Follow-up of ETAS SIG day Reading into writing workshop

FIrst of all, a big thanks to Fiona Joseph, who gave us an excellent workshop.

It was the second of two to be given through Skype and with a pre-recorded presentation.

You can find the pre-recorded part below, but you will need Flash installed to ensure it works properly. There are also all the links mentioned during the workshop.

Flo-joe for ETAS

One of the links that we looked at is LibraryThing but there is another social network for books at Shelfari.

We discused how to include literature in the classroom and agreed to share any experiences, problems and ideas as comments to this post. I am looking forward to your input!

Follow-up of ETAS SIG day Skype workshop

ETAS’ very first on-line presenter gave an excellent workshop on skype. Technology went well with everything except the couple of computers that were down. Thank you, Peter Travis!

As ETAS is concerned about the environment and wants to save trees, there were no handouts. However, the presentation (not including live talks) and all the links which were mentioned are included in the website below.

Splendid speaking for ETAS

You will need Flash for the presentation to work, but all the other links should by fine.

We would love to hear from you about your experiences with teaching and learning with Skype, so please do leave a comment here if you have had any- good or bad.

Cardiff IATEFL conference on-line

LAst year the yearly IATFL conference in Exeter was accompanied by on-line coverage including videos and podcasts (see the according blogposts here). This year the conference will be in Cardiff and the organizers are roaring and ready to go on-line again.

IF you are interested in being part of the fun, read the invitation below and leave a comment. I’ll respond and give you the necessary information:

Have you considered holding a TA Event making use of video sessions and
material from the 2009 Cardiff IATEFL Conference?

We would like to encourage TAs to organise such events so that teacher
associations and their members can take full advantage of the Cardiff Online
project.

As with the 2007 Aberdeen Online project and this year’s Exeter Online
project, we will be providing *free* online coverage of the Cardiff IATEFL
Conference.

Our web coverage will include over 20 sessions which will be webcast from
Cardiff.

We would like to see TAs invite their members to workshops and events which
would feature videos and discussions from the Cardiff IATEFL Conference.

By the way, as of writing, the EVO sessions (see last post) just begun and it is only 3 days away from the ETAS AGM!

Brush up on technology in the New Year

I’d like to invite you, dear reader, to an excellent opportunity to expand your technology skills and get new ideas for teaching using technology and blended teaching.

Every year a group of educators called the Webheads offer a number of courses free of charge online between mid-January and mid-February. These experienced people are devoted to passing on their knowledge and helping others come to grips with new technology. It is here that I too have learned so much and made so many contacts around the world.

Have a look around, and I hope to see you there in the new year!

http://evosessions.pbwiki.com/Call_for_Participation09

Don’t worry, there is something for everyone and even true beginners in this area. AND you get a chance to meet some of the most wonderful people (next to the ETAS gang, of course )

And here is the official invitation:

The CALL Interest Section of the international TESOL
professional association is pleased to offer the
opportunity to participate in the Electronic Village
Online (EVO) 2009 sessions. This is a professional
development project and virtual extension of the TESOL
2009 Convention in Denver, CO . The intended audience
for this project includes both TESOL 2009 participants
and those who can participate only virtually.

You do not need to be a TESOL member to participate in
a free, six-week, wholly online session of the EVO,
Jan 12 -Feb 22, 2009. Please visit our Announcement
Web page to select one among the various offerings.

http://evosessions.pbwiki.com/Call_for_Participation09

Yours in TESOL,

The EVO coordination team

EDTAGS – social tagging for educational purposes

This is the website mentioned in the NECC 08 presentation (see last post) from Tuesday at 11am called edtag.org: Academic Social Tagging to Aid Learning and Assessment.

I strongly recommend listening to the presentation, especially if social tagging is a new idea to you. However, be aware that the sound sometimes goes.

Just to give you a summary, the idea is to bring together websites that are relevant in the educational area, including ESL/EFL. It is a place for you as a teacher to find resources, but also to add resources that you find so others can alos profit from them.

Social tagging also leaves the idea of folders with fixed names, becoming more flexible and more dynamic, i.e. you choose the key words that you find relevant. You can choose as many as you think apply so others may find the relevancy as well. They, in turn, may choose to use the same tags, but can choose other instead or in addition to make the tags more meaningful to themselves.

You will find this idea of social tagging in the delicious and blinklist, which are both under ‘Bookmarks’ on the left side bar, and also in diigo, from which I am posting this entry.

The difference to those mentioned above is simply that this site was made by educators explicitly for educators, so it is more limited in this way- not as expansive, at the same time perhaps making it more accessible to some teachers, librarians, etc.

• Edtags.org: Tags: esl

• tags: education, teaching, NECC08, learningwithcomputers, wiki, documents, web2.0, resources, edtags

Easy summer listening

If you are reading this around the time it’s been posted, then you are probaly home for at least part of the summer holiday with a bit of time on your hands next to cleaning up the office (which is what I’m busy doing)

So, I’d like to invite you to the NECC 2008 Webcasts (National Educational Computing Conference)

There are some very interesting and thought-provoking webcasts (audio and video broadcasting) about learning and pedagogics in today’s digital world.

You will need to sign up, but it is a short process of about 2 seconds and  the only result being that you can watch and listen to the webcasts.

Feel free to leave a comment about any which really struck a note in you.

And happy summer!

Exeter follow-up 2

Join Exeter on-line homepage to watch and listen to 15 different workshops and numerous interviews, inlcuding one from a dear friend, who says why SIGs are so important in IATEFL. You could certainly say the same applies for ETAS!

Here are a few more I hope you will enjoy.

Marion WIlliams, President of the IATEFL, introduces people responsible for bringing EXETER to you on-line. A big applause!!!

Gavin Dudeney and Julian Wing talk about the future of EXETER ONLINE . We really appreciate your work guys!

Here’s a truly international interview for you. I really enjoy the enthusiasm of this multicultural group. In these interviews with Hornby scholars you will get an idea of some of the workshops which took place and the research they are involved in.

And here is one about gender issues by Silvija and Jaroslaw.

Of course, there are many more, and I hope you will have a look at them. I’ll add another post with more links in the meanwhile.

Exeter online follow-up

You can now find several workshops and interviews from Exeter on-line, so grab your i-pod, mp3-player or take some time in front of the computer and give it a listen!

http://exeteronline.britishcouncil.org/

Exeter online!

Since many of you are bound to home and cannot take few days off to go to Exeter for the IATEFL conference, you may be happy to know that you don’t need to be left out!

Here is the blurb:

As with Aberdeen Online, there’ll be video recordings of workshops, moderated forums and photo albums and a lot more. This year we’ll also be *live* streaming several plenary sessions!

What else is new?
It’s a new-look site. The first time you visit the site, you’ll need to create your own free user account – there are online tutorials and handy tips to help users update their profiles.

Just go to:  http://exeteronline.britishcouncil.org  to join in the virtual fun!

See you in Exeter

Free online courses in January

After a long and busy November, I’m back to keep up the blog again. Sorry for the silence!

But now I have a great offer for you. It’s time to reserve the 14th January and the following 6 weeks in your diary because EVO is taking place.

What’s Evo? Electronic Village Online   is under the tesol wing and offors free 6-week courses to anyone interested. There is a large range with something I’m sure you’ll find useful.

Last year I joined 2 groups and profited immensely from both of them, so much in fact, that I’m back again this year as a moderator!

You will find the moderators there extremely supportive  and the level of learning high. It is well worthd your time!

But  don’t just believe me, have a look for yourself!

Here is the invitation:

Dear all,

The CALL Interest Section of the international TESOL
professional association is pleased to offer the
opportunity to participate in the Electronic Village
Online (EVO) 2008 season. This is a professional
development project and virtual extension of the TESOL
2008 Convention in New York. The intended audience
for this project includes both TESOL 2008 participants
and those who can participate only virtually.

You do not need to be a TESOL member to participate in
a free , six-week , wholly online session of the EVO,
Jan 14 – Feb 24, 2008. Please visit our Announcement
Page to select one or two among the various offerings.

http://evo08sessionscfp.pbwiki.com