Na sala da aula de português

My Portuguese class (MWF 2:10-3:00) is comprised of 17-18 of the biggest language nerds on campus. I say that with a combination of affection, awe and envy. Our instructor is excellent and transmits his love of Brazilian Portuguese to his students. The room is rarely silent during those 50 minutes. At any given time, some or all of us are repeating some or all of whatever he's just said, whether he asks us to or not. He often looks a bit taken aback by this, and I'm not sure he understands how lucky he is. It's often difficult to get students in the beginning language classes to pronounce things even when we ask them two or three times to do so. This is not because they're lazy - there's a shyness and a fear of sounding silly on the part of most beginning language students (who are mostly just getting a requirement taken care of ) that language nerds don't have. When I mentioned to a friend that I should tell him how very cool it is that we do this, she said it would also be a good way to teach "good noise" vs. "bad noise" in the classroom. This difference is something experienced teachers can discern automatically. Our tentative, often poorly pronounced or downright butchered Portuguese is definitely "good noise" because it means we have caught our instructor's enthusiasm and we appreciate him and the language.