MEXTESOL Morelia Gets Together for Their 8th Regional Convention

On April 18th-19th, 2008 I attended MEXTESOL Morelia's 8th Regional Convention at the Universidad Latina in festive Morelia, Michoacan. The conference was a great opportunity to meet new colleagues in the field and catch up with others.
I attended an informative presentation by Francisco Lozano on Video Techniques for the ELT Classroom and the very dynamic closing plenary" What Makes a Good Teacher and What Makes the Best Teacher" by English teacher trainer/dance instructor Adan Alberto Hurtado Olivares
My own session "Fun and Games for Oral Fluency and Motivation" was packed with 45 enthusiastic students and teachers.
At my other session"Letting Them In On the Secret:Rubrics for Formative Assessment", 36 teachers and students learned how to create rubrics with their students. For those interested in more information about rubrics please check out this wonderful online resource "Rubistar" or get a copy of the final handout by leaving me a comment with your email address here on the blog. I look forward to hearing from you!
I had the opportunity to catch up with, founding president of MEXTESOL Morelia and teacher trainer, Luis Gerardo Ramirez Amor (pictured here with me passing out certificates of attendance and books generously donated by the publishers). I also got to meet the Universidad Latina's new English coordinator Yacine Kabbage and MEXTESOL Morelia's lovely president, Monica Alvarez (pictured here after all the event's activities were successfully finished).

Thanks MEXTESOL Morelia! I had a great time. Best of luck with your next event!

"Worlds of TESOL" meet in New York City for the 2008 TESOL convention

The theme of the 42nd annual TESOL convention in New York City was "Worlds of TESOL: Building Communities of Practice, Inquiry and Creativity". People from all over the planet gathered in this most global of cities to present, learn and connect. I, for one, met up with friends, colleagues and mentors from Monterrey, Cairo, Morocco, Russia and San Francisco as well as former fellows from everywhere! Personal favorites were: the session by AUC professor Phyllis Wachob and Salma Waly on their work with refugee communities called "Teaching English to Refugees in Transition", the session "Online TESOL Education: Creative Communities of Practice" with Liz England, David Hall, John Knox, Ralph Sabio and Datta Kaur Khalsa and finally, the English Language Fellow Program networking event. There were plenaries by Penny Ur and Lia Kamhi-Stein among others and the TESOL job market place was filled with recruiters from all over. If you didn't attend this year, but you'd like to attend next year, register for MEXTESOL membership to be eligible for a grant that could help you with expenses for the 43rd annual TESOL convention to be held March 25-28th, 2009 in Denver, Colorado.

Tabasco Teachers Try Out Tasks, Technology and TOEFL

Twelve English teachers from the Insituto Tecnologico Superior de Centla in Frontera, Tabasco participated in a 25-hour workshop (from February 25th-29th, 2008) on Motivating Teachers and Learners, TOEFL Preparation Strategies, Authentic Tasks and Materials, Integrating Skills, Cooperative Learning and Fun Web Tasks. Participants were very enthusiastic (100% of them liked the topics, activities and explanations). During the workshop they took TOEFL practice tests, developed picture stories, created blogs, perfomed role plays and cooperated in a reading jigsaw.
According to the workshop evaluations, the favorite parts of the workshop and the topics they will use most in their teaching are: Cooperative Learning and Authentic Tasks. A comment from an email since the workshop proves it's true too. “I have practiced with my students about cooperative learning. I prepare my classes with authentic material, it really works!!! It´s funny and amazing to work in this way!!!!! Thanks for your teaching.” To let me know how this workshop has affected your teaching please fill in my Workshop Follow Up Survey. Thanks.

Some of the other participants' comments were as follows: “Sincerely was the first time I talked to a native speaker. For me was so wonderful”. “It’s my first participation in a workshop like this. I gonna apply cooperative learning in my English class”. “It was fantastic, we had a great time”. If you'd like to see more photos and the participants' blogs please click on ELT Workshop ITSCE . The workshop was very well organized by Citlalli Garcia Albores.

Citlalli at the Centla swamps.