Learning to Teach Better

Hi everyone! I'm joining late. I'm from Seattle but have been living in Hungary for 10 years. I teach grades 1 - 3 part-time and write curriculum part-time. I'm excited to be a part of this class and am mostly interested to learn more about research that drives best practices.

I just got the EFL magazine in my inbox and I think I spy an article from Elizabeth Bekes, if it's the same one on this course? :)

Dear fellow teachers, Like many others, I started teaching EFL in Japan in 2001 in what was going to be a 1-2 year experience(!) whilst working on my Japanese before heading back into the world of business/finance or law. But within a year, I realised that I loved my job so there was no reason to change. ;-) So, I ended up teaching in Japan until 2014 in various contexts from kindergarten, secondary school and university to private language schools, businesses, government ministries, and on Peace Boat. I've been volunteering as a Mentor for iTDi since 2012 and am currently working with Steven Herder on the forthcoming TESOL Certificate course and other exciting iTDi developments :-) Having role-swapped with my wife in 2014 as primary caregiver for our kids (now 2, 4, and 6 years old), I work part-time from home as a Tutor on the University of Birmingham’s MA TESOL and Applied Linguistics (distance learning) programmes, do some editing, and have just started private tuition classes...

Dear all, I am an English teacher for public schools in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. It's a great honour to have Penny Ur and her team during this online course. Please note my 23-second video on YouTube about Transhumanism. Thank you.

Good morning all, Originally from Canada, I have been living and teaching in Japan for the past 19 years. My visit to Japan was only intended to last 1 year but to my surprise, I discovered I actually liked teaching and was becoming quite happy! I started off as a middle school ALT. After seven years I became discouraged at the tired ideas of the old complacent teachers (a minority, but more influential than the young vigorous ones) and the lack of support for foreign teachers (I grew tired of being treated as a "CD player"). I moved to Elementary schools and enjoyed the enthusiasm and energy of the kids. Unfortunately more and more schools wanted the teacher to stay all day, every day, regardless of English lessons, and it did not fit my schedule. Basically I was not happy to be paid as part time but work full time--so I started my own school. I primarily teach young learners--last year of kindergarten to 6th grade, but also have junior and senior high school students a...

Dear colleagues, My name’s Ruslan and I come from Poltava, Ukraine. I work in a private language centre. I’ve been teaching for about 8 years now. I adore teaching English to different levels of learners, both young and adults. It’s simply amazing when your learners can express their ideas in English or achieve their goals with your help. In addition, I find my job rather interesting, motivating and quite challenging. Luckily, it’s never tedious or monotonous. All my free time is dedicated to improving my teaching skills and gaining more and more competence in this sphere. I used to be a member of Cambridge English Teacher professional development website and I’m also keen on following different teacher trainers’ blogs, e.g. for CELTA or DELTA. This year I’m looking forward to receiving another international certificate for teachers of English as a foreign language. I’m taking part in this course because I believe that the best teachers should never stop learning. This is a great o...

Hello everyone! My name is Laura and I run an English language company in Rennes, France (Espace Lingua). My courses are mainly aimed at business professionals in Rennes and further afield in Brittany. I'm very excited to join this community full of teachers. I am particularly interested in topics such as error correction, how to teach listening effectively & classroom management.

Greetings to all around the world. Work in the English Language and Literature Department at a university in Korea and I've been teaching for more than 10 years. Penny Ur was instrumental when I was taking my Trinity Diploma in TESOL, ie, her position on the use of music in the classroom helped me with my action research. I'm looking forward to gleaning any more tips from her!

Hello everyone. My name is Mikaela Smith, and I am a teacher at a private high school in Kanagawa, Japan. This is my second time taking an iTDi course, and I'm really looking forward to working with you all.

Hello everyone. My name is Tamanique. I am based in Madrid, Spain. I have been teaching as a qualified teacher here for nearly 5 years. I am a Cambridge speaking examiner, I have done the DELTA and am currently an in house teacher trainer as well as a CELTA trainer in training. I am looking to develop in all areas and extremely interested in developing ways to improve writing and reading skills of students (given they never do enough in their free time to meet the level required) My experience is predominantly exam classes with this years timetable including 9 different exam groups from PET to CPE. I look forward to learning lots of new strategies and brushing up on my own techniques/skills. Best, and thank you

Hello everyone. I am Daniel Ginting. I am currently teaching some English skill courses at Ma Chung University, Indonesia. I have been teaching English for about ten years. I am very grateful to be a part of this learning community. I believe I can learn a lot from Penny and all of you. Thank you.

Hi, everyone! Nice to meet you all here! My name's Septina Nur Iswanti, but just call me Nina 😊 I come from Indonesia and live in Semarang, Central Java. I teach at a private language school here and I've been teaching for 9 years now. I'm so grateful that so far I've been given the opportunity to teach and learn from a great number of students from all sorts of ages and backgrounds. I'm joining this course simply because I want to teach better. And I'm particularly interested in correcting spoken errors and using translation. So excited to learn from Penny again since her last iTDi course with Scott Thornbury, I know this is going to be another fruitful and rewarding experience. And it's really wonderful also to meet and learn from all the participants here. Let's get connected on FB as well if you like 😊 Looking forward to starting this journey!

Hello, everyone! I’m Hannah, originally from the UK (England and Scotland) but now live in Zurich, Switzerland. I’m currently an assistant English teacher in an upper secondary school where I teach communicative language and literature lessons to 15-20 year olds, plus I help prepare many students for the Cambridge First and Advanced speaking exams. I did my CELTA in 2012 and have taught children, adults and teens in the past. I’ll start my Delta next year. After that... Who knows! I’m looking to have my own classes again, that’s for sure, I enjoy teaching teens and adults and I’m really interested in developing listening skills through British music. Why am I here? Well, I can’t wait to hear about Penny’s experience and I’m not very confident with teaching grammar or my board work. I’d also like to learn more subtle techniques for error correction. Really looking forward to studying with you all over the next month. I’ve never done a course with iTDi but I signed up after reading rave ...

Hi everyone, this is Katarina Brezani from Bratislava, Slovakia. I've been teaching for more than 20 years, I am a Language coach, Business English teacher and an Academic Director at ProStaff . I run and design tailor-made courses for corporate and individual adult students focusing on employability & life skills development in combination with ESP. I'm excited to be a part of this fascinating training with Penny Ur. I see the course as a great opportunity to hear from one of the world's leading authorities on teaching sharing her wide experience and providing useful teaching tips. I'm particularly interested in student-centered approach, error correction, teaching one-to-one lessons and teaching techniques to adult students.

Hi everybody. I just wanted to quickly introduce myself - I'll be moderating this course with Steven Herder and I'm here to help with any technical problems you have during the sessions. I can't wait to join this course with you!

Hi everyone, It's nice to meet all of you here (and some of you again)! My name is Suzanne and I currently teach at an Intensive English Program in California. I have been teaching there for 4 years, and before that, I taught in South Korea for nearly 5 years. Like others, I am interested in having more ideas for error correction, especially for low-intermediate/high beginner students. I have taught mostly advanced students in the past, but I am currently teaching more intermediate level classes, which has been a shift and a learning experience for me. Looking forward to learning with all of you!

Hi Penny, Steven, Anne and everyone, Happy to join this course. I'm Canadian and live in Toronto, but I was born in Johannesburg, South Africa. I have travelled and lived in many countries and have picked up a couple of languages other than English. I have been teaching ESL to newcomers to Canada for 17 years (adult, noncredit programs, all levels) At present I teach a Level 6/7 class (high intermediate I guess - but really any class of 20 people has 20 levels! Agree? ) I'm interested in assessment - not because I like to do it but because it seems to be a very hot topic now. I've learned from taking other online courses to be very flexible about my expectations - and to always be pleasantly surprised by what I get from the courses. So - looking forward to seeing you all tomorrow! Claudie

Hi, everyone! Many thanks for your contributions to this introductory discussion. We have a very mixed group here: mostly teachers of adults and teens in the private sector, but some public school teachers as well and at least one teacher of very young learners! Nice that some of you have been on ITDI courses with me before, or met me at conferences or through my books ... I do hope I won't repeat things you've already heard from me, and will have something new to contribute this time. Your areas of interest are very wide-ranging, and I won't be able to cover them all. But I note that several of you are interested in error-correction, so I'll certainly be discussing that - mainly with reference to oral correction, but also writing. Dealing with mixed-ability classes, and creating engaging and interesting activities: yes, already in the first session and also in later ones. And of course practical activities... there'll be plenty of those! Looking forward to our fi...

Hi everyone, I'm Bechir from Tunisia, I've been teaching English for 11 years. This is my first course with Penny I am looking forward to exploring the knowledge and experience of everyone here.

Hello everybody I am a private tutor from Moscow, Russia. I mostly work with teenagers and adults, teaching general, business and exam courses. My classroom can be either online or brick-and-mortar, so to speak, but I teach only one-to-one these days. I love teaching Business English and helping my students prepare for exams, as these are the most motivated groups in my experience. I have been at it for about 9 years, so now I am looking for some insights to keep me moving forward and developing as a teacher. It might be too bold of me, but I hope to be inspired both by the course and by my fellow teachers’ experience. As for the particulars, I am interested in digital tools for teaching, motivating students to do more self-studying and independent work, peculiarities of teaching high-level students and ways of giving better feedback. P.S. When I am not trying to teach English (better), I am a curious globetrotter instagramming my experiences and an avid language learner trying to rele...