Cultural Awareness and Diversity in the adult classroom

Culture is not usually at the heart of EFL teachers’ concerns. This talk aims at showing how your coursebook can serve as the perfect springboard to dive into cultural issues, an essential and integral aspect of language. I will show examples of how topics usually found in course books can be given a cultural focus and be transformed into opportunities for worthwhile discussion and learning about intercultural issues. The use of authentic materials will also be referred to as a means to engage learners in meaningful tasks that promote cultural awareness and respect. I will go over the process of adapting such course book materials, coming up with authentic cultural links and using the power of the world wide web to find and organize authentic materials that can bring these links to life and provide a meaningful opportunity for discussion and learning. This process will be made transparent and systematized for easy implementation by any teacher.

Cultural Awareness and Diversity in the adult classroom from Vicky Saumell

Presented at Teacher Development Conference in Cusco, Peru on October 26th, 2012.

Developing and evaluating speaking and writing with technology

This session aims at exploring issues and ideas related to the development and evaluation of speaking and writing with adult learners. I will go over the main concerns teachers have when teaching the productive skills. I will then show creative ways to develop speaking and writing with easy-to-use technology tools both in and out of class. We will explore examples with different web 2.0 tools and discuss different ways to evaluate speaking and writing in a more effective way.

Developing Speaking and Writing with Technology from Vicky Saumell

Developing Speaking and Writing with Technology Handout from Vicky Saumell
This mindmap is available online at http://popplet.com/app/#/525933

Presented at Pearson events in Trujillo, Chiclayo, Lima and Arequipa in October, November, 2012.

CLIL and cultural diversity

CLIL discussion and practice has mainly focused on the relationship between content and language to varying degrees. Culture, although part of CLIL’s 4Cs curriculum, is not usually at the heart of the debate. This talk aims at showing how using CLIL can serve as the perfect springboard to dive into cultural issues, an essential and integral aspect of both content and language.

A brief theoretical background of CLIL including its benefits, current CLIL models and how culture permeates all other aspects of CLIL will be mentioned in order to pave the way for the practical part of the session.  By focusing especially on soft CLIL and Rachel Hawkes’ “meanings that matter” model, I will show how general English teachers can easily introduce CLIL in their language classrooms.

CLIL and cultural diversity from Vicky Saumell

Presented at the 4th CLIL Symposium on 6th October, 2012 in Barranquilla, Colombia.

CLIL and ICT

This session aims at analysing the links between CLIL and ICT with a two-fold purpose. Firstly, showing why they are a good match. Secondly, demonstrating how ICT tools, both pc-based and web-based, can have an impact on the teaching and learning process as well as on its results. We will explore a variety of tools and the implications of their use in a CLIL classroom.

CLIL and ICT from Vicky Saumell

Presented at the 4th CLIL Symposium on October 5th, 2012 in Barranquilla, Colombia.

Implementing Digital Storytelling with Teens

This session aims at showing how to implement digital storytelling with teens by pointing out its benefits and by showcasing different digital storytelling tools and applications.  These tools are presented through examples of actual projects done with teenagers and simple tutorials on each of the tools´ use. The benefits of digital storytelling as a powerful tool to develop language ability and creativity, as well as a great motivation tool for learners of all ages, will be pointed out throughout the workshop. The selected tools offer a variety of formats to suit different needs and ability levels, both in terms of language and technology skills: from pictures to videos, from text to audio, from storybooks to animation.

Implementing Digital Storytelling with Teens

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Presented at IATEFL Glasgow 2012 on March 22nd, 2012

Guided Discovery for Language Instruction

New language can be introduced in different ways, and there has been a long standing debate on how to do it best. Most approaches fall within the deductive / inductive classification. Guided Discovery takes the best from both in a way that makes it work for a variety of settings and contexts, and as a tool to introduce different aspects of language at all levels. The purpose of this presentation is to provide theoretical background and a practical 4-step framework for implementation of Guided Discovery, accompanied by examples to see it in use.

Most approaches of language instruction fall within the deductive / inductive classification. Guided Discovery takes the best from both in a way that makes it work for a variety of settings and contexts. The presentation aims to provide theoretical background and a practical 4-step framework for implementation of Guided Discovery.

Guided Discovery

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Guided Discovery for Language Instruction

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Presented at Pearson Always Learning events in Monterrey, Cuernavaca, Puebla and Mexico city in March 2012.
Presented at PUCE conference in Quito, Ecuador on April 14th, 2012.
Presented at VenTESOL Convention in Valencia, Venezuela on May 26th, 2012.
Presented at Universidad de La Sabana in Bogota, Colombia on October 10th, 2012
Presented at Teacher Development Conference in Cusco, Peru on October 27th, 2012.
Presented at English is the Future event in Arequipa, Peru on November 3rd, 2012.
Presented at TOSCON14 in Toronto, Canada on May 24th, 2014.