Primarily, insights into my learning on a Masters distance course with the University of Nottingham.
In his article, Creative Writing for Language Learners (and Teachers), Maley (2009) highlights the value of creative writing to combine, intuition, close observation, and personal memories. According to James (2006), a learner can be creative with their language when they only have a little to play with. Within the confines of creativity there is a…
After reading Gill James article, Writing Creatively in Another Language, I feel inspired by all the possible activites that can be offered to differing levels of students: 1. Write a Haiku on any topic (five, seven, five syllable combination) The (beginner) learner, – confirms what they know about the language – gives some attention to the…
In order to develop a reflective approach to my language teaching, I’d like to share details of two of my weekly classes – Class 1: two 40 minute lessons per week About the Student: 121 with bubbly, 8 year Chinese girl. Course: Trinity 4 preparation (exam apparently booked some time in March) Issues (i) fatigue…
Revisiting the Gap between SLA Researchers and Language Teachers by David Block discusses gap or a mismatch between theories of SLA and practices, whereby the way in which we teach languages is often un- or ill – related to the findings of researchers in Second Language Acquisition. This topic resonates with me now as, just…
How do Learners acquire their Second Language? On our Forum this week, my classmate Victoria started us off by sharing her beliefs about how learners go about picking up a new language. I agreed with her view that there is a fundamental difference between second language learning, which is formal, and ‘by the book’, and,…
Adam House, host of TEFLCast, breaks down the fundamentals of online gaming within virtual worlds, and we uncover some striking parallels with the basic tenets of teaching and learning. Part Two According to the ‘End of the Year’ update from Bungie, the producer of online game Destiny, 13 million had people played Destiny, creating…
Creative Fluency vs. Creative Accuracy The author of Writing Creatively in Another Language Gill James, believes that even beginner learners can be creative in the way they use a foreign language. I agree, and place fluency, which allows for creativity, as a first objective in my classroom, over accuracy. A controversial stance, perhaps. And that’s…
What is Flash Fiction? Actually, our first creative writing task was not the first time I had come across the term flash fiction. Indeed, it is through seeking out fun ways to learn Chinese that I began to think about how to make writing Chinese characters, just that little more enjoyable. I have spent considerable…
Advanced Language Teaching: Technology-Enhanced Creative Writing This week, officially, week 19 of the academic year, I begin two new modules. The first of which is Technology-Enhanced Creative Writing (for Advanced Learners). I’m very excited to start this ‘hands-on’ module where I expect to not only learn how to make my own creative writing activities, but…
Second Language Acquisition and Language Teaching Being very much interested in the process of learning languages, I look forward to starting this new module where I hope to uncover the fundamentals of second language acquisition and better understand how to apply these theories to my classroom practice. Check out my video self-introduction, where I introduce…