Meet Catherine, TESL Ontario’s Newest Career Coach


Written by - Guest Contributor
Image Source: Catherine Crawford

Guest Contributor: Catherine Crawford

Do you struggle to reflect your value in your resume and cover letter? Ever wonder what exactly a hiring manager is looking for in the interview? Feeling stuck in your career and don’t know where to begin? We all seem to know there is a recipe for success when it comes to job competition, but few of us have sought professional guidance on what that is.

Let me introduce myself. I’m Catherine Crawford, a Certified Career Strategist and Resume Strategist, and I’m very excited to help support TESL Ontario members with career strategies for better outcomes.

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Listening Comprehension with the Cloze Test


Written by - Cecilia Aponte-de-Hanna
Image source: www.bigstockphoto.com

Most language teachers are likely familiar with the Cloze Test – the omission of specific words in a written passage (every 5th or 9th word, for example) to assess students’ reading comprehension and vocabulary knowledge. I have also found them to be extremely useful to teach listening skills.  

When creating your own Cloze Tests, the first step is to find a passage that is at the students’ language level or no more than —as Krashen would advise— i+1 (just ONE above the students’ comprehensible input). The first two sentences and last sentence in the passage should also be kept intact as they give students important background information about the text.

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An Epic Battle of the Imagination


Written by - Daniela Greco-Giancola

“Why, sometimes I’ve believed as many as six impossible things before breakfast.”

Image source: www.bigstockphoto.com

(Carroll, L. 1865. Alice in Wonderland)

Introduction

 I wrote this piece about three years ago, reflecting on an old lesson and the role imagination plays in our ESL curricula.  I believe this activity could be modified for an online classroom. If you give it a go, please let me know how it works out!

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#CdnELTchat Summary for June 1, 2021 Self Directed Professional Development with Anna Bartosik


Written by - Guest Contributor
Image Source: #CdnELTChat Team

Post by Jennifer Chow

#CdnELTchat was happy to have Anna Bartosik (@ambartosik) share her expertise on Self-Directed Professional Development (SDPD) on June 1. Anna is an English language teacher at George Brown College, instructional designer, and PhD Candidate at OISE. Her research is in self-directed professional development in digital networks. Learn more by reading her blog: https://annabartosik.wordpress.com/.

Before we started our discussion, we had a moment of silence to mourn and remember the #215children in Kamloops. #CdnELTchat is also taking time to reflect and plan a future chat with #teslONchat later this month to talk about what we need to do in order to move forward with the 94 Calls To Action from the Truth and Reconciliation Commission, and work for #Reconciliation.

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Google Earth in your class? (Part Two)


Written by - John Allan @mrpottz
Google Earth front page with a night sky
From the Google Earth front page

Last week, I talked about the application Google Earth and explained how it works. Check it out if you haven’t already! Today, I will discuss several possible activities and examples of ways to incorporate Google Earth into your language or immigration classes.
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SHARE YOUR TESL EXPERTISE AT OUR ANNUAL CONFERENCE


Written by - teslontario
image source: TESL Ontario

Article by Dave Fraser

Plans are well underway for TESL Ontario’s Annual Conference, “Forging Ahead: Building New Normals Together,” to be held virtually in November 2021. We are looking forward to providing a creative, informative and exciting program of sessions covering a wide range of topics that span the entire TESL sector! 
 
The TESL Ontario Annual Conference is an amazing opportunity for you to share your knowledge, expertise and experience with your peers and to make a valuable contribution to the TESL Ontario community and beyond. We welcome your thought-provoking, practical, experiential and innovative presentation submissions for this year’s conference Continue reading →

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Google Earth in your class? (Part One)


Written by - John Allan @mrpottz
Google Earth front page with a night sky
From the Google Earth front page

Google Earth is an application that some of us may have heard about or used for personal purposes. Unless you are a social science teacher, it is a sure bet that you have not tried integrating Google Earth into your language or settlement lessons. Whether it is used on the web or on a device, Google Earth is a very intuitive tool, and I thought it might be a good idea to raise awareness of some possibilities it can offer language instructors teaching fully online. Today, I will go over what Google Earth is and how to navigate the application, and in my next blog post, I will go more in-depth with ways to use Google Earth in your lesson plans. Continue reading →

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#CdnELTchat and #teslONchat Summary with Guest moderator JPB Gerald: Decentring Whiteness in #ELT


Written by - Guest Contributor
Decentring Whiteness in #ELT Guest Moderator, JPB Gerald
Image Source: #CdnELTChat Team

Post by Tanya Cowie, Jennifer Chow and Bonnie Nicholas

On May 11, the #CdnELTchat team, along with #teslONchat, welcomed JPB Gerald (@JPBGerald) as our special guest moderator for a live chat on the topic of Decentring Whiteness in #ELT. JPB Gerald is a doctoral candidate in Instructional Leadership. His scholarship focuses on language teaching, racism, and whiteness. Learn more at jpbgerald.com or by listening to the podcast, UnstandardizedE. We can also recommend his article in the BC Teal Journal, Worth the Risk: Decentring Whiteness in English Language Teaching, as well as his most recent co-authored piece (with @ScottStillar and @Vijay_Ramjattan) in Language Magazine, After Whiteness.

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A Year in the Life


Written by - Jennifer Hutchison

Source: bigstockphoto.com

It’s been a little over a year since ESL campuses shut their doors. I can’t decide whether it has gone by slowly or quickly. In my personal life, the pandemic has lurched along, one depressing headline after another; endless days without family and friends. However, as a teacher I have been flying through the days by the seat of my pants!

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


Written by - Guest Contributor
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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