BELTA goes to Glasgow: 51st IATEFL Conference (Part Three)
09/04/2017 - 15:54
This final post about the IATEFL Conference in Glasgow combines my experiences from Wednesday and Thursday. I am sorry that it is late, but as I mentioned in my previous post, I needed to finish my presentation for Thursday on Wednesday evening, and this conference is exhausting! Then on Thursday evening, I had dinner with some lovely Belgians (you can read more about that in the post) and let left for ‘sunny’ Belgium on Friday morning. So, from the comfort of my own home, I am writing this last post in which I try to link the experiences of Wednesday and Thursday. If you have comments about my posts, please don’t hesitate to add a comment!
As I mentioned in my introduction, I am sorry for being late with this post. A five-day conference is, equally, exciting and exhausting. And, it certainly doesn’t help that your presentation needs to be fine-tuned the night before your presentation. Lesson learned! In this final post from Glasgow (via my home in Antwerp), I will try to condense the last two days that I attended into one post.
Both days became with exceptional plenaries. Before I venture into the two plenary speakers, I have to say that this year’s conference featured great plenaries. Sometimes, one or more the plenaries are clunkers, but not this year. Sarah Mercer’s plenary on Wednesday, ‘Connecting minds: language learner and teacher psychologies’ and JJ Wilson’s plenary on Thursday, ‘ELT and social justice: opportunities in a time of chaos’, were excellent and thought-provoking.
Mercer, from the University of Graz (Austria), spoke about the need for teachers to be ‘psychologically-wise’ because ‘psychologically-wise’ teachers can make huge differences in the lives of their learners, daily. She offered three principles of ‘psychologically-wise’ teachers. ‘Psychologically-wise’ teachers…
Develop positive relationships.
Focus on growth and positivity.
Nurture their own professional well-being.
She then illustrated each point with relevant research and thoughtful examples. As you are sitting in a conference auditorium after spending a lot of money to travel, stay, eat and attend the conference, it was good to hear that one’s attendance at an event like IATEFL 2017 was helping a person to rethink and reach these three critical, yet simple, points. I suggest that everyone take a look at Mercer’s plenary by going to the recording on the IATEFL Online site.
Wilson’s plenary also gave all 3000 of us in attendance something to think about. When I first read the title, I was apprehensive about attending. I do think that teachers need to be careful and trend lightly when it comes to social justice. I chose to attend because I have heard Wilson speak before and I knew that no matter the final message, listening to his talk would affect me. It did. With Brexit and the election of Trump, the world has changed (at least for me). I guess I was walking through life with rose-coloured glasses. It is our jobs to keep our mouths open and realise that teaching is never neutral. Wilson offered some practical tips for promoting social justice through activities; not a methodology, but a materials approach that opens our eyes and the eyes of our students. Again, I think watching his plenary should be required (it will be in my class next year). Check it out on the IATEFL Online site as well.
It was good that I saw Wilson’s plenary the day after I attended a session by Angelos Bollas from CELT Athens. Angelos’ session was recommended by another colleague, who knows I am always on the lookout for good, engaging speakers to invite to Belgium. His talk was based on his research, ‘De-idealising the heteronormative self in the ELT classroom’ was a thought-provoking and question-raising experience. Normally I stay away from these ‘issue’ oriented sessions, but I am glad that I attended. As a gay man in the ELT field, I have never felt like my identity was minimized, but after listening to his talk (and listening to Wilson’s plenary), I realized that it could be. Are our materials too focused on one limited view of the world? Is ELT white-washed? And by ‘white-washed’, I mean straight. Maybe so. I have never turned my back on my sexual identify, but here in Belgium it is very easy to be a gay man in the teaching profession. My students and my colleagues never question nor minimize my identity, but after listening to Angelos’ session I realized that many students that we teach (not just homosexual, but also ethnically diverse students) might feel minimized. Language is culture and culture equals identity; therefore, we should all strive to be more inclusive in our selection of materials and conscious of the effects our choice can have on our students, especially if we want to build positive relationships like any good ‘psychologically-wise’ teacher. By the way the IATEFL Online also offers interviews with some of the people in attendance; Scott Thornbury interviewed Angelos about his thought-provoking session. Check it out!
Enough preaching! (Sorry for that; sometimes you don’t realize the effect that something has had on you until you reflect.)
Part of having attended the IATEFL Conference for several years is meeting up with old friends and making new ones. On Wednesday and Thursday, I spent some time putting aside my agenda and checking out familiar faces. Unfortunately, I had missed Rob Howard’s session on Tuesday. Rob will be speaking at BELTA Day, and I apologised to him, and he – as also – was understanding. But I did get to see a few people who I enjoy listening to. One is Bruno Leys. Bruno has spoken at a previous BELTA Day, and we run into each other a couple times a year at different events. I always enjoy Bruno’s presentations and this year it was no different. I think that Bruno does an excellent job of talking about and presenting examples of a lexicalized grammar approach. His session was even more interesting than usual because the session just before his was – in a word – AWFUL. I won’t be the ‘mean girl’ that names names, but after listening to the session before Bruno’s, one could have been truly turned off grammar teaching as nothing more than b******t. Bruno’s session was practical. Bruno often presents in and around Belgium, so make sure you check out his ‘Grammar rules, OK?’ session if you get a chance.
I made a point of visiting Laura Patsko’s session ‘How to give feedback on learners’ pronunciation.’ Laura has presented at BELTA Day and has given a webinar on pronunciation; her sessions are always well-attended, practical and informative. She offered a frame for helping teachers manage pronunciation training in the classroom. I suggest you check it out; she was sponsored by Cambridge and Cambridge recorded all their sessions, which you find at IATEFL Talks. Another person I visited was BELTA Day 2017 speaker Ron Morrain. Ron is a great talker who offers practical tips and advice to his audience. At our conference, his double-session will be very hands-on! In a way, his talk (Mind Mapping for Business English and Coaching) was an introduction to his talk about Mind Maps for BELTA Day. Ron has done some amazing work with mind maps, but in a way that might surprise many participants. His session – like all the BELTA Day 2017 sessions – is a not-to-be-missed moment. Finally, I saw (and finally met face-to-face) Georgios Chatzis, the TESOL Greece Chair. I first saw Georgios two years ago at a session he gave on grammar; it was good that I invited him to give a webinar for BELTA. I am hoping that by meeting Georgios face-to-face that we can start a formal partnership between our two organizations. Georgios’ session was of great interest to me because I teach adults at Linguapolis at the University of Antwerp. More and more of my students want to take and pass a qualifying exam. Georgios gave some reasons why we should be working in a more collaborative environment and some tips for Google Docs to facilitate this.
I often attend sessions dealing with technology, which I have a great interest in. I should be careful not to overdo the technology workshops. In my last post, I spoke about a piece of software that I thought could be helpful with my teacher trainers; I am happy to say that I spoke directly with the sales reps and signed up for a free pilot. Now, I need to convince my colleague and my boss that we should follow through. So, it was good that I attended four additional technology-focus workshops. One workshop, by a fellow American, focused on a song project; it was not an earth-shattering workshop, but it did get me thinking about how I could rework some of my oral projects. I have been working not only with my own students but other language teachers at the University of Antwerp on good sites for creating online materials, so I went to David Read’s session. He demonstrated some tools I was unaware of. This was followed by a session on ‘Videos created by students as their assessment’. This was a great session (one of presenters was sadly out-of-touch with the material), but I did think of different ways to organize some of my assessments. Finally, I attended Fiona Mauchline’s excellent session on ‘Silent videos’. She had some great ideas for using visuals (her specialty) in the classroom.
Finally, I attended two sessions on extensive reading, which is a major topic in my English 5 course for teacher trainees and one session on vocabulary, which got me rethinking the notion of a vocabulary notebook. All-in-all, it was a great conference. Now, I just need to organize all my new information into a usable action plan!!
For me, the conference ended when I had dinner on Thursday evening with some of the other Belgian participants. I reconnected with old friends (Marleen Peters and Chan Roovers), had in-depth conversations with new friends (Mario Lecluyze and Mark Van Dongen), and met a new friend (Kris Denewet). It was an amazing end to an amazing conference.
But, before I sign off for good, I have to play ‘fan boy’ for a minute. On Wednesday, I introduced myself to Mr David Crystal and to his lovely wife, Hillary Crystal. I have been corresponding with them for months now about BELTA Day. I wanted them to see my face before they arrived in Belgium on 12 May for our conference on 13 May. Wow – you couldn’t meet two more amazing people than the Crystals! I was like a 13-old boy meeting his football hero! I can’t wait to see them in May when we will have more time to talk and get to know each other.
Thank you taking the time to read this blog. Maybe next year, you can write about your experiences at IATEFL Brighton for us!
