E V O L V E S C H O O L: September 2012

TeachingEnglish Newsletter

26 September 2012

Regular readers will know that the TeachingEnglish website has hosted a number of Guest Writers. Why not have a look at our archive where you can find articles and blogs by ELT luminaries such as Adrian Underhill, Carol Read and Michael Swan.

LearnEnglish Teens

Welcome to our new website with material especially designed for teenage learners.

LearnEnglish Kids
Children can develop their English skills with topic-based games, songs, stories.

LearnEnglish Central
Develop your English, with language games, downloads, stories and articles.

BritLit
The aim of BritLit is to help teachers from around the world to exploit English literature in the ELT classroom.

Premier Skills

Communicate in two of the world's global languages - English and football

Welcome to the latest edition of the TeachingEnglish newsletter!

This week we have a lesson plan and a few activities to help you get all your students talking and developing their fluency. And if you're looking for more practical classroom ideas, British Council Spain is streaming sessions from its Teachers' Conference on Saturday 29th.

You may also be interested in contributing to a survey. Aston University is looking into the transition from primary education and is interested in teachers' experiences. And, did you know there are 285 million blind or visually impaired people in the world? If you'd like some useful tips on how to cater to their needs, take a look at this week's article.

And finally, if you'd like to know more about what's going on in the world of ELT in your region, why not subscribe to the ELTeCS newsletters too?

Enjoy!

Deb

TeachingEnglish Team | British Council | BBC

Lesson plan - Conversation lesson: music

During this skills lesson you might want to use background music where facilities allow. You will also need some samples of music, not necessarily just in English, but a variety of different genres.

Activity - Getting the whole class talking

These activities are designed to get everyone talking. They can be used with all levels because the language required to communicate is determined by the students. Remember to set up and demonstrate these activities carefully before letting the class go ahead.

Teaching English to visually impaired students

According to the World Health Organisation there are 285 million visually impaired or blind people in the world and 90% of those live in developing countries. So what can we as teachers do to cater for the particular needs of these learners?

Top story - Aston University Transition Survey

Would you like to contribute to a research survey?

Aston University, UK in conjunction with the British Council is carrying out a survey of teachers' experiences of teaching English to children between the ages of 9 and 14 as they move from primary education to the next level of the school curriculum.

Find out more

British Council Teachers' Conference, Spain

The British Council Spain holds its annual Teachers' Conferences in Madrid, Barcelona, Bilbao and Valencia on Saturday September 29th, and the focus this year is: Practical Classroom Activities. Four of the sessions will be streamed online starting at 9:00am UK time. For a more detailed overview of the live talks, download the programme.

Find out more

Community - English Language Teaching Contacts Scheme - ELTeCS

If you like to know what's happening when and who's who in ELT, then you need ELTeCS. ELTeCS provides English teachers, teacher trainers and managers worldwide with the latest news about opportunities in their region and globally. Keep updated with what's happening in your region by subscribing to ELTeCS.