When teachers talk about debate and debating classes, it never ceases to make me smile and think, ‘Oh dear …’. This is both from a teacher training and a teaching perspective; where there’s always one enthusiastic trainee who wants to have ‘debate’ as the focus for their speaking lesson. Then there...
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29th September 2020By Sean Martin
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11th August 2020By Amanda Greenhalgh
After 20 years of teaching English in Asia, my thoughts on teaching grammar have swung. When I started my teaching career, I honestly thought that we should not teach grammar to EFL/ESOL students. After all, many native speakers do not know grammar, so why would we expect our EFL/ESOL students to... -
20th July 2020By Sean Martin
We’re always encouraging our learners to listen for a purpose. But, how often is it that we focus on our own listening skills as teachers rather than maintaining that ‘instructional teacher mode’ and ‘tune in to the language and errors?’ Nothing’s wrong with identifying errors; it’s an essential... -
7th April 2020By Sean Martin
How often have you heard a learner say, ‘I know this’ or ‘we’ve done it before’? I can sometimes raise a smile when a learner says it, but when a teacher says, ‘they know that’ or ‘they’ve done that’, I can only stop and ask myself, ‘do they?’ or ‘have they?’ When learners and teachers say they... -
25th February 2020By Clare Voke
Despite becoming more and more popular in recent years, there is still a certain stigma attached to online learning. Even in this digital age; the idea that face to face learning is somehow superior to e-learning is a commonly held view. “I much prefer being in a real classroom with other students... -
14th January 2020By Sean Martin
‘We never follow maps to buried treasure and X never, ever marks the spot’, according to Indiana Jones. If you’ve ever wanted to be an Indiana jones type but thought it’s only some Hollywood fantasy and I’m only an English teacher, think again. We can all be language archaeologists and perhaps we... -
23rd December 2019By Sean Martin
Receptive skills are the means by which we interpret written and spoken language. Reading is one of the ways we do this. In order for learners of English to be able to understand simple written texts (short sentences, short articles, newspaper headlines, etc.) or longer texts, complex thinking... -
22nd July 2019By Laura Wilkes
Earlier this year, I stepped back into the primary school classroom to teach two groups of young learners (one group of mostly P3s and another group of P6s) as part of my studies and assessment on the Trinity College London Teaching Young Learners Extension Certificate (TYLEC) course. Even though I...