Mobile education, also called m-learning, is perceived by some as a kind of e-learning, yet it can be much more than that. By using smartphones in the class, and allowing – or even encouraging – my students to do the same, I bring some real context to the artificial environment of a classroom. No longer a forbidden fruit, smartphones can be useful, entertaining and… motivating!
We all know that teaching kids requires not only knowledge and patience, but also wild amounts of ingenuity and creativity – the younger the learner, the more creative the teacher must be! And since I’ve professionally come back to dealing with young learners and teens, the book I felt like browsing through really carefully addressed the needs of the youngest learners – especially knowing the author.
With warmer days we may either feel encouraged to spend days in the garden or in the park, or to spend evenings outside, enjoying slightly cooler air. I myself prefer the second option, especially that, as usually, I have so much to learn, that evenings and studying seem to be one… for ever.
Even if you’re not as much into CPD as I am, you might find some of the courses interesting:
There’s always one part of testing English that you hate. Some hate writing, others listening (aye, that would be me), but somehow it’s speaking that seems to cause lots of worries. To tell you the truth, I haven’t had problems with speaking ever since I came up with some simple steps. I can’t claim you’ll excel at speaking tests after following my ideas, but I do encourage you to give them a go – maybe they’ll work out for you just as they did for me!
What implementing self-assessment gave me, was something close to all-year long system of formative assessment. The great bonus is that those teens gain the great skill of being able to self-assess their own progress and this is a skill that will be useful in the future, when the memory of the IELTS preparation course is long gone.
It’s a really strange feeling, when you read a book in April and you realise you’ve just read your Book of the Year. Also, it’s hard to believe I hadn’t heard of Jane McGonigal before my Prince Consort picked her book during our monthly book hunt and said “You will love it”. He was right, naturally.
April showers brought May flowers and indeed, there are many free online courses blooming on various platforms – and since next week I’m going to have a well-deserved May mini-break, I managed to find nice subjects to study, so that you’ll have something to choose from even before May starts!
I want to present my top 6 apps that will help students practise at home and prepare for the test – links will direct you to Google Play Store where you’ll be able to download the app. You may also find most of them in the Apple Store as well.
The following note is a rough translation of the post Erpegi na pierwszy raz. The author, Michał Laskowski, kindly agreed to me translating and sharing his work. It is originally meant for people who are already familiar with RPGs, so I believe you already know enough of theory and it’s high time to start playing on your own!
April showers bring… a lot of free online courses. With the weather still unpredictable, it’s still a nice idea to spend windy days at home, studying and developing our teacherish skills… and not only those, as I found some courses everyone might find useful, not only teachers.