Roy Cross's Blog

1. My intention today is to not mention a single webinar: let’s see! (And let’s see also whether some of my more particular colleagues object to the formulation ‘to not mention’.)

Are you suffering from Zoom fatigue? What’s your personal rating on the ZEF scale? More info here https://news.stanford.edu/2021/02/23/four-causes-zoom-fatigue-solutions/ and a link to the Stanford University survey to assess your ZEF rating here https://stanforduniversity.qualtrics.com/jfe/form/SV_1RpkgSOyl1fPhpY PDF of the research paper below. I scored 37 on the ZEF scale …

2. DEAR is a movement that appears to be gaining popularity in schools here in the UK – to judge by the number of mentions it’s received recently. Here’s two blog posts about it https://readlistenlearn.net/blog/drop-everything-and-read and https://educationblog.oup.com/secondary/english/if-you-do-one-thing-make-sure-its-drop-everything-and-read-dear

3. If you’re into Donna Leon and her urbane Venetian detective, Commissario Guido Brunetti https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guido_Brunetti_novels then you might like to pop in to Daunt Books tomorrow – well, their YouTube page – to watch an interview with her https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC7b45jrzxt4aDdXWEEYDdHA Not available till tomorrow.

4. There’s an Inuit Film Night at 18:00 UK time on Sunday evening at the Polar Museum here in Cambridge as part of their Big Freeze Polar Art festival: https://www.spri.cam.ac.uk/museum/bigfreeze/ Free tickets available here: https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/big-freeze-art-festival-film-night-tickets-141850756431 You need to register but once you’ve done so, you can watch the films at your convenience for the next 24 hours.

The film night is a partnership between the Polar Museum and the Native Spirit Foundation: https://nativespiritfoundation.org/

5. And, finally, a friend sent me this: http://aero.tpk.edu.hk/~engweb/learn_and_know/can_you_read_this.html See what you make of it. I’m not sure how serious the science underpinning it is …

1. First up tonight, a (very!) short notice invitation from the University of Oslo to attend their (slightly delayed) celebration of International Mother Language Day tomorrow, Friday 12^th March. The event starts at 08:30 UK time. More info and Zoom link for tomorrow here https://www.hf.uio.no/multiling/english/news-and-events/events/conferences/2021/International-Mother-Language-Day/Mother-Language-Day

I’ve attached a PDF of the programme below.

2. Two events next Monday, 15^th March: the earlier of the two, at 10:00 UK time, is The Spectator magazine’s debate on the impact of the pandemic on disadvantaged children’s learning, The Learning Gap. More info and a registration link here https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/the-learning-gap-tickets-141437811301  I’m aware there are degrees of disadvantage globally which position this UK debate very much at the less disadvantaged end of the cline, but I’d expect The Spectator’s editor, Fraser Nelson, to chair a lively event. You need to register in advance.

3. The second event next Monday, at 12:00 UK time, is a talk by Ken Hyland, who’s a professor of applied linguistics at the University of East Anglia. Ken’s talk is entitled Why is peer review broken and how do we fix it? and will examine whether it’s true that all peer reviewers are ‘slow, biased, contradictory, hurtful or wilfully obtuse’? More info and a registration link here: https://www.bigmarker.com/UEAUK/Why-is-peer-review-broken-and-how-do-we-fix-it

4. WARNING! This one’s actually an advert and the product it is advertising, a virtual reality course, is well beyond the means of most of us, not to mention the cost of the virtual reality googles. I’m posting it, though, not as an advert but as an example of what is now technologically possible https://www.ecenglish.com/en/young-learners/virtualreality Click on the embedded videos and while you’re at it, do some window shopping for goggles https://www.oculus.com/quest-2/ How long before we can all afford this technology, I wonder? Maybe not so very long?

5. And, finally, having conducted a small straw poll yesterday evening, I now suspect that not as many people know about this site as I had thought! https://theenglishchannel.britishcouncil.org/content

1. A little flurry of webinars to start with. First, this coming Friday, 12th March, the next webinar offered by the Lancaster Literacy Research Centre (LLRC) is by Gee Macrory on New Orthographies in the Primary Languages Classroom and the challenges they pose for young language learners. More details and booking here: https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/new-orthographies-in-the-primary-languages-classroom-tickets-142845806653

The LLRC has an interestingly eclectic back catalogue of webinars here: http://wp.lancs.ac.uk/literacy-research-centre/

2. My British Council colleagues in Uzbekistan have been under-publicising an interesting series of webinars in conjunction with the Uzbek Ministry of Education and the Norwich Institute of Language Education (NILE) on English Medium Education. The next one is on Friday, 12^th March, at 10:00 UK time https://www.facebook.com/BritishCouncilUzbekistan You’ll need to scroll down the page a little.

3. Every NATESOL webinar comes with a free joke, courtesy of Tony Picot. NATESOL’s next webinar is at 10:00 UK time on Saturday, 13^th March: Learners as Partners: Voices from Different Contexts ~ a learner-centred discussion hosted by Alex Holloway & Clare Courtney from NATESOL. Please register before the end of your Thursday here https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSfF1U8jmeGbEXwI2x4EJlWSCszKbHoLPdAqhsz3m0Z2UWjlwQ/viewform

Tony’s latest? ‘I was teaching grammar last week. Asked a student to give me two pronouns. She said, “Who? Me?”’ Stop groaning at the back and please don’t let the joke inform your decision on whether or not to attend the webinar!

4. There’s a good lesson to do with interpreting graphs and data in this OECD report somewhere: http://oecd.org/economic-outlook and, if you need it, you’ll find guidance on creating lesson materials AND publishing them here on Macmillan Education’s one stop english site https://www.onestopenglish.com/lesson-share-/creating-lesson-materials-for-lesson-share/1000134.article This page is free to view – not all are – but you need to register.

5. And, finally, who suffers from zymocenosilicaphobia? Hands up!

1. At 17:30 UK time tomorrow, Wednesday 10^th March, you can join the latest Bilingual English Project webinar, on Helping students process and understand texts: insights from reading test developers. More info and registration here https://register.gotowebinar.com/register/1363760968907825422?source=EES+uk

and PDF below with info on both the event tomorrow and the one on 24^th March on Developing literacy by putting literature at the heart of planning in Secondary. (Careful – times on the PDF are Spanish time, one hour ahead of UK time.)

2. At 11:00 UK time on Thursday March 11^th, the first anniversary – yes, twelve months have passed! – of the declaration of the pandemic, The Conversation are hosting a panellist discussion on How coronavirus has changed us https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hNenRRF1Ovk As the rubric has it, “It’s easy to forget what things were like before the pandemic, now we are so used to wearing masks, washing our hands constantly and keeping metres apart from other human beings wherever we can. But the truth is that coronavirus has changed our lives completely – from the way we work to our social interactions and how we spend our leisure time.” (Panellist discussion is a new one on me.)

3. Might you fancy something just a little different at 09:00 UK time on 10th March, dealing with a Samoan system of classroom management and a Pasifika translation methodology called Talanoa? Swansea University cordially invite you to join their research seminar with Professor Averil Coxhead on Researching vocabulary in another language: Lessons from trades, Talanoa and Tongan Click here to register https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLScDiHlbj9KZZvfUHTuJR1VV3IOdSmwJV_1JnqOmCn8uF8Mzyw/viewform 

PDF of abstract below, and recordings of other Swansea talks here, including one by Heath Rose on ‘Global Englishes’ https://swanseauniversity.cloud.panopto.eu/Panopto/Pages/Sessions/List.aspx#folderID=%22dae194ed-9905-4d50-b651-ac5c011fbafa%22

4. If you enjoyed the first David Heathfield storytelling webinar, join this one which looks forward to a face-to-face future at 14:00 UK time on Thursday, 11th March https://www.teachingenglish.org.uk/article/face-face-storytelling-freedom-share-physical-sensory-space

You’ll find a recording of the first one about online storytelling here: https://www.teachingenglish.org.uk/article/online-storytelling-engaging-personal-creative

5. And, finally, Alexandra Mihai’s latest post on her Educationalist blog is Hear me out! – about making the best use of audio materials for teaching and learning: https://educationalist.substack.com/p/hear-me-out As ever, a good list of resources at the end of the post.

1. Two reasons for this message being earlier today: one, because I’m taking the afternoon off (eventually!), the other so that more of you will be able to catch this concert in celebration of International Women’s Day from St John’s Smith Square at 20:00 UK time this evening: https://www.sjss.org.uk/century-music-british-women-1921-2021-directed-madeleine-mitchell The concert is free; contributions are welcome but not required. One of my favourite music venues in normal times!

2. A request from my colleagues in the English for Education Systems Research and Insight team, who are currently embarking on an investigation of English as a global language. “We are interested in the views and opinions of people on trends and movements in English from those who work in English language education in a variety of contexts. The results will be used to stimulate thought and discussion about the ever-changing position of the English language in the world.  We are aware that some of you may already have completed a survey towards the end of last year.  This is a follow-up survey and we would be grateful if you could complete this one too, as it is using a more country focussed lens. The survey is completely anonymous and will take around 10 minutes to complete. If you would like to take part please click on the link below: https://www.surveymonkey.co.uk/r/TY9TYQB The survey will be open until 18 March 2021.” Money back guaranteed if it takes you more than ten minutes!

3. A good clear presentation on the use and protection of data (which I think might work quite well with older students as a basis for discussion) by the UK Information Commissioner, Elizabeth Denham: https://youtu.be/Pzk7qOKP8lU

4. An invitation to take part in the webinar “Covid-19 and language education: Making home schooling motivating and fun” that Deirdre Kirwan is delivering on behalf of the ECML at 15:00 UK time on Thursday, 11^th March: https://www.ecml.at/Resources/Webinars/tabid/5456/language/en-GB/Default.aspx Please note that you need to register in advance – well worth the effort! Deirdre’s an engaging speaker and used to be the inspirational leader of a primary school in Ireland – with 320 pupils and more than 50 home languages – where plurilingualism was both celebrated and normalised.

 5. And, finally, free to watch until March 15^th, The Man behind the Microphone, a musical family detective story film about Hedi Jouini, the Tunisian ‘Frank Sinatra’, made by his granddaughter, Claire https://youtu.be/SWf2GjpOGnQ

And here’s the playlist of the soundtrack: https://www.themanbehindthemicrophone.com/music

1. Podcasts, webinars and blog posts from Pearson under the banner of Experiences: ‘a fresh look at important questions’ that aims ‘to come up with new answers’: https://www.pearson.com/english/professional-development/experiences.html  The four topics addressed are critical thinking, STEAM (not the kind that comes out of your kettle), mindfulness and career skills.

Also from Pearson, Warm Up: https://www.pearson.com/english/catalogue/assessment/warm-up.html  No need to take PTE, but Pearson don’t mind if you do!

2. One for your science-inclined students to explore: https://www.britishscienceweek.org/  I suggest they start with the Smashing Stereotypes page: https://www.britishscienceweek.org/plan-your-activities/smashing-stereotypes/

3. From the Royal Opera House here in London starting on Monday 8th March, a week-long celebration of International Women’s day: https://www.roh.org.uk/international-womens-day-2021 Maybe start with this one on Monday? https://www.roh.org.uk/tickets-and-events/kind-regards-details

4. A wonderfully eclectic Eastern and Central Europe one-hundred-book-long reading list from The Calvert Journal, starting with The Life Written by Himself, written by the Archpriest Avvakum in prison in Siberia in 1660, through to F Letter: New Russian Feminist Poetry, edited by Galina Rymbu, Eugene Ostashevsky, and Ainsley Morse in 2020: https://www.calvertjournal.com/features/show/12441/100-books-eastern-europe-central-asia

The only favourite of mine who appears – to my surprise – to be missing from the list is the Austrian writer Joseph Roth. Here’s a piece about Roth by his long-time UK champion, Michael Hofmann: https://www.theguardian.com/books/2005/dec/31/featuresreviews.guardianreview20 Tell me if I missed Roth in the list, please!

5. And, finally, 8 professions that are hiring more people in 2021, according to LinkedIn: https://www.facebook.com/worldeconomicforum/videos/1575649839490737/  I’m investing in #7!

1. I hope this next OECD webinar is not too depressing: How do gender stereotypes affect five-year-olds’ ideas about the future? Monday 8^th March at 13:00 UK time https://meetoecd1.zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_sZSxLQdcS_qandQpIEc2IQ

2. A free book in the Cambridge University Press Elements in Applied Linguistics series, edited by Rodney Jones, Viral Discourse, about the language we’ve been using to talk about the pandemic https://www.cambridge.org/core/elements/viral-discourse/21AB09E9D27AC77408ACEDC3E0F6BEC9

plus an invite to a webinar discussing the book at 12:00 UK time on 11^th March https://us02web.zoom.us/webinar/register/4016125218460/WN_HGB0c_8LRXa1tJzT2pYqCg 

To download and skim-read – or indeed read! – the book before the webinar might be the best way to go about it? Let me know if you have difficulty with the book download and I can send you a PDF.

3. Against Disappearance: A discussion about trade and culture at 14:00 UK time next Tuesday, 9^th March, is the next event in the Against Disappearance series of discussions about cultural heritage and contemporary culture organised by the British Council and the Shubbak Festival of contemporary Arab arts and culture https://www.shubbak.co.uk/ Marina Warner, Hammour Ziada and Abu Amirah will be having a lively discussion. More info here https://uk.live.solas.britishcouncil.digital/arts/culture-development/against-disappearance and registration here https://www.eventbrite.com/e/against-disappearance-a-discussion-about-trade-and-culture-registration-141694394749

4. I was having an online discussion with colleagues today about happiness – as one does! – and how cortisol, the ‘fight-or-flight’ hormone, is sadly more powerful than ‘happy’ hormones – that’s shorthand that will annoy endocrinologists – like serotonin and dopamine. (The catch would seem to be that cortisol also plays a role in the production of the other two.) Anyway, two recommendations from that discussion:

the first, a great TED talk by Jill Bolte Taylor, My Stroke of Insight. Bolte Taylor got a research opportunity few brain scientists would wish for: she had a massive stroke, and watched as her brain functions – motion, speech, self-awareness – shut down one by one – and understood in detail what was happening to her. She lived to tell the tale! You may want to look away when the human brain teaching aid appears. https://www.ted.com/talks/jill_bolte_taylor_my_stroke_of_insight?language=en

and the second, an equally positive talk from last year’s Edinburgh International Book Festival by Rutger Bregman about his ‘hopeful history,’ Humankind: https://www.edbookfest.co.uk/media-gallery/item/rutger-bregman-there-is-hope-for-the-human-race

5. And, finally, a shameless plug for ‘God’s Own Country’: https://youtu.be/WohhLX_YLlE You can take the boy out of Yorkshire but you can’t take the Yorkshire out of the boy ….

1. The Culture for Sustainable and Inclusive Peace Network Plus (CUSP) will launch itself (!) next Monday at 14:00 UK time: https://www.cuspnetwork.org/home/events/ In their own words, CUSP aims to “strengthen artistic and cultural institutions in low- and middle-income countries so that they can become a reference point for the identification and transformation of social conflict whilst ensuring equal participation of women and girls in this process”. Pop in next Monday to find out more!

2. Tomorrow, Thursday 4^th March, at 14:00 UK time you can join a webinar led by the Hoopla-Macmillan Education Brazil Garden Project team, Local Innovation Award winners at last year’s ELTons: https://www.teachingenglish.org.uk/article/garden-project-bringing-learning-life-sustainable-elt-practices Nothing to do with plastic detectives – I think! Link to Hoopla here https://www.hooplaeducation.com/ and to Macmillan Education Brazil here http://www.macmillan.com.br/

3. A quick reminder of the Gender in Language Education courses that start next Monday: https://www.teachingenglish.org.uk/article/gender-language-education-gender-representation-teaching-materials  PDF of course flyer attached below – please share widely!

4. The British Association of Applied Linguistics (BAAL) has just published issue 118 of its newsletter. The ‘B’ in BAAL is a bit of a misnomer: this issue has a piece  on ‘Tracing the causes of the rise of English as an international language’ by Anna Kristina Hultgren from the Open University here in the UK, a report from Brazil on ‘Why and how the Rio Exploratory Practice Group is surviving in the pandemic’, and a review of Jim McKinley and Heath Rose’s Doing Research in Applied Linguistics (DRAL) series for Routledge: https://www.baal.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2021/03/118_BAAL-News-FV.pdf PDF copy of newsletter below.

5. There’ll be a word for this week’s phobia, hippopotomonstrosesquipedaliophobia. That word is not onomatopoeic but something similar, to describe words that embody their own meanings. And, no, hippopotomonstrosesquipedaliophobia was not in the MS Word dictionary – so I hope I’ve spelt it right!

1. The LearnEnglish sites have some good stuff for next Monday – or indeed any other day!

https://learnenglish.britishcouncil.org/general-english/video-zone/international-womens-day-we-are-generationequality

https://learnenglishteens.britishcouncil.org/study-break/video-zone/how-can-more-women-get-into-politics

https://learnenglishkids.britishcouncil.org/video-zone/kamala-harris-why-her-new-job-so-important

2. TIRF is The International Research Foundation for English Language Education, and they’ve just published a new paper on ESP in their Language Education in Review series: https://www.tirfonline.org/2021/02/tirf-language-education-in-review-series-english-for-specific-purposes/ You’ll find previous papers in the series here, including one on the Common European Framework of Reference and one on English as a Medium of Instruction: https://www.tirfonline.org/publications/

Plus, TIRF’s announcement of this year’s Doctoral Dissertation Grants, which may be well timed for some of you: https://www.tirfonline.org/grants-prizes/doctoral-dissertation-grants/

3. The March book of the month at the Hay Festival is What We Owe Each Other by Minouche Shafik. Her book seeks to answer the salient question of our time, “At a time when government seems broken, where can we find a framework for social, economic, and political renewal?” https://www.hayfestival.com/p-17441-minouche-shafik-talks-to-matina-stevis-gridneff.aspx

There’s a Q&A with Baroness Shafik on Tuesday, 9^th March at 19:00 UK time. You may need to explore the page for the registration link: on my computer, it was small and in the centre at the top of the screen! If you have a moment, read her CV – the very definition of stellar, as in the phrase ‘stellar CV’ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Minouche_Shafik,_Baroness_Shafik

4. And, finally, a good piece in the latest issue of The New Yorker, Last Exit from Afghanistan, from Dexter Filkins, who wrote the excellent The Forever War about the ill-fated (ill-conceived, ill-planned, ill-conducted, just plain ill) USA interventions in Iraq and Afghanistan https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2021/03/08/last-exit-from-afghanistan He’s clearly pretty brave himself but not as brave as some of the people he describes, such as Fawzia Koofi.

1. In the lead up to International Women’s Day, the Inter-agency Network for Education in Emergencies (INEE), Education Cannot Wait (ECW) and the UN Girls’ Education Initiative (UNGEI) are launching a new core resource package for gender in education in emergencies: the ‘EiE-GenKit’. Register here to join the launch event on Wednesday 3 March at 12:00 UK time https://unicef.zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_PugoM3glSyCgK2EZbVZm9w

More info on UNGEI here https://www.ungei.org/what-we-do/gender-education-emergencies

on INEE here https://inee.org/

and on ECW – who I think I’ve mentioned before – here https://www.educationcannotwait.org/

2. Two pieces from just down the road here in Cambridge: scroll down the page a little for a time lapse video of the Cambridge University Botanical Garden’s Moonflower eventually opening: https://www.botanic.cam.ac.uk/the-suspense-is-over/

and click here for the programme for Cambridge University’s free festival starting 26^th March https://www.festival.cam.ac.uk/ Early notice so you can book early – a number of the events have limited capacity.

3. A great set of animated films from the Smithsonian Center for Folklife and Cultural Heritage,  Animating the Mother Tongue: An Indigenous Language Playlist https://folklife.si.edu/magazine/mother-tongue-indigenous-language-animation Try the Mapudungun one!

4. More – yet more! – on accents, from the British Library: https://sounds.bl.uk/Accents-and-dialects For a blast from the past, try this collection https://sounds.bl.uk/Accents-and-dialects/Survey-of-English-dialects

The one in the Yorkshire section from Askrigg https://goo.gl/maps/koe6AuCgcq2KpEny9 comes from just up the dale from my family hometown, Richmond – give it a go! https://sounds.bl.uk/Accents-and-dialects/Survey-of-English-dialects/021M-C0908X0006XX-0500V1

5. And, finally, another – yet another! – podcast: https://www.nosuchthingasafish.com/ 362 weekly episodes on strange facts and counting …