Remembering to remember

I often struggle to remember the names of my students, especially in large classes. Like most people, using my visual and spacial memory helps. Classes with fixed seating arrangements are out because you want students to mix partners. Attendance lists are frowned upon at the institution I am currently working for.  This had me in […]

What psychologists are saying about how technology affects us

Speaking about “The Secret Powers of Time”, Stanford professor emeritus Philip Zimbardo (famous for the Stanford Prison Experiment) explains how various perspectives of time – past, present and future – influence our actions and relationships. There are six main orientation time zones: Past: Past positive (nostalgic), or past negative (regretful) Present: hedonistic (seeking pleasure, knowledge), […]

Hasan Elahi: FBI, here I am

“The Visible Man”, Bangladeshi-born American Hasan Elahi, says that he was mistakenly included on the US government terrorist watch list — “and once you’re on, it’s hard to get off”. (Wired) In response, he has dedicated his work to surveillance culture and has put the minute details of his life and travels online. See his […]

Goldie Hawn’s MindUP

I find NLP and yoga are great techniques to stay grounded and to be able to tap into your inner resources. In the process of rethinking how these practices feed mindfulness and connect to learning, I’ve stumbled upon a great project: Goldie Hawn, is into strengthening focus in school children, running a project that came […]

Pronunciation of words

Part 1: Individual words In English, words are rarely pronounced the way they are spelled. Here, an online teacher, Melanie (American), provides short video lessons, between 4 and 10 minutes each, contrasting and comparing words that many speakers of other languages find difficult in English. Video 1: said, suit, clothes, recipe, mountain, famous, virus Video […]

Teaching pronunciation using jazz chants

Carol Graham trains teachers how to use jazz chants to teach pronunciation. They’re great energizers and get learners speaking faster than they can think – one of the elements of fluency. I’ll be doing some jazz chants in the telephoning part of a compact course next week, first giving them some jazz chant minis (see […]

Question: Can you learn from a robot?

http://annehodgson.de/wp-content/uploads/2009/11/chatbot.mp3Podcast: Play in new window | DownloadI had great fun last week, exploring what it is like to talk to a chatbot. It was Shelly Terrell who originally put me up to it, advising me when I was gathering ideas for a Spotlight Magazine article edited and coauthored by Jo Westcombe on ways English learners […]