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Great minds discuss ideas. Average minds discuss events. Small minds discuss people. – Eleanor Roosevelt. — Murray Farrell (@MurrayMelb)

#ELT Chat

How many of us wish we had colleagues to sit with on a regular basis to brainstorm ideas for improving our teaching, our classrooms, our programs, our in-services, our teaching techniques our up-to-date uses of technology, and most of all our students’ learning?  Well, actually we do, and in the comfort of our own homes!

#ELT Chat fills just that bill, and it takes place weekly via Twitter.   For us in mid-western United States, the chat is held Wednesdays at 6:00 AM CST or Wednesdays at 3:00 PM CST.  However, for those of you outside that time zone, the organizers of this event have provided links to “Find your own local time for each chat here for 12:00 London time and here for 21:00 London time.” If neither of the two times works out for you, there aretranscripts of the conversations available for you to peruse at your convenience.

By participating in this “chat”, we have the opportunity to network with active, creative, collaborative, innovative ELT/ESL/EFL/ESOL/TESL/TEFL etc. professionals from around the world.  Take a look, see what’s there, and put the next #ELT Chat on your calendar!   You can’t go wrong by connecting with this group!

Today’s Top Tweets

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@AngelaMaiers Be humble enough 2 understand ur genius; Be smart enough 2 find a mentor, Be generous enough 2 pass the torch 2 another…

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@AngelaMaiers …Work hard, stay on course, stick to ur values, Be The Trend!

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Powerful words, powerful thoughts, powerful living.

A Happy New Year with Sites to Share!

After somewhat of a hiatus from blogging, I’ll begin this year by recommending a few good sites to get us off to a good start this semester with some new and proven ideas. On the ESL Resources page of this blog, you’ll find listed 2010 Year in Review from CNN. What a great way to start off our some conversation with our intermediate/advanced ELLs this semester. Before watching the video, ask the students to brainstorm what they remember as newsworthy events from the past year. (You may need to help them get started…)  Then, after watching the video, get their reactions to what they had not mentioned and why they think those events were or were not critical to our country or world.  (This could also be done online using a Google Doc Form!)  

The Year in Rap: 2010 is another site to review the year with your high intermediate/advanced students.  Reviewing some critical vocabulary before watching the videos will be helpful with their understanding of the rap.  The first viewing is usually a blur, the second one, less foggy, the third is amazingly intelligible!

50 Brain Facts Every Educator Should Know by Pamela Brown will give you a lot of brain trivia, but it also offers you ideas for teaching to different parts of your students’ brains.  I’m sure you’ll say, “hmm…I didn’t know that,” several times, and, “well, I thought so” a few times as well.

You say you want to add more technology to your teaching?  These next few sites will help you with that.

44 Interesting Ways to Use Your Pocket Video Camera in the Classroom by @tombarrett (no, not our current mayor) was a great find for me because I just recently purchased a flip cam and have already started having fun using it and my students.  This site offers great suggestions for use with all levels of ELL students such as producing a video of a school tour with language appropriate explanations to beginning students.  Field trips can be video taped and narrated or captioned by intermediate students.   I like the idea of Digital Chicken Soup for absent students which could include classmates simply saying “We miss you.”  These student videos could go so far as to having students present explanations of missed lessons.  Of course, speech presentations can be videotaped.   I particularly like the idea of videotaping students’ demonstration speeches and posting the videos to a class blog.   What fun!

Our college is really pinching pennies these days as are most schools, so one way we’re trying to economize is by thinking green (ecology and economy) and minimizing our use of paper.  57 Interesting Ways to Use Google Forms in the Classroom also put together by Tom Barrett  doesn’t only help us cut our spending, it gives us creative ideas for working with our students, working within our faculty, working on bookkeeping and record keeping chores.   It even includes sample forms and blog articles with expanded explanations on how ideas are carried out, and more!   I plan to try to incorporate the Exit Ticket into my classes.  This was just a thought I had prior to finding this link, but seeing how another teacher has set it up already online will be very helpful to me in expediting this task.  The ideas presented here also give us plenty of reasons for continuing to blog and/or set up a class blog for our students.

The Best Reference Websites for English Language Learners compiled by @Larryferlazzo will help your students learn to develop their English language skills through the use of free online tools to improve their pronunciation, spelling, and understanding of meaning. There are sites that will help them discover and learn world facts, facts about our 50 states and about our cities and states.  Some ELL appropriate online encyclopedias and encyclopedia-like website are listed as well to satisfy and pique your students’ curiosity for learning.

Have a happy 2011 and a happy and productive year exploring new ideas and resources for your students.  If you like these resources,

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How has the way you work changed over the last ten years?

The Chronicle of Higher Education’s ProfHacker asked today how the way we’ve worked has changed over the last ten years.  My answer is with regards to teaching is… in almost every single way.

1.  Ten years ago, I was making audio cassettes for my students to purchase through the bookstore.  Now I give them links to free sites on the Internet.

2. Ten years ago, I collaborated with very few faculty in my department because our schedules didn’t mesh.  Now we collaborate via the Internet in a variety of ways, email, instant messenger, Facebook, Skype, and a new favorite, Google Docs, as needed or desired.

3.  Ten years ago, if I collaborated at all, it was with teachers in my own school primarily in our shared office.  Now, with all these new technologies, I  collaborate with people all over the world 24/7 .

4.  Ten years ago, two-way video conferences needed to be scheduled well in advance in order to get the equipment.  Now many of us have the equipment at home.  I’m videoconferencing on Skype almost daily.

5.  Ten years ago, people weren’t very willing to share their work.  Now we put our projects, both big and small, on sites such as YouTube, TeacherTube, Facebook, Twitter, SlideShare and on blogs and wikis to share with the world.

6.  Ten years ago, our work used to be saved on our hard drives and always backed up on a floppy.  Now our work is primarily saved in the clouds and backed up on a flash drive.

7.  Ten years ago, teachers got nervous if there were no overhead projectors in their classrooms or transparencies to use (colored ones had to be purchased by us since they were too expensive for the schools to purchase).  Now we have multimedia systems in our classrooms that project right from the computers.

8.  Ten years ago, nearly everything was printed on paper.  Now we are endeavoring not to use paper in order to save our natural resources, not to mention our budgets. Now we are encouraging our students as well as ourselves to design and create using technology rather than paper and pencil.

9.  Ten years ago, I had to carry extra handouts with me for students who had been absent, or the students had to go to my office for them.  Now these handouts are posted online for the students.  Likewise, students submit their work online so there is less chance of conflicts regarding if and when the work has been handed in.  It is also less likely to be lost by either the student or the teacher.

10.  Ten years ago, I worked equally hard, but had access to much less information.  Ten years ago I had to wait to get answers to my questions until I could get to the library or at least to a computer.  Now the answers to most of our questions are at our fingertips wherever we are via our cell phones.

What can you add to this list?  It’s fun to ponder.  It’s even more fun to ponder how our work will change over the next ten years.