#KELTChat 1st November 2015, 8-9pm KST: Using holidays in the classroom

Posted on October 31, 2015 by Alex Grevett (Breathyvowel)

This post is a preview for the upcoming #keltchat one hour Tweet chat on Sunday evening from 8 until 9pm KST. The topic of the chat is using holidays in the classroom.

A teacher doesn’t need to look far too find a lesson based on a holiday at this time of year. And those holidays are more often than not Western ones. It doesn’t seem unreasonable to suggest that all this holidaying in ELT classrooms the world over is done with a great deal of critical examination.

So here is #keltchat to step into the breach and ponder aloud why and how we can best bring seasonal good cheer into our classrooms. This pondering will be conducted along the following lines:

Do you use holidays in class? Why? How? Which ones?
Is using holidays really as popular as Breathy thinks it is it seems? Why?
Culture is probably important here, but what are the important cultural insights that holidays give us?
Are holidays popular because they give us an opportunity to have fun with students? How important is this? How does it compare to other kinds of fun?
Are there any downsides or things to be cautious of in using holidays in the classroom?
If we want to connect holiday themed lessons to specific language items, what would those items be?

The questions above are a guideline only, and diversions, distractions and tangents are most welcome.

We hope to see you on Sunday. If you have any questions, please get in touch.

The #KELTChat Team

Alex (@breathyvowel)
Anne (@annehendler)
David (@davidharbinson)
Dayle (@daylemajor)
Michael (@michaelegriffin)
Tim (@timhampson)

#KELTChat: “Building rapport with students” (Sunday 6th September, 8-9pm KST)

Posted on September 5, 2015 by Alex Grevett (Breathyvowel)

After a summer off to gather its thoughts and give those niggling injuries a chance to heal, #KELTChat is back to take once more to the lush fields of Twitter and do battle with the ELT issues of the moment.

If you have never encountered #KELTChat before, here is a short introduction. #KELTChat is a space on the internet (and increasingly in “real life” too) for teachers in Korea and further afield to talk about issues that affect us in the classroom and the industry as a whole. We have a Facebook group but the greater part of teacher interaction takes place in our regular Twitter chats (lots of good information in that link).

The first such chat takes place on Sunday 6th September from 8 until 9pm Korea time (click here for the time in your part of the world). The topic will be “Building rapport with students”. Most teachers would agree that rapport is important, but it may mean different things to different people, and the ways that it is created will vary in each case. This chat is an opportunity to explore our own and others’ approaches to building rapport.

The chat will be structured around the following questions, though tangents and diversions are very welcome.

What does rapport mean to you?
Are there any aspects of rapport that you think might be particularly important for Korean students?
Are there any aspects of rapport included in common definitions that you think are NOT important?
How explicitly do you try to build rapport between students, and between yourself and the class?
What activities to you find are effective at building rapport?
How do you act towards students in order to build rapport?
Is there anything else that you do to encourage rapport?
What kind of timescale do you have for building rapport?
Is there any value in assessing rapport between students?

We hope to see you on Sunday. If you have any questions, please get in touch.

The #KELTChat Team

Alex (@breathyvowel)
Anne (@annehendler)
David (@davidharbinson)
Dayle (@daylemajor)
Michael (@michaelegriffin)
Tim (@timhampson)

Words

Posted on June 18, 2015 by timothyhampson

“Words are trouble, words are subtle Words of anger, words of hate Words over here, words out there In the air and everywhere” Tom Tom Club – Wordy Rappinghood

Getting students to learn new words can be difficult. Teachers might have memories of seemingly endless rote memorisation of words at school, but also appreciate that learning vocabulary is essential to learning language. In ‘The Big questions of ELT’ Scott Thornbury writes

“All in all, this suggests that the learner needs to assemble as big a lexicon as possible–even if this means putting other areas of language learning, such as the learning of grammar, ‘on hold’.”

On Sunday 21st of June at 8 PM KST #KELTchat will be discussing teaching students words. Questions discussed might include: