TEFL All Inclusive

  Kolk, Melinda.  earthdrawn.jpg . Oct-00. Pics4Learning For a number of months now I have been taking groups of students on virtual tours to all corners of the world, and beyond! We have been learning about different countries, increasing vocabulary, improving  communication and cooperation skills and growing in autonomy. In this lesson, I wanted the learners to reflect that, although enriching, there is always an environmental price to pay when travelling. Like many others, I have recently been commenting on the continued patchy cover of environmental issues in tefl materials. As well as this, I have noticed that interest in this topic is not continued over time by many teachers. They will address some small aspect of the environment in one or two lessons, then that's it! There also seems to be a general lack of ideas about how to incorporate resources into interesting and motivating lessons. I feel that it is important to do what you can to remedy this – no matter ho...

Photo by Free Birds on Unsplash If you have students who are interested in art and culture, this is the perfect virtual tour for them! It is suitable for all, as the resources I made are all easily adaptable for all levels. As always, these virtual tours have a strong focus on learner autonomy and group participation and communication. In particular, this session will help the students to develop listening skills in a variety of ways. They will use Total Physical Response (TPR), Higher Order Thinking Skills (HOTS), and collaborative and cooperative learning throughout. To lead in and create interest in the topic, I created a simple Zoom poll to get the group talking about art galleries in their countries. After this, they are asked for their ideas about the location of the virtual tour. I elicited that it was France and that it was The Louvre and one of the students was able to guess the Mona Lisa.  The students then take part in a sensory activity, designed to stimulate the...

  Photo by >>> niedblog.de on Unsplash My latest virtual tour is to the world-renowned Kruger National Park in South Africa. It became South Africa’s first national park in 1926 and is the largest game reserve in the country. Kruger National Park is reportedly home to 500 species of birds, as well as 100 reptiles and almost 150 mammals. In addition to taking a 4x4 safari   with the ranger, which is what we do on the virtual tour, visitors can take take a bush walk or view the park from a hot air balloon. This session has a strong focus on learner autonomy running throughout all the activities.   We use peer teaching for vocabulary building,   a KWL graphic organizer to allow the students to take more control over their own learning and track their own progress and to decide if they have met their objectives, a quiz where the students are in charge of the questions, and finally we use an activity based on Twitter to allow for self-reflection. To activate...