Pete Sharma Associates

We had a great time at the PSA Christmas party. Not sure who sneaked in a video camera, but the video has now appeared on the web. We hope you enjoy it. It is only available until mid January 2012, so see it while you can.
http://elfyourself.jibjab.com/view/FsWRDZ202idVROhS

I’m really pleased that George Drivas, the Head of the Department of Foreign Languages at Doukas Schools is posting over a copy of his book Education, learning and training in a Digital Society (Express Publishing). I understand this is a practical handbook which aims “to help educators to become aware of the digital learning environments”.

Not only that, I believe I’ll meet the author himself next January. On Saturday 21 January 2012, I’ll be at the Hellenic American Union, Athens giving a talk for the Panhellenic Association of Accredited Quality Language Schools. Then on Sunday, I’ll be at TESOL Greece, Patras.

See the Events page for more details of the talks.

I haven’t been to Greece for many, many years and I’ve never been to a TESOL conference there – so I’m really looking forward to this trip!

To what extent is there a divide between the world of academia and the world of the language classroom?

Well, as an RSA trained-teacher with a Diploma, I embarked on an Masters. I went to a (fantastic) conference about computers in language teaching in Barcelona where I first met the Dude (aka Gavin) & saw on the programme the following names: Mark Warschauer, Catherine Doughty, Carol Chapelle, Martha Pennington. I picked up my Bibliography for the Masters and anyone who was anyone in the booklist was at this conference! Holy schmolly. In the hallowed world of CALL, theory, research and SLA, these were mythical figures.As a teacher, I never heard of any of them.

Now we have our practitioners book out there, (400 ideas, in case anyone has forgotten), I am spending this Christmas reading Interactive whiteboards for education: theory, research and practice, Edited by Michael Thomas M. & Eulin-Cutrim Schmid  (2010).  A mere 314 pages, heavier than a door-stop.

I’m preparing for running a session for the Research group at Warwick University, and for the Pro-T conference in Argentina. I’m delighted to consider the link between theory and practice. Like great contrarians, I have decided to work backwards from what we do in real life to what the research shows.  Tee hee.  After all, wikipedia could never exist in theory…………

Interactive whiteboards for education: theory, research and practice, Edited by Michael Thomas M. & Eulin-Cutrim Schmid  (2010), published by Hershey, PA (USA): IGI Global. ISBN: 978-1-61520-715-2.

I have a dice app on my mobile phone. You can different dice – 6-sided, 4-sided, etc. – and also flip coins. My three-year-old son likes playing with this app and today he decided that he only wanted coins on the screen. There were, however, two dice still there. He came to me to get rid of them, and as I was in the middle of cooking dinner, I told him he had to first press the minus sign, and then tap the items he wanted removed. Unfortunately, his initial stabs hit adjacent coins, causing them to disappear. I was just about to say I would help him shortly, when, to my amazement, I saw him drag the coins that were overlapping the die away from the area before successfully tapping the die to remove it.

The thing is, he has never been shown how to use the touch screen, he just did something to solve the problem in a way that seemed appropriate to him. And it worked! In fact, this is more often the case than not, so it is a pity that more adults don’t have a stab and see if it works. A less complicated view of technology use could help us all perhaps.

I am really delighted to say that the first in a new series of blog posts has just gone up. These posts are written for the language training organisation marcus evans Linguarama. These posts are available to everyone in the language teaching profession on the Linguarama blog.

Over the coming months, this series of posts will be looking at technology in language teaching, along with other aspects of business English and language teaching.

Visit: http://blog.linguarama.com/

Webinar: 400 Ideas for Interactive Whiteboards

Here are all the LINKS  and MATERIALS from today’s webinar:

Download Barney Barrett’s fantastic lesson using Google Earth – Directions giving directions

Watch the authors of 400 Ideas on Macmillan ELT’s YouTube channel

Download a template for generating ideas for use with an IWB template

Read Wayne Trottman’s insightful review of our sumptuous tome http://www.waynetrotman.com/wp/?p=643

Download free updates to Blended Learning http://www.macmillanenglish.com/methodology/books/Blended-Learning.htm

Read out about future IWB webinar from Barbara Gardner on the IATEFL Learning Technology webinars http://ltsig.org.uk/

Find out about the English UK training day on IWBs in London next February http://www.englishuk.com/en/training/training-days

Find out 1 and 2-day training courses in IWBs for ELT from PSA (aka acronym city) http://www.psa.eu.com/training/courses/three-hour-modules

PSA one

PSA two

Visit iTILT Interactive Technologies in Language Teaching http://itilt.eu/

Read a version of the article ’10 things to do with an IWB’ published in Modern English Teacher Vol 19 Number 1 January 2010 IWB

Don’t forget – if you have any post-webinar thoughts or questions, you can always use the Comment box below!

400 Ideas for using Interactive Whiteboards

Pete Sharma

This webinar will not cover ’400 Ideas for using Interactive Whiteboards’. It will, however, look at a number of practical teaching ideas, and explore how the IWB has changed our approach to way we teach grammar, vocabulary and pronunciation; how we deal with the four language skills of listening, reading, speaking and writing; and finally, ideas for language games. The session will also cover hardware and software and mention a key publication in the field which focuses on theory and research, complementing the latest book (400 Ideas) in the Macmillan Books for Teachers series. The session is aimed at both experienced IWB users and those new to the technology. Many of the practical ideas in this presentation can be used with a simple lap-top and data projector.

Visit: http://www.macmillanenglish.com/BlankTemplate.aspx?id=43108