Informed pronunciation teaching is a challenge for new and experienced teachers. It involves a minefield of technical knowledge, confusion over accents and varieties of English, and when related to reading, involves a lot of fighting against the horrible spelling rules that English has held onto...
-
2nd January 2018By Tom Garside
-
26th December 2017By Eve Conway
As a Cert TESOL tutor, I work with trainee teachers every day who upon finishing the course go out to teach in the real world. One of the biggest challenges facing new teachers in particular is planning. Whilst experienced teachers may have a bank of readily available lesson planning ideas which... -
12th December 2017By Bryan Holmes
Using authentic materials in an ESL classroom provides many benefits for learners. Exploiting them in class can give learners a sense of achievement, show language in a realistic context, and offers opportunity for real communication. Unfortunately, many learners assume that they are incapable of... -
5th December 2017By Ryan Robbie
Teaching in Asia is full of surprises. One of the most surprising things is how many students write “Christmas tree” at the top of their Christmas wish list. This helped me understand just how different our cultures are from East to West. Even though Christmas may not be celebrated at home in... -
28th November 2017By Tom Garside
The language that we use with our students, and the language that they use with each other at different points of a lesson, is fundamental to English language education. This article aims to outline some of the features of the interaction which happens in language classrooms in order to find ways... -
21st November 2017By Bryan Holmes
Nowadays, English is an international language and used throughout the world. The ever increasing need to develop one’s communicative competence is often something learners struggle to do. Outdated methods and a focus on grammatical proficiency tend to inhibit improvement. Though grammar is a... -
17th October 2017By Eve Conway
Halloween is just around the corner and is the perfect time to do some festive-inspired activities with your young learner classes. As holidays go, Halloween is one of the most fun, paying homage to all things weird and wonderful, such as ghosts, ghouls and goblins. Here are five of my favourite... -
19th September 2017By Eve Conway
Although English only has two ‘official’ tenses ‘past’ and ‘present’, grammar can be tricky for the best of us. In particular it poses difficulties for young learners as they are still developing the ability to comprehend abstract ideas and may not to grasp such concepts as ‘time’ or ‘real vs...