Twenty-five CBTIS English teachers participated in a 30-hour workshop entitled "The Basics of English Language Teaching" from May 19th-23rd, 2008. They learned how to: structure cooperative lessons, use a variety of tasks which appeal to multiple intelligences, motivate students with authentic tasks, materials, and internet activities and use rubrics for student-centered, formative assessment. According to the participants' evaluations, the favorite parts of the workshop were the "multiple intelligences" activities and the internet activities, particularly the blogs. The participants are most interested in learning more about Rubrics and they said that the parts they will apply to their own teaching are (in order of number of responses): 1 Everything, 2 Multiple Intelligences, 3 Fun web tasks, 4 Authentic Materials, 5 Cooperative tasks and 6 Rubrics. The workshop was very well organized by the ever hospitable and always cheerful Carmen Guardado and facilitated by fellow Brigitte Miller. The course was opened with a ceremony that included a student's speech about Aguascalientes and closed with fabulous performances by CBTIS 195 students and the soulful singing of Jorge and Carlos (two participating teachers). Also present were the gracious principal Mrs. Sara Veronica Serrano Macias , directors of the CETIS and CBTIS, Mr. Juan Antonio Glez Arechiga Ramirez Weilla and Mr. Jose Luis Ortega Juarez. The festivities were topped off by a long chatty lunch in town. 
To see more pictures from the workshop, including student performances click here. To see the participants blogs click here. To see what the participants learned about Internet tasks, click here.
Thank you, all of you, for a wonderful experience in Aguascalientes. Keep in touch to let me know how your classes progress. Best of luck!
