Hello everyone

Hello everyone,
I would like to thank Ahlem Marrakchi and Riadh (can't tag him here) for delivering their first teacher training session on 'Materials Writing' in our centre, sharing what they learnt from the course with other teachers. Apart from asking participants to think of an idea of an activity based on an image or authentic article, Ahlem shared samples of her nice materials with everyone at the end of the session.
So, do you have any post-course plans, ideas or projects you're working on ?

Hello

Hello,
I'm very late with this introduction. I was away on a trip for two months and couldn't do it before.
My name is Sanja. I come from Croatia. I've been a teacher for 22 years. I run my own language school in Croatia where I teach children from 2,5-18 years old. I run workshops at the conferences and I would like to learn how to create my own materials.

Where would you like to see yourself 12 months from now, in terms of being a materials writer?

Where would you like to see yourself 12 months from now, in terms of being a materials writer?

One of my purposes is to share with other educators my experience from being in the classroom for 35 years and seeing all the change that our students bring every new year. It's amazing really, that no class has ever been the same!
Also, I wish to write materials that derive from the compound of English language, Psychology and Coaching, diverse materials for the learners of the new generation.
I would like to create materials that are easy even for the busiest teacher to use, materials that are enjoyable for the students, that can help them develop and grow into independent learners.
I love materials that promote critical thinking and teach social skills to students, materials that can make them responsible world citizens aiming to peace and love for everyone.
I would like to create a blog or participate in one with other like-minded people in this group, and together share ideas, projects, views, knowledge and materials in order to develop ourselves, other teachers and our students.
I believe it's about time we found our tribe and created the change we want to see in this world.

When using an authentic audio or video it is important to use only ‘native speakers'.

When using an authentic audio or video it is important to use only ‘native speakers'. Do you agree or disagree? Give reasons.

Depending on the level of our students, I would use native speakers with beginners, as they need a basis on which to start building their knowledge and reference of language sounds. Moving to the upper levels they can gradually be exposed to nonnative varieties to get to recognise the language through different accents and come to know the cultural varieties that connect to these differences.

Which Principles of Material Design are most important for you? Why?

Which Principles of Material Design are most important for you? Why?

I teach mostly children and teenagers and from experience I've seen that in order for material to be effective, it's very important for the students to be able to understand the content, to feel comfortable with it and be able to respond and produce results. They can similarly work with enjoyable material and other times with intriguing material, depending on the demands we have on the production of language. They become more emotionally involved when the content touches their interests, opinions, when they can make connections with their lives or when they can visualise different situations. This mostly works with speaking and writing.

Here is my week 4 assignment. It is a word search based on my week 1 assignment.

Here is my week 4 assignment. It is a word search based on my week 1 assignment.
https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B4wwDoYnNVfqSGRSR2lmNTQweFN0bk5VZ1ZGanpzcmdOZVRj/view?usp=sharing

Here is my week 2 assignment.

Here is my week 2 assignment.
https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B4wwDoYnNVfqQWwxTVJjNWJoUXBaclJDXy1xX3FZcnkyWmRF/view?usp=sharing

Where would you like to see yourself 12 months from now, in terms of being a materials writer?

Where would you like to see yourself 12 months from now, in terms of being a materials writer?

Not really a materials writer (I think not in 12 months), but I will have definitely created a lot of materials.
So, maybe create a website or blog where I share materials and lesson plans. I think I will have created more interest in that area among my colleagues and hopefully encourage them to form a materials writing group where they create and share materials in a more professional and accessible way.

What ONE piece of advice would you give a teacher who wants to create their own classroom materials?

What ONE piece of advice would you give a teacher who wants to create their own classroom materials?

- Always put your target students in mind; consider their learning styles, interests and above all their needs when creating your materials.
- Share your materials with others and ask them to try them and give you some feedback if possible.
- Start small (one task, one skill or language area) and develop your materials till you create more professional materials and lesson plans.
- Don't forget to store your materials. You'll definitely need to use or share them later or even develop and improve them.
ooops, those are more than one, but I believe they just sum up the most important pieces of advice in my own point of view (a reminder for myself, as well) !

I felt that week four assignment is kind of the most challenging for me.

I felt that week four assignment is kind of the most challenging for me. I don't know whether that was because I wanted to aim high and create something that is genuine and new or because I was not creative enough to make the job easier for myself!
In our summer school courses, we do graded readers with students of different age groups, so I created a board game to review all language and content of one of the readers "The Prince and the Pauper".
Anyway, I created a board game. I used Publisher to create the table myself (rather than using a ready template) , then filled it with some questions and other instructions. I am still exploring Publisher, so I had to copy the document to Word to save it at the end !

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1M81Gk6V9WwqnIrDO_YnEjgMau87UpmKa/view?usp=sharing

Here is my week 3 assignment.

Here is my week 3 assignment.
https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B4wwDoYnNVfqVzF2bzNvRVJPb3JEXzdBODVqaC1YMlJPZ2JF/view?usp=sharing

Title

Dear All,

Here is my last assignment. I'm sure you are already enjoying your summer break, but I hope Mocha's nose in the preview convinces you to have a look :)

I struggled to make the layout look as neat as possible, but Google docs doesn't always want to cooperate, so show some understanding if things are not always just in the right place.

I used myrebus.com to create the fun part of this lesson (thanks for the recommendation, Maria Theologidou).

Enjoy the rest of the summer, everyone :)

Margarita

Where would you like to see yourself 12 months from now, in terms of being a materials writer?

Where would you like to see yourself 12 months from now, in terms of being a materials writer?

I would like to have built up a bank of resources that I can use in my lessons, and have them all indexed according to subject/level/grammar/function/topic. I would like to feel that I was in a position to start a website of some description and be able to start sharing resources with teachers working in a similar context to myself.

Attached is my Week 4 assignment.

Attached is my Week 4 assignment. It was quite difficult to think of creating puzzle materials for my context, being 1-2-1 online teaching - everyone else's activities seem really exciting and colourful, but I find with my context it's often more engaging for learners in 1-2-1 online lessons if you can create the content during the lesson - so I will use the interactive whiteboard a lot to draw etc.

Anyway, one game I play quite frequently is Twenty Questions, which is a very popular British travel game, so I have created a worksheet to explain how to use this as a game to practise question forms and workplace vocabulary. I use it with B1 learners, and I only use it once with each learner. The word I think of is always 'stapler'. I find this works really well because it's an object that many people use every day, but that (in my experience) they don't know the English word for. It's really interesting to hear them try to describe it to me, and how to use it, and really extends their vocabulary.

I would say 'keep it simple' - start with one resource, whether that is a picture or text and look at how you can...

I would say 'keep it simple' - start with one resource, whether that is a picture or text and look at how you can exploit that resource for different levels, different grammar/language points, for classroom or 1-2-1 lessons.

Here is my week 3 assignment, using pictures from the flickr/elt account.

Here is my week 3 assignment, using pictures from the flickr/elt account. I have designed it as a self-study lesson, to take approximately half an hour, with another 20 minutes of homework (task 5). It is designed for B2/C1 level Business English students.

Apologies for submitting this assignment late.

Apologies for submitting this assignment late. The attached lesson plan is for B2/C1 Business English learners. It is designed for 60 minute 1-2-1 Skype class. I removed one paragraph from the original article to make it shorter. When I did the vocab profiling, almost 20% of the words were 'off-list'. Many of these were the more interesting business/marketing words and this vocabulary would be crucial to having a good understanding of, and ability to discuss the topic, hence I believe this article would be most suited to higher level learners than the profile results would suggest. I would use an interactive whiteboard throughout the lesson to illustrate the grammar points/lexis that are the focus of the lesson.

Title

This puzzle was designed today from scratch, since I wanted to make it appropriate for use by any teacher interested.
In Greece the majority of coursebooks are accompanied by a book called ‘Companion’ which contains the new vocabulary in each unit. In levels A1 - C2 under each word there is its explanation in English, an example sentence containing the word, synonyms, antonyms, derivatives and the Greek translation of the word. So, to make this puzzle I usually use vocabulary I have set as homework in the previous lesson and I copy the original sentences from the companion, which helps the students who have studied guess the words easily .
Please feel free to have a look at it. Any comments would be much appreciated.
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1mvzXqORTKQAWboXMNGnFgEDM4S1gx-mEYpLdnvLXibE/edit?usp=sharing

Hi Everyone!

Hi Everyone!

For this assignment I designed a board game to review and practice superlatives.

https://drive.google.com/open?id=1Ma8I-GyspLpntDmQF9ic3ssVINawUiPp
https://drive.google.com/open?id=1Ma8I-GyspLpntDmQF9ic3ssVINawUiPp

I really cannot visualise myself as a material designer 12 months from now.

I really cannot visualise myself as a material designer 12 months from now. I can only ensure that I will always try to do my best in order to make my students happy and help them in discovering their potentials ans their skills. As far as personal creativity and productivity is concerned all I know is that I will be in the process of conducting my dissertation starting in October. This will definitely involve a lot of deep thinking, writing, designing, creating, researching, data collecting, analysing and evaluating. And .. maybe, if things go well I will be conducting my Phd proposal in a year from now...