Materials, Planning and a bit of Inclusiveness...
Let me start today by wishing you Ramadan Mubarak if you observe it and if you don’t, welcome to March! Hope it’s a good one either way.
I'm off on my travels again this week. Getting in Nellie the Van and heading out for a week with my youngest (20 year old) son.... and yes- that's the same one who ended up in a Malaysian prison for a weekend a couple of years ago if you remember that story.
We don't even know where we're going yet. We'll see where the weather is good and head there. It's my favourite kind of holiday: a road trip with no plan- let's see what happens! I'll put pics on Facebook...
So, I'm in a great mood and as always I've got food for thought and practical activities, so buckle up, settle down and enjoy.
Something old
This week, my attention was drawn to an Open Letter to the English Language Teaching Industry. I've signed it and I wanted to give you a heads up about it too. You can read it for yourself but it's about the continued invisibility of the LGBTQIA+ community in ELT materials. You might be thinking that it’s often difficult to judge how effective petitions like this are and I’d agree but I also think it's important to stand up and be counted, so here it is.
On that note, I thought it would be useful to include something about inclusive materials this week. You might not want to rock the boat in your class or bring up topics that you think might offend anyone, but being inclusive doesn't have to be a major debate. It's just about making sure that a fair rainbow of the people who exist in the world (and within your classes) are seen.
I made this video a while ago with a practical idea for doing this with family vocabulary. My own family is a bit of a mish-mash so it's an easy start for me. The video includes a listening part (from timestamp 1:34 to 2:20) that you could take into class and use with your learners if you want to - and a picture of me when I was about three if you're curious! Let me know what you think.
If you want some other great inclusive materials, Peter Fullagar's site has a range here including some that are free and Lottie Galpin’s site is useful if your organisation is looking for materials support in this area.
Something new
OK- I've delivered you some practical activities, so here's a bit of food for thought in my new video this week.
There are a couple of reasons you should hit this link. The first is that the video is very short - only 86 seconds - I KNOW you have time for that! And the second is that it's definitely a useful thought for teaching and it might also be a useful idea for life in general. It's certainly one I have to keep in mind....
I've called it Less is More so if you're the kind of person who goes into lessons with an armful of photocopies, this might resonate. Planning less, exploiting material better and giving more time for practice is an easy win as one of the teachers in The Next Step programme was saying this week.
Feel nervous about running out of material? You can always have an extra activity up your sleeve just in case!
Something borrowed
Finally- and continuing with the theme of planning- I've got a course for you on the subject. This is from the British Council, so you know it'll be good quality.
It's called Planning Courses. It's free, it looks useful for teachers in any context and it's self-paced with download-ables and a group to join. You can enrol until 24 March 2025 so you have a bit of time but don't put it off- it's always easy to procrastinate...
Just while we're talking about the BC, if you don't visit their site very often, I'd strongly recommend that you have a look. They have so much, covering so many angles of our profession (including a lot of practical material) and it's all FREE (and no, I'm not on their payroll...)
OK. Wish me a good trip and I'll be back again next Sunday with more ELT goodies for you. Have a fantastic week.
Best