On the fourth day of Geekmas, some blogger gave to me:  fo(u)r recalling words Welcome to the teflgeek Christmas celebration!  Themed around the classic Christmas carol – but going backwards, mostly because it’s more like a countdown that way: 12 blogs worth clutching 11 tips for writing 10 tricks for reading 9 pretty pictures 8 talks worth ...

On the fifth day of Geekmas, some blogger gave to me:  FIVE FAVOURITE THINGS Welcome to the teflgeek Christmas celebration!  Themed around the classic Christmas carol – but going backwards, mostly because it’s more like a countdown that way: 12 blogs worth clutching 11 tips for writing 10 tricks for reading 9 pretty pictures 8 talks worth ...

On the ninth day of Geekmas, some blogger gave to me:  nine pretty pictures Welcome to the teflgeek Christmas celebration!  Themed around the classic Christmas carol – but going backwards, mostly because it’s more like a countdown that way: 12 blogs worth clutching 11 tips for writing 10 tricks for reading And nine pretty pictures – or rather ...

I’m not a great fan of “festivals” teaching in general, but this year my timetable has more young learner classes than usual and halloween is almost upon us, so here’s what I managed to find to help you cook up some devilish lessons for your learners… ESL-Galaxy has it’s usual great selection of flashcards, crosswords, wordsearches ...

There’s a really nice app on the BBC website that lets you figure out where you come in the global population statistics – for example, when I was born I was the four billionth, 50 millionth, seven hundred and sixty four thousandth, one hundred and sixty first person alive on the planet.  It goes on to let you look at country population statistics ...

It’s not until someone goes that you realise the impact they had on your life – Steve Jobs was one of those public figures who inspired belief and achievement in others. One of my classes was asking if we could talk about Steve Jobs and his life, and clearly he meant a lot to a lot of people – so here are some resources that you can use with your ...

The Voxy Blog has an interesting infographic for teaching and teacher development, examining the question: “Are Flashcards an Effective Learning Tool?” .  I suspect most YL teachers (especially those at Primary level) are thinking “well duh” at this point. The infographic was developed at least partially in promotion of one of Voxy’s i-phone ...

While visiting the UK over the summer, I was introduced to a relatively new BBC Game show – “Pointless“, in which contestants try to score as few points as possible.  Or as the BBC phrase it:  ”Quiz in which contestants try to score as few points as possible by plumbing the depths of their general knowledge to come up with the answers no-one else ...

Back in July I posted a selections of 20 ideas and activities that might be worth trying out as you get to know your new classes this school year – and since then there’ve been a couple of additional ideas to throw into the mix: First Lesson Ideas / Warmers First Lesson: Find Nobody Who… First Lesson: I don’t know what you did last ...

The two year old comes “running” into the living room brandishing a blue vaguely whale shaped bath toy that has somehow been liberated from it’s rightful home.  She toddles up to her father and thrusts it up at him: “Daddy!  Lemon.” “No darling, it’s a fish.” “Lemon.” “Fish.” “Lemon!” “No sweetheart, you can tell because lemons aren’t ...