20 Ways To Be A Better English Language Teacher (Part 1) | ELT Experiences English language teaching can be a challenging and difficult process, especially if you are seeking for new ideas and thoughts on improving your day-to-day teaching. Much of the challenge is learning to develop yourself, especially once you have found your place in this career and feel settled. You must continuously strive to improve your own teaching day in and day out. Here are some ideas to consider when you want to improve and develop your own teaching or if you want to be a better teacher overall. 1. Reflect on your lessons It seems like commonsense but for some teachers that I have observed, they have difficulty reflecting and improving their own lessons. Did the students enjoy the lesson? 2. If you have any difficulty on reflecting your lessons, or you wish to consider studying your lesson in more detail, you could record your own lesson to analyse afterwards. 3. When you are preparing your lessons, think about the following: “By the end of the lesson, students will be able to …”.
Teach with Your iPhone: Apps to Use in the Classroom You don't need a class set of netbooks or iPads to integrate technology into your daily instruction. There are some fantastic, free iPhone apps that are perfect for teachers who are looking to change up their daily routine. These apps can make everyday tasks easier, simplify what you're already doing, and maybe just inspire others to make an investment in technology at your school. Common Core MasteryConnect has designed a wonderful app to keep the Common Core State Standards at your fingertips. Pick a Student It's important that all students are held accountable during class discussions and everyone has a chance to speak his or her mind. Timer, Sand Timer and Traffic Light Whether you're preparing your students for state exams or feel that they need to practice their pacing and stamina, use the timer on your iPhone to keep them on task. BookLeveler If you're organizing a classroom library or helping a student find a "just right" book, the BookLeveler app will definitely come in handy.
StoryCloud Lizzie Pinard - Course books in the language classroom: friend or foe? This is not the first time I’ve discussed or reflected on the use of course books in the classroom, neither, I’m sure, will it be the last. While in my first post-CELTA job, I initiated an #ELTchat discussion entitled “How to avoid death by course book?” – the summary of which can be found here – which hints at my feelings towards course books at that time! Since then, and via a lot of teaching, learning (both on the job and during my Delta/M.A.ELT year at Leeds Metropolitan) and reflection, my relationship with course books has evolved… How do I feel about using a course book? For me, the course book is a cookery book. Instead of dismissing your course book out of hand and assuming that you know better (hey, you might – but not necessarily!) Ask yourself these questions: What is the purpose of this sequence? (You could look in the Teachers Resource Book, if you have access to it, to explore this further. Now consider your students and context: Accordingly, if you opt for change: References:
Educational Technology and Mobile Learning: A Visual Chart on Summative Vs Formative Assessment February 5, 2014 This post is born out of a discussion I had with a fellow teacher on the Facebook page of Educational Technology and Mobile Learning on the differences between summative and formative assessment. Luckily this discussion coincided with me reading Frey and Fisher's book " Literacy 2.0 : Reading and Writing in The 21st Century Classroom." and there was a section in which the authors talked about these differences in a subtle way by referring to formative assessment as assessment for learning and summative assessment as assessment of learning. However, knowing that several of you might probably need a refresher about these concepts I went ahead and created the visual below for you to keep as a reminder. Besides the book I mentioned earlier, I also drew on Eberly Center page for more examples. I invite you to have a look and share with your colleagues.
Useful site for student choice. Wide variety. Tony DiTerlizzi - Illustrator Tony DiTerlizzi is the illustrator of the Caldecott Honor Book The Spider and the Fly and the coauthor and illustrator of the best-selling The Spiderwick Chronicles. He grew up in an artistic household in South Florida and quickly gravitated toward fantasy and whimsical stories. In addition to writing and illustrating children’s books, he has also worked in gaming. RIF: What was your inspiration for the idea and art of The Spiderwick Chronicles? Tony DiTerlizzi: I am a tremendous fan of old fairy tales like those of the brothers Grimm and Hans Anderson. Holly and I have both written before (Holly has written several young adult novels, and I several picture books), so we met halfway in the format of middle reader books and collaborated together on the plot and story arcs. Unlike other author/illustrator collaborations, though, we constantly exchanged feedback blurring the lines of our roles in an effort to create the best book possible. TD: Thank you!
Europeisk språkportfolio - pedagogisk verktyg för lärare Språkportfolion hjälper eleven att bli mer medveten om sitt eget lärande. Både eleven och läraren får syn på vilka kunskaper eleven har och vad han eller hon behöver lära sig mer om. Äldre elever kan använda dokumentationen inför studier utomlands eller för att söka ett arbete. Språkportfolion ersätter inte betyg, certifikat eller diplom utan är ett komplement till formella examina. I språkpasset dokumenterar eleven vilka språk hon eller han kan, hur väl hon/han behärskar dessa och var hon/han har lärt sig dem. I språkbiografin planerar, bedömer och reflekterar eleven kring sin inlärning av olika språk och sina kulturella erfarenheter. I dossiern samlar eleven ett urval av sina arbeten. Handledning - ESP 6-16 år (3,5 MB) Handledningen innehåller förslag och instruktioner hur du och dina elever kan planera och arbeta med språkportfolion. ESP 6-11 år, interaktiv pdf (1,0 MB) Min språkbiografi 6-11 år, interaktiv pdf (515 kB) Materialet innehåller planerings- och utvärderingsblad.
Using cell phones in the classroom when computers are not available (by Fabiana Casella Congratulations Fabiana! Click this image and “like” the facebook image to vote for Fabiana! Everybody is talking about 21st Century skills and preparing students for a whole different world. The truth is that our students have become digital and there are a whole lot of educators around the world who are still “analog”. That is why I would like to share my work with my two secondary school groups with as many teachers as possible. My story starts right after my first online presentation for The Future of Education Reform Symposium 2013, (RSCON4) where I was kindly invited to participate by Shelly Sanchez Terrell. My first step was to open an account in Edmodo, the educational platform for teachers, in order to protect my students’ online identity. Last year, the fact that 100% of my students had a Smartphone (except for me as I just bought one) was a double advantage. Anyway, I am proud to say that these children responded wonderfully!
Simulations Can Change the Course of History . . . Classes I went to a Professional Development workshop several years ago with a master history teacher, Eric Rothschild, who spent his career teaching at Scarsdale High School. He was a brilliant workshop facilitator, and I learned more about teaching history in that workshop than in any other professional development experience I'd had up to that point in my career. He ran a workshop on teaching AP U.S. History, and it was unlike anything I had seen before. After taking his workshop, I began to apply his approach to teaching AP European History and found it to be liberating and transformational as a teacher. With each unit of study, I made sure to incorporate an active simulation, ranging from mock press conferences and trials to murder mysteries and dinner parties, from spy dilemmas to mock Survivor games. 5 Tips for Bringing History to Life Here are some tips to get started in transforming your history classroom into a simulation-driven, game-based learning environment: 1. 2. 3. 4. 5.
Gmail+1 = Student Email Addresses to Register for Online Services The Gmail+1"hack" isn't a new trick and I can't remember when I first tried it, but it still works and it still provides a solution to a problem that a lot of teachers run into when they want their students to use a new web tool. Let's say there's a new service that I want my students to use but my students don't have email addresses that they can use to register for that service. In that case I can quickly generate Gmail addresses for my students by using the Gmail+1 hack. Here's how the Gmail+1 hack works: 1. Disclaimers: 1. Two stars, a wish and a supertext! English 8C Homework for Wednesday 22nd of January is to watch this film and make sure you understand the phrases. Before you fly away with your text take a look at the things below. Perhaps you find something you need to work more with. (The phrases below are made by Mia Smith and her pupils year 9 Herrgårdsskolan, Gothenburg) STARSVariation and vocabulary Your language is varied. Clarity and coherence Your text has good flow. Adaption Your writing is well adapted to your theme. Variation and vocabulary You could vary your vocabulary more. Clarity and coherence Your text could have better flow. Adaption You could adapt your language more to your theme. Grammar and spelling You can improve the grammar in your text. Sara
Education Week Hopefully last week's digital learning day brought more awareness to how technology can transform teaching and learning. In our network, we had dozens of new and veteran teachers realizing how they could harness the power of tech to create new opportunities for their students. However, no matter your level of buy-in or awareness, if you don't have devices it doesn't matter since you can't "go digital", right? Not necessarily! YouTube Channels YouTube is more than just cat videos and music video parodies! 101Qs True learning comes from authentic curiousity. Mystery Skype Speaking of inquiry, imagine pairing two classes from different sides of the city or different sides of the world and having them ask questions to determine where their mystery partner class is calling from. Connected Classrooms If you think it's cool to bring other kids from around the world into your room, imagine using video conferencing tools to send your kids all over the world! Class Voice Blog Twitter Tuesday Plickers
Teaching in the 21st Century Subscribe to Anders Bobäck Get the best videos sent to your inbox Thanked Anders Bobäck 22mo Teaching in the 21st Century Educational Technology and Mobile Learning: 8 Practical Tools to Easily Gather Student Feeback February 4, 2014 Students feedback can sometimes host a treasure trove of new insights not only about their own comprehension but also about our teaching. Giving students the opportunity to share their own response on the learning taking place in the classroom is highly beneficial to them particularly in the way they position themselves vis a vis the content being taught. They also feel empowered because they know their voice does matter and therefore become more engaged and involved in the learning/teaching process. There are a wide variety of web tools teachers can use to gather informal feedback and responses from students. 1- Socrative Saocrative is one of my favourite tools for getting feedback from users. TodaysMeet is a great web tool for creating backchannels with your students. Poll Everywhere is another powerful web tool to collect feedback from your audience. Google Forms is another practical way to gather responses from your students. Simple Meet is similar to TodaysMeet.