Once in a while I read something and I find myself thinking, ''Now, why didn't I think of that?''. Well, Richard Gresswell had such an idea. He started a blog, called it ELTBITES, and challenged us: ''Describe an activity that requires no more than the teacher, students, and possibly making use of the board, pens, and paper. Describe the activity ...

I've always loved this song (written by Jagger/Richards, and released on the Stones' Let It Bleed album towards the end of 1969), and, as you probably already know, I'm very fond of Playing for Change, too. They are good enough reasons for me to link it here in this blog.But how can we use it in our lessons, you might ask. Well, think about it and ...

Read my analysis of emergent language based on lessons using the above image in my guest post for Barbara Sakamoto's Teaching Village. Thanks, Barb, for the invite. Related posts: Speaking lesson using close-up imagesPhotos + Mindmap = Ideas on a silver platterCokey Monkey lesson planEvery picture tells a story - let the students speak!

A few weeks ago, I suggested some ideas for a lesson based on a close-up image - if you've missed it, I suggest you read that first. Click here to read it.I snapped this shot today, and I thought I'd share some more ideas with you all. Between this and the previous article, I think you'll get an idea how you can start your students speaking on any ...

The Partnership for 21st Century Skills cites the ability to work collaboratively among some very important skills students will need in order to be ready for the careers of the 21st century.  However, as school district budgets shrink and as our classroom rosters grow, finding opportunities to have our students collaborate can be difficult.  ...

Last published on 15 Nov 2009. This version has been reworked and supersedes the older version.         Do you have trouble making a telephone call in English? Do you get nervous when you don't understand the person on the other end? Are you familiar with most of  the basic telephone language? In this post, I will  ...

Mathematicians are artists and artists sometimes need to be mathematicians, too! Here, we present (my thanks goes to the cooperation of José Alberto of IES Los Tarahales, who did most of the work, really) some common basic expressions. The file is, as usual, available in Scribd and SlideShare. How can you use it? One way is to cut them up along ...

This presentation attempts to summarise the basic points of proportions of our body parts, especially with regards to the head. It also includes a tutorial on how to draw a face. My gratitude goes to José Alberto of IES Tarahales for sharing his expertise on the tutorial, without which  the presentation would have been lacking a vital part. The ...

My original posts on dialogue at the airport check-in and at the passport control have been rather popular, so I decided to improve them slightly here. They have been combined into one quiz, and a matching vocabulary exercise has been added, too. If you provide a valid email address, the results of the quiz along with the correct answers will be ...

As teachers, we have to be innovative,  to keep up with the times, so to speak. The days of teaching with a book, chalk and blackboard are long gone now. Every year, more and more schools are installing digital boards, more classes are having projectors and white boards, if not a screen, and it won't be long before every class will be equipped ...