Dear colleagues, Summer is here and we would like to share some great articles from our authors that we hope you would be interested in reading during the summer holidays. In this issue's Feature article, we are welcoming Sally Farley who shares her expertise giving us useful tips on how to identify dyslexic students but, most importantly, how to employ teaching strategies from which the whole class can profit and not just the individual student. In the second Feature Article of our issue, Milica Stamenković answers the question whether marriage will become obsolete. In the Academic Corner, Joanna Malefaki is back with a new article, this time on Plagiarism, in which she explains what it is, why it occurs and provides also ideas for some tasks teachers can use to help learners avoid plagiarizing in academic writing. This year, we started two new columns: the Business English and the Teacher Development Section, which seem to be receiving some very interesting contributions so far! In the first one, Paul Shaw uses some new online tools to create fake text messages in his lessons and he sees the level of engagement in his classroom skyrocket! In the second one, Biljana Pipović reflects on the importance of ‘sharing’ your knowledge with your colleagues and how rewarding this is. In the recent months, we have all been busy attending Conferences and workshops. So in the ELT Flash section, we are proud to present four articles written by our valued colleagues: Božica Šarić - Cvjetković on the 3rd TETA Bosnia and Herzegovina Conference, and Tijana Tasković on the 22nd International IATEFL Slovenia Conference. Also, Katarina Ristanović reflects on the workshop that ELTA organised to support English teachers working in inclusive classrooms , while Gorica Kostić on the Continuing Professional Development Programme for Primary EFL Teachers – Theme Based Instruction in Teaching English to Young Learners in Novi Sad, sharing also the unit plan of four lessons she did on summer time. In her Lesson Plan, Vicky Papageorgiou explains how learners can find U-tube videos around a controversial topic and then use them to critically synthesize information/arguments to use in a class debate which can take place on two platforms : http://www.pearltrees.com , and http://www.collaborizeclassroom.com . In the Young Learners’ column, Nevena Stoilkov gives us some guidelines for successful teaching when working with young learners . Last but not least, we take special pride in our students' contributions and this time, Dajana Lazarević, a student at the Faculty of Philology (University of Belgrade), shares her poems with us in the Student's Corner.
Finally, as always, the Upcoming Events are here for you to decide which one you would like to attend. We would like to thank our readers as well as our writers for supporting us. Thank you for contributing your work. Your support is invaluable! We hope you will enjoy this issue, too, and we encourage you to write for the ELTA Newsletter and share your ideas and experience with other colleagues. Write to us at newsletter.elta@gmail.com! All the best, ELTA Editorial Team
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Academic Writing: Plagiarism Joanna Malefaki (Pre sessional EAP tutorUniversity of Sheffield) Key words : academic writing, plagiarism, references, citations, activities
Plagiarism is an academic offence that has existed for many years in academia, especially in academic writing. This article will provide a definition of what plagiarism is, why it occurs, as well as ideas for tasks a teacher can use in order to help learners avoid plagiarizing in academic writing. Introduction One of the biggest challenges for universities is students’ plagiarism. Plagiarism is presenting someone else’s work as your own without giving credit to the source ( www.plagiarism.org ). Plagiarism does not only refer to copying words, it can also be pictures, graphs or even music. Studies have shown that in the UK, undergraduate students have admitted to having copied a whole paragraph into their own work without acknowledging the source, and 26% have said that they have done so more than once or twice (Bennett, 2005, cited in Elander et al., 2010:157). Another study showed that 57% students did paraphrase, but did not reference, and 53% copied without referencing (FranklynStokes and Newstead,1995 cited in Elander et al., 2010: 157). As plagiarism is something that occurs quite often during students’ university studies, it is essential to identify why students plagiarise and determine what a teacher can do to help students avoid plagiarism. Identifying why students plagiarise Plagiarism can be intentional and unintentional. Intentional plagiarism is, of course, copying knowingly without referencing. Unintentional plagiarism can occur if, for example, there is a typographical mistake in the author’s name or date/page number of a publication. As plagiarism does occur, understanding and knowing why it happens is very important. Students may plagiarise because, first of all, they may not be aware that they need to acknowledge all their sources when writing (Bloor and Bloor 1991, cited in Jordan, 2012: 48). In addition, students possibly do not actually realize what plagiarism is, and because the pressure to succeed is so ). great, they view plagiarism as the only way to achieve their goals ( www.escalate.ac.uk
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Learners may also plagiarise because they do not manage their time well, the workload is too heavy and it is easier to copy a text ( www.nottingham.ac.uk ). They might also feel scared that they will ‘insult’ experts. In fact, some international students often believe that they show respect by copying the exact words of acclaimed experts (Jordan 2012: 100). Finally, another reason why students plagiarise is because they might want to challenge their teacher ( www.nottingham.ac.uk ). Addressing the problem of plagiarism In order to eliminate plagiarism a teacher needs to take a few steps/measures. First of all, learners need to be informed. They need to have a clear understanding about what plagiarism is and when it occurs. They also need to know how much (if any) tolerance towards plagiarism there is (especially when it is not deliberate). Students can also be asked to sign forms that state that the information in their assignments is their own ( www.csu.edu.au ). As far as tasks are concerned, students often plagiarise because some tasks that teachers use have been used throughout the years, without any changes to them. In order to minimize the chances of plagiarism, it is essential that tasks are varied, especially for students who are from the same cohort ( www.csu.edu.au ). Allowing students to learn from looking at their own examples of plagiarised texts is a great learning experience as well. It will, in fact, give students a better picture of what plagiarism looks like in their own texts. Getting proof of how the learners find the information is also important. This can be done during one to one tutorials where a learner walks the teacher through where s/he found the information in his/her paper. The teacher can also ask students to highlight sections from the original sources they have and their version of what these sources say. Another step a teacher must take in order to eliminate plagiarism is to look for it in texts and make students aware that looking for plagiarism is one of the assessment criteria, for example, and that if detected, it will affect grading ( www.csu.edu.au ). If plagiarism is detected, then measures need to be taken. Ideas for tasks to help learners avoid plagiarism Learners require a lot of training in order to be able to avoid plagiarism. This is why it is imperative that learners are, first of all, informed about what plagiarism is. This can be done by
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getting students involved in research about plagiarism, getting them to do projects, drilling terms related to plagiarism with the help of a terminology checker or even through simple reading comprehension tasks. Showing students what plagiarism is can be very helpful too. This can be done by using videos. It is also a good idea to show students examples of what happened to people who plagiarised and to be clear about the referencing system they should use when writing. As far as actual writing is concerned, training learners on paraphrasing and summarizing skills will improve their writing skills and help them avoid plagiarising. Reformulation of texts can also give students a better understanding of how to move from copying and plagiarizing to recreating a plagiarismfree text. Finally, involving learners in activities that will require them using critical analysis and questioning their sources is another way to deter students from using texts as they are, and taking credit for them. The more the learners understand a source, the easier it will be for them to paraphrase it. Conclusion As plagiarism is not taken lightly by universities, understanding why it happens and taking measures to eliminate it is necessary. Teachers need to know why it happens and then train learners on how to avoid it. This can be done by informing them about plagiarism and also equipping them with micro skills and strategies that will make them writers who will produce plagiarismfree texts. References Charles Sturt University (n.d). How to minimise plagiarism in your students’ work in five steps. (pdf) Available at: http://www.csu.edu.au/__data/assets/pdf_file/0011/235685/HOWTO_Plagiarism.pdf [Accessed online 09 July 2014]
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Elander, J., Pittam, G., Lusher, J., Fox, P. & Payne, N. 2010. Evaluation of an intervention to help students avoid unintentional plagiarism by improving their authorial identity. Assessment & Evaluation in Higher Education , 35 (2). 157171. Routlegde. Jordan, R. R. 2012. English for Academic Purposes: A guide and resource book for teachers. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Plagiarism org. 2014. What is plagiarism? Available at: http://www.plagiarism.org/plagiarism101/whatisplagiarism/ [Accessed online at: 27 April 2015]. The Higher Education Academy . 2006. How to identify when your students are using websites to plagiarise: the problem of 'mouseclick' plagiarism: 2.0 Why do students plagiarise. Available at: http://escalate.ac.uk/resources/webplagiarism/03.html [Accessed online at: 11 July 2014]. The University of Nottingham . 2006. Academic integrity: Why do students plagiarise. Available at: http://www.nottingham.ac.uk/csc/academicintegrity/tutor/whydostudentsplagiarise.php [Accessed online: 10 July 2014]. ***** Joanna Malefaki lives in Greece and has almost 18 years of teaching experience in various contexts. She teaches mostly exam classes in her hometown and has taught EAP at various universities in the UK (Newcastle, Bristol and Sheffield). She has also been teaching Business English online for a few years now. She holds a BA in English, a M.Ed in Tesol and a Cambridge Delta. She really enjoys blogging and has two wordpress.org and www.myeltlessonplans.blogspot.gr ). You can also blogs ( www.myeltrambles. find her on twitter: @joannacre
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Faking it! Raising learner engagement with fake messages Paul Walsh – TH Wildau, Berlin, Germany
Key words: create, engagement, fake, flow, message, phone, SMS, social media, tinkering
I often have trouble gaining and keeping the attention of my learners. How can I possibly compete with the bright, flashy lights of WhatsApp and Facebook? Social Media sites provide a quick, authentic, constant flow of information text, images and film. It’s not surprising that my learners are intrigued. But if you can’t beat them join them. Completely by chance, I discovered some online tools to make ‘fake’ messages with my learners and the level of engagement in my classroom went up like a rocket. Here are short reviews of three online tools to create fake messages try them out and see which one you like best: http://www.fakephonetext.com/ This is my favourite as the interface is similar to a real phone. You have lots of options here you can change the operator setting, the battery setting it’s very authentic. The only downside is that when downloading you don’t get your entire message; to get the full conversation you need to screenshot each ‘page’. http://iphonesmsgenerator.com/ This is good because you can create SMS messages in other languages. The disadvantage is that it doesn’t look very authentic and you also don’t get the full conversation when downloading. http://www.classtools.net/SMS/ The best feature of this site is that you get the full SMS conversation as a separate URL. The downside is that the interface is small, and the surrounding ads are a little distracting. Now I’m going to give you a brief guide to using one of these online tools fakephonetext.com followed by some other tools that you might want to use in your context.
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Preparation Go to www.fakephonetext.com and familiarise yourself with the user interface. On the left are the adjustable settings where you can change the person who is ‘talking’, the name, the operator, and other settings. In each box on the left there is a tiny question mark; if you hover the cursor over a question mark you get useful tips. When you want to add text to the conversation, simply press the button ‘Add message to conversation’. Create one conversation between a sender and receiver (A and B) to use as an example. Here are some possible ideas: ●
an SMS conversation between yourself (the teacher) and a student who is late for class
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an SMS conversation between two learners in class about how boring the class is!
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an SMS conversation between two learners about learning English and how easy or difficult this is
Procedure 1) Show your example SMS conversation to your class, either with a projector or by printing the conversation out. It’s much easier to show learners a model then give complicated instructions. 2) Tell the learners that they are going to use their phones, tablets or computers today. Arrange the learners into small groups (pairs or groups of three work well), making sure that each group has access to at least one device. 3) Your learners are first going to ‘tinker’ with the site, to see what they can or can’t do. In my opinion, this is a more efficient way of introducing them to the website functions than the teacher explaining everything. Write these questions on the WB: ●
What can you do?
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What can you NOT do?
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How can you get help on the website? (Answer: hover over the tiny question marks)
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Is there anything you don’t understand about the site?
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4) Write the URL of the website on the WB and ask them to go to the site and answer the four questions. Go round and monitor. 5) Open class feedback and discussion. Answer any queries the learners have. 6) Say that “You are going to create an SMS conversation between two people”. I teach English for Human Resources, and in my context I asked the learners to write a conversation between someone from the HR department and an employee. The person from HR had to convince the employee to attend an event (a training event or a party). This was the scenario in my context you might invent a different scenario for your context. 7) Set a time limit say 20 minutes and tell learners to start working on their conversations. 8) Go round the class to monitor; be available to assist the learners. 9) When they have finished the task, ask the learners to act out their conversations as a real dialogue. 10) Highlight examples of good language use, point out errors or possible improvements. 11) Ask learners to screenshot their conversations. IMPORTANT: the fakephonetext.com website will only let you download one phone ‘page’ at a time so don’t use the ‘Download’ function. If you use the ‘Download’ function,
you will just have one ‘page’ of your
conversation. My advice is to ask your learners to take screenshots of each individual ‘page’ that way they will have the entire conversation. They can even use their phones to photograph what they have written if necessary. 12) Ask the learners to email you their SMS conversations. Here’s one of the conversations from my classroom:
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Follow up/ Variation Give learners different scenarios to work with e.g. you need to invite one of your friends to a party at your house by SMS.
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After you receive the learners’ conversations, compile a list of common errors. Test the learners on these errors in the next class. Further tools for faking it! http://simitator.com/generator/twitter/tweet This is a fake Twitter Tweet generator. http://www.wordgenerator.net/fakewordgenerator This is a fake word generator. You can get your learners to make up fake words and definitions, mix them with real words and definitions, and play Call my Bluff e.g. ‘chaintwist’ a tool used in the manufacture of iron chains (not a real word). Conclusion I hope that you found this article useful and that ‘faking it’ in your classroom leads to higher learner engagement! ***** Paul Walsh is a Business English teacher based in Berlin, Germany. He works incompany and for the Technische Hochschule Wildau where he teaches ESP. He has a Trinity TESOL Diploma and graduated from the Freie Universität Berlin in 2013 with an M.A. in East European Studies. He blogs at www.decentralisedteachingandlearning.com and is interested in pedagogy and innovative teaching approaches. He is the cofounder of Teacher Stories ) a place where ELT teachers tell their own stories. He can be ( www.teacherstories.com contacted by email at pwalsh1974@gmail.com and on Twitter, username: @josipa74
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22 nd International IATEFL Slovenia Conference “Adopt, adapt, improve” Terme Topolšica Experimenting in Slovenia Tijana Tasković, Lingua Foreign Language Center, Novi Sad, ELTA Serbia Key words : Slovenia conference, workshops, reports, RELO project
The IATEFL Slovenian team called this conference “the largest independent event organized by people like you and me!” It most certainly felt surreal and made me think. Worldwide, we are all one big group of teachers who not only share a profession but much more than that. The conference was motivating and educative on one side, and very pleasant and relaxing on the other. I was welcomed in such manner that I felt I had been there many times before. People are the greatest gem of every town or country, and I must say that, without any doubt: Terme Topolsica was the friendliest place! Thank you, Slovenian team, for everything! I was one of the two representatives of ELTA Serbia after submitting my speaker proposal called “Development of discourse skills through the use of experiments”. The aim of my workshop was to demonstrate a technique and explain the study aimed to determine the development of discourse skills through the use of experiments as just one type of language enhancers and context providers in class. It reflected on my research paper Development of Students’ Discourse Skills Using Visual Material in Teaching published in the magazine of methodology called Metodički vidici in Faculty of Philosophy in Novi Sad, in 2010 (ISSN 2217415X). The workshop was followed by a useful discussion that left me with amazing impressions and very positive feedback from the listeners. As usual, it was impossible to visit all the workshops as some were scheduled to be at the same time. However it was so fulfilling to meet that many people sharing the same passion. My learning experience started off with a workshop by Agnieszka Kruszynska who talked about “giving science a chance” by enhancing children’s curiosity through some handson experience in the classroom. Later that day, we experienced a revealing plenary in the swimming pool by Mark Andrews. It was probably the most engaging plenary that placed all the learning on each individual and left enough room for personal exploration. It was interesting to hear what kind of different impressions we were all left with. I have used TED talks in my classroom before, but the presentation called “When ELT met TED” provided so many options for the classroom. It was highly motivating. Maja Jerković’s “Gamification of the classroom” brought a new light to something which serves both as a tool for learning and relaxation at the same time. Further on, Karen White presented some very interesting activities and games for improving student’s listening and speaking skills that are easily adaptable to creative writing tasks. Also, Dragica
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Zdraveska had a very interesting teaching perspective of “real” classroom situations. The workshop was emotionally engaging, reminding us of all the reasons why we began teaching in the first place. RELO project included all the representatives from our region, and it was my pleasure to be part of something like this. The idea of connecting our associations sounded very useful and promising in several ways, and ELTA Serbia would benefit in terms of adapting ideas from other conferences that have the same experience. It would enable us to gain some introspective into what could be done differently or more easily, and so much more! Besides the professional fulfillment, IATEFL Slovenia provided everyone with an opportunity for physical relaxation with the medico wellness program and spa/sauna experience. There was nothing more we could hope for. I will just say that my skin is still thankful! In the end, let me just point out that I had the most wonderful time with my old friends and made some new ones. I spent the most amazing weekend! Without any doubt, I plan on revisiting IATEFL Slovenia next year. A special thanks to IATEFL Slovenia , RELO project and my association E LTA Serbia ***** Tijana Tasković has graduated from the Faculty of Philosophy, University of Novi Sad, and has an extensive experience in ELT/TEFL and conference interpreting. After mastering numerous methodology and teacher training courses in Serbia and UK, she started with ESL presenting. ) She has also been an ELTA member since 2009. (email: beatrice_playground@yahoo.co.uk
*I certify that I have the right to publish these photos.
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Supporting English Teachers Working in Inclusive Classrooms Katarina Ristanović Grammar school Takovski ustanak, Gornji Milanovac Key words : inclusive classroom, dyslexia, support
With the introduction of inclusive education from the earliest stage of the Serbian educational system, learners with special educational needs have become new members of our language learning community. However, there is no reliable data on the current number of the students with special educational needs in ’’regular’’ primary and secondary schools (school year 2014/2015). On top of this, many SEN students are ’’invisible’’ to the system as there is lack of readiness and knowledge for teaching them. Having this in mind, at the beginning of 2015, the ELTA team set up a survey to diagnose the problems English teachers come across when it comes to teaching SEN students. The results of the survey showed that the most common problems are dyslexia with 69% of the answers, followed by social emotional behaviour disorder with 62% and ADHD with 53%. Being asked how they felt teaching these students, most teachers expressed discomfort, insecurity and lack of selfconfidence. However, a number of them said they were feeling enthusiastic and regarded this task as a challenge.The interviewees rarely had the chance to attend professional development programs on teaching students with learning difficulties or the programs they attended were not designed to suit the needs of the language teachers. The results of this survey were used to plan a one day training event with the support of the A.S.Hornby Educational Trust which is part of a small scale project ELTA proposed to this trust in November 2014. The seminar was organized at the premises of the Regional Centre for Professional Development in the city of Čačak in the presence of 41 teachers from three different regions. The speakers ELTA invited with the help of The British Council were Sally Farley and David Crabtree, renowned experts on teaching students with learning difficulties. Sally Farley currently works as a Specialist Support Tutor for students with Dyslexia and other Specific Learning Difficulties at the University of Kent and the University for the Creative Arts in Canterbury and has over 15 years of teacher training experience. Her opening plenary Creating inclusive classrooms –challenges, strategies and practical tips explored the challenges that teachers face when trying to include learners with diverse needs in a mainstream classroom, ways of creating a classroom culture that recognises and celebrates difference and finally, the speaker offered practical activities that promote inclusion. The conclusion of this plenary was that teachers need not and cannot always be experts on the problems they come across but can be encouraged to become aware of these problems and include all the students in the class when dealing with them. In the afternoon workshop Sally addressed the issue of dyslexia. The participants were taught how to recognize a dyslexic student which was one of the most common doubts. Along with the ideas how to help reading comprehension of a dyslexic student, the presenter also focused on boosting the selfconfidence of this student which supports her humanistic approach to teaching. The second speaker at the mini conference was David Crabtree, an education expert on neurodiversity and learning differences with over 30 years experience in schools and
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colleges. His plenary Learning how to teach in the world in which 2+2 does not equal 4 further explored the challenges of inclusive classrooms while the workshop led teachers through 10 steps they can take to cater for learning variations. The teachers were supplied with handouts, useful links and ideas which was very much appreciated in their feedback. This event was accredited by The Ministry of Education and Science which means that all the participants received a certificate and the points for professional development. The feedback forms the participants filled in upon the end of the program showed that they were satisfied with its content. About 68% of the participants said that the seminar had increased their knowledge of the subject matter and 65 % of them said it had increased their interest. What is most satisfying is the fact that teachers agreed on the possibility of applying the presenters’ ideas to practice. You could read the following comments: ‘’This program was excellent. I would like to have a seminar like this in my hometown.’’ ’’Useful activities for teaching students in combined classes ( different age groups).’’ All things considered, ELTA feels proud of organizing this seminar. We are hoping it would lead to a series of similar events. What is more, we are sure that this get together of the ELT professionals involved in such a delicate subject matter will promote attitudes that may help us overcome the difficulties we face when teaching children with special needs embracing the diversity they bring to our language learning community.
Sally Farley summing up her workshop on dyslexia with a mind map
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David Crabtree when 2+2 does not equal 4
Participants from Čačak, Gornji Milanovac, Kraljevo, Kruševac, Priboj, Požega, Krupanj, Beograd, Sremska Mitrovica, Bajina Bašta
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*I certify that I have the right to publish these photos
***** Katarina Ristanović graduated from the Faculty of Philology, Belgrade, in 2000 and has been working in Takovski ustanak high school, Gornji Milanovac ever since. As SITT trainer she has been involved in the‘’ Towards Better Understanding’’ project as a teacher trainer for the past 7 years. She is the ELTA Regional Coordinator for Moravički district. Her interests include teacher development and CLIL.
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rd The 3 TETA Bosnia and Herzegovina Conference
Božica ŠarićCvjetković, Primary school Triva Vitasović Lebarnik , Laćarak, Serbia Key words : TETA, conference, professional development th th The 3rd annual TETA Bosnia and Herzegovina Conference took place in Tuzla on 12 and 13 June 2015. The theme of the conference was “Creating a RealWorld Connection”. It started with the opening ceremony where Dijana Marković Hajdarhodžić, the president of the association, addressed and welcomed the participants.
The first plenary speaker was Maggie Sokolik, University of California, Berkeley. The title of the plenary session was “The Changing Face of English Education in a Connected World”. She reminded us how English language education continues to change due to technology, which affords greater creativity and interactivity. She believes that focusing on these qualities will ensure that online education offers new engaging and exciting ways for learning and teaching English.
Maggie Sokolik, PhD, English Language Specialist, University of California, Berkeley “The Changing Face of English Education in a Connected World” This plenary session was followed by six parallel sessions of workshops. Among others was my presentation on teaching English to children who suffer from hyperactivity. Interesting discussions, sharing experiences and active participation were the highlights of the workshop.
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Božica ŠarićCvjetković, ELTA Serbia representative “ADHD, a myth or reality?” The closing plenary for the first day was Philip Kerr’s “The learner’s own language”. He pointed out that nobody talked much about the learner’s own language for many years (whether you call it L1, mother tongue, native language or own language). Many teachers were criticized for using the learner’s own language in teaching, but it is clear now that it has an important and
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unavoidable role in learning another language. There are numerous reasons for bringing back translation into the classroom. Among many techniques which can be used in teaching English, the “sandwiching technique” stands out. It is when you say a chunk of language in English, then translate it to L1, and then translate again to English. After this plenary, no teacher will be afraid to say they use the learner’s own language in the classroom. You can read more on this topic on translationhandout .
Philip Kerr, Vienna, Austria “The learners’ own language” The first day of the conference ended with a walk through the town, followed by dinner, a raffle and a karaoke party. The second day started off with George Kokolas’ plenary session “Brain Rules” based on John Medina’s book . He explored some techniques that could trigger students’ brains and make our teaching more effective. One of them is “Repeat to remember! Remember to repeat!” claiming that the repetition is the mother of knowledge. He believes that when we begin to understand the workings of the mind, we can organize our classrooms in a way that is conductive to boosting brain power.
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George Kokolas, Express Publishing, UK “Brain Rules” This talk was followed by a set of five workshops. I decided to attend Nick Michelioudakis’ session “Transform Tests: Practical Techniques to Motivate Students”. He demonstrated some easytouse techniques of transforming exam preparing materials and making them motivating for learners.
Nick Micheliodakis, Express Publishing, UK “Transform Tests: Practical Techniques to Motivate Students”
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After that, it was time to play during the practical workshop “Just playing” presented by Iva Ristivojčević, Ivana Mijailović and Tamara Sijanta. They reminded us of some old and demonstrated some new activities that can be effectively used in teaching young learners.
Iva Ristivojčević, Ivana Mijailović, Tamara Sijanta, Centar za obrazovanje Premier, Šabac “Just playing” After the lunch break, there were two slots of workshops. In the first slot, I attended “Primary school projects from top to bottom” led by Lidija Branilović, where she demonstrated some of the projects she did with her students. In the second part of the workshop, we shared our ideas
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for which all participants were awarded a book. In the last slot of workshops for the day, I presented teaching materials website “Disabled Access Friendly Campaign” .
Lidija Branilović, HUPE Croatia “Primary School Projects: From Top to Bottom” The closing plenary of the conference was Eric Bergman’s “The Choice is Yours: Decision Making in the English Language Classroom”. The fact that our lives are full of different choices also reflects in our teaching, planning and managing successful lessons. Decisions must be made about a wide range of practicalities: from which areas of language to focus on to what sort of activities to choose for our students to make sure their learning is successful. One of the books recommended for further reading was “Finnish Lessons” by Pasi Sahlberg .
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Eric Bergman, Pearson, UK “The Choice is Yours: Decision Making in the English Language Classroom” All in all, there were five plenary sessions and twentyfive workshops throughout the two days of the Conference, but time spent at publishers’ exhibition area during the lunch and coffee breaks was as valuable as the lectures. I met many old friends and colleagues and made new ones. Another conference, another great experience! ***** Božica ŠarićCvjetković has a BA degree in English language and literature. She has been teaching young learners and teenagers for almost ten years. Last year she was awarded the U.S. Government scholarship and successfully finished the online course Special Education and Differentiated Instruction with the University of Oregon. This year she successfully completed The British Council Trainer Development Course and became a teacher trainer. Her professional interests include teaching young learners, implementing global issues in EFL and teaching English to children with special needs. She is ELTA Serbia regional coordinator and a board member. When she is not teaching, she enjoys yoga and reading. *I certify that I have the right to publish these photos.
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ThemeBased Instruction in Teaching English to Young Learners 20142016 Faculty of Education in Jagodina in cooperation with Embassy of the USA in Belgrade Gorica Kostić, Primary School Marija Bursać, Belgrade This winter I have participated in the Continuing Professional Development Programme for Primary EFL Teachers – ThemeBased Instruction in Teaching English to Young Learners in Novi Sad. I come from Belgrade but as soon as it was announced by ELTA that this seminar would be held I decided to join. I never regretted it. The presenters were excellent ( Zorica and her team) and the teacherfellows were great. We had the seminar for two days during one weekend and at the end of the second day we were to choose the colleague who we were to complete the mutual project with. I did it with Zeljka Ljubišić from Novi Sad. We only had one phone call and had our conversation through mails afterwards. We were to present the Unit containing four lessons on the third day of the seminar after a month. Each lesson was to be prepared and described in following: students’ age, grade, and proficiency level the language skills we were to focus on list of target language structures list of objectives for the students list if everything the teacher needs to implement the lesson the source of materials being used warmup,presentation and practice activities evaluationhow the teacher will assess if students had met the objectives for the lesson followup activity and the explanation of the connection to the next lesson At the end of each presentation of the team of two teachers all the participants filled in the checklist which helped greatly in correcting the mistakes if there were. The checklist contained the following categories: a.) concerning the thematic unit the content is interesting the content is relevant to learners’ life
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the unit builds on what learners know and leads to increased knowledge the activities are varied and appeal to different learning styles/Multiple intelligences the content fits the English syllabus for the grade the content fits the grade curriculum (connects to other school subjects) b.) concerning the presentation/teachers communication and teamwork teaching TU lesson materials (creativity and innovativeness) presenting Here I will show the unit plan of four lessons which we did. The topic is Summer time – at the beach. I enclose the presentation, too hoping it will help others to use it in their practices. Please find the lesson plan and the presentation in this document. To download PowerPoint presentation go to this link https://docs.google.com/presentation/d/1j3OLXUsLIxYy8FAv3wyKk14bGk_kpKedNslq2__k o/edit?usp=sharing **** Gorica Kostić has been to ELTA Conferences four times. She graduated at the Faculty of Philology in Belgrade, Serbia. Now She works at Primary School Marija Bursać, Belgrade. As she has been working for years with children from 7 to 14 she has mingled with the gallery of characters, trying to meet their needs, create new strategies, support children with special educational needs and develop an inclusive learning approach without labeling them. She is also involved very much in drama work. She has passed the training for Forum Theatre that belonged to the Programme for Prevention of Violence in schools, and successfully trained several generations of kids and together with them had performances being invited by the UNICEF and UNODC. She also conducted the Program for Empowerment of Families supported by American Educational Program. She passed the training Socially Responsible Theatre, too. She has completed the Trainer Development Course in British Council.
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ThemeBased Instruction in Teaching English to Young Learners 20142016 Faculty of Education in Jagodina in cooperation with Embassy of the USA in Belgrade Gorica Kostić, Primary School Marija Bursać, Belgrade
Teachers
Željka Ljubišić and Gorica Kostić
Place Date
Novi Sad 7th March , 2015
and
Theme
It’s summer time At the beach
Student Profile
Young learners, ages 6 and 7, in their first year of English (Grade I)
Language Objectives
Grammar: Introducing action verbs, modal verb CAN abilities affirmative, Present Continuous Tense first and third person singular, revising numbers Vocabulary: items connected to the summer, sea and beach. to introduce beach and summer vocabulary to develop listening skills in English to learn to listen to classical music to identify beach nouns and verbs and develop recognition of objects
Content Objectives
to personalize using Present Continuous Tense to develop imagination and curiosity to revise sea animals to revise numbers to think critically by identifying and continuing a sequence to develop hand coordination and make beach hands and a poster
Language Skills
Listening: listen to classical music listen to a story with a tiger listen to a number song Speaking: talk about sea animals and repeat what you hear talk about things you take to the beach talk about you can do and repeat what you hear talk about what you are doing at the beach ask what is in the mystery bag ask and answer what is missing
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Materials
ask and answer what you can do ask and answer what you are doing at the beach sing a tiger song sing a number song Video clips, realia, scissors, colored paper, different materials for making a poster
Source
You Tube, home
Lesson One
Warmup
th Play the video. Tell children to listen to the Beethoven 5 symphony and to repeat the names of the sea animals when they hear them. Play the video again pause after each word and ask Is it a fish? It develops listening skills. Children repeat individually or chorally.
Children learn through auditory rhythms and they are nature smart connected to the environment. Tell the children they are going to learn the words they will need when they go to the beach. Ask them to tell you in the children’s own language what they take to the beach. Introduce the game Mystery bag: it is enjoyable, full of practice and supported with realia. It relates content to children’s real life. Presentation Tell children they are going to put beach items in the mystery bag and you are going to say a word and they should repeat them. After a while they go one after another and do it themselves, you just help. They create confidence. There is lots of repetition. It develops imagination and curiosity. They all want to practice, promise them they will do it again next class.
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Practice
Change the activity and the pace. Tell children you are going to put items on your desk. Tell them to remember the items. Tell them you are going to play a game What’s missing? Divide them in 2 groups, point a leader. Tell them to close their eyes, you remove one item, then they open their eyes and whisper the leader the missing word and the leader shouts the missing item.
Application
These two games helped them to draw in their notebooks the items they take to the beach those from the Mystery bag and What’s missing together with the sea animals and the beach environment. Suggest them to do it drawing a hand and drawing items on it those they remembered, which will be a preparation for their homework.
When they hear the word and repeat it correctly say Well done and suggest them to draw a star (the best mark) in their notebooks. If they can’t repeat do it yourself again and ask them to do it again. Assessment Count the items from the bag and score how much they know. Count the points. Count the points for each of the two groups for What’s missing game. Give them stars for drawings in their notebooks. Selfassessment: they draw smiles: I know the beach items.
Followup
Give them the flash cards to show each other the items. It encourages social interaction.
Lesson Two Warmup
Play the video. Children watch the video and recognize some of the sea animals from the previous class.
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Children watch the video again, but this time they are focused on the verbs from the video. They mime the actions and say the verbs starting with: I can. Teacher introduces some additional verbs and corresponding moves, referring to beach activities and children mime and repeat. They say the following sentences: Presentation
•
I can swim.
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I can jump.
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I can eat.
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I can dive.
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I can make a sand castle.
•
I can splash.
Children practice the sentences. Teacher says the sentence and children need to repeat it and show the corresponding movements.
Practice
One of the children can take the role of the teacher and say the sentences.
Application
Children play the game Simon Says. They need to listen carefully and react immediately. Teacher monitors.
Children complete the handout titled What I take to the beach. They need to Assessment circle the objects they take to beach and say them in English.
Teacher shows the movement and children should guess the action and say the corresponding sentence.
Followup
Children need to draw their favorite activity.
Lesson Three
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Warmup
Ask children to draw their favorite Disney character. Ask them to add the beach and to put in their drawing the items they remember and to show some action verbs like splash, swim, etc. They learn through scaffolding by a teacher.
They learn through new contexts and use repetition and recycling in order to understand new structures and use them correctly. Show them a pps with Mickey Mouse and let them relate what they did with the presentation. Tell them to add what they want. Read them: He is splashing the water…and the items and let them point and repeat them. Explain them in Presentation their own language that this is their own beach in the classroom. Point to their notebooks and say Beach! Language is highly contextualized, authentic and the children are highly motivated. Grammar is in context – through story. The approach is learningcentered, they are active, the context is interesting and meaningful, the children actively participate
Practice
Children learn by doing so suggest them to personalize it by changing it from He is swimming. to I am swimming. using Present Continuous Tense. Ask children What are you doing? They repeat individually. they like they can go together to the beach and do it together: We are swimming. They repeat chorally. Encourage children to come closer and point to the fish and ask Is it a fish? The class responds Yes, it is. Ask them to point to a fish and ask Is a starfish? The class responds No, it isn’t. It is very interesting and motivating.
Application
Tell children that they are going to play Pretending game. Explain them that they are going to pretend that they are swimming and the others are going to guess. The first child who guesses correctly can come to the board and act out the next action verb. If the class cannot guess whisper to somebody to continue the game
Arrange the children’s drawings on the board and praise them Well done! Assessment Give them stars when they use Present Continuous Tense, and when they correct their peers (peer assessment). Give them smiles when they guess the mime from the story. Assess the dictation as peer assessment.
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Followup
Progress check: Listen and color. Say an item and say the color of it. Don’t say more than 23 words.
Lesson Four
Warmup
L e s s o n F o u r
Play the video and tell the children to repeat the numbers.
Play the video again and tell the children to pay attention to animals, objects Presentation and actions they have learnt in the previous classes.
Practice
Children say what they have seen on the video. The need to use English and they need to remember other related items.
Application
The class is divided into groups. Each group needs to make a poster. The posters are 3D. Students use pebbles, watercolors.
Assessment Teacher shows the poster of each group and students name the objects on posters. Followup
Teacher can arrange It’s summer time exhibition in the classroom or in the hall of school. Posters and sea hands are shown on the exhibition.
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It’s summer time Project for Theme-Based Instruction in Teaching English to Young Learners Seminar Gorica Kostić Željka Ljubišić 33
It’s summer time
stage 1
Introduction https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5zkieaVLOac
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It’s summer time Mystery bag • • • • • • •
stage 1
suncream sunglasses goggles hat shorts swimsuit shovel
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It’s summer time Mystery bag
stage 1
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It’s summer time What’s missing?
stage 1
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It’s summer time What’s missing?
stage 1
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It’s summer time Action verbs
stage 2
• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hA3ClzoslBo • Revision of sea animals
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It’s summer time Action verbs • I can swim. • I can jump. • I can eat.
stage 2
• I can dive. • I can make a sand castle. • I can splash.
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It’s summer time Action verbs
stage 2
• revision (items from mystery bag) -What do I take to the beach? Circle the objects you take to the beach.
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It’s summer time The Story
stage 3
• Power point presentation -Present Continuous -Personalization
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Mickey Mouse
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What are you doing? 50
It’s summer time General revision
stage 4
• revise numbers https://www.youtube. com/watch?v=_jxzZMw89qY
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It’s summer time General revision
stage 4
• Making a poster
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It’s summer time General revision
stage 4
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It’s summer time HOMEWORK
stage 4
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It’s summer time Look what we’ve made
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It’s summer time Look what we’ve made
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It’s summer time Look what we’ve made
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Will marriage become obsolete?
Milica Stamenković, student, Faculty of Philology, University of Belgrade, Serbia Abstract Marriage has turned from an expected, even obligatory step in the average person’s life to a st challenge for people living in the 21 century. The future of marriage in Serbian society depends
on the new generations’ attitudes and convictions which are greatly influenced by a number of modern trends, such as the rising divorce rates. The authors of this research opted to examine these attitudes because they consider marriage to be the bedrock of Serbian society. The main aim of this paper is to determine what young people think about getting married and having children and how they regard some patriarchal values which have been present in Serbia for a long time. The data were acquired by means of anonymous questionnaires which were distributed to 50 university and high school students from different parts of Serbia. The findings showed that, contrary to the authors’ assumptions, young people, despite having liberal attitudes, still believe strongly in the institution of marriage and that it is not likely to disappear in the foreseeable future. Key words: marriage, family, patriarchy, children
Introduction Some claim that marriage has been practiced for 5,000 years, while others state that it has been st present for much longer ( Kruszelnicki, 2000 ). This might alter in the 21 century to a certain
extent because a large number of values and beliefs are questioned nowadays. Young people often seem uninterested in their ancestors’ customs and convictions, causing patriarchal values to hover on the very brink of extinction. Some of them are largely interested in money and social status because people tend to be marginalized unless they fulfill these two conditions. Between pursuing education and a career, marriage appears to be a challenge, even a step some strive to escape. Furthermore, women enjoy more freedom nowadays and usually have a choice to make, divorce being an entirely acceptable option. For instance, every fourth marriage in the USA and Russia ends in divorce (Jerotić, 2004). Serbian society, too, has witnessed many changes in terms of people’s attitudes towards marriage and patriarchy over the past decade. This research
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was conducted with a view to investigating whether the situation is as grave as it seems and the authors decided to include students from Belgrade and other parts of Serbia in the research. Definitions of marriage When defining different terms, it is particularly difficult to demarcate them. This task is even more demanding when notions are complex and can be discussed in terms of history, anthropology, religion and law, which definitely applies to marriage. However, the least we can do is try and notice the ways in which the term marriage has changed thus far. th In the 18 century, Samuel Johnson defined marriage as ‘the act of uniting a man and woman
for life’, and there were no major changes a century later when Noah Webster defined it as ‘the legal union of a man and woman for life’, even stressing its religious aspect, by saying that it was ‘instituted by God himself’ (Baron, 2013). Nowadays, this definition is either changed to a degree, or some subentries are added. For instance, MerriamWebster’s Collegiate Dictionary and the Oxford English Dictionary have added a samesex segment to their definitions of marriage. Languages reflect ways of thinking, as well as changing attitudes and values in any community. Dictionaries are a reliable indicator of attitudes of a certain period because they adapt to social changes in order to depict reality as accurately as possible. Marriage can be defined as a legal or traditional institution, as a religious one, heterosexual, or even homosexual, depending on those who define it, the time when it is defined or the place where it is defined. The authors of this research were eager to explore how young people in Serbia would define marriage. Methodology The main method of conducting the research was an anonymous questionnaire which was distributed to 50 subjects, either online or in person. The questionnaire consisted of twentyodd questions. The respondents were first asked to provide some personal data (their hometown, age, education etc.). Some questions were closeended and the participants were supposed to circle the corresponding answer. Three of these were yes/no questions. A numeric scale was used to assess the participants’ attitudes and this proved to be a wise choice, despite the fact that a number of subjects often circled number 3 (‘I neither agree nor disagree.’) which did not reveal as much about their standpoints as the other four options did. Two questions were openended, where the respondents were asked to explain their choices concerning marriage in a more elaborate way.
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The questionnaire was administered to 25 university and 25 high school students, the age of participants ranging from 16 to 24. The former were the students of the English language, psychology, theology, security studies and electrical engineering, diversity in terms of profession being achieved. The latter were high school students from Belgrade and Valjevo. Students from Belgrade constituted the majority of respondents (66 percent), but students from other parts of Serbia, apart from Valjevo, were included as well, coming from various big towns, small towns and villages. Both male (36 percent) and female (64 percent) subjects partook in the research. The authors found the respondents with the assistance of their friends and fellow students, and the majority of them were eager to complete the questionnaire. Some, mainly students of psychology, showed a great interest in the topic, and expressed their desire to be informed of the results. The research was anonymous, but the authors cannot be absolutely certain that all of the participants were totally honest. Some of the subjects preferred formulating their responses at home, but the majority did it between classes or lectures at school or university.
Research findings and data analysis To marry or not to marry One of the main hypotheses formulated by the authors of this research was that high school students would not look forward to marrying and having children, unlike university students. The second one was that boys would not take such a deep interest in the topic as girls. These two hypotheses were based on the lay assumption that boys need more time to mature and that high school students are less mature than undergraduate students. However, the findings proved these two hypotheses wrong. A staggering 100 percent of high school students (13 boys and 12 girls), would like to marry in the foreseeable future, whereas a humble 4 percent of university students do not have favorable attitudes towards marriage, either calling it ‘an outdated institution’ and ‘an absurd step in modern society’ or saying that ‘their personality is not suitable for marriage’. The third hypothesis was that the marital status of the participants’ parents would be of key importance for their standpoints. Contrary to the authors’ expectations, children from singleparent and oneparent families do not differ in their attitudes towards marriage from those whose parents are married. However, the authors assume that had the percentage of children from incomplete families been larger, the findings might have been different.
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Career/Marriage The authors supposed that university students would attach more significance to career than the rest, but this did not prove to be the case. A meager 4 percent altogether, including subjects from both Belgrade and other places, strongly agree that priority should be given to career. The vast majority of undergraduate students find marriage more significant, whereas as many as 56 percent of high school students are not sure. The authors find such data surprising because they assumed that the undergraduate students, who are on a higher rung of the educational ladder, would find forging a career a more important step, at least at this point. On the other hand, the results demonstrate that the majority of respondents believe that it is ideal to marry between the age of 25 and 30, from which the authors infer that they plan to devote a couple of years to pursuing a college education and selfdevelopment. Children Back in the early centuries of the Roman Empire, marriage was not regarded solely as a means to procreate, and Christianity, which is the predominant religion in Serbia, doesn’t regard marriage in that way (Meyendorff, 2000). Marriage should be an end in itself, although children do reinforce it. The substantial majority of undergraduate students are of the same opinion, whereas a number of high school students (26 percent) disagree. Having taken into consideration the fact that the family structure has turned from extended to nuclear and that the average number of children per family has decreased, the authors formed another hypothesis. Knowing that no more than one third of the subjects have two or more siblings, the authors assumed that the remaining two thirds would not be bent on having three or more children, but the findings reveal the opposite. No fewer than 70 percent would like to have at least three children. Only one respondent would not like to have children at all. Such results are extremely positive for a country with low rates of population growth. Traditional values As few as two or three generations are sometimes sufficient for some drastic changes to occur in one society. The conservative values which were fostered in previous centuries are no longer
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prevalent. In the past, it was unimaginable to enter into a marriage without one’s parents’ consent. The parents would choose an ideal partner for their child, paying special attention to the potential spouse’s social and financial status. The data illustrate that more than half of the subjects would get married without their parents’ consent, and without taking into account their partner’s status, although they largely think that the family of the future marriage partner is important. A few decades ago, having children before getting married verged on tragedy and was considered the deepest shame one could bring on one’s family. It is still so in some small villages where patriarchal values predominate. Nevertheless, the findings show that the young mostly do not think that this is morally wrong, although one third of them are not sure. Serbian culture was remarkably patriarchal, and women, who were regarded as inferior to men, were expected to wait for men to choose them for their wives, whilst preserving their innocence. Vuk Karadžić depicted the disgrace which was brought on the family of a bride who had not abided by this rule. Parents of such a bride would be derided, taunted and stigmatized in different manners. For example, when at lunch with their daughter’s in laws, they would be given glasses of brandy with no bottom (Savić, 1988). A surprising 96 percent of high school students have nothing against premarital sex, whereas 4 percent are not sure. More undergraduate students (24 percent) have no definite opinion about this issue and some (8 percent) think that sex should not be practiced before marriage. Such results can be explained by the fact that there were students of theology among the respondents, whose views on premarital sex might be influenced by the nature of their studies and their religious convictions. As for the gendered division of labor, only around 20 percent of subjects believe that the main role of men is to be breadwinners, and that the key role of women in marriage is to look after children and that their place is in the home, which indicates that some of the most important patriarchal values are slowly diminishing. All the aspects examined show that the young are more liberal and egalitarian then their ancestors. Marriage partners This research also tackles the question of tolerance that the young show towards people of other nationalities, skin colors, religions and sexual orientation.
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As for finding a marriage partner of a different nationality, 92 percent of the respondents would have nothing against it, whereas fewer of them, 72 percent, say the same thing for marrying a person of a different skin color. The young seem to be less tolerant when it comes to religion because only 48 percent of subjects would marry a person of a different religion. This can be related to the fact that 60 percent would like to get married in church and a marriage between an Orthodox and a nonChristian cannot be entered into in church. The students show least tolerance towards samesex marriages. Eightyeight percent of high school students think that marriage is supposed to be a union of two persons of opposite gender, whereas undergraduate students seem to be more tolerant towards people of homosexual orientation. The data obtained through this research show that students display fairly tolerant and liberal attitudes in relation to marriage. Conclusion Nontraditional living arrangements and nonmarital unions have become commonplace, and homosexual marriages have started to be practiced in a number of countries. Women have claimed their rights and divorce rates have increased substantially. Some claim that marriage is improving, whereas others maintain that it is at risk of disappearing. This research shows that the youth of Serbia still believe in marriage. The young would like to marry for various reasons: to strengthen their relationships, because they are religious, because they want to gain certain rights, etc. Most of them think that it is not an easy task to find a perfect partner today and save a marriage as it might have been 100 years ago, but they are willing to try. The authors expected the attitudes to be more ambivalent in general, which might have been the case had the research been larger in its scope. Including only a random sample of educated young people, the research was not as comprehensive as it would have been if less educated participants had been questioned as well. Only time will tell whether the results obtained are an accurate indicator of reality. Overall, the authors are satisfied because the findings show that marriage is not an obsolete institution in Serbia. References Baron D. 2013 The highest dictionary in the land? The Supreme Court and the definition of "marriage" Retrieved April 19, 2014 from http://illinois.edu/blog/view/25/93323
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Jerotić V. 2004 Neuroza kao izazov , Ars Libri, Beograd Kruszelnicki K. 2000 Math of Marriage Retreived April 19, 2014 from http://www.abc.net.au/science/articles/2000/10/26/204128.htm Meyendorff J. 2000 Marriage: An Orthodox Perspective , St Vladimir’s Seminary Press Crestwood, New York Savić M. 1988 Izbor bračnog druga, brak i bračna kriza, M. Savić, Beograd ***** Milica Stamenković is a fourthyear student of the English language at the Faculty of Philolgy, University of Belgrade. She is currently volunteering at the Faculty of Technology and Metallurgy, University of Belgrade, where she is teaching English for engineering. Apart from English, she is fluent in French.
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Identifying and working with dyslexic students in the English classroom. Sally Farley, Teacher Trainer, Counsellor and Dyslexia specialist, University of Kent, UK Key words : dyslexia, symptoms, teaching strategies, multisensory teaching
‘How can I teach English to a child who has trouble reading her own language?’ ‘What can I do to motivate a dyslexic student who finds language learning so difficult?’ ‘I haven’t had any specialised training so how am I supposed to know what to do to help a child with dyslexia?’ I have been asked questions like these by teachers all over the world, anxious about how to help children with dyslexia learn English. They often feel that they don’t have the expertise or the time to pay special attention to these learners. Some teachers worry that children with dyslexia may never succeed in learning another language. It is quite natural to have these concerns. Most teachers understand that dyslexia is a language based learning difficulty ) so it is which has a negative impact on reading and writing ( www.dyslexiaaction.org.uk obvious that it will impact on learning English. As English teachers we also know that English spelling is notoriously inconsistent and therefore likely to cause even more problems for learners with dyslexia. However, although it is true that dyslexia is caused by difficulties in phonological processing (identifying and linking the sounds in speech and text) and problems with working memory, it is also associated with many strengths including holistic thinking skills, strong visual memory, problemsolving and creativity (Davis & Braun, 1997). Identifying and working with these strengths in order to overcome their weaknesses is the key to helping children with dyslexia to learn English. Does the child have dyslexia? What to look out for. Teachers are not expected to diagnose dyslexia, and it is important not to ‘label’ a child who has not had a formal assessment. However, there are certain signs that may indicate dyslexia and if a learner in your class displays most of them, it will be helpful to use the teaching strategies and activities suggested below. These are beneficial for all your learners anyway, so it is a win/win situation! The most obvious indication that a student has dyslexia is when there is a marked discrepancy between their perceived ability and their actual performance. This is because there is no link between dyslexia and intelligence. You may know instinctively that a certain child is bright, but when you see their written work or hear them trying to read, you are surprised and dismayed at their low standard. Written work may be messy, disorganised and chaotic with many spelling errors, ‘flipped’ letters, confused syntax and missing words. Reading may be hesitant and stumbling with the child having no sense of the meaning of
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what they are reading. On top of this they may find notetaking and copying from the board almost impossible. This is because dyslexia impacts on the ‘working’ memory, the part of the brain that holds information while you do something else. Working memory is different to shortterm memory; it’s the human equivalent of the time between ‘copying’ and ‘pasting’ on the computer. It is also the gateway to longterm memory. Further symptoms of dyslexia include problems with sequencing, general disorganisation (losing things, forgetting homework) and difficulties with timekeeping ( www.dyslexiaaction.org.uk ). Now for some good news! The negative aspects of dyslexia are well documented (Kormos & Smith, 2012) but there are plenty of positive aspects to counterbalance them. The dyslexic brain is not inferior to the nondyslexic brain, it’s just different. People with dyslexia tend to have strengths in the socalled “rightbrain” thinking. They are usually good at seeing the ‘big picture’ with skills in threedimensional thinking, strategy, understanding systems and processes as well as computers. They can make exceptional entrepreneurs, politicians and strategists. Bill Gates and Winston Churchill are two great examples of dyslexics who have excelled in these fields. Children with dyslexia also tend to have good spatial and visual intelligence and can be highly creative and imaginative: Picasso and Einstein are fine examples of this. Sports, music and acting are also areas where people with dyslexia tend to excel and many more examples of famous dyslexics in these fields can be found, including Tom Cruise, John Lennon and Muhammad Ali. My work with dyslexic students at the University of Kent has shown me that dyslexia does not need to be a barrier to success in life. Teaching strategies which use the students’ strengths to overcome their difficulties are highly effective and can be employed as a matter of course in an ordinary class setting. We just need to realise that if our students can’t learn from the way we teach them, we must teach them in the way they learn. Strategies to help the individual student Every student with dyslexia is unique with their own particular combination of strengths and weaknesses. Once you know that they have dyslexia it is a good idea to spend some time with them finding out what they find most difficult and what they enjoy most in the class. If notetaking is a problem you can prepare clear notes to give them before the lesson. Occasionally, people with dyslexia experience the text blurring or moving on the paper which makes it very hard to read. This is known as ‘Irlen Syndrome’ and can sometimes be overcome by using coloured paper or overlays which reduce the ‘glare’ of black print on white paper. You can experiment with different colours and find the one that helps your student most. It is a wonderful feeling if you can find a simple solution to what has seemed an insurmountable problem. Low selfesteem is another problem that children with dyslexia can face as a result of feeling ‘stupid’ and failing to keep up with their peers. You can help them to overcome these feelings by making sure the child and the rest of the class understand that dyslexia is nothing to be ashamed of, that it affects almost 1 in 10 of the population ) and that it is simply a different way of perceiving the world. ( www.dyslexiaaction.org.uk Giving examples of famous dyslexics who your students see as role models is a good idea. Support, praise and encourage the dyslexic child and make sure you mark their work
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positively, ticking what is right rather than highlighting mistakes. The technique ‘2 stars and a wish’ is a nice way of giving feedback – it means pointing out 2 things the child has done well and one thing that you would like them to work on. The ‘think, pair, share’ model gives shy children and those with slower processing speeds a chance to think carefully and rehearse their answers before sharing them with the class. You ask the class to think on their own about a question, then talk about it with a partner. Finally you ask if anyone would like to share their ideas with the class. Finally, never ask a dyslexic child to read out loud in front of the class. Of all the bad memories of school reported by my dyslexic undergraduate students, reading aloud was the most humiliating. They also explained that the fear of being asked to read aloud prevented them from concentrating on the rest of the lesson; the more they worried, the less they learnt. If we think of learning English like climbing a mountain, then we can picture the child with dyslexia having to take the steep and difficult route to the summit. Each step needs to be carefully cut into the rock face before the next step can be taken. A multisensory structured learning approach (Schupack & Wilson, 1997) is the best way to help make these steps secure. Chunking information into small parcels is the answer. Give instructions one at a time, break worksheets into smaller sections and set shortterm achievable goals. Make sure the child has plenty of opportunities to revise and practise each step before moving on. There are lots of software programs that can be used for practising vocabulary and grammar, and of course computers, unlike people, never get bored of repetition! The use of multisensory techniques such as colourcoding, drama, drawing and music help all children remember new vocabulary and language structures. The rest of the class can climb the less arduous route, but there is no reason why the children with dyslexia can’t meet them at the summit. Children with dyslexia usually find working on the computer enjoyable and there are several software packages which help with reading and writing difficulties, effectively cutting out the process by reading out text from the screen or converting speech to text. There is also mindmapping software which mimics the thought process of the holistic thinker and enables them to convert this to a linear form in order to write essays and sequence information. A wonderful free resource which includes all of these features is ‘My study bar’ available from www.eduapps.org . Parents can also be a great help by reading assignments to their children, or recording the reading on tape for them. Providing a homework book to write tasks in, with information on how the parents can help and details of what needs to be brought into school the following day, will help the child with dyslexia stay organised and keep up with their peers. Each child has a preferred way of learning. You can help them to discover which techniques work best for them by modelling and practising different learning strategies. The child then uses the strategy that is most effective for him/her. For example, the word ‘because’ can often be difficult for children to spell. You can offer 3 different strategies for remembering it: 1. Mnemonic: Big Elephants Can Always Understand Small Elephants 2. Word origin: Be Cause – i.e. the ‘cause’ or reason for something 3. Visual: Colourcode the problematic part of the word bec au se.
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As hearing and blending phonemes is often difficult for children with dyslexia (www.interdys.org), it is important to include activities that help identify the sounds in new vocabulary. You can ask the children to clap or stamp out the syllables and encourage close listening through games like ‘jump the line’ when you have 2 similarsounding words (thin/fin) which you call out and the children jump to the right or the left depending on which word they hear. Mouthed dictations give children the chance to see how a sound is formed, and colourcoding the different phoneme clusters in a word gives a different kind of visual aid. Strategies that can benefit the whole class Teachers sometimes think that they don’t have the time to make special allowances for students with dyslexia and other specific learning difficulties. Luckily the teaching strategies that help these students to learn can benefit the whole class. Using multisensory teaching methods, including role play, music and drama as well as video and learning technologies will enrich the learning experience for everyone. Visual aids such as mind maps, timelines and Venn diagrams can be used in imaginative ways for language learning and then put on the classroom walls as constant visual reminders of the target learning. Timelines can be used to represent processes in a lateral rather than linear form. Everything from the events in a novel to the steps in a chemistry experiment can be converted into this format, as well as their more obvious use as a way of depicting time and tense. Consistent colourcoding of tense endings and plurals is another way of engaging visual learners, as is learning vocabulary through picture cards with the English word printed underneath. It is important not to include the L1 word on these cards as this interferes with the direct learning process of object=English word. Write important words clearly in the top right hand side of the board as this corresponds to the visual learning area of the brain. Kinaesthetic activities which involve role play, movement, rhythm and touch can engage the whole class. Cuisenaire rods, buttons, shells, beads and pebbles can be used in many creative ways to encourage speaking as well as teambuilding. One useful activity that can be used at many levels involves splitting the class into groups and asking them to design a special room using the rods/pebbles/buttons etc., and whatever else they want to represent objects and features of the room. It can be a sports centre, disco, youth club, teenager’s bedroom or anything else that interests them. Tell them that money is no object and encourage them to be as creative as possible. Once the design is complete, the students answer questions from the other groups, explaining what the rods represent and why they have chosen to put them in specific places etc. Finally the groups vote on which room they would most like to be in. There are many examples of kinaesthetic teaching activities on the internet so it is easy to incorporate them into your lessons as a matter of course. Your students can all benefit from the opportunity to express themselves through movement and touch, and the learning experience will be enhanced for all. Finally it is worth remembering that you can really make a difference to the way a child with dyslexia experiences language learning. You don’t need to be an expert in dyslexia to help, but a positive attitude together with an understanding of their learning difficulties and an
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appreciation of their gifts can turn a painful experience into something enjoyable, challenging and rewarding. References ● ● ● ●
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Birsh, J. R. (Ed.). 2005. Multisensory teaching of basic language skills. Paul H. Brookes Publishing Co., Baltimore Davis, R. D. and Braun, E. M. 1997. The Gift of Dyslexia: Why Some of the Brightest People Can't Read and How They Can Learn. Souvenir Press, London Kormos, J. and Smith, A.M. 2012. Teaching Languages to Students with Specific Learning Differences. Multilingual Matters, Bristol Schupack, H., & Wilson, B. 1997. The “R” book, reading, writing & spelling: The multisensory structured language approach. The International Dyslexia Association, www.dyslexiaaction.org.uk www.interdys.org International Dyslexia Association *****
Sally Farley is a Teacher Trainer, Counsellor and Dyslexia specialist. She has trained teachers both at home and abroad for the last 15 years. She currently works as a Specialist Support Tutor for students with Dyslexia and other Specific Learning Difficulties at the University of Kent and the University for the Creative Arts in Canterbury. Sally takes a Humanistic approach to teaching, using many multisensory, learnercentred techniques in order to help her students learn in the style that suits them and reach their full potential. She is interested in working with and embracing difference in the classroom, believing that every individual can become involved and enjoy language learning. She has written two modules for the British Council‘s Secondary School Teacher Training course on Inclusive Learning and Working with Dyslexic Students and has recorded several webinars on this subject. She also writes for HLT magazine and has been a speaker in 2 of the British Council’s seminar series. She has written several modules for the British Council SEN online course for teachers. For more information you can contact Sally Farley at s.e.farley@kent.ac.uk
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Lesson plan Learning with YouTube videos: Internet censorship Vicky Papageorgiou, English instructor, Metropolitan College, Thessaloniki, Greece Key words: YouTube videos, debate, internet censorship, blended learning
Target learners: Young adults or adults, C1+ level Learning outcomes: ●
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By the end of this course, the learners will learn to search for a small variety of videos and to critically synthesize information/arguments to use in their debate, they will be able to enrich their knowledge about a current and controversial matter which they have experienced in some ways, they will learn to work together to reach an agreement on a controversial problem, solve a problem, they will learn to use online platforms to upload their written work and to hold a debate, like http://www.pearltrees.com , and http://www.collaborizeclassroom.com , and finally they will have to reflect on the debate by summarizing the important points of it.
Short description In this blended learning activity, students will have to work on a controversial matter. While divided in teams, they will have to find youtube videos relevant to the side they have to present and defend, record their arguments to support their position and finally, make evaluations and judgments about this controversial matter. In the end, the two teams will have to hold a debate and reach a consensus. Preparation The T spends some time choosing videos that present opposing arguments or depict opposing sides. 24 videos for each side should be enough but the T should make sure their duration is not over 15’ each. (In this activity, Ss are asked to search for the videos they should use, on their own. Yet, because this is timeconsuming and/or difficult for some students, it is advisable that the T has already prepared a selection for them, at least for the weaker ones). Some example videos the T could show them or post on the platform are the following: An informative video about internet censorship
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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XPAvg6CU6sI The Past, Present and Future of Internet Censorship https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=spapXznZf4I Internet Censorship Is the Wrong Answer to Online Piracy https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1ngRPuXpCIw Procedure (approximately 3 hours) 1.
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3. 4.
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Tell your students that you have noticed that people of their age are very dependent on the internet and they spend a lot of time surfing the net. It is also true that there are a lot of voices currently calling out for online censorship because the internet is far too open. So, since this is a situation that they are familiar with, you thought it was time they discussed internet censorship because this is an issue in discussion lately. (5’) Tell them that to be able to form a wellrounded opinion about the topic, they have to find videos on YouTube that support or condemn this kind of censorship. (5’) Explain to them that they are going to be divided in 2 teams . (1015’) Allow them time to search for these videos online. Explain to them that you are going to be present and offer any help needed but you expect them to be independent in their search. Tell them that in the next lesson, both teams are going to watch their videos about internet censorship in class. The first team are going to watch videos that support it and team number two will view videos against this censorship. (1 h) Tell the students they should focus on three questions, which you have already posted on http://www.pearltrees.com/ : These are the following:
• • •
Is internet a public or a private sphere? Should there be more censorship? Should freedom of speech be absolute or should it be limited?
They should note down all of the arguments used. Then, they have to upload the relevant videos as well as their arguments on http://www.pearltrees.com/ so that both teams can prepare their counterarguments. No analysis or reflection of the arguments will be posted there, though. (30’) 8. You should set up the day the discussion will take place (online class). 9. On the day the online debate takes place, ask them to share the videos online on a specific platform http://www.collaborizeclassroom.com/ and tell them they can also add 7.
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10. 11. 12.
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the arguments they have come up with. Each member of every team starts a brief discussion by posting their comment/argument and their video. Other members are asked to post their responses to this (this procedure can be done synchronously as well as asynchronously). (1h) You should moderate the discussion. Once each team has decided about their arguments, they should also rank them in terms of validity. (10’) At the end of the debate, the Ss can vote and then see the results. Remind everybody that they should reach an agreement in the end and perhaps even specify a solution. Remember, you are there to moderate and not intervene in any other way. (5’) At the end of the class, the students will present their decision, again in the forum. (5’)
Follow up Ask each team to write a summary of the debate as well as the decision on the matter and how the whole discussion has changed their perspective (if it has). They can post it later on http://www.pearltrees.com/. Software/web 2.0 tools http://www.youtube.com http://www.pearltrees.com/ http://www.collaborizeclassroom.com Materials The learners need access to PCs with internet connection, possibly 1 PC for every 2 students. ***** Vicky Papageorgiou is a foreign language teacher (English, Italian, Greek) with approximately 20 years of experience with mainly adult learners. For over 15 years she has been preparing students for English language exams of various exam boards. She holds an MA in Education (Open Univ. of Cyprus) and an MA in Art History (Goldsmiths College, UK) and she has just completed her PGCE in Technology Enhanced Learning at University of Wales Trinity Saint David. She studied in Greece, Italy and the UK but also participated in an international project for the McLuhan program in Culture and Technology for the University of Toronto, Canada. Her fields of interest are ESL and Art, Educational technology, critical thinking, use of video. She is currently based in Thessaloniki
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(Greece) working as an English instructor at AMC College for the past 5 years, preparing students for IELTS, teaching ESP and General English.
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A selection of poems Dajana Lazarević, student at the Faculty of Philology, University of Belgrade Love you to death It started like any other day, (That`s not all I have to say) I wrote my very first essay, And created my new life`s way. I was writing about a spell, About demons, ghosts who tell That magic is like a ringing bell, With a lot of curses, which scream and yell. In my head there are no boys, There is just one screaming voice, Who is calling people all To answer on lost souls’ call... It started like any other day, In rainy and sad May, When you found a way to my heart, And made with me a fresh start. Suddenly you left me, died, And I cried, for days I cried! You were a young and good man, What happened to you then? Your voice is still in my head, And that pain makes me mad! My heart is forever lost and deaf, I will love you, love you to death... *** Never let me go My mind is like a ringing bell. Listen! I have something to tell! Let`s make together a fresh start,
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You trapped me in your heart! Don`t tell me just: "Alright", This is such a beautiful night! Come out from noisy bars, Let`s go and watch the stars! I wish we went to the floor, To dance to pop and rock`n`roll. I love your "Alright" for the first time. All mine is yours: heart and rhyme. Let`s play! But don`t cheat! Playing fair we can all beat! My soul is all alarmed, Sending notice of your charm! To our love I am giving a chance, Take my hand and let`s dance! We are the best dancers here, Never let me go, my dear! *** Private super star Open my heart and you will see, That love is burning inside of me. That`s only truth, so let me be! Don`t reject me, set me free! Your eyes are my only sight, That`s why I don`t need light. In my world lights are switched. I cast a spell, you are bewitched! By my side you will stand, Don`t try that to understand. I love your songs and your band, Your innocent eyes and promised land. You are close to me wherever you are, I don`t mind if you were here or far!
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I don`t want your money or car, Be my private super star! I can feel you love me strong, Show your love, that`s not wrong! I don`t want your money or car, Be my private super star! ***** Dajana Lazarević was born in 1993 in Šabac, Serbia, where she nd finished high school. Currently, she is a 2 year student at the Faculty of Philology, University of Belgrade. So far she has published three collections of poems. The poems chosen for this issue of the ELTA st Newsletter were published in 2011, in her 1 book entitled Through Space and Time. She has received a multitude of awards for her work and has so far been published in myriads of papers.
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I share. Do you? Biljana Pipovic, Grammar school Stevan Jakovljevic , Vlasotince, Serbia Key words: sharing information, ideas, knowledge, experience
Everyone has the knowledge, everyone. In my opinion, it is not the knowledge that makes you the specialist or the expert – it is how much you share that knowledge that does. ‘Teach. Share. Learn.’ That is my motto. Therefore, if I find something that works to educate my students, I always make sure that I share it with my colleagues (in my school, district, country). So they, too, can use it to support and teach their students. The more we share and work together, the better educated our students will be. I am always willing to share my knowledge because I believe that if you share your experience and your knowledge with other teachers, you gain even broader knowledge by seeing how they may apply your materials or ideas in different ways. When they need guidance or explanation on how to implement the material (and why) or use a new strategy or technique, it forces you to vocalize your objectives, rationales and approach – solidifying it all in your personal knowledge framework. I always consider three levels of knowledge/experience sharing – inhouse with other teachers at my school, at training seminars or conferences, and over the Internet through websites, blogs or facebook pages. I see technology as an integral part of what I do each day. This is an easy and effective way to get/keep in touch with both students and colleagues and share my knowledge and experience in the digital age. I use social networks Facebook, YouTube and Twitter on a daily basis. I have profiles and a certain amount of activity on nearly every network, like LinkedIn, SlideShare or Google+, but I am not active daily. Apart from my personal profile on Facebook, I maintain a Facebook page 1) English Club, Vlasotince, and groups 2) Variety as the 3) Spice of ELT and Britannica, Leskovac. In this way, I have the opportunity to reach thousands of people interested in learning or teaching English, to engage them and share information about myself and things I find interesting and important. Aside from sharing news and information, I can upload photos and videos (which I make using Animoto or Windows Movie Maker, or which my students make) on my 4) YouTube channel. I also use 5) SlideShare, another great site which enables people from all over the world to stay in touch and read my documents, articles, and PowerPoint presentations. I write contributions for 6) ELTA Serbia Newsletter, which enables almost all ELT professionals in Serbia to get informed about what I do and how I do it in my classroom. Being a teacher trainer, I hold three seminars approved by the Ministry of Education. These seminars provide an opportunity to meet a lot of colleagues and in that way I can show them the activities and methods that work in my classroom. I always make sure to get their feedback. I get my colleagues to write down what they learned, whether they enjoyed a particular experience,
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what they think can help their way of teaching, and if they can adapt any of the shown activities to their students and their individual needs. Adapt is the crucial word here, I believe. Personally, after each seminar or a conference I attend, I take some time to think, digest and utilize the new information. By aligning my interests, experiences and goals with what I learned I am always able to apply something of that knowledge in my classroom in different ways by adapting what I learned to meet the needs of my students and their expectations. I have learned to choose the strategies to apply in my classroom depending on the goals I want to accomplish, the interests, cultural backgrounds and personalities of my students. I believe in creating opportunities for them to pursue their own interests and practise skills in a variety of ways, and I always cater for different learning styles. I am convinced that teachers sharing their ideas and practices are the most important elements to help raise educational standards both locally and globally. When talking about our teaching experience, we model and encourage enthusiasm, openmindedness, curiosity and reflection among each other. In that way, we motivate each other to experiment and use different ways of teaching. The time spent talking to other teachers, brainstorming ideas and discussing, is never the time wasted. That’s why I share. Do you? 1
https://www.facebook.com/english.club.vlasotince.srb
2
https://www.facebook.com/groups/343705445705578/
3
https://www.facebook.com/groups/112278508803917/
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http://www.youtube.com/user/biljanapipovic971
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http://www.slideshare.net/BiljanaPipovic
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http://elta.org.rs/2014/11/07/eltanewsletterseptemberoctober2014/
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http://www.oxfordmagazine.es/2013/10/01/5greatwaystostarttheschoolyear/
***** Biljana Pipovic is an English teacher, born in Leskovac, studied in Nis, employed at Grammar school Stevan Jakoljevic in Vlasotince, Serbia, with working experience of 17 years. She has also been working as a language instructor in private schools for ten years teaching teenagers and adults of all language levels, both general and Business English. Since 2006, she has been a mentor to talented students, the members of the Regional Talents’ Center in Vranje and four times award winner at the Republic Competition for Talented Youth. She is the author and a
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teacher trainer of three seminars recognized as a form of professional development by the Ministry of Education in Serbia, trying to make teachers change their approach to teaching, showing them that variety is the spice of ELT. Her present interests include teaching FCE, CAE and CPE exam classes, international school projects, classroom interaction and working with gifted students in a mixedability classroom.
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Working with Young Learners – Guidelines for Successful Teaching Nevena Stoilkov, English teacher at primary school “Milisav Nikolić ” , Boževac, Serbia Key Words: young learners, classroom atmosphere, teaching material
When I started working in a primary school as an English teacher, I worked with learners aged 11 to 15. I adapted to their needs and that kind of work quickly and had no major difficulties in work; the communication between me and my students was great, and mutual understanding was also noticeable. I was very satisfied with my job. However, after a year, I found myself working in a class with learners aged 9 and younger. I was absolutely terrified. I had never thought of working with children of that age. I was afraid that I would never be able to teach them successfully. At first, I had great difficulties in working with them. I couldn’t imagine which skills they had already developed and which they had not, how they perceived the world around them and how I should approach them to make them adopt new things. So, during the first year, I was the student and they were my teachers. After a year had passed, working with young learners became a great satisfaction. It was becoming easier and more interesting. This article is meant for all those who are about to start working with young learners – there is no need to be scared. It’s easier than you might think. When sevenyearolds enter the school door, they are not students; they are children who miss their family, their mum and dad, maybe their dog. They are kids who need help to shape their personality, adopt new knowledge and make friends. You will be their only support in the school building. Some of them will feel as though they were torn away from their home; they will cry and be sad.You will be there to calm them down, to free them from fear and help them fit in the new environment. The teacher is not just a teacher for them.He/she is mum and dad, granny and grandpa, the best friend who will entertain them, play games and sing songs with them, and sometimes be the judge. One of the most important things is the atmosphere in the classroom. It needs to be a welcoming and an encouraging one. Your students must feel safe with you since it is probably the first time they are separated from their home for several hours. They must have complete trust in you. This is the only way you can achieve your goal, which is teaching them. When it comes to learning, young learners are more ready and interested in adopting new things. Let’s say they are an empty bowl they will take whatever you give them.
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There are many ways you can bring certain language points closer to them. But first, you must do these things: 1) set the right atmosphere, 2) check what they know in their mother tongue. When I was once showing third graders pictures of animals, there was an image of a rhino, so I said, in English, “This is rhino”. They all said “rhino”, but I noticed something was wrong. I asked them if they knew what animal it was, and they shyly said “No” they had never seen it before. Now I had to tell them everything I knew about rhinos so they could make a picture of it in their heads. So, the rule is: make sure they understand what you are talking about! Every type of teaching material is more than welcome: pictures, toys, puzzles, short cartoons. If they don’t see what you are talking about, they won’t learn it. Whatever you tell them, you have to show them. Surround them with teaching material; put it on the walls as much as you can, make them see it every time they enter the classroom. You will be amazed when you realize how much they have learnt. After a lesson about domestic animals, I put the pictures of them on the wall. When I came back after few days, I wanted to check if they still remembered the names of these animals in English. So, I said “cat” and they were supposed to say it in Serbian. They couldn’t remember it immediately, but they turned their heads to the pictures I had showed them a few days before, and gave me the correct answer. The only simple thing that happened here is that they remembered which picture I was holding when I said “cat”. Short cartoons are also very interesting for young learners. They watch and listen to them very carefully, thus learning new expressions and words. When they were supposed to learn the expressions “I like/I don’t like”, I played them a cartoon about a dragon and his human friends going to the supermarket. I was amazed at their attention focused on the cartoon. They learned the expressions easily, and I was very satisfied with it. Young learners are highly motivated to learn and show to others what they have learned, and to be praised. Whatever you do with them color pictures, draw, or make something put it in a visible spot, so they can show the result of their work to their parents, or simply let them take it home. They will be thrilled. Everybody will be pleased the students, their parents, and yourself. And remember: whenever you put a smile on a child’s face, your mission is successful. ***** Nevena Stoilkov graduated from University of Kragujevac, Serbia in 2011. She has worked as an English teacher since 2011. She is interested in teaching English to young learners and working with children of challenging behavior.
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ELTA Newsletter July – August 2015
UPCOMING EVENTS ● ● ●
Conferences Students’ camps Teachers’ camps
CONFERENCES * Call for papers still open for some of the conferences, check it out th ✓ 10 ATECR Conference: Shades of ELT
Date: September 45, 2015. Place: Uherské Hradiště, Czech Republic For more, follow the link: Shades of ELT
✓ IATEFL Poland Date: September 1820, 2015. Place: Jagiellonian University in Krakow For more, follow the link: IATEFL Poland
✓ International Congress on Education, Innovation and Learning Technologies Date: September 2123, 2015
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ELTA Newsletter July – August 2015
Place: Granada, Spain For more, follow the link: International Congress on Education, Innovation and Learning Technologies
✓ 1st International SKA Conference Date: September 2526,2015 Place: Bratislava, Slovakia For more, follow the link : 1st International SKA Conference
✓ “Innovating the Classroom of the Future!” Date: October 23, 2015. Place: Shkodra, Albania For more, follow the link : Innovating the classroom of the Future!
✓ Looking Forward, Looking Back Date:October 911, 2015 Place: Budapest, Hungary For more, follow the link: Looking Forward, Looking Back th ✓ The 17 International INGED ELT Conference “Rise and Shine”
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ELTA Newsletter July – August 2015
Date: October 232425, 2015. Place: Ankara, Turkey For more, follow the link: The 17th International INEGED ELT Conference
✓ Annual ELTAM Conference Date: October/November (TBA) Place: Macedonia For more, follow the link : Annual ELTAM Conference
✓ “Making Teaching Count!” Date: November 2324 Place: Vlora, Albania For more, follow the link : Making Teaching Count!
STUDENTS’ CAMPS
✓ SOL – Programmes for students For more, follow the link: SOL Programmes for students
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ELTA Newsletter July – August 2015
✓ International Village Project Time: MayJune; September 2015. Place: Lubovnanske Kupele in the Tatra mountains in the north of Slovakia For more, follow the link: International Village
TEACHERS’ CAMPS ✓ SOL – Programs for teachers ✓ Devon Course 1 : A uthentic British Language and Culture : July 5th – 16 th ✓ TUTORS: MARK ANDREWS & UWE POHL ✓ Devon Course 2: G reen issues and language teaching: July 19th 30th ✓ TUTORS: MARK ANDREWS & FIONA MAUCHLINE
For more, follow the link: Programmes for teachers ✓ SO(u)L Camp – Refresh your Mind, Body and Soul in Slovakia 2015 Date: August 2nd – 9th 2015 Venue: Bilingválne Gymnázium Čadca. For more, follow the link: SO(u)L ✓ SO(u)L Camp – Refresh your Mind, Body and Soul in Serbia 2015
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ELTA Newsletter July – August 2015
Date: 13th – 20th August 2015 Venue: EcoCenter “Radulovački”, Sremski Karlovci, Serbia For more, follow the link: SO(u)L
WEBINARS ✓ Macmillan webinars Macmillan webinars
✓ OUP webinars OUP webinars
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