Roy Cross's Blog

1. TeachingEnglish have just published a report by Gary Motteram, Improving teacher development through the effective use of social media groups https://www.teachingenglish.org.uk/publications/case-studies-insights-and-research/improving-teacher-development-through-effective-use

Here’s the beginning of the abstract: The trend for using social media for teacher development started before the Covid-19 pandemic but has now become a far more common and established practice. This report explains why the use of social media is an important tool for teacher development and looks at how online learning theories may be applied to this kind of teacher education. We include case studies from various countries to show what works best in social media teacher groups. We also conducted a questionnaire to gather insights from teachers worldwide. The questionnaire asked about the use of social media for teacher education, the activities teachers do online, and how useful they find these tools. The results highlight how these tools can help make education more fair and accessible. (My emphasis)

PDF of the report below.

In addition, next Thursday, 8^th August, at 12:00 UK time Gary is giving a webinar on the topic with Nicky Hockly https://www.teachingenglish.org.uk/news-and-events/webinars/webinars-teacher-educator/supporting-teacher-development-through-effective

If you’re keen, scroll down the page a bit to the pre-webinar task and the pre-webinar reading!

2. From the Cambridge Partnership for Education, a blog post by Helen Cunningham on The future of schooling https://www.cambridge.org/partnership/future-of-schooling

In 2006, Sir Ken Robinson delivered the most watched TED talk of all time. Asking, ‘Do schools kill creativity?’ he concluded that “We have to rethink the fundamental principles on which we’re educating our children.” The expectation that learning in the future will need to cover different things, happen in different places, at different times and via different media has only proliferated since. As we approach the UN’s first ever ‘Summit of the Future’, there is international momentum for ‘a fundamental rethink’ of our systems. Schools are at the heart of those systems, and their role in shaping our societies cannot be underestimated. ‘Schooling’, education received at school, is the anchor for learning that happens across a person’s life and experiences.

I’m not sure that very much has changed in most education systems since 2006 – certainly not in the principles underpinning them – despite the popularity of the Robinson video. Using new technology for the same old same old?

3. Jim McKinley pointed out that The University of Sydney TESOL Research YouTube channel is well worth a look https://www.youtube.com/@USydTESOLResearch There’s some good short videos with Jack Richards and Ken Cruickshank: try this one of Jack’s on The Role of Textbooks in Language Teaching https://youtu.be/NPw61jKCrqI

4. A new publication from the British Council, Soft Power at a Turning Point – a comparative analysis https://www.britishcouncil.org/sites/default/files/soft_power_at_a_turning_point.pdf

From the (slightly disheartening) executive summary: Our headline finding is that in 2024, countries are increasingly prioritising national interests over multilateralism and the global order. There is more alignment of soft power activities with foreign and economic policy goals, and less emphasis on shared global challenges. Domestic considerations are also more prominent, with a focus on demonstrating benefits to higher education and creative sectors. PDF below.

5. And, finally, two really good short videos from a Michelin-starred chef, Andrew Wong:

* ‘velveting’ meat for tenderness (which I’m proud to say I do but didn’t know was called velveting) https://www.greatbritishchefs.com/behind-the-pass/andrew-wong-2

* how to ‘laminate’ dim sum pastry (which I don’t do!)  https://www.greatbritishchefs.com/behind-the-pass/andrew-wong

I need to start saving up so I can afford to go to his restaurant!

1. Over two years now since I gave FACTWorld a plug! In their own words, it “is a forum set up to support the teaching of subjects through the medium of a foreign language, bilingual education, immersion education, content and language integrated learning (CLIL). The site contains links to country reports, useful sites and contact details of key people in participating countries. The site is run entirely by volunteer teachers for other teachers. If you have something to share, send it to us, and we’ll post it here” https://www.factworld.info/

The thirty-sixth issue of their journal, with a focus on young learners this time and a seven-year-old co-editor, has just come out https://www.factworld.info/en/Bulgaria-FACT-Journals-Issue-36 PDF below.

2. From BOLD, who focus on ‘big ideas for growing minds’, Why children can benefit from using their fingers for math by Venera Gashaj & Korbinian Moeller from Loughborough University https://bold.expert/why-children-can-benefit-from-using-their-fingers-for-math/

Do you, too, remember sitting on your hands during math classes to avoid being caught counting on your fingers? When we were children, our teachers discouraged us from using our fingers, believing that doing so would hinder the development of an abstract understanding of numbers. Nevertheless, we would still glance at or move our fingers while counting or performing simple calculations. Even today, we occasionally use our fingers to count the days to know how many nights to book at a hotel from Wednesday to Sunday. Does this sound familiar? If so, you’re not alone. Thinking about our shared experience, we wondered why using our fingers to count and calculate feels so natural and helpful, and yet is often discouraged in early math education.

Plus, an interview with Moeller, How do young children learn mathematics? https://bold.expert/how-do-young-children-learn-mathematics/

From an evolutionary point of view, numbers are a relatively recent invention as they have only been around for about 3,000 years. This is too recent for our brains to have developed a dedicated number area. Instead, we most likely process numbers using parts of the brain that process visual information including perceptual features like density.

Numbers are a relatively recent invention, eh?

3. New York Times Readers got their own back and picked their own 100 Best Books of the 21st Century https://tinyurl.com/4f2pnkjf There’s not a huge amount of overlap with the NYT’s own list: 39 books out of 100.

4. This is probably one for the weekend, and you need to be a bit file-nerdy-needy like me: The National Archives releases Cabinet Office files online https://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/about/news/the-national-archives-releases-cabinet-office-files-online/

Try this one about the access ex-prime ministers should and did enjoy to their personal papers when writing their autobiographies (or more usually having them written for them) as an exercise in civil service ineffability and the old boys’ network, with frequent appearances by a formidable Miss P M Matthews from the Historical and Records Section. https://cdn.nationalarchives.gov.uk/documents/release-2024-07/cab103-827.pdf

Or this one about European Union Enlargement, which includes the first draft of a 2002 paper entitled ‘Something for Turkey’ (as in something – anything – is better than nothing) and includes the following judgement de haut en bas in a report on ‘Focus Groups on EU Enlargement’ on page 87: It would be very hard to underestimate the ability of ordinary people to understand the arguments for and against enlargement. It may be that the pamphlet was written with a different, more enlightened audience in mind.

The whole report on the focus groups – with all its painfully grating condescension – anticipates (unintentionally) the background to Brexit and is well worth a read if you have time (pages 72-96 of the file) https://cdn.nationalarchives.gov.uk/documents/release-2024-07/prem49-2505.pdf

PDFs of both below.

5. And, finally and delightfully, all fifty-three of Leonard Bernstein’s Young People’s Concerts with the New York Philharmonic from 1958 through to 1972 https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLU0HyYmOgH8Xn06fDThwLDh95igfZpurQ

Plus, all his handwritten scripts (and typed up versions) https://leonardbernstein.com/lectures/television-scripts/young-peoples-concerts

1. Inclusive Classrooms is a free TeachingEnglish course that promises to “make your classes inclusive learning spaces by identifying barriers that can affect learning and (suggesting) practical strategies to overcome them”. Totally free; enrol before 21^st September!

More info and registration here https://www.teachingenglish.org.uk/training/teachingenglish-inclusive-classrooms

2. This one’s from The PIE, An ELT phenomenon – who is Dong Yuhui? https://thepienews.com/an-elt-phenomenon-who-is-dong-yuhui/

Talk about clouds having silver linings and necessity being the mother of invention!

3. Who else feels guilty about not finishing a book they’ve started? Here’s Calum Bains on the topic in The Guardian, I couldn’t put a boring book down. Now I take pleasure in saying enough is enough https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/article/2024/jul/15/why-i-quit-having-to-finish-reading-books-games

Thanks to Maja Mandekic for that one!

4. I’ve just discovered the EF Teach Online Library https://www.youtube.com/@efteachonline thanks to a LinkedIn post from Ian McMaster – who many years ago commissioned an article on ‘English Cheese’ from me for the magazine he was then editing, Anglo-American Spotlight – about a talk he gave for the 3^rd EF Online English Teacher Conference this summer.

Ian’s talk, ‘Language, communication, behaviour and culture: What are we trying to affect?’ is in the ‘Videos’ section https://youtu.be/O-ou92daxZA?feature=shared

5. And, finally, a Spanish proverb that I stumbled across the other day which I hope someone from Spain can vouch for: “An ounce of mother is worth a ton of priest.“

1. You need to register for a free account to read this New Statesman piece by Geoff Dyer, but it’s well worth that minimal effort if you haven’t got one already. The shot seen round the world – the photograph of a bloodied Trump has turned him into a hero and captured the carnage of American politics https://www.newstatesman.com/international-politics/2024/07/shot-seen-round-the-world-donald-trump-photo-geoff-dyer

2. There’s often interesting stuff in The Knowledge, including good summaries of articles that are behind a newspaper paywall. Here’s a recent edition, which includes a summary of Peter Hitchens’s Daily Mail piece, Is Lucy Letby really guilty? https://www.theknowledge.com/p/lucy-letby-really-guilty I realise that we see what we know and want to see, but I can’t help drawing parallels with medieval witch trials.

Sign up yourself to The Knowledge daily newsletter here https://www.theknowledge.com/

3. Thanks to Jason Skeet for this one, an interesting new(ish) take on classroom observation, Unseen observations by Matt O’Leary https://www.ucet.ac.uk/downloads/12424-Unseen-Observations_MattOLeary_Nov2020.pdf PDF below.

Hosted on the Universities’ Council for the Education of Teachers (UCET) website, which I’d not come across before https://www.ucet.ac.uk/ Not something that university teachers in my time got much of, teacher education!

4. Here’s a very accessible way in – courtesy of Katja Hoyer’s podcast, Zeitgeist – to a very well-reviewed book by Andrea Wulf about a remarkable accumulation of genius in a small town in Germany, Jena, at the end of the eighteenth century, Magnificent Rebels https://www.katjahoyer.uk/p/magnificent-rebels-with-andrea-wulf  Along the way, Katja and Andrea share a number of interesting thoughts on the differences between writing in German and writing in English.

Here’s the beginning of Adam Sisman’s review of Magnificent Rebels for The Guardian https://www.theguardian.com/books/2022/sep/11/magnificent-rebels-the-first-romantics-and-the-invention-of-the-self-by-andrea-wulf-review-big-ideas-from-a-small-town

A philosophy student attending a concert in the heart of Germany in the spring of 1797 could scarcely believe the evidence of his eyes. Seated in one row were Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, the greatest writer of the age; Johann Gottlieb Fichte, the philosopher of the moment, whose packed lectures attracted students from across Europe; Alexander von Humboldt, just setting out on a career that would transform our understanding of the natural world; and August Wilhelm Schlegel, then making a name for himself as a writer, critic and translator. It seemed extraordinary to see so many famous men lined up together.

Except that it wasn’t, not then in Jena, a quiet university town at the heart of Germany of only 800 houses and fewer than 5,000 inhabitants. For a brief period, as the 18th century gave way to the 19th, Jena had a claim to be the intellectual capital of Europe. The nation’s finest minds were gathered there.

5. And, finally, from the sublime to the ridiculous, Fenton! https://youtu.be/3GRSbr0EYYU

Apologies if – unlike me, but like millions of other people – you’ve seen the video before, and thanks to Jamie Keddie for bringing it to my attention!

1. Khawla Badwan from Manchester Metropolitan University has been writing A Poem for Palestine each day since the early days of the current conflict, usually published on LinkedIn. You’ll find the first nine poems for July in the PDF below, and here’s Khawla’s poem for 9^th July,

The privilege

Beware the other

They are inconveniently here

They don’t count in your sphere

Turn around

Look away

Beware the other

Don’t mention their dead

Don’t care about their end

Turn around

Look away

Beware the other

If challenged, call it neutrality

Don’t worry about morality

Turn around

Look away

Beware the other

Let’s stand firmly together

Protecting our privilege forever

Turn around

Look away

2. This coming Saturday, 20^th July, at 13:00 UK time you can join this Mentoring Teacher-Research Network (MENTRNET) webinar,  ‘EAR-Thailand #2024 project – Successful practices in a teacher-research mentoring programme’. More details and registration here https://us06web.zoom.us/meeting/register/tZEqd-usqjMsGtEshpnZNewySHLHZEGItXan#/registration

More information on future MENTRNET events and recordings of past events here https://mentoring-tr.weebly.com/festival-2024-25.html

3. Founded in 1954, the purpose of the European Cultural Foundation (ECF) https://culturalfoundation.eu/ is “to grow a European sentiment of solidarity among the peoples of Europe”. Common Ground is the ECF’s annual publication https://culturalfoundation.eu/wp-content/uploads/2024/07/Common-Ground-2024_web.pdf

Try one of the following:

Brussels’ Eastern Enigma by Katja Hoyer;

Europe in Barbieland by Pawel Zerka;

Fragile Memory, Friso Wiersum’s interview with Mariia Ponomarova & Olexii Kuchanskyi about their documentary film of the Odesa Film Studio.

PDF below as well.

4. Emanuel Schegloff, who died on May 23^rd  at his home in Santa Monica, California was the last surviving co-founder of the field of conversation analysis (CA), the study of naturally occurring conduct in human interaction, which introduced notions now familiar to us all, such as turn-taking. Here’s the graceful obituary that John Heritage wrote for him https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/epdf/10.1080/08351813.2024.2368389 PDF below.

5. And, finally, Poetry, prose and plumbing: some first reflections on how Labour will govern from Geoff Mulgan https://tinyurl.com/a9whrvmu

Here I share thoughts about the new administration which has got off to a very good start and is a dramatic improvement on what went before. How government works matters just as much as what it does (even though this is of almost zero interest to the commentariat) and I’m now a professor in an engineering department, a field which cares a lot about practicality and implementation and has a low tolerance for the hot air that is all too common in and around politics.

1. Now that Lucy Letby has been found guilty of another murder, the UK press are free to report the doubts over her conviction first raised by The New Yorker which were censored by the UK government when first published https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/article/2024/jul/09/lucy-letby-evidence-experts-question

Radio 4’s Today programme interviewed Dewi Evans, the lead scientific witness for the prosecution the other morning. I’ve written to them to ask if they shouldn’t also interview his counterpart for the defence, Mike Hall, whose evidence the judge chose not to hear, in the interests of balance.

2. Here’s a short notice reminder of this TeachingEnglish mini-event from 09:00 to 12:30 UK time this Thursday, 18^th July, Valuing multilingualism. Three sessions; five speakers. More info and registration here https://www.teachingenglish.org.uk/news-and-events/webinars/webinars-teachers/valuing-multilingualism-mini-event

3. Here’s a ‘gift article’ from The New York Times, 100 Best Books of the 21st Century, that’s worth this month’s subscription on its own https://tinyurl.com/5662uz2s The NYT’s choices will raise at least as many issues as they resolve, of course!

4. Five common English words we don’t know the origins of – including ‘boy’ and ‘dog’ from The Conversation by Francesco Perono Cacciafoco of Xi’an Jiaotong-Liverpool University https://theconversation.com/five-common-english-words-we-dont-know-the-origins-of-including-boy-and-dog-232299

5. Three pieces with historical perspective from Engelsberg Ideas:

i) The Habsburg world we have lost by Luka Ivan Jukic https://engelsbergideas.com/reviews/the-habsburg-world-we-have-lost/

The Habsburg monarchy’s political culture persisted in odd and varied ways, following the disintegration of the Austria-Hungarian state. The failures and mendacity of the succeeding generation of Central European politicians offers a warning from history.

ii) Inside Iran’s election circus by Ali Ansari https://engelsbergideas.com/notebook/inside-irans-election-circus/

Rather than presaging a reformist revival, the Iranian presidential election revealed the vast chasm between the state and society-at-large.

iii) The true sources of Soviet conduct by Rodric Braithwaite https://engelsbergideas.com/reviews/the-true-sources-of-soviet-conduct/

The Soviet Union believed that it was manifestly destined to lead the world to a higher future but that ambition masked profound insecurities about its economic, political and military status as a great power.

My own insecurities were unmasked when I was chairing Rodric Braithwaite’s presentation of what was then his latest book, Afgantsy: The Russians in Afghanistan, 1979-89, a few years back at the Edinburgh Book Festival. I looked out at the audience and saw at least five onetime UK ambassadors to the Soviet Union or Russia, plus two former permanent undersecretaries to the UK Foreign Office. My own experience of Afghanistan was – and remains – a five-day sojourn on the way to India in 1974.

6. And, finally and scarily, from Wicked Leeks, Intensive farming, superbugs + antimicrobial resistance https://wickedleeks.riverford.co.uk/news/intensive-farming-superbugs-antimicrobial-resistance/

According to the Soil Association https://www.soilassociation.org/ farm animals consume about 30% of all antibiotics in the UK and about 65% of antibiotics worldwide.

Blog version: https://roycross.blog/

1. The first of two heterodox pieces of research, free-to-read from Language and Intercultural Communication, Working with/beyond ‘language’: insights from a listening walk with young men from asylum-seeking backgrounds in a rural treescape by Khawla Badwan, Caitlin Nunn & Kate Pahl from Manchester Metropolitan University https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/epdf/10.1080/14708477.2024.2373156

This article takes readers on a journey that narrates research reflections from a listening walk in a forest with a group of young men who migrated to the UK as unaccompanied asylum seekers. This listening walk is framed as a generative and disruptive research encounter through which we explore how our linguistic and cultural differences ‘encounter each other, adjust to each other, oppose each other, agree with each other and produce the unpredictable’ (Glissant, 1996, p. 98).

PDF below.

2. And the second, free-to-read from the latest issue of Current Issues in Language Planning, The politics of distraction in English-medium higher education across three global settings: a collaborative autoethnography by Sarah Hopkyns from the UK, Sender Dovchin from Australia & Shaila Sultana from Bangladesh https://www.tandfonline.com/toc/rclp20/5/3

English-medium instruction (EMI) is on the rise around the world, due to globalization, internationalization and neoliberal ideologies which equate English with social capital, prestige, and success in the labour market. While many EMI policies aim to equip students with English as a ‘lingua academia’, produce ‘neoliberal subjects’ and compete in university ranking systems, such policies often overlook larger sociolinguistic, sociohistorical, and sociopolitical issues at play.

While you’re there, take a look just a little further down the page at the intriguingly titled Failing interventions to harness English fever infiltrating early childhood education in South Korea: politics of distraction by Jee-Hee Kim from Hong Kong & Tae-Hee Choi from the UK – also free access. PDFs of both articles below.

3. The 2024 Teacher Tapp Guide to the 7 Types of Teachers on Social Media is an interesting read, even if you’re not running a business targeted at teachers. 29% of UK teachers do not now use social media at all for work purposes, up (a lot) from 20% last year.They don’t use social media for work at all. Sure, they might have accounts on Facebook or Instagram but they’re using them to chat to friends and escape work! https://teachertapp.co.uk/app/uploads/2024/07/7-Types-Of-Teachers-On-Social-Media-2024.pdf

PDF below.

4. Another post about the recent UK general election from Carne Ross’s blog, Out for the Count – at the tip of democracy’s spear, kind ofhttps://carneross.substack.com/p/out-for-the-count

5. And, finally, carnivorously and possibly eccentrically, another chance internet encounter generated by my ignorance, How To Make A Turducken https://youtu.be/mRT1WQXqdCw

1. We need to give small companies the chance to be heard from time to time, so here’s

a) Generative AI Misuse: A Taxonomy of Tactics and Insights from Real-World Data from Google DeepMind https://arxiv.org/pdf/2406.13843

b) Khan Academy Founder Sal Khan on the Future of Learning from Microsofthttps://www.microsoft.com/en-us/worklab/podcast/khan-academy-founder-sal-khan-on-the-future-of-learning

2. And here’s the CEO of another small start-up on the Logan Bartlett Show, Sam Altman talks GPT-4o and Predicts the Future of AI https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fMtbrKhXMWc

3. Handbrake turn: here’s some natural intelligence. For this week only (I think), Haruki Murakami’s ‘The Art of Fiction’ interview from The Paris Review https://www.theparisreview.org/interviews/2/the-art-of-fiction-no-182-haruki-murakami

Also free this week, from The New York Review of Books: https://www.nybooks.com/articles/2007/03/01/gods-of-the-mall/

Here’s Wikipedia on the handbrake turn https://w.wiki/AcCQ

4. It’s been a while since we visited the UKFIET blog. Here’s the most recent post, The Impact of the Language of Instruction on Foundational Literacy and Transitions from Pui Ki Patricia Kwok, Nisha Thomas, Catherine Young & Ann Veitch https://www.ukfiet.org/2024/the-impact-of-the-language-of-instruction-on-foundational-literacy-and-transitions/

The role foundational literacy plays in successful learning outcomes of children and young people is widely recognised. Without a solid development of foundational literacy, children will encounter a wide range of challenges throughout their schooling and potentially in their life outcomes. In many multilingual contexts, apart from developing literacy in their familiar languages, students are often challenged by the need to simultaneously develop literacies in multiple additional languages – including ones that are unfamiliar to the local communities. While there are many varied and contextual reasons for this, a common challenge is the early transition to a different Language of Instruction (LoI).

Other UKFIET blog posts here https://www.ukfiet.org/blog/

5.And, finally, here’s Henry Oliver’s take on The Hobbit by J. R. R. Tolkien on his blog, The Common Reader https://www.commonreader.co.uk/p/the-hobbit-by-jrr-tolkien

I can’t quite make up my mind about Oliver: when he’s good, as in this piece, he’s very good; sometimes, though, he’s a bit precious!

1. Transcendence to start with today, transcendence in the AI context, where it means that the machines are taking over. Transcendence: Generative Models Can Outperform The Experts That Train Them https://arxiv.org/pdf/2406.11741 PDF below.

Abstract: Generative models are trained with the simple objective of imitating the conditional probability distribution induced by the data they are trained on. Therefore, when trained on data generated by humans, we may not expect the artificial model to outperform the humans on their original objectives. In this work, we study the phenomenon of transcendence: when a generative model achieves capabilities that surpass the abilities of the experts generating its data (my emphasis). We demonstrate transcendence by training an autoregressive transformer to play chess from game transcripts, and show that the trained model can sometimes achieve better performance than all players in the dataset.1 We theoretically prove that transcendence is enabled by low-temperature sampling, and rigorously assess this experimentally. Finally, we discuss other sources of transcendence, laying the groundwork for future investigation of this phenomenon in a broader setting.

2. Multilingual pedagogies for all: Language-inclusive teaching and learning at 09:00 Bangkok time (03:00 UK time) on Tuesday 9^th July from the UNESCO Asia Pacific Multilingual Education Working Group will offer “practical solutions for preparing teachers to lead multilingual classrooms and will highlight promising practices and concrete examples from various countries”. More info and registration here https://www.unesco.org/en/articles/unesco-and-unicef-webinar-address-challenges-multilingual-classrooms-linguistically-diverse-asia?hub=84624

Multilingual pedagogies are instructional strategies that incorporate two or more languages in the teaching and learning process. In the Asia-Pacific Region, where an estimated half of the world’s languages* are spoken, multilingual education can leverage existing linguistic resources and cultural backgrounds to enhance learning experiences and make more accessible, engaging and effective educational content.

With Kathleen Heugh from Australia, Sangsok Son from Thailand, Dhir Jhingran from India and Maria Mercedes Arzadon from the Philippines. PDFs of concept note and speakers’ notes below.

* Currently 3,582 languages and declining … https://www.ethnologue.com/

3. A piece by Elif Shafak on Lit Hub, 75 Years of 1984: Why George Orwell’s Classic Remains More Relevant Than Ever https://lithub.com/75-years-of-1984-why-george-orwells-classic-remains-more-relevant-than-ever The adverts are now a bit annoying on Lit Hub but stick with it! I’d not come across the distinction between ‘solid’ and ‘liquid’ lands before.

4. For those of us with an interest in the results of today’s General Election here in the UK, here’s Helen Lewis’s handy guide to when the especially interesting constituencies declare https://helenlewis.substack.com/p/bluestocking-extra-election-night You don’t have to stay up very late at all: if the Conservatives lose Basildon and Billericay, due to declare very early at 00:15 on Friday morning, then their goose is well and truly cooked – and you can go to bed with an easy conscience!

Plus At the Hustings: an encounter with real voters from Carne Ross, which confirms my own highly subjective view of Lady Nugee, a.k.a. Emily Thornberry https://carneross.substack.com/p/at-the-hustings

Lady Nugee’s Wikipedia entry here https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emily_Thornberry

5. And, finally, something I found down a rabbit hole on the internet, A Dictionary of Victorian Slang https://publicdomainreview.org/collection/a-dictionary-of-victorian-slang-1909/

1. From the National Centre for Writing (NCW), Meet the ILX 10: Rising Stars of UK Writing https://nationalcentreforwriting.org.uk/writing-hub/ilx10/ “This selection is intended to represent to our international community just how pluralistic, diverse, and globally engaged the UK literature scene is.”

Download the pack with more information on each of the writers here https://nationalcentreforwriting.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2024/05/ILX10-pack-FINAL.pdf

PDF below, in case that’s easier.

2. This could have been (much) better timed on my part, an overview of all TeachingEnglish activity in June and July 2024, with a focus on Understanding educational policies and practices https://www.teachingenglish.org.uk/community/top-stories/june-and-july-2024-understanding-educational-policies-and-practices

Lots of stuff still to come in July, and I’ll time things better in future!

3. This one from Gallery Teachers, Using Cuisenaire Rods to Teach English in the Classroom with Anna Cuccia, took me back to the very early days of my career and a wonderful training session on the Silent Way with Mario Rinvolucri. Not sure Cuisenaire Rods are much used nowadays?https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tGI9Y-WKS4M

Lots more stuff on the Gallery Teachers YouTube channel https://www.youtube.com/@GTEFL

and here’s the Wikipedia entry on the Silent Way https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Silent_Way

4. For ELT teachers and teacher trainers from all over the world, an invitation from Macmillan English to apply to speak at the Advancing Learning New Voices online event on Wednesday 25th September https://www.macmillanenglish.com/new-voices

Deadline for applications? 30^th July!

5. And, finally, ‘Barbara’s Rhubarb Bar’ from Bodo Wartke https://youtu.be/ZYkBf0dbs5I?feature=shared