I wrote this in 2019. Just came across it again. My loose thoughts on a random post-writing, pre-COVID evening… Balancing writing alongside teaching (and other) commitments isn’t always easy. I try to be realistic about the amount of time I… Read More ›
There was a good post from Russ Mayne recently on the importance of criticism. He mentioned overly unpleasant criticism and unnecessary venom that might accompany it. Russ mentioned both academic and social media contexts. This post is about the latter,… Read More ›
This book from Garnet Education explores various issues around the integration of 21st Century Skills in the ELT classroom (!). In the foreword, Christopher Graham (Editor) states that while each chapter is framed with reference to research, the focus is… Read More ›
BICS and CALP in a nutshell BICS and CALP was an idea first proposed by Prof Jim Cummins in the early 1980s. BICS stands for Basic Interpersonal Communication Skills, and CALP is Cognitive Academic Language Proficiency. Here’s what they are:… Read More ›
Phrasal verb resource books you’ve used… GO! Okay, so there was a good one on the bookshelf at LTC called ‘Illustrated Phrasal Verbs’. Me and Sketch used it so often that the student’s book fell apart (only one copy –… Read More ›
Just a few things this time. I’m out the loop at the moment, enjoying my teaching too much! Facebook groups for writers There are a lot of Facebook groups for ELT writers these days. If you would like to share… Read More ›
Onestopenglish is still free at the moment. This is a great opportunity to make the most of their awesome resources. There’s so much available on the site: lesson plans, articles related to methodology, resources created by the Onestopenglish community… they’ve… Read More ›
Russ Mayne suggested I should have a post or page listing all my reviews. So, here it is. It turns out there are quite a few. As always, all views are my own and these reviews are highly subjective! Before… Read More ›
WordAds… ah, go on then. I didn’t want to make money from my blog. I had my reasons for that, which were basically… I’ve always felt bad, kinda guilty about the idea. My content is random and rambling – I… Read More ›
I had to induct a new teacher at school once. They were fairly new to teaching and unfamiliar with our in-house product at the time (called myClass). I thought that listening to me ramble on for half an hour about… Read More ›
ELT Planning 