Roy Cross's Blog

1. Spotted by my colleague Ann: the publication Grading Goal Four, edited by Antonia Wulff from Education International (who I mentioned a few weeks ago), reviews the progress we’ve made to date towards Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) 4: Ensure inclusive and equitable quality education for all and promote lifelong learning https://brill.com/view/title/57471

PDF of the introductory chapter below, to give you chance to decide if you want to spend your data on downloading the whole book, which you’ll also find a PDF of below.

2. The next OECD webinar, How can education recover from the pandemic effectively and equitably? is at 11:30 UK time on Friday, 11th June. More info and registration here https://meetoecd1.zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_nueLX1bdS_K8IocKXROc5w The speakers include Anna Ekström, the Swedish Minister of Education, and Susan Hopgood, the President of the organisation that’s now behaving a bit like a London bus, Education International. (You wait ages for a London bus and then three come along one after the other!)

3. Also on 11^th June, at 12:00 UK time, the next Language and Sustainable Development Webinar, with Leketi Makalela & Clarah Dhokotera talking about To know and to be of ubuntu translanguaging: Towards multilingual multilingualism for decoloniality and sustainable development in Africa More info and registration here https://essex-university.zoom.us/meeting/register/tJcsceutrTMvG9bXBWy__xJy1t2Q8VmG_hya

I hesitate to translate ‘ubuntu’, so here’s a short video from Mpho Tutu instead https://youtu.be/SMSqZckROfA

4. 10 Reflections from Online Teaching from Tyler Tennant on the HASTAC blog https://www.hastac.org/blogs/tylertennant09/2021/04/19/10-reflections-online-teaching  Tyler’s sixth reflection is one I think I’ve touched on before: Providing video feedback is a handy – and faster – method than providing hand-written or typed feedback.

Here’s more about HASTAC itself https://www.hastac.org/about-hastac

5. And, finally, this week’s phobia is one that must make life difficult if you’re a teacher, glossophobia. But I don’t believe the stat that says 75 % of us suffer from it to a significant degree – a little preparatory nervousness, fine and necessary, but not a phobia!

1. I’d have loved one of these when I was teaching, the Pearson Text Analyser (PTA) https://www.english.com/blog/gse-text-analyzer/ Here’s a blog post about it https://www.english.com/gse/teacher-toolkit/user/textanalyzer

I tried the PTA out on the first six paragraphs of this article from today’s Guardian, ‘Massive internet outage hits websites including Amazon, gov.uk and Guardian’ https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2021/jun/08/massive-internet-outage-hits-websites-including-amazon-govuk-and-guardian-fastly and it told me it was B2+ in CEFR terms and 66-70 in terms of Pearson’s own Global Scale of English.

Interestingly, it also told me that the following words from the passage I chose were above the level of my text: terse, affected, twitter, inaccessible, twitch, broke, geographically, streaming. Not quite sure what’s going on there. (I’d love to try it out on some of those old textbooks that always seemed much too difficult for the students they claimed to be written for – maybe I will!)

2. While Pearson are analysing your classroom texts for you, Oxford University Press (OUP) are throwing down the gauntlet, a 10-minute reading challenge gauntlet, to be precise https://elt.oup.com/feature/global/10-minute-reading-challenge/?cc=gb&selLanguage=en You can download the challenge pack for parents in English or Spanish, to help them help their kids read for ten minutes each day.

3. If you’ve no idea what a kaitenzushi is, you need to read the article by Janeth Elizabeth Diggs-White Hori in the June issue of Humanising Language Teaching (HLT) https://www.hltmag.co.uk/jun21/ PDF of the Contents below, and here’s a direct link to the kaitenzushi piece https://www.hltmag.co.uk/jun21/kaitenzushi

[PDF]

4. And, finally, Shipwreck: originally planned as a stage theatre production, it’s been re-worked specifically for an audience listening from home or on headphones. It’s described as a “harrowing and hilarious masterpiece about race, religion, family and the nightmarish fallout of the American experiment”. There’s a short trailer on this page, as well as all three half-hour episodes, with and without subtitles https://publictheater.org/media-center/series/shipwreck/shipwreck/ I’ve not listened to it all yet, but it starts well!

1. Parents with a migration background: What does it take to raise bilingual children? is the title of the next lecture in the University of Leiden’s Language policy and practices in the Global North and South: Challenges, opportunities and future directions series at 12:00 UK time on 9^th June by Annick De Houwer.

Here’s her abstract (PDF below, just in case) https://www.universiteitleiden.nl/binaries/content/assets/geesteswetenschappen/lucl/lecture-series-events/7_annick-2.pdf

and here’s a link to registration: https://universiteitleiden.zoom.us/meeting/register/u5UqcOGrqT0uGdS01iSiu3Xo7Bj5J5NUXxU5

Annick is the Director of the splendidly named Harmonious Bilingualism Network: https://www.habilnet.org/

When I first worked in Croatia – such a long time ago it was called Yugoslavia! – many of the students I taught at secondary school had been sent home to Zagreb at the age of fifteen or sixteen by parents who were working in Germany and Switzerland ‘to learn their family language properly’ – and that was often a very painful process for all involved.

2. Get your students to truly love collocations is this month’s challenge from one stop english! https://www.onestopenglish.com/vocabulary-lesson-plans/vocabulary-builders-truly-loving-collocations/1000194.article PDF copies of lesson plan and teacher’s notes below.

Part of the one stop english Vocabulary Builders series https://www.onestopenglish.com/vocabulary-lesson-plans/vocabulary-builders-an-introduction/1000117.article You need to register but you don’t need to subscribe.

3. If, like me, your eyes were bigger than your stomach and you didn’t manage to watch all the Hay events you’d booked for, you can at least catch the Opening Night Gala for free this week with a cast that ranges from Her Royal Highness The Duchess of Cornwall to rapper Guvna B, with a host of literary stars in between https://www.hayfestival.com/p-17756-opening-gala-a-night-of-hope.aspx?skinid=16!

You can also explore for free – or get your students to explore for themselves – the very rich Hay archive of children’s events and readings https://www.hayfestival.com/c-209-archive-hay-player.aspx

4. And, finally, The Shimmering Extraordinary, six short films from Scottish Ballet, each about and by a different dancer and two to three minutes long https://www.scottishballet.co.uk/join-in/community-projects/safe-to-be-me/safe-to-be-me-festival/the-shimmering-extraordinary

1. A nice idea from Cambridge University Press that I’ve somehow missed hitherto, their annual Dedicated Teacher Award https://dedicatedteacher.cambridge.org/

Here’s an e-book with the global shortlist of sixty teachers (from nearly 13,000 entries) https://www.calameo.com/cupeducation/read/006433997c5be0a2d94a7

and here’s the even shorter shortlist made up of the six regional winner finalists https://dedicatedteacher.cambridge.org/finalists/

Plenty of time to enter your colleague for next year’s competition!

2. I advise signing up without delay for the next NILE Insights event, a panel discussion on Video in the Language Classroom, at 16:00 UK time on Tuesday, 8^th June, as tickets are limited (Well, that’s what they tell me!) https://www.nile-elt.com/products/InsightsVideo

From the event blurb: “Videos can be a great addition to the classroom but they are not just listening exercises with nice pictures!” More on the panellists here https://www.nile-elt.com/products/InsightsPanellists

3. Some listening for the weekend next, for which over-the-ear headphones are recommended (but ear buds will do): Earwig Sonic Theatre Podcasts https://earwigsonictheatre.buzzsprout.com/

Earwig seeks, they claim, “to challenge, inspire, envelope and embrace its audience, inviting you deep into the inner world of its characters, placing you, the listener, at the centre of the drama.” Give it a go?

4. Actors never mention the name of this play, so I won’t either https://themacbethsfilm.co.uk/ Dominic Hill’s production for the Glasgow Citizens Theatre https://www.citz.co.uk/ It’s one hour long and free – but you need to book a ticket – till 30^th June. Short enough for use with your students? Watch it first yourself, to see if their stomachs are strong enough!

5. And, finally, these short plays from Watermans Arts Centre in West London, Myths and Adventures From Ancient Greece, about  Pandora (and her box), Persephone (and the Underworld), Midas (and his gold) and Theseus (and the Minotaur) are definitely OK for your students https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLZvJ49nF0XmZ8yY89ZpLh3TDET6Uyuxfk

1. Another good thing with a long name: Intercultural Citizenship Education through Picturebooks in Primary ELT – ICEPELL for short! Their next symposium is on 7^th and 8^th June, starting at 09:00 UK time each day. Programme here (NB! Norwegian time) https://blogg.nord.no/icepellsymposium2021/ and registration here the sooner the better, as places are limited https://nord.zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_S-UAzlxzSli2_3RRJ9fW7g

Can you remember what ICT4D from yesterday’s message stands for, I wonder? More likely than not, I reckon – the acid test of a good acronym.

2. The plenary speaker at the ICEPELL symposium (at 14:00 UK time on Monday 7^th June) is the very popular British writer (for both children and adults), Michael Rosen. He has his own YouTube channel full of stories and poetry with over half a million subscribers https://www.youtube.com/MichaelRosenOfficial

Try the Wicked Tricks of Till Owlyglass with your students? https://youtu.be/csy4inhvn6k

3. Here’s the latest OECD newsletter for teachers http://newsletter.oecd.org/q/1I6bf6ne22nirdslqP0LV/wv This one has an interesting infographic on How good are young people at detecting misinformation? – 84% of young people in Singapore report being trained in class to spot fake news, compared to only 44% in Switzerland – and a survey for your students to take on the future of education https://futureofwork.oecd.org/en/the-survey There’s a short introductory video to the survey https://youtu.be/iJnPlhPyWMc

4. And, finally, time for another visit to The Conversation? Yes! https://theconversation.com/uk

Here’s three pieces likely to provoke discussion in (virtual or online) class:

https://theconversation.com/what-are-the-ethics-of-giving-back-money-that-doesnt-belong-to-you-159497

https://theconversation.com/namibian-genocide-why-germanys-bid-to-make-amends-isnt-enough-161820

https://theconversation.com/covid-19-why-the-lab-leak-theory-must-be-formally-investigated-161297

1. It’s that time of year again! Nominations for the ELTons Outstanding Achievement Award are now open until Sunday 27 June. The Outstanding Achievement Award recognises and celebrates people who have made a lasting, extraordinary impact on teaching and learning, and the ELTons team are keen to spread their nomination net as wide as possible round the globe – that net has maybe been cast too close to home in previous years?

Please think about the members of your own ELT community who’ve made a difference over the years – and nominate them here! https://www.teachingenglish.org.uk/article/eltons-outstanding-achievement-award-2021

2. Next, a reminder about the Climate Action in Language Education (CALE) campaign. If you missed the CALE professional development modules first time round, don’t worry – they’ll all be available again from 16th June https://www.teachingenglish.org.uk/article/climate-action-language-education-module-1-introducing-climate-change-issues-language

And if you’ve not yet had chance to listen to the Climate Connections podcast, you can catch both episodes here https://www.britishcouncil.org/climate-connection/get-involved/action-language-education/podcast The second episode has a nice pun in the title – ‘Speaking youth to power’ https://www.teachingenglish.org.uk/article/climate-connection-episode-2-speaking-youth-power

3. I’ve mentioned the Techfugees website before. It’s one of those sites that’s well worth popping into every now and again https://techfugees.com/ They have an interesting looking webinar (with a long title) on 9^th June, on Sustainable and Innovative Community Practices as Drivers of a new Agenda on Integration https://techfugees.com/wp-event/webinar-on-sustainable-and-innovative-community-practices-as-drivers-of-a-new-agenda-on-integration/ Copy of the webinar agenda here https://techfugees.app.box.com/s/oxgy9xclxhbwti63ro9u6julal2y1won and PDF below.

4. And, finally, I do not suffer from this week’s phobia, ovinophobia, as last week’s holiday in Swaledale proved! Photo below by way of proof.

1. First up today, a joint announcement from NILE and Ready to Run: the two organisations are now working together, and Ready to Run’s videos are now available from this page on the NILE website https://www.nile-elt.com/products/Ready_to_Run

You’ll need to become a member of NILE’s teacher community to access the videos, and you can do that here in approximately 35 seconds https://www.nile-elt.com/catalog?pagename=NILE-Membership A case of 2 NILE + 2 R2R = 5, I reckon!

2. “Become an Animal Superhero… Save the animals, Save the World!” National Geographic Learning are offering two online lessons for your students on Wednesday, 9^th June: one at 09:30 UK time for kindergarten and grades 1 & 2 students, and a second at 11:00 UK time for grades 3 to 5. More info and registration links here https://www.ngl-emea.com/projectexploration

Early notice as you’ll need to make arrangements for your students to be able to attend; PDF copies of letters for teachers and school leaders below with details of learning resources for the lessons for each class.

3. ICT4D is UNESCO’s Chair in Information and Communication Technologies for Development – acronyms have their advantages sometimes: why use 60 characters when 5 will do? They’ve just signed up to the Kindness Matters campaign – maybe your students would like to share an act of kindness? More details on the ICTAD home page https://ict4d.org.uk/

Last year ICT4D published Education for the most marginalised post‑COVID-19: Guidance for governments on the use of digital technologies in education https://edtechhub.org/education-for-the-most-marginalised-post-covid-19/

Here’s a podcast version of the executive summary of the report https://ict4d2004.files.wordpress.com/2020/10/200921_0055.mp3 and I’ve attached a PDF of the summary below. Well worth a skim even if you’re not in government – yet!

[PDF] 4. And, finally, from the British Museum, A space to be: a musical celebration of Edmund de Waal’s ‘library of exile’ https://youtu.be/Fp63AVjj0nk

A bumper crop today as I’m on holiday next week back home in Swaledale! I’ll be back on Tuesday 1^st June.

1. Early notice of this year’s British Association of Applied Linguistics (BAAL) Language in Africa SIG conference, African languages and social change: Politics, activism, and justice, which runs over a two-week period from1st to 14^th June. More info and registration here https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/african-languages-and-social-change-politics-activism-and-justice-tickets-154725729823

It’s an interesting model for a conference, with pre-recorded talks uploaded on 1st June, to give participants plenty of time to view and think about them before panel discussions with (some of) the presenters from 7^th to 14^th June.

2. Next, a set of slides from Nik Peachey on Exploiting Infographics with your students https://view.genial.ly/600953d174d7d8137d55ecfc

More free stuff on Nik’s site https://peacheypublications.com/the-teachers-classroom-app – and some stuff you have to pay for!

3. Early notice of Trinity and Regent’s free online Future of ELT conference on Saturday, 26th June, so you can make arrangements to be able to attend on a Saturday, if that’s what you’d like to do https://learn.trinitycollege.co.uk/foelt Registration link here https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/the-6th-future-of-english-language-teaching-conference-online-tickets-154821403987

Plenaries by Silvana Richardson and Scott Thornbury (tbc) and twenty breakout sessions on English for Specific Purposes, Young Learners, Technology & Innovation, and Teacher Education.

4. Available for one month only, a BBC Radio 4 series of five short programmes on Hans Rosling, the man behind those amazing data presentations, How I Learned To Understand The World https://www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/m000w4pv

And here’s one of those amazing presentations, on Why the world population won’t exceed 11 billion https://youtu.be/2LyzBoHo5EI There’s lots on the web.

5. Beyond Survival, four essays from Graham Leicester of the International Futures Foundation, who I met earlier today for the first time in years, “exploring the resources we need to draw on if we are to bend the arc of history toward the hope of a better day” https://www.iffbeyondsurvival.com/ PDF below.

IFF main site here https://www.internationalfuturesforum.com/ and lots of interesting resources for working on change together in their ‘Practice Centre’ here https://www.iffpraxis.com/

6. Quite a treat, from 19-29 May: Sakari Oramo and the Royal Stockholm Philharmonic Orchestra explore Sibelius together as the crescendo of Oramo’s thirteen years with the RSPO https://www.konserthuset.se/en/programme/festivals–themes/grande-finale–sibelius-with-oramo/

7. And, finally, another kind of treat: a photo essay on the remote region of Murghab in Tajikistan from the Calvert Journal: https://www.calvertjournal.com/features/show/12754/murghob-pamirs-tajikistan-photography-life-at-altitude

1. Today is Global Accessibility Awareness Day (GAAD) and marks the tenth year of a campaign to raise awareness of the need to ensure digital content is accessible to disabled people and those with additional access needs https://globalaccessibilityawarenessday.org/ My colleague Andrew Skinner has produced a really useful set of guidelines for accessibility based around the mnemonic SCULPT:

S: Structure (heading styles): Use heading styles in your document 

C: Colour contrast: Use a strong colour contrast between any text and background colour

U: Use of images: Use alternative (alt) text on images

L: Links: hyperlinks should be embedded in text which in isolation would describe what the link was to. Avoid nondescriptive text for links, such as “click here”

P: Plain English: Use clear uncomplicated language, keeping jargon to a minimum

T: Table structure: Use simple tables without merged or split cells.

I’ve attached a copy of Andrew’s presentation below and clearly need to read it carefully myself!

2. Here’s a bit more on reflective practice from the two Steves, Walsh and Mann, this time their open-access article from ELTJ on Doing reflective practice: a data-led way forward. We all wholeheartedly agree that reflective practice is the only possible practice – but on what evidence base? PDF below. Here’s a link to their webinar last November, in case you missed it first time round https://youtu.be/M94bjcoMlNA

3. IH World – the International House World organisation – brings together all the IH schools around the world, 136 of them last time I looked https://ihworld.com/ Here’s a link to the most recent issue of their journal https://ihworld.com/ih-journal/issues/issue-48/ and there’s plenty of other issues to explore.

Here’s a piece from Issue 47 on Teaching people to tie their laces https://ihworld.com/ih-journal/issues/issue-47/teaching-people-to-tie-their-laces/

and here’s a piece on Getting Teacher Educators to Practice what we Preach from Issue 40 https://ihworld.com/ih-journal/issues/issue-40/customisation-in-teacher-training-programmes-getting-teacher-educators-to-practice-what-we-preach/

4. And, finally, a reminder that this year’s Hay Festival starts on 26^th May. All the live events are free, and nearly all events are then available for free replay for 24 hours after the start time of the event – but you need to sign up in advance for the event to be able to watch the recording free https://www.hayfestival.com/m-163-hay-festival-2021.aspx?skinid=1&currencysetting=GBP&localesetting=en-GB&resetfilters=true

Click the ‘Quick View’ radio button for a quick (obviously!) and convenient way to view the programme; hover your mouse over or tap on individual events for more detail. I’ve booked for several events, including number 75 and number 77!

1. This one, recommended by my colleague Adam, won’t be around for ever, he says: the Association for Learning Technology‘s 12th annual conference for Open Education research, practice and policy https://oer21.oerconf.org/

Adam recommends you click on whatever takes your fancy in the programme here https://oerxdomains21.org/index.html and follow your nose. If, like me, you’re a bit less of a digital native than Adam and find the home page doesn’t behave as you’re expecting it to when you click repeatedly on the picture of the TV, the menu’s in the top right-hand corner and it will take you here https://oerxdomains21.org/day1.html and here https://oerxdomains21.org/day2.html Be sure to scroll across – the programme covers more than two screens’ worth breadth-wise.

There’s probably another, simpler word for ‘breadth-wise’ that I’ve forgotten – maybe ‘across’? I’m enjoying listening to Rajiv Jhangiani’s closing plenary right now.

2. We’re now bang in the middle of the Cambridge English ‘Insights on Demand’ event which runs from 18^th to 20^th May. Here’s the very rich library of resources for the event http://view.ceros.com/cambridge/ondemandlibrary/p/1 and here’s the programme, just in case you get chance to pop in today or tomorrow http://view.ceros.com/cambridge/ondemandlistings/p/2

3. More than thirty million people worldwide have watched this short talk on ‘A Counterculture of Commitment’ by Pete Davis; I’m hoping some of you haven’t yet. This page has both video and transcript https://petedavis.substack.com/p/a-counterculture-of-commitment-speech Are you stuck in what Pete calls Infinite Browsing Mode? His claim is that the defining characteristic of our generation is keeping our options open (and avoiding commitment).

4. And, finally, look away now if you suffer from turophobia. If you don’t, you’ll enjoy these two short films https://youtu.be/UTgcNd5X0gw and https://youtu.be/Ed7wkHnaRmw

More of the same here https://www.youtube.com/user/NealsYardDairyFilms/videos