project#366 Week 40

What a wet week! I left home in the rain, went out in the rain and went home in the rain. There were dry periods in between, and it hasn't been like the weather in the Uk, but-blehhhh!
I feel sorry for Tam, who has come down from Scotland to do his CertTESOL, and was hoping to get out and about in between times. He won't have much time as the course warms up, but I hope that the weather will be kind to him when he does.
Sunday 30th September 2012
The supermarket near me has been very clever. It has invested in some trolleys with little cars on the front. That way the child is occupied while the parent does the shopping:-). It has resulted in many young families changing their routine, and going to that supermarket instead of one of its rivals- shrewd marketing!

 

                                                 Monday 1st October 2012

This year is just flying by. My new course started this morning- I haven't got the measure of them yet, but they are very different trainees from the last group. My timetable is a bit different too. My colleague is doing the Unknown language input after lunch, giving me a 2-hour me-time :-). Unfortunately, it has been wet, and I haven't wanted to go out much. The tree outside, which is my calendar, is beginning to change colour now. It will be glorious when it is completely done. None of the neighbouring trees have shown any sign yet of Autumn.

Tuesday 2nd October

I lost one of my trainees today, through ill-health. I think you need to be physically and mentally fit to do a training course which is so intensive. The others are fine, beginning to suss each other out and make friends. Today I had time to go to the local supermarket cafe for lunch. The Bulgarian chef was pleased to see me again, and gave me a table by the window, where I could look out- high up over St Brelade's bay bay. The difference between the water and the sky was very clear as the sea looked almost silver.
Wednesday 3rd


remember this?

I had time for #ELTChat this evening, which was excellent! Knowing that the trainees would be tied up for a large part of the next day, I volunteered to write the summary. I'm really looking forward to Marisa's Greek lessons- and then I'll have a holiday in Greece to test out my new language skills :-).

This sign has gone up in the car park of the college.

A while back, one of the trees fell down on the teachers' cars and so now we can park, if we want, but......  You can see the trunk of the one that came down.

Thursday 4th

One of the trainees practises yoga and stress-busting techniques, which he was sharing with the others. This could be a very handy trick to have for the next few weeks. Here are a few of them trying out some of his 3-minute techniques. I hope that they will make use of them during the month:

Friday 5th

Golf in the dunes

The island of Sark in the distance

Ages ago my husband signed us up for the Church of Scotland Annual Quiz Night. It is organised by a friend of his, who was collecting together a team to take part. M and his friends decided that they would volunteer to do it, so the wives were roped in too. It took place at the posh golf club of La Moye which I have never been to before. Fortunately for me, it was on the West of the island, as the early start would have made it difficult for me to get there on time. The golf club building is nothing special, but the setting, in the dunes above St Ouen's bay, is out of this world.



Saturday 6th
 A normal, domestic day, for a change! We did some housework, and then I wandered down into town to have lunch with friends. Cairis had lunch planned with the members of her course who are still on the island, as they will all be off shortly. Unfortunately, they changed their plans at the last minute, so she came into town with me, instead. M met up with us afterwards and we went out to look at bedroom ideas. We are thinking of changing the layout of the house to make it work better for us.  We  might annex Cairis's upstairs bedroom as our office when she goes overseas. We will give her the one downstairs, and turn it into a granny flat, so that she would be independent whenever she came home. We could then think about becoming a host family for the college when they get busy in the summer. I had a wedding to do in the evening. It was back out  West again. I sometimes wonder whether I should just have a bed at the college! This time the venue was opposite the lighthouse at La Corbiere. Unfortunately, although it has the potential to be amazing, it rained hard all day, and I drove down there in a drizzle which obscured the view :-(. The family of the bride were hospitable Irish people and the evening was a great success, despite the weather.

#ELTchat summary: Does learning a foreign language help teachers teach?

Does learning a foreign language help teachers teach?

This is an account of the evening #ELTchat discussion of 3^rd October 2012.

The people present were ably moderated by @Marisa_C, @theteacherjames and @BrunoELT.

Taking part were :@shaznosel, @teachertom, @Marialva, @stephenburrows, @Noreen_Lam, @leoselivan, @SueAnnan, @sandymillin, @hmbaba, @Mo_Americanoid, @InglesnaRede, @anna_whitcher, @dianatremayne, @knolinfos, @elawassell, @Notyetlanguage, @inkscriblr, @AnnLoseva, @MarjorieRosenbe, @SahalZyad,  and a number of lurkers. J

Marisa started us off by asking how many of us had undertaken to learn a language recently. Bruno wanted to know whether we had struggled.

@Marisa_C has only done a bit of an online lesson in Portuguese recently, while

@ sandymillin has been learning Chinese. @hmbaba learned a language for her DipTESOL, but more in order to analyse the teaching techniques.

@Marisa_C one of the things I remember as a beginning learner of Turkish is how difficult the step to reading paragraphs/texts was

There were many questions:

Are NESTS taught grammar at school?

If not, as seems to be the case, certainly in the UK and the US, then learning a foreign language can only be of benefit- as they will learn about their own language through comparison with the structure of the new one, although James said that he learned more about students than about the language. Many of us agreed with Bruno that our L2 students often have a better understanding of English grammar than UK or US students.

 Both the Trinity CertTESOL and the CELTA offer lessons in a foreign language to trainee teachers. The comparative element is important, and being a student in a class where techniques can be tried out and their soundness (as good teaching methods for beginners) can be assessed, is invaluable.

@BrunoElt Am I too off if I say that learning a foreign language is a step to becoming a better ELT teacher? The answer was a resounding NO!

How do our students benefit?

The key word here is EMPATHY. We are all in agreement that knowing how difficult it is to learn a language ourselves helps us to empathise with our own students. The point was raised that it can help with recognising L1 interference problems and with finding strategies to encourage our students. We are also able to employ techniques and theories from 2^nd language acquisition which we have experienced ourselves, and know which methods and ideas work well. Teachers who have lived in another country appear to be more sympathetic to learners, too. @sandymillin says that having other languages reminds her that she has been in the same shoes as her students, which struck a chord with all of us.

Do teachers make good students, or are we hypercritical?

We were honest enough to suggest that maybe we are not all good students. Marisa looks at how the teacher teaches, and I am much more critical of teachers who use techniques which don’t meet my learning style. There was a debate about whether that was an issue of ego, a little ‘I would have done that better/differently’. Perhaps we should just put ourselves in the teachers’ shoes and be open to different techniques. Stephen believes that he is a good student who can recognise when a teacher is making an effort, even if the activity is not successful. 

@stephenburrows: being on the other side of the fence is a rewarding but frustrating experience.

Others have had poor teachers who are badly prepared, or simply boring.

@theteacherjames: I’d love to have just one good teacher, just one.  

@sandymillin: I know I’m a bad student. I speak too much English and only do my homework the night before the lesson J I prefer 1-2-1 classes so that I have some control in what the teacher does.

@AnnLoseva borrowed ideas from her teacher at University. However she makes the point that it was before she became a teacher herself, and that now she has more knowledge she would be more critical.

@leoselivan: I’m a bad student, I never do my homework, yet I make my students do it J

Is learning something, no matter what, also valuable?

A resounding yes for this one! It appears that it doesn’t actually matter whether what you are learning is a language, or edtech, or something else. By involving themselves in the learning process, the teacher can understand some of the frustration, and highs, that their students experience.

@Marisa_C If we take it a step sideways, any learner feels good about having a T who is learning something all the time.

@Mo_Americanoid I was growing impatient with my students- until I took up playing the piano!

As a language learner, which techniques used by the teacher did you like/love/hate?

@Marisa_C: Love: grammar

@stephenburrows: Love; Vocab and speaking, Hate; Grammar (Portuguese) and teacher translating words all the time

@SueAnnan: Like: enough drilling of pronunciation and structure (but hate teaching it)

@teachertom: one of my Japanese teachers used glove puppets- interesting!

@sandymillin: in Chinese lessons Like: repetition, and listening practice Dislike: teachers who talk to the board and don’t allow time to answer questions.

@theteacherjames Hate: endless grammar explanations. Teachers who interrupt to correct errors during fluency activities

@leoselivan: Hate: lists of vocabulary, or explaining every word in a reading text

@Mo_Americanoid Dislike: vocabulary lists Love: role-playing or reading dialogues

@BrunoElt: Dislike: reading aloud

Some of us don’t enjoy role-plays, or perhaps have to be in the right mood. Others love/hate reading aloud. It just proves that we are all individuals, as are our students. There was a question about edtech, which may /not be used in class, but it didn’t make any difference to our decision as to whether the teacher was good or not.

Is it an advantage if the teacher has learned another language?

@shaznosel Guess the answer lies in how she learnt it.

What insights did you gain from learning a foreign language?

@MarjorieRosenbe it helps with rapport when you tell sts about your own language learning mistakes.

@MarjorieRosenbe It helps me to teach English. When I learned a new word it was everywhere!

@leoselivan survival techniques (making the language you know fit the concept you need)

@ellawassell English is simpler than Polish –it takes longer to prepare a Polish lesson!

Many comments were along the lines of ‘you appreciate your language more’

@Noreen_Lam it’s all about being a good role model for sts. We can show them how we incorpotate the FL into our life which might motivate them to do the same.

@anna_whitcher Just because we love languages doesn’t mean our students do. WE have to engage them…

@leoselivan I can use examples of my learning to show how knowledge of lexical items develop over time. I am more aware of grammar, chunks in English

@sandymillin I think my L2 learning has benefitted from my teaching

@theteacherjames I learned more by teaching the language than by learning one

@annan_whitcher it’s important to start from scratch, to remember how hard it is for our students who really struggle.

@hmbaba it’s not about the teaching, but the sharing of study skills and knowing what students need to do to practise and succeed.

 

So, to sum up……

You may gain insights into the workings of your own language- or it may just help you be more aware of the needs of your students in the classroom. Whatever, learning another language can be seen to add value to the development of the teacher.

@Marisa_C offered to teach us some Greek. This opened the floodgates to other offers. @Notyetlanguage offered to teach Croatian

@ellawassell offered Polish lessons

@AnnLoseva promised Russian at some point in the future

@leoselivan suggested Modern Hebrew. 

 

Wow! We are really fortunate in the number of languages on offer, and the generosity of spirit of our world-wide #ELTchatters.

Links

The Neurochemistry of Empathy, #Storytelling, and the Dramatic Arc, Animated http://t.co/Wh9LH6R8

 

Ann Loseva’s story of a language learner

http://t.co/AiYg0B3S

The teacher James’s language learning experiences

http://t.co/6m15i11w

Ken Wilson’s German lessons

http://t.co/mQmBeXNF

Language Highs

http://t.co/OGY64zf9

Old #eltchat summary  ‘How does your Language Learning influence your teaching?’

http://t.co/Cde43k4s

 

 

 

Project #366 Week 39

This was the last week of the first course, and I spent it marking, and preparing for the next one. Bed was a distant luxury and M going to Scotland was a wise decision on his part. The weather this week was fine, although it sounds like it was very wild and woolly in parts of the mainland. It still isn't really cold, and I'm not yet wearing any heavy clothes, or even a coat, although it is starting to get nippy at night.

Sunday 23rd September 2012
Cairis was busy finishing off her paperwork, so I got to grips with some housework, and spent the rest of the time fielding phone calls and emails from my trainees. I picked up some flowers from the little stall I always go to on a Sunday  and we bought some bread from the Garden centre, and had it with some home-made soup. M's friend was working on his boat at low tide. Here is Jigsaw sitting in the mud. No wonder Mike is in bare feet:-)

Monday 24th

Today was the day that the trainees handed in their learner profiles. The profilees were sad that their time in the spotlight had come to an end. Cairis and Josh had  been working with Swiss girls, who gave them each a Lindt chocolate as a thank you for their work. The trainees  made copies of  their profiles for their students, which will help them in the future.





Tuesday 25th
I had a free 5 minutes today! Not a lot! I decided to have a quick look to see if there were any comments on here. I was excited to see that I had exactly 5000 views on the counter. By the time I had organised my camera to photo the detail for posterity, it had changed to 5001 :-)

Wednesday 26th

The moderator arrived today, so I picked him up from the airport and dropped him down to his hotel in the village. Imagine my surprise to see a robot made of recyclede elecrical appliances outside the Parish Hall. It was made by a local artist to highlight the fact that we should be doing more recycling, and was outside to encourage locals to bring their rubbish along. I belive that there is going to be the same thing in the other parishes.

Thursday 27th

My trainees were delighted to have handed everything in for marking, and were sitting at rest in their room. I snapped a couple of them- checking their social media, I think, for the first time in days :-) while the other two were chilling!. I don't know where everyone else was at that point.

Friday 28th

Nice piece of Jersey Granite

Poor Kit. Not only did he have to be moderated, he was also releasing an album in the evening. Normally we all go out for dinner after the party we lay on for our TP students. Kit suggested that we all go down to watch the album launch, and then eat together in town. My own band also decided to go down to listen, and, as a result of the posters Kit had placed around the school, many of the students turned up too. I felt as if  the different parts of my life were colliding! The band is a Jerriais band called Les Badlabecques, which means The Chatterboxes. They were veryy good, and many people turned out to listen to them. They performed outside the States Chambers, where our government meets, and chose the date to celebrate the Corn Riots of the 18th Century, which led to Jersey getting some degree of democracy.

Saturday 29th

Crowds out to watch the Dragon Boat race

M came home yesterday, but he wasn't planning on hanging around :-) His friend had asked him if he would helm his big boat for a race to Granville, in Normandy. When I dropped him down to the harbour it was very busy. The  French ferry was in, boats were preparing for the race, and there was a dragon boat race about to start. This takes place every year, and companies put forward a team to take part. All the money is raised for Jersey Hospice. Last year they made £40,000. I finished the day playing music at a ceilidh wedding for one of the Jersey Lilies. She got married in the bay, with a full moon overhead. It was magical!

Project #366 Week 38

Well, here goes for the end of another week. This one was so busy that something had to give! Unfortunately, the sacrifice was my time, which meant that I had to bow out of the course I was trying to do myself:-) Apologies to everyone else. Never mind! At some point I'll have the opportunity to do something similar again- and have the time to devote to it :-)
Sunday 16th September


Gorey beach looking South



Gorey Promenade

Today was a busy one -  My house was slowly turning into a disaster area with all the work I've been doing leaving me no time for boring things like housework. M was still sailing in the Regatta, and Cairis was very busy doing the paperwork for the course :-). I decided to pop down to Gorey, a village on the East coast, to visit a friend who had been in hospital. He lives on the coast road with a view over the promenade gardens and Mont Orgeuil Castle which overlooks the harbour. After procrastinating over a coffee, I headed back and tidied up:-)

 Monday 17th

Today was a chance for me to use my new gadget. I've been carrying it around in my bag and had forgotten it was there. It is a little curl of rubber to use as a door stop. My trainees were in and out today, and as we are upstairs and I didn't want to disturb the other classes, it was the perfect way to hold back the big fire door at the end of the corridor. Our room is the one at the back, as it's the biggest room in the building, and perfect for training purposes.

 

Tuesday 18th

I was running late today and not very pleased when I got to work to find that the minibus was parked in my usual space. The driver normally takes the bus up into the corner and out of the way, leaving one small space which I have adopted :-)

Wednesday 19th
 The weather has been beautiful this week, although decidedly cooler in the evenings.  I am enjoying the leaves on the tree outside the window slowly change colour. It will soon be glorious! Tonight the sky was spectacular, both from the front and the back of the house.

 

Thursday 20th

 My husband knows me too well. Next week there are not enough hours in the day for everything I want to do. He informed me that he was going to go to the mainland to visit his family. He actually has more holiday time than I do, so it's a good idea for him to use some up. Mine will revolve around TESOL France, or some other conference :-)

Today one of my trainees decided to do a very suggestopedic lesson, which involved crossing a crocodile infested swamp. This was all in aid of practising the Prepositions of Direction the beginners class had been learning. They thoroughly enjoyed it, and I think that it helped them retain some of the info.

Friday 21st

 TGIF! today was pay day too! I had time for lunch, for a change, so I popped up to the local supermarket cafe. The Bulgarian waiter told me that he was coming to my classes in October and then proceeded to make me a free coffee :-) That was a nice touch. The trainees have now taught for 6 hours each, with more to go next week. It has been nice to see their development each lesson, and soon they will be out in the big wide world looking for work. Some of them already know where they are going and have jobs to go to. The picture that will remain in my head for this group is this teapot. They drink tea and coffee non-stop, especially fruity and green tea blends!

 

Saturday 22nd

This is a catching up and finishing everything weekend. I marked all the Language Awareness tests, which everyone passed :-) and then had a look at their collaborative tasks on the wiki. I am now free to sort out this blog, do some cooking and cleaning and curl up by the fire. Yes- I've bitten the bullet and ordered in the coal for the winter. I already had a large basket of pinecones too, so this evening I am sitting by the first fire of the cooler days. I don't want to turn on the central heating yet- gas is so expensive and it is not really cold. The flickering flames of the fire are psychologically soothing. I also managed to catch up with a couple of interesting things online: The BESIG people did a webinar on copyright, and in the morning there were a couple of interesting sessions in Turkey for aPLaNet.









 

Project #366 Week 37

Every morning has started with drizzle, making everyone think that the weather is turning autumnal, but it has brightened up by lunchtime and been warm and sunny. Still, I think the weather is on the turn. It's still in the 20s, but only just.


Sunday 9th September 2012




Windy

Final day of the regatta. Today there was enough wind to go sailing, and M finished, at the end of the day, with a second prize. Not bad considering that he went swimming yesterday instead. I drove him down to the quay so that I could get a look at Le Marite. She is the last 3-masted  fishing boat in the French fleet, and has been massively renovated. 

Monday 10th September

Today our guinea pigs will arrive for teaching practice sessions. My fellow TP tutors and I are going to teach them, to do a diagnostic lesson for the trainees. At the moment I don't know how many, what level or where they come from! I'm going to eat my lunch by the beach in St Brelade's in order to have some quiet time before the chaos.

Update- We had 70 students,  mostly from Portugal and Eastern Europe, although there were a few Western Europeans, and a couple of Thais and Philippinos. We managed to make some excellent sized TP classes, with some beginners, elementary, pre/intermediate and upper int students. That will give the trainees some good practice at the different levels:-)

Tuesday 11th

I went to the supermarket this morning to pick up some milk. We have a rota system on the course and today is my turn. I had to get my camera out because I couldn't believe my eyes. Talk about wishing one's life away. Is this the earliest sign of the big C word ever? I was surprised and dismayed in equal parts.
My trainees did well for their first session. We don't have any weak trainees- including my daughter, thank goodness :-)
I have quite a lot of things to do this evening, including getting to grips with the course Gavin Dudeney is running on Digital Literacies. It's probably not a brilliant time to do a course, in the middle of mine, but I will try to make time for it, as it is something I'm interested in.

Wednesday 12th

 These are the first Gladioli of the season. The ones I found were almost black, but they are opening up as a dark, velvety red. As you can see, we still  have the scaffolding which they promised to take away last week! A busy day today, quite wet and windy in the morning. In the evening M and I went out to pick up a birthday present for Cairis. I had to wait until she went to bed in order to dress the room and table, and to wrap the presents. This was late, as she was writing her self evaluation of her lesson, and preparing for her next lesson.

Thursday 13th

Cairis's birthday and the Battle of Britain air display. The college is on the flight path from the airport to the bay. You can't hear yourself think, so we have cancelled the lessons for this afternoon, and given the trainees some catch-up time. I offered to do lunch for everyone, as it is Cairis's birthday. She loves sushi, so I ordered some from the local deli. We were eating it in the lunch room, with a handful of elderly Japanese students at the next table. They were looking longingly at our food, and sadly at their sandwiches and fruit, so we shared with them. Much bowing ensued:-)
We dashed down the hill at four O'clock, to watch the end of the air display. We were in time to see a few enormous helicopters, and then, the stars of the show- the Red Arrows. The sky was cloudfree and the sea was a beautiful blue. The bay makes a natural ampitheatre for the show, which was watched by hundreds of people all around the coast. We were also treated to a view of le Marite leaving the harbour in St Helier, on the other side of the bay. She had her sails raised and looked like an elegant vessel from times past.

 

Friday 14th

 The end of the week. The students have all turned up regularly, and the trainees have done a good job of teaching them at the different levels. I take my hat off to the group who had the beginners class. It is difficult, even for experienced teachers, to have a class of students with a spiky profile, and they coped surprisingly well. One of the Japanese students from the main college made a birthday card on Photoshop for Cairis to say thank you for the Sushi :-)

When I got home, I was delighted to see that the scaffolding had been taken down at last. Our house is not quite finished, as there are bare patches where the pillars were placed, but I expect it will be finished on Monday . Our neighbours like it so much that they are going to paint theirs the same !

 

Saturday 15th

I had to go in to work for a few hours. I promised my trainees the chance to get in to photocopy or prepare lessons without getting under the feet of the main school teachers. I returned to find everyone at home working flat out- Cairis was doing her Learner Profile and M was preparing a Money Laundering prezi for his trainee accountants at the office.They look like a pair of bookends, although they were actually working in adjacent rooms :-)