I was recently assigned the role of a full-time supply instructor in an English as a Foreign Language department of approximately 70 instructors. “Take this on as a new challenge” was my first thought, and I haven’t looked back. Our EFL department has two divisions. These are the academic and the technical preparatory programs. I […]
As teachers we prepare lesson plans for many reasons. We do it because it helps us keep track of our lesson delivery and also because it is required of us. The latter one, however, can make us lose sight of its true purpose, which is to help our students achieve the learning outcomes of the […]
The following are diary entries from a fictional ESL student. March 1st I started my new English class today. I was excited to meet my teacher and classmates. I like my teacher a lot. Harry was very friendly and he made us laugh right from the start. I already feel very comfortable with him and […]
What happens when you take ESL learners outside the classroom? There’s a peak in interest in the class and in the lessons, a growth in connection among the class members, and an increased sense of belonging to the wider community. Over the past number of years, I have taken adult learners in small, mixed-level ESL […]
Something that I have struggled with for the last ten years as an ESL teacher has been whether or not to properly inform my students about the implications of studying a new language. There seems to be a prevalent preconception among many ESL students that learning to speak English is easier than say, learning the […]
In John’s previous post, Organizing Your Personal/Professional Learning Network (PLN), he discussed three types of tools for organizing your PLN start page. This post presents three more useful tools: Curated Content For the purposes of this post, curation is defined as aggregated content that has been identified and vetted by a human curator. You might […]
As presented in my last post, Personal Learning Network Sources, a Personal Learning Network (PLN) can include numerous resources that assist communication, resource sharing and professional growth. I have found that one of the most challenging aspects of PLNs is organizing the content for efficient retrieval. As PLN resources are added or removed it […]
A typical conversation that I have with students near the beginning of a semester goes like this: Me: How are things going? What would you like to do today? Student: Ugh I have so many assignments you know, and I have to study a lot and write so many papers. It took me a long […]
*Warning: This post contains snarky and in-your-face concepts to shake up the teaching world as we know it! Hey friend, grab your favourite beverage, find a comfortable spot to relax in, and prepare yourself for 3 teaching hacks that are going to change the way you give activity instructions. Have you ever put loads of […]
For some time now, I have been having some reservations about the effectiveness and value of the competency based form of assessment that my paymasters have asked that I use in my class of older English as a second language (ESL) learners. For starters, I don’t think that I am that competent to give what […]