Devon Gunning | La Libre Language Learning
49 episodes listed below
PRESS PLAY
Where world language teachers gather to transition to proficiency oriented instruction through comprehensible input. All through practical, real-life, teacher-friendly ideas that make teaching language more joyful! Hosted by Devon of La Libre Language Learning.
Based on 6 episodes we listened to · September 2026
Specific classroom guidance connects language-learning principles to vocabulary, comprehensible input, curriculum choices, and the realities of teachers' workloads.
Devin turns proficiency-oriented language instruction into classroom decisions teachers can act on. Practical Proficiency Podcast moves between direct coaching, listener questions, guest conversations, workshops, and personal experience, keeping its attention on what instruction…
Devin's language-class pool party comes with floaties; your students don't have to sink to learn.
Press play if you want
Short reviews from the PlayNext desk, based on the episodes we processed.
A small doorway routine that settles into calm classroom structure.
The episode gives a clear look at a proficiency oriented world language class and the small routines that keep it moving. The password setup fits into the school day as a greeting, an attendance check, and a simple way for late arrivals to join without friction.
A practical take on AI that keeps teacher judgment at the center.
The episode treats AI as a classroom helper, not a cure-all, and that makes the advice useful for world language teachers in proficiency-oriented classes.
Useful ideas for lowering anxiety without lowering language expectations.
The piece offers grounded coaching for world language teachers who want proficiency-focused instruction to work in real classrooms. It points to concrete moves that can be used right away: start with pairs, move students into groups, and keep planned one-on-one check-ins in the…
Grammar should support communicative goals, not drive the course map.
Devin stays on proficiency-first teaching and keeps pulling the listener back from grammar-first planning to input that students can understand.
A candid reminder that similar languages tangle faster than expected.
Devin turns a personal language-learning snag into a clear reminder that Spanish and French can get in each other's way. She talks through how French words can slip into Spanish writing, and how French structures can start to shape Spanish more than English does, then widens the…
A practical reset for teaching past tense without overwhelming students with irregular forms.
This episode stays close to a real classroom problem: how to teach past tense forms without dumping every irregular form on students at once. It makes the case for narrowing the target, beginning with high-frequency forms and then building outward, with quedar used as a…
A practical way to build a can-do-based final around class time and end-of-semester check-ins.
Devin makes the case for treating the final exam as something students can work toward in class, not a pile of work that appears at the end. The plan is straightforward: use class time to rebuild the can-do statements, give the needed review, and spend the last week or two of…
Devin frames cognitive load for elementary world language teachers with a concrete 30-minute classroom structure.
Devin's episode takes cognitive load theory and gives it a plain classroom use case for elementary world language teachers. He keeps coming back to a familiar problem: how to help young learners build sentences without piling on too much at once.
John McWhorter and co-hosts trace English etymology, grammar shifts, and idiom origins episode by episode.
Héctor and Beto dissect Mexican grammar, slang, and news in native-speed Spanish conversations.
Devin opens by asking listeners to send in their questions through the show notes.
The host opens with a simple invitation for listeners to send in questions.
Devin opens by asking world language teachers to send in their questions and saying she will troubleshoot real classroom problems on the podcast.
Practical Proficiency Podcast opens with Devon Gunning thanking listeners and inviting them to send in questions about proficiency-oriented teaching.
This listener Q&A tackles recurring classroom problems in a proficiency-oriented ASL and world language setting, including support for autistic learners and getting students to answer more clearly.
Devon Gunning uses Practical Proficiency Podcast #46 to argue that AI can act as a classroom assistant for world language teachers while also exposing which assignments are no longer worth doing.
Devon opens by asking listeners to send in their questions, then turns to a familiar problem in proficiency-oriented classes: quiet participation and anxiety.
Devin opens the year with a listener question about cognitive load and elementary language teaching.
Devin opens with a direct call to teachers who are working toward a more proficiency-oriented classroom and have a question to send in.
She talks about how her teaching changed over time as she kept looking for a better way to run a proficiency-oriented classroom.
The host begins by thanking listeners and inviting them to send in questions about classroom problems they are working through.
Practical Proficiency Podcast #48 follows Devin's language path from Japanese school at age 2–4 in Nafetugi, Japan, to French in seventh grade, to Spanish in college and study abroad in the Dominican Republic.