Book Review: Talking Images: Idioms - by Lucy Holmes and Sharlene Matharu

I am delighted to be writing a review of a newly published photocopiable teachers' resource book called Talking Idioms: Images, written by two of my Lake School of English colleagues.

The talented joint authors are Lucy Holmes and Sharlene Matharu and they have been working at the Lake School of English for a considerable number of years between them now.

Below an image reproduced with kind permission from the Lake School.  It shows the two authors with their book called 'Talking Images: Idioms'. This resource book is created for teachers by two practising and very experienced teachers.  You can read more about them here.

All the original and brilliant artwork contained in the book has been drawn by Sharlene Matharu herself, seen below on the right.

Before I begin the review, I would just like to mention that the Lake School is a hotbed of incredible creativity, talent and innovation. This is thanks to the amazing support and encouragement of the two hardworking and inspirational directors, Carmel Engin and Susan Barber, (seen in the image below).........

..........and the warm, friendly atmosphere created by the school by the teachers and staff, and of course, inspired by the many students from around the globe!

'Talking Images: Idioms'  has been primarily designed as a 'pick up and use' resource book, and I honestly believe it is and will be the perfect addition to any busy staffroom.  It contains a wealth of idioms, all based around practical themes, and using images to gain maximum communicative effect.  All the materials have been trialled at the Lake School beforehand, and given the seal of approval by both students and teachers alike.

I have recently had the pleasure to have a good look through the contents of the book, which contains 12 thematically based units. Each lesson aimed at B1 level and above, would ideally take 45-60 minutes of classroom time.

I was most impressed by the following aspects:

What I liked most of all was the wide variety of lesson activities contained in the book.  They would appeal to new or indeed, experienced teachers, to enjoy using and I have added a few of them below:

Each lesson has a set amount of clear, logical stages, and thus it makes it an engaging book for any teacher to work through.

I can't wait to try some of the lessons out in real time, and hopefully this will happen in the very near future :-)

The authors have included a free sample chapter for people to view, and it is available via their website here:

http://talkingimagesidioms.com/sample-chapter

Once again I would like to extend my warmest congratulations to Lucy and Sharlene, a dynamic duo who have worked so hard to achieve this dream of self publishing their materials.

I would highly recommend this excellent teachers' resource book, and it is a truly......

........achievement for them both.

I hope I have given teachers, who are reading this post, a little taster of what the book is for and about.

You can find out all the details of how to purchase it via the writers' own website 'Talking Images: Idioms'

http://talkingimagesidioms.com/

There is also a great competition to win a signed copy for free, and details are on the Lake School of English Facebook page:

Lucy and Sharlene have created their own 'Talking Images: Idioms' Facebook page where you can view comments and updates as they occur:

https://www.facebook.com/talkingimagesidioms

To enter the competition, you need to like their Facebook page, and post a funny sentence, using your favourite idiom.  If your entry makes them laugh the most, you could be .....

If you do win a copy, please DO make sure to add a comment here to let me know!

Best of luck!

Congratulations to the Lake School of English!

In 2018 the Lake School of English will proudly be celebrating its 40th year as a hugely successful English language school in Oxford.  This is an enormous achievement, and a glowing testimony to the two dedicated directors, Carmel and Susan, and each and every single member of the hardworking members of staff.

In recognition of this incredible landmark number of years, there is currently a special promotional offer for earlybird bookings!

Link to Lake School page with more details of this special limited offer is here

Also, for the recent British Council Inspection in August 2017, the school achieved 14 points of strength out of a possible total of 15.  Again this is great cause for celebration and congratulations.

Below a screenshot of the Instagram page with news of the outstanding success:

In addition, the Lake School has been nominated yet again by the EL Gazette as one of the UK's Top 100 British Council accredited English Language Centres in 2017, and it is currently in third position.

You can read more information on the Lake School of English News page here

A personal message of congratulations was sent to the school using one of my favourite comic tools.

I am proud to be associated with the Lake School, and I wish the whole team all the very best for the future.  May it continue to provide an excellent and outstanding teaching service for many more years to come!!

If you wish to read more about the school and all it has to offer the discerning EFL student / teacher, then the website offers a comprehensive overview of everything you need to know.

Link: https://www.englishinoxford.com/

You can follow and read all the latest news from the Lake School on Twitter and on Facebook!

Summer Teaching at the Lake!

I think I am now .........

regarding blogging for the moment!

This rather belated post is going to be about my teaching at the Lake School of English during the summer months from July through to October this year.

Comic tool used: http://www.professorgarfield.org/pgf_comics_lab.html

I had the great pleasure to teach a variety of levels ranging from AO (Complete Beginner) to B2+ (Upper Intermediate).  All the learners were wonderfully receptive and I enjoyed teaching each individual class.  It was also as usual, fantastic to be back in the staffroom and be an active member of the dynamic teaching team.

If you are on Facebook, you can see the many social activities that are organized by the school, and it is plain to see that all the students are happy with their studies and with the school in general.

Lake School Facebook Page:  https://www.facebook.com/TheLakeSchoolofEnglishOxford/

Never Stop Learning
Not having taught in a physical classroom for a number of months, I was pleased to see that I slipped straight back in as if I had never been away.  This was encouraging, and over the nine weeks I challenged myself to be creative and try out new lessons whenever possible.

Whilst in Oxford, in September, I quietly celebrated my 38th year of being an EFL teacher / Teacher Trainer.  Looking back on my very first day of teachng at the Briam Institute in Madrid in 1979, I was able to reflect on how things have changed since those early days when I was a novice teacher. I guess the most important  point I have learned along the way is to always strive to develop as a teacher, and to never stop learning.

I will outline some of the tools I used in my lessons. They are tried and tested ones, and I have used them time and again to create colourful visual aids to help motivate my learners.

The Joy of Teaching Teens

I taught classes mostly consisting of adult learners but also included a lot of Under 18s.  I particularly enjoyed teaching a group of Teens from Switzerland, who really kept me on my toes and forced me to think quickly during the lessons.

I hadn't taught a specific teenager class for a little while and with a 40 year+ age difference, I asked myself this pertinent question:

 'How can I motivate these lively teens and hold their interest, and how on earth can I gain an insight into their psyche and interests in a short period of time?'

Well, the lessons worked out fine and I found the learners to be very knowledgeable with a good level of English and keen to communicate.  The age gap did not make any difference to how I felt about teaching them and I really enjoyed the buzz from their collective energy. 

The following articles make for interesting reading:

• Teaching Teenagers, English Teaching Professional, Issue 23, 2002 
• Teen Power,  English Teaching Professional, Issue 39, July 2005
• Teenagers! Motivating the teenage brain, MET, Vol 13, No 4, 2004
• Motivating Teens to Use English (and not L1) in Class, ELT Chat summary, 19/01/2011 
• How to motivate teens to extend their speaking activities, ELT Chat summary, March 15, 2011

This article written by Tiziana Angiolini , outlines a summary of a presentation she attended called Motivating Teens and Youngsters

I have bookmarked it as essential reading for my next class of teens in the future.  Thanks Tiziana!

Jazz Chants

What the class above seemed to enjoy most of all was doing Jazz Chants.  This was a good way of drilling them on stress patterns in a fun way.  I asked them to create their own jazz / rap chants to recycle some phrasal verbs I had taught them and then to recite them in front of the class.  It helped that one of the students was a keen rapper, so he offered to keep the dialogues flowing in a rap style by beating the rhythm on the desk to keep the flow moving smoothly.  They did really well on this activity and although they had protested at the beginning that they didn't really like studying phrasal verbs, it was amazing how many verbs came up in their rap chants and all were used in a great context.  I wish I had recorded a few of them!

The Wonderful World of Word Clouds

I used word clouds very often in my lessons for recycling / revision purposes, as lesson summaries and as vocabulary pre-teaching.

Below a selection of lesson ideas using WordArt

A summary of one of my classes.  The umbrella shape was chosen because it had rained during some of the lessons and I had asked the students if they had all brought their brollies with them!

Here is a summary of the Green Room class I taught.  The bike represents my cycling to work every day!  The cloud shows what topics we covered in one of the weeks and some adjectives about the group, who were receptive and hardworking!!

Below a summary of a 1-1 lesson, where we had a cup of tea whilst discussing a wide variety of social topics around the world...

Below a smiley word cloud to recycle phrasal verbs with 'OFF' particle:

Below a word cloud used with my AO class to review family vocabulary relevant to them:

Reviewing some classroom language with this Beginner group:

I asked B2 students to create a dialogue / short story using some of these verbs in the cloud as prompts:

In the example word cloud below, you can see some informal English expressions which were included in a lesson from OK 4 book.  I simply added them into a word cloud and used it for revision and recycling purposes.  The students were given a copy to refer to.

The general feedback I received was that learners liked the word clouds very much as it / they helped them to remember the expressions in a memorable and visual manner.

 Using Comics to Motivate Learners

I love using comics in my classes as they can be powerful learning tools for learners. My scoop it site contains many links to comic creation sites and information on how comics can be used in a challenging, creative, and pedagogical manner:

https://www.scoop.it/t/comics-and-cartoons

Here is a comic I created a while back and I always use it when presenting phrasal verbs. 

Asking questions about the weekend using informal expressions:

Some sentences my students created with 'OFF' phrasal verbs transfered into comic form:

Mind Mapping Introduction!

I used Popplet mind map to create a simple introduction to myself, and students had to ask me questions to find out more information.  They were then invited to do the same.

Quizlet

I used this tool for revision and recycling of colloquial expressions with one of my groups.  I invited  members of the class to go to the computer and then the rest of the class had to help them complete the tasks.

                                        
This was great fun and the students were invited to create their own flashcard sets if they wanted to.

Newspaper Info

Summary

The time spent teaching face to face during the summer months went by too quickly. Teaching is in my blood, and I guess it is one of the most satisfying jobs one can ever do.  Of course it all depends on the students, the staff, and the working environment.

All three aspects and many others were absolutely .........

Another post about the Lake School will be written soon. I will include a mention of a very special landmark event for the school in 2018!!

It's been a while......

.........since I last posted, and I am now going to set thngs right, before even more time passes.

The honest reason for my recent lack of posts is that I simply lost 'the flow'.  I have discovered over the years that writing blog posts is a special art form and you need to be creative and be in the right frame of mind.

I have decided to reignite this lost 'flow' by planning to write 5 special posts, over the coming weeks, on topics which have inspired me recently.

• Summer school teaching at the Lake School of English, Oxford
• Lake School of English successful BC Inspection result, and 40th Anniversary in 2018
• Bumper Olive picking harvest November 2017
• Little Free Library of Abruzzo Initiative
• Roccascalegna Castle, Abruzzo

Watch this space!!

The Lake School of English: News Update

The Lake School of English has recently been awarded 14 points of strength out of a total of 15, credited by the British Council.  It continues to be a Centre of Excellence in 2013. You can read all about it, and view the full British Council Inspection 2013 report here.

 Image of bus from Bus slogan generator

It is now one of only two UK schools to have received this outstanding result. I would like to wish all its dedicated group of directors and staff my heartfelt congratulations!

I was lucky enough to be in the staffroom when the result came in several weeks ago and I was able to enjoy the joyous atmosphere and impromptu celebratory drinks with a few members of staff.  After I had spent 2 hugely enjoyable weeks running a Creative Teaching for Secondary Schools course, this fantastic news was the final icing on the cake.

This truly outstanding accreditation is fully deserved and I am proud to be associated with the Lake School.  Having first walked in to the establishment in 1982 and hired on the spot to do a 1-1 session the following week, I have always felt a part of its rich and vibrant history.  I know very well how incredibly hard everyone works in all aspects of the running of the school, always paying great attention to every little detail.

I have four personal photo albums spanning from the 1980s to the present day.  These memories will one day be a vibrant reminder of my time spent at the school and will be something to treasure forever.

There have been many celebrations of fantastic achievements by the school in the past, but this one I believe tops them all, as it is the most current, and it means so much to everyone. Well done!!!

Font above created with Font Image generator

 

Photo of Fireworks by @eltpics. Link to original source: http://www.flickr.com/photos/eltpics/6325716290/sizes/m/in/set-72157627956640513/

Quattro!

Janet's Abruzzo Edublog is proud to announce its fourth birthday.  My blog has been going for four enjoyable years, and I hope to continue writing on it for many more years to come.  Last year I didn't celebrate, and I vowed I would in 2012, after reading this blog post by Natasa.

My blogging adventure started four years ago.  Since then, I have written and published over 400 posts, on a wide range of subjects.  These include teaching English to students and teachers, thoughts on educational technology matters, experiments with many Web 2.0 tools, and my own lesson ideas and materials. In addition, I have posted my opinions of the beautiful region of Abruzzo, where I am currently living.

I would like to say a very big thank you to all my readers and viewers. I feel incredibly honoured and humbled that viewers from 171 countries from around the world have at one time or another taken the time to read one of my posts. Below are screenshots taken just now of the different countries.  The first shows the top countries from the Clustrs list that is in my dashboard.
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The second shows the countries where readers have visited occasionally:

Here you have a current view of the world map:

...and another view:

The most popular posts being viewed today include some which are over two years old!

Fun at the Lake is one of my most recent posts, and outlines some of the activties and lessons that I taught recently at the Lake School of English, Oxford.

Why do I blog? There are many reasons, but the most important ones are as follows:

• to share my teaching ideas
• to share my presentations and webinars
• to share my experiments with using new tools
• to reflect on my teaching
• to reflect on my experience of online courses
• to have a repository for my thoughts on teaching
• to connect with teachers and educators from all over the world
• to connect with my PLN
• to write my personal reflections on conferences I attend
• to write book reviews
• to write about my life in Abruzzo
• to connect with other bloggers via my sidebar

Once again I would like to say a very big .......

......... for reading my blog!! 

Fun at the Lake

Jumping back into the Lake School of English, Oxford,  after a period of time away is always a refreshing change.  Face to face teaching is still such a thrill for me personally, after all these years, and I enjoy the experience enormously.  The three directors, Susan, Carmel and Lilly are wonderfully supportive, and the dedicated group of  friendly teachers and staff are a real joy to work with.

The Lake School of English has been featured in the EL Gazette in 2010, 2011 and 2012 as a Centre of Excellence.

This time round in September, I taught two General English courses, Elementary and Pre-Intermediate level - my favourites!  The students were a fabulous mixed bunch from Poland, Turkey, The Ivory Coast, Spain, Angola and Italy.

Having taught complete beginners for a whole year in Dresden, I have a particular soft spot for teaching lower levels.  The reponsibility of establishing a solid foundation right from the beginning, is quite vital.  If a teacher does not oversee a student's development at this critical stage it could lead to a lifetime of fossilized errors taking hold.  I enjoy being the lead teacher of an elementary group, so I can set up a strict focus on accuracy right from the beginning.  Trying to undo errors which have become fossilized at a much later stage can be a nightmare..

I decided I wanted to introduce a Blended learning element into this itineration of sessions and therefore any homework I set also had the option of being sent back to me by email.  A few of the students welcomed this opportunity and I was delighted to receive regular online tasks submitted.  I was able to give immediate feedback and  a good working relationship was established from the outset.  Mixing an online element with the f2f element gave me the chance to experiment with various tools to send to the students as feedback encouragement as follows:

Once again I used my Project366 blog for and in my lessons, and it was a useful place to keep materials and resources in one site.

Below you can see a word cloud I used as a warmer for students to guess my likes and dislikes connected to food and drink.  Can you guess what I like / dislike eating & drinking?

 I created an Animoto "Around Town" which was used in my lessons to teach vocabulary of places.

Try our video maker at Animoto.

We studied some make and do expressions and I had fun creating a new lesson.  You can see some of the lesson activities embedded in a Youblisher e-booklet format below.



I showed the class my weekend in the shape of a TagxedoWord Cloud flower, and then got them to create one for themselves, if they wished as homework to show to the class.

To get us in the mood for the weekend ahead, we listened to Rebecca Black's (in)famous Friday song.  Before the all-important singing stage, the students had to predict what the song was going to be about by viewing the words below:

My final message on my blog to the lovely students I taught. This cartoon was created with ToonDo. Picture frame by Tuxpi.

Now I am back in Abruzzo, I can keep up to date with Lake School news by checking into the Lake School of English Facebook page.

The Lake School is also on Twitter and you can follow regular updates from @EnglishinOxford.

Thanks to everyone at the Lake School for making it such a memorable teaching experience for me!
See you all again very soon :-))