMAS METHOD: THE MASTER TEACHER'S MODEL ............................................. 93 Chapter Seven THEORY AND PRACTICE: THE WAR BETWEEN THE TWO ................................................. 261 Chapter Eight PRACTICAL APPLICATIONS OF THE MICHEL THOMAS METHOD ............................................... 297 Chapter Nine MICHEL THOMAS: A UNIQUE PROFILE THE DIFFERENCE THAT MADE THE DIFFERENCE ................. 317 x THE FUTURE OF LEARNING THE MICHEL THOMAS METHOD Freeing Minds One Person at a Time Chapter Ten MICHEL'S MODEL SCHOOLS: DREAM OR REALITy ............... 361 Chapter Eleven MICHEL THOMAS' TEACHING TRIUMPHS: THE RULE RATHER THAN THE EXCEPTION ............................ 377 Chapter Twelve CONCLUSION .............................................................................. 415 APPENDIXA ADVANCED BEHAVIORAL MODELlNGTM TECHNOLOGY ........ 421 APPENDIX B MICHEL'S LANGUAGE COURSES ............................................ .425 APPENDIX C PHOTOGRAPHS AND DOCUMENTS ........................................ .431 ABOUT THE AUTHORS ................................................................. .437 INDEX .............................................................................................. 441 xi FORWARD Forward HOW THIS BOOK CAME ABOUT This book is about a magnificent journey that began in 1997. At that time, a mutual acquaintance, who attended one of the modeling trainings we had conducted several years previously began talking to us about an incredible educator named Michel Thomas, who was able to teach a foreign language in three days. Of course, it sounded too good to be true. After all, within our current educational system, it takes years to learn a foreign language. In fact, most people never achieve an acceptable level of proficiency. Our mutual acquaintance, Harold Goodman, D.O., was aware of the diverse modeling projects that we had been working on in different fields and of our particular interest in and research on learning. He thought that it would be a great idea for us to "capture" Michel's revolutionary teaching method by means of our proprietary Advanced Behavioral ModelingTM Technology (Appendix A). We were obviously intrigued by all that we were hearing and wanted to know more. It seemed so outside of the realm of consensual reality that someone could actually teach a person to speak a foreign language proficiently in what seemed to be nanoseconds in the grand scheme of things, that we agreed it would be a fascinating modeling project on which to work. Being open-minded and always in search of that which is unique and different, we truly believe that anything is possible with extraordinary individuals in extraordinary situations. This is particularly true when certain elements synchronistically come together, even if the world at large may not think in such a manner at this point in time. Also, the two of us had been planning to write our own book on what we refer to in our teachings as our "dis-educational system"TM. So why not do it now and write about the man who has made such a magnificent and lasting contribution to education and to our world in general. We have spent years modeling how different experts in their respective fields do what they do. Being the "Experts on Experts"TM, we figured that it would be enriching and captivating to model an expert who seemed to have come up with an extraordinary teaching method, one that could help revolutionize