University of Nottingham MA in Digital Technologies for Language Teaching - Here we go!

I have started a second MA, this time on Digital Technologies for Language Teaching with the University of Nottingham and the course program the tutors and the online facilities are excellent.  We're using the latest version of Moodle which is pretty slick and I love it already. I'm also using it on the course I tutor on, the Cert ICT by TheConsultants-e and it's great to be able to use it both as a students on the MA course and as a tutor on the CertICT program as this gave me an enhanced understanding of the Moodle platform when I first did it a couple of years ago first when I did the CertICT myself and then when I started tutoring.

Anyways, we've started with socialisation tasks using Popplet, and it's great to do this because I hadn't used it for over 6 months now so it's great to get back to it and see how much such a simple tool can be used to establish relationships, build group rapport and all done in the spirit of technology being harnessed to reach a very clear pedagogical aim.  I love it already and can't wait to get into the nitty-gritty of my course program.

Needless to say, my posts from now on will be heavily influenced by my studies while on the course. All the same, this doesn't mean that my Methodology Pills will stop from coming along!  On the contrary, I hope they will get even better with all the new stuff I will be reading about and studying and learning!  Yay!

Methodology Pill No. 22 Lead-ins & Warmers

It's been a month since my last post so time does fly fast! It's now two weeks since the Aug CELTA course finished and although it's by no means less hectic than before, I've managed to set some time aside to do this Methodology Pill which became evident on the last course my future and now ex-trainees would appreciate.

The idea is that of giving a few ideas and examples of lead-ins and warmers via examples built around a real text found in a popular course book, in this case - Cutting Edge Elementary page 21. I've used this text before and thought it would make sense to use a real teaching text as an example.  Now, I don't claim to own any of these ideas as some I've picked up through my 20-year long teacher career in 8 different countries and from different colleagues so I just put them all together in this video as examples of what can be done. Of course, there are lots of possibilities and combinations so the sole aim is to get you started with some tried and tested examples which can enhance the learning experience of your students.