Discoures

After many years of having a very static presence on the web, we are very happy to be moving onto something new, fresh and a little different!  I look forward to never again being asked the question “So what do you do exactly? Sell shirts?”

We are very grateful for the design work and coordination skills of Nina Heimbrecht who pushed us along to get this done, as well as Peyman Azhari for making us look good in black and white! Thanks also to Michael Köllejan for the rocking programming and intro into TYPO3.

We are still working on getting more content and presenting our offerings in more detail, but look forward to the opportunities the new site gives us to be more creative and dynamic in what we can put on here.

We would be more than happy to hear any comments you have about the site, and also any bugs you may find.

All the best for 2012,

Mike Hicks & Rob Beaudoin

I was recently asked what I considered most important when training groups…and my mind went blank.  Well, not exactly blank, but I started thinking about all the different things that you take into account when training a group of people.  Is there one “most important” thing that you can nominate, or are there simply many interdependent and equally important factors that one should keep in mind?

I would tend to argue for the latter; training a group is a juggling act that begins with the needs analysis and course design and continues into the classroom where you choose your approach and style.  Ignoring one part of the sequence will inevitably lead to problems somewhere down the line.

But coming back to the question and answering in a concrete fashion; what is important in training groups?  Indeed, what is important in training ESL in general?  In no particular order, here is my list of points to consider when you are “on”.

• >   ensure that your lesson plan is coherent, not just to you, but to those who count…the students!
• >   mix up your methodologies;  TTT, TBL, Communicative approach…even grammar translation!  It makes it easier to recycle and reinforce the material.
• >   variety.  Variety of exercises, variety of medium, variety of classroom role (You be the student for awhile), variety of skills, variety of topic, variety of organization of the lesson. Variety!
• >   use gaps.  The tried and trusted Information Gap.  But why not also gaps in media (listen and take notes), gaps in reasoning (give clues and then Ss must extrapolate the answer),memory gap, opinions gaps (try formal debates with high level learners).
• >   be a “lazy” trainer.  Get your students to do the work.  They can write on the board, answer vocabulary queries, explain grammar points etc.  Use the existing knowledge of the class first before giving your own input.  We do not work with empty vessels!