Do you ever teach CLB 5 narrative paragraph writing? Do your students usually write something with pencil on paper that they later discard? Have you ever thought of using Storybird to engage and enhance writing skills or create a class anthology of stories?
Publish it
Continue readingI recently got certified as an adult ESL teacher, more than a decade after graduating with a bachelor’s degree in English. Although teaching had been an option in the past, I decided to pursue other avenues—and I’m glad I did.
Over the years, I had many great experiences, learned many things, and acquired skills that make me a better teacher today. There truly are many different roads to teaching and I would like to share mine.
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Helping the Students to be Independent
I believe that the first step to foster Self-Regulated Learning (SRL) and independency in our students is to use critical thinking and inquiry. I teach English for Academic Purposes (EAP) to students who very often come from countries where neither SRL nor inquiry are particularly encouraged. I have been experimenting with critical thinking and inquiry and SRL skills in the classroom during my Master’s degree and I haven’t stopped. It is quite fascinating and rewarding. I would like to share a lesson in pronunciation I have recently adopted with one of my advanced EAP classes. Continue reading
Have you ever thought about how you could use your skills as a teaching professional in the online world to earn additional income?
When I left classroom teaching in December 2015, after a 20-year teaching career, I certainly did. During the next eighteen months, I had the time and energy to discover how I could use my skills and expertise as a teaching professional to earn income outside of the traditional ESL classroom.
For many of us, our parents or grandparents graduated from high school, walked into a permanent full-time job, and stayed there until retirement. That’s not the case for the majority of people these days.
Many ESL professionals are on short-term contracts, working at multiple locations, or looking for their next way to earn a living. TESL Ontario makes every effort to stay relevant for its members, and a recent member survey showed the need for this topic to be addressed. Continue reading
I was able to attend the presentation given by Tareq Hadhad, owner
of “Peace by Chocolate” at the Toronto Reference Library this past summer. My Specialized Language Training course was just wrapping up; within the course, learners explored local entrepreneurs and local small business stories. Peace by Chocolate showed up as a news story sometime in May, and immediately I could see the relevance for my group of adult newcomers. I created a skill-building activity related to the news article, Daily bite: Peace by Chocolate names new bar after Mi’kmaq word For peace and the class responded with a great deal of enthusiasm, hope, and energy. The reason they did so was because they connected emotionally to the story. Peace by Chocolate is more than a success story for newcomers to Canada. It’s a chronicle that exemplifies what it means to never give up, to pursue your passion, to develop strong community relationships, and to do what’s right. Continue reading
Dear TESL ON blog readers,
We wish you all a Happy Holiday and a well deserved time of rest and relaxation, as the clock winds down for year 2017. And on that note, below is a recap of the blogs for 2017 – in case you missed something. It’s a good time to catch up on your blog reading. 🙂
We all have our own beliefs about teaching and learning English. Sometimes these beliefs are explicit, and we can articulate them. Other times, these beliefs are more implicit. We may not be aware of them and we may not be able to articulate them, but they are still there.
Professionally, we have beliefs about many things, including our students, the effectiveness of various pedagogical practices, the nature of knowledge itself, and even our capabilities as teachers (i.e. self-efficacy). Continue reading
Years ago the ESL program at Brock University welcomed a cohort of remarkable students on scholarships to pursue graduate studies in Canada. All of them were optimistic and highly motivated, but one – let’s call her Marianna – stood out for her exceptional diligence. She was a geneticist, and perhaps that academic focus promoted her extremely methodical approach to studying English; in any case, she wonderfully exemplified the self-aware style that often characterizes successful adult learners. One of my experiences when teaching her was especially memorable.
But first, the background: Guided by theoretical findings that were emerging at the time, we required every ESL student to read one entire easy-reader per week. We offered a large bank of fiction and non-fiction texts, and students could freely select whatever title and difficulty-level they wished. Continue reading
Over the years, I have always found it interesting that the first three words many of my students have seemed to master by day one are peace and safety. Oh, the third? – double-double, or so it seems. I’ll get back to that in a moment. Most of my students come from places where conflict and corruption create an environment that lacks peace and safety, two things that we as Canadians often take for granted. So, when asked why they come to Canada, these two words form a neat summary without needing much grammar. Sometimes they say or write: Peaceful and Safety, or Peace and Safeful, but we get the idea.
And though they certainly did not come here for the double-doubles at Tim Horton’s, considering many left behind the delights of Turkish coffee and various forms of baklava, or real tea brewed in pots, this is the comfort Canada offers them so they take it. Continue reading