Category Archives: Inclusion

TESL Ontario 2022 Conference: Takeaways from 6 Talks on Diversity, Equity and Inclusion  

TESL Ontario’s 2022 conference, which marked the organization’s 50th anniversary, brought forth current perspectives, reflections, and suggestions related to diversity, equity, and inclusion. This post highlights takeaways from six talks about fostering inclusion, advancing accessibility, and supporting newcomers.

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Trauma in the Classroom (Part 2)

Guest Contributors: Allyson Eamer, Amea Wilbur, Katie Crossman, and Jennifer Allore

This blog is the second in a two-part series on trauma in the classroom. Part 1 discusses how teachers can better facilitate learning and provide support for students who have experienced trauma, such as refugees.  This segment focuses on vicarious trauma?

Vicarious trauma is a form of second-hand trauma. It is experienced by people in helping professions when they are deeply affected by their exposure to others’ trauma. The term was coined in 1995 by Laurie Pearlman and Karen Saakvitne, and originally was used to describe symptoms that clinicians experienced from working with clients with trauma experiences. Vicarious trauma has since been recognized in other fields. It can occur in various ways, such as listening to traumatic stories or viewing disturbing images. 

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Web Accessibility for Language Teachers

Educational digital accessibility is often viewed as a set of practices  dedicated that assist disabled individuals with challenges to participate in online and blended courses.  In fact, accessibility practices endeavor to more than eliminate barriers to education; they ensure that digital content is enhanced for everyone. Digital accessibility practices are something we all should practice because: 

  • they remove barriers to education and training
  • legislation requires accessibility across Canada 
  • many Canadians live with at least 1 disability 
  • they improve all digital resources for all users 
  • it is the right thing to do 

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Learning the Art of Critical Pivoting

Image sourcewww.bigstockphoto.com

Guest Contributor: Christine Smart-Wiseman

Like many others in the field, I am always looking for new ways to improve my teaching. My research as a PhD student at York University led me to examine teaching from a critical pedagogical approach. The guiding principle of this approach is to construct equitable and democratic classrooms with a goal to positively transform students’ lives (Canagarajah, 2005).

While I was doing my research in an ELL classroom, I uncovered many ways in which ELL environments contradict the goals of critical pedagogical approaches. In many cases, planning and preparing ahead to foster a classroom environment that supports critical learning can overcome these challenges, but at times, there may be a dynamic need to shift classroom spaces towards empowering teaching and learning. I have developed a strategy I call critical pivoting to address this problem and would like to share it with you.

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#CdnELTchat Summary for April 27, 2021 Building Community in Online Classes

Image Source: #CdnELTChat Team
Image Source: #CdnELTChat Team

Post by Bonnie Nicholas

As we continue with online teaching and learning, I think all of us have discovered the importance of building community in the online spaces in which we spend so much time. I suspect that we have all also discovered that it’s more challenging to build a community in an online environment than in a face-to-face class. #CdnELTchat hosted a Twitter chat to talk about this ongoing challenge.

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#CDNELTCHAT & #TESLONCHAT : JOIN THE CHAT ON THURSDAY!

Image Source: #CdnELTChat Team
Guest Contributor: Jennifer Chow
 
Join #CdnELTchat & #teslONchat to chat about designing inclusive pedagogies in #ELT on Thu, Feb 25 (note the date) at 6PT 7MT 8CT 9ET 10AT.

If you can, join @Jessifer ‘s webinar earlier on Feb 25 as this will be the basis for our chat (but not essential): https://asuevents.asu.edu/content/design

Below is a recap of the January 26 chat written by #CdnELTchat moderator Jennifer Chow.

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Summary of the #Representation in ELT discussion

On October 23, 2020, teachers from Ontario and other provinces gathered on Twitter to discuss representation in ELT (English Language Teaching). This #teslONchat was a joint event with the popular #CdnELTchat. The hour-long chat was guest moderated by Tyson Seburn (@seburnt) while Vanessa Nino (@vnino23) kept the questions coming, and Jennifer Chow (@jennifermchow), Augusta Avram (@ELTAugusta), and Bonnie Nicholas (@BonnieJNicholas) from the #CdnELTchat team welcomed participants and kept the conversation flowing.

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Online Teaching Reflections

Fast forward and rewind symbols on either side of zen stone, pause reflect and rewind
Image source: www.bigstockphoto.com

Some of my primary concerns about this current online world of teaching are the creation of community and how to effectively engage learners.

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