ELTMentor News
Here’s our weekly digest of forum comments, upcoming dates and other snippets of useful information.
Welcome to Katia our latest member of the programme. Katia is from Italy and keen to get involved in using technology in her teaching I am certain that you can all help her to do this and have lots of advice and practical suggestions to pass on.
Back to school!
I know some of you will have that back to school feeling and I think we can get going in earnest with ELTMentor also once September is underway.
My line is fixed so (fingers crossed it remains so) I am back in full flow – at present preparing for my daughter’s wedding next Saturday (pray for good weather!) then we will be full steam ahead!
The Forum
Cintia has completed her CELTA with flying colours! Well done Cintia – I’m sure you will all add your congratulations on the forum and maybe at tomorrow’s webinar too!
Don’t forget to use the forum for sharing ideas, asking for help or posting successes!
Can anybody who hasn’t yet please post up a short bio?
Here’s the link again:
If you haven’t managed to find the forum yet let me know.
#eltmentor
We’ll try and get this hashtag chat going again after the next session at the end of August (29th). I hope that we can do this after tomorrow’s session. I can talk about it at th end of the presentation.
(Sign up to twitter, then sign up to tweetdeck and post a comment there. If you need any help with this let me know).
#eltchat
For those of you who would like to follow #eltchat but haven’t signed up to twitter and would prefer to ‘lurk’ and observe before taking the plunge, you can observe #eltchat on Tweetchat.com. Here is the link:
When you get to the site add eltchat to the # box. You can then sit back and watch the action! If you want to contribute you can sign in but this is really the best place for smart lurking :-0
#eltchat is held on Wednesdays at 12.00 and 21.00 UK time – but the # is in use at all times so you can check in anytime to see what is going on.
I have now come across something called a twitterwall which I will investigate further. Apparently we can create a wall for us to pull in relevant tweets. If anybody has experience of this please step forward – I need your help and advice.
Useful articles
Here’s one on Universal Grammar
http://aggslanguage.wordpress.com/2011/08/23/a-short-history-of-the-universal-grammar-hypothesis/-
A second a piece by Dave Dodgson on webinars
http://www.davedodgson.com/2011/08/weird-wonderful-world-of-webinars.html
Gapfillers
Don’t forget to give me feedback if you use the site for yourself or with students. Also if you have suggestions they’re always welcome 🙂
We’re running a very special offer in August so learners can really get going with their English practice in September £50 ($80) for a whole year and we’ve added lots of goodies too – so please let your students know. The subscription reverts to £175 ($280) after September 1st.
Here is some more information on this you can pass the link on 🙂
Just a reminder that we do offer a school licence so if your school has advanced students (if wants to use it for teachers) this is possible – just let me know.
O can also syndicate content which means we can deliver straight to your school site or intranet.
Webinar tomorrow 12.00 GMT
I hope you have all received your invitation from the site for this.
We will be looking at classroom dynamics and management.
In case your invite got lost here is the link: http://www.wiziq.com/online-class/607030-classroom-management-and-dynamics
We’ll begin at 12.00 GMT. Hope to see you there!
Need help with anything?
If anybody else needs help with anything just post in the forum, or on twitter or email me or message in Gapfillers. I am really pleased that you are using the forum – it’s becoming a buzzy place.
Until next week
Berni