Blogs and articles
"Benim adιm Suzanne". The Turkish teacher points at herself. From the programme I know that Suzanne is her name. So my brain concludes: 'Benim adιm means something like 'I am called' or 'my name is'.
I am with some 4th-year secondary school students. Due to an organisational failure I am not teaching, but the students can't leave either. Time for a chat. And as a language teacher I wish to know: did you choose a language?
"Don't forget ...!" This might be the most frequently used sentence of teachers. Because we don't want our students to forget what we told them in our class.
Or ... DO we want our students to forget?
The headphones were attached to rails on the ceiling of the classroom. The French teacher lowered them and while we were holding our breath, we each took a headphone: we had a French listening test.
In our courses we advise to limit the input of new vocabulary to approximately 3 target structures (chunks) per lesson series.
Why so little?
If you know how the human memory works, you can adjust your lessons to that. Consequence? Students showing greater proficiency and a higher language awareness, students who are more motivated because the lessons fit our natural learning process.
Justin Slocum Bailey gave a very inspiring, practical workshop about how teachers can keep their voice & energy level healthy when teaching language in a dynamic way.