Wednesday 26 September 2007

Today has felt like a series of lost opportunities, thanks to several external factors. However, I did some further work on the material I'll be presenting at the English UK conference and produced an initial PPT that I'm going to do with my students. The aim is to see how they react to a different way of seeing tenses and verb structures in English. I discussed it with Liz, one of my colleagues, and it helped me crystallize a few concepts. Interestingly, it has almost confirmed a suspicion I had that my hypothesis is very difficult for people to understand regarding their own language, yet becomes crystal clear when they think about a language acquired later in life.
I'm sorry I'm being a bit cagey: It's just that I want to get the explanation of this idea right before I discuss it. Suffice to say, it builds on some of Michael Lewis' stuff, and is apparently mirrored by Stephen Pinker in his new book, which I have yet to read.

Induction day

Two new classes today - an upper intermediate group in the morning, an advanced group in th evening, the lesson virtually identical in every aspect, as we have to give an induction to each and every class we give on their first day. This, I suspect, leaves students feeling 'Jeez, is it going to be like this for the next year?', and possibly leaving forthwith. I made a generic PPT for all the part time cohort to use this year, which seemed to do the trick - it certainly soaked up the teaching time.
In the morning, walking Angus to school, I reflected on how there is a direct cognate between going to/will and have to/must; the first in each pair operate as 'false modals', and imply a certain external point of view, or rather one that is not as immediate and personal as the second in each pair.
No time for any reading today, as rather hectic.

Monday 24 September 2007

Right, a new blog, but this one is to be about my work, study and research in EFL/ELT.

Labels

Motivation (12) ESOL (11) Methodology (8) Acquisition (7) Learning (7) Portfolios (5) Dip TESOL (4) blended learning (4) dogme (4) EFL (3) FE (3) language citizens (3) language commuters (3) language denizens (3) language tourists (3) learner attitudes (3) linguistic hierarchy (3) marking (3) technology (3) #eltchat (2) English (2) Hierarchy of needs (2) L1 (2) Maslow (2) Natural Approach (2) SATs (2) SLA (2) Silent Way (2) Speaker and listener roles (2) The Language City (2) Turkish (2) VLEs (2) attitudes (2) differentiation (2) elt (2) handling and manipulating (2) iPad (2) language and depression (2) language at intermediate level (2) language city model (2) lesson (2) lesson planning (2) moodle (2) phonology and phonetics (2) smart phones (2) speaking (2) teaching (2) ALTE (1) Arabic (1) CEFR (1) CLL (1) Cadbury's Creme Eggs (1) Classroom activity (1) Communication (1) DTLLS (1) ELT Unplugged (1) ETS (1) French As An Evil Language (1) GLAW profilies (1) Higher level students (1) L1 context (1) Language Interaction (1) Observations (1) P4C (1) Steve Krashen (1) Syllabus (1) TPR (1) actuive vocabulary (1) advice (1) affective filter (1) ambiguous language (1) approaches (1) apps (1) articulator (1) aspect (1) blockbuster (1) boardwork (1) bullying (1) childhood acquisition (1) citizen (1) citizenship (1) city guide (1) classroom techniques (1) cognitive tasks (1) conjunctions (1) copyright (1) creating content (1) curating content (1) diagram (1) digital literacy (1) dimension (1) disruption (1) distance learning (1) e-learning (1) easter (1) encoding (1) english uk (1) examiner (1) experiments (1) failure (1) fossilization (1) future forms (1) grade scales (1) grading (1) grammar (1) group work (1) handedness (1) holistic learning (1) integration (1) interlanguage (1) l2 (1) lesson ideas (1) lexis (1) listening (1) literacy (1) manager (1) meaningful interaction (1) mindfulness (1) mondays (1) neologism (1) online content (1) page o rama (1) passive grammar (1) passive vocabulary (1) podcast (1) politics (1) power law distributions (1) presentation (1) problem solving (1) provider (1) register (1) research (1) resolutions (1) routine (1) sentence structure (1) silent running (1) skills and systems (1) stereotypes (1) style (1) suggestopedia (1) teacher talk time (1) tense (1) tenses (1) total bloody genius (1) tutorial aids (1) tutors (1) twitter (1) using IT (1) validity (1) varieties of English (1) web profiles (1) world englishes (1) writing (1)