Teacher training, ESL & EFL
I am collecting evaluations of various teacher training programs for this section of my site. If you'd like to share your expereince in a teacher training program, please email jtrotta@gmail.com.
I've completed two teacher training programs, my CELTA in 2001 and my Master of Applied Linguistics in 2004. While I learned something during each program, I was not satisfied with either. Currently, I am a teacher trainer in the TESOL certificate program at Sookmyung Women's University.
I hope to collect articles in this section of my site to help teachers make informed decisions about enrolling in teacher training programs and to help teacher trainers improve their programs.
Since I hate saying only a little, why not see if the latest entries on my Teaching English in Korea blog are of any interest to you?
Raiders of the Lost Ark opening action sequenceHere's the video that goes with this lesson: Raiders of the Lost Ark passive voice They cut out the first few minutes and you miss the donkey being tied up and Indy whipping the gun out of the guy's hand....Slowmo shopping in Home DepotSlow motion shopping in Home Depot (in Manhattan). Kind of funny but I want to show my students what these big DIY stores look like because they don't exist in Korea: Just a little extra just in case... Tony beats...Link to Friends video for discourse activityThis is the middle 7 minutes from the season 3 episode, "The One Where No One's Ready". I use the phone conversation that starts at around 5:00 to about 6:50. There's nothing wrong with playing from the beginning to give...Very tough questions on racism in AmericaIn this article the author complains that the "Empowerment Experiment" - in which black Americans give all their business to other blacks - is being applauded while if whites decided to go only to white businesses they would be branded...How far behind are US schools?There are some interesting points in this article. The author argues that the US is not as far behind as we have been led to believe and points out several ways the public has been misled. However, the author also...More Youtube videos students can practice describingThe Sopranos scenes made for an interesting class. The scenes themselves were pretty surprising. Once I made it clear that I wanted students to be as detailed as possible in their descriptions and that the point was to stretch their...Sopranos clips for ESL conversation / discussuion classesIt's tough to find Sopranos scenes for classroom use. But it's fun looking for them and I want to use scenes from the best TV show ever... This one has no cursing and students can work on telling the story...Special events in US cultureWedding photos: Wake: Burials: The first one is not like my experience where people throw in flowers endlessly. The second is longer, has the military flag ceremony, and has everybody holding a single flower which they will, I assume, next...ETS, the Evil Testing Satans, strike againI hate ETS. I scheduled a GRE for July 2009 and now have to reschedule. So I try to reschedule for July 2010 - which they have in their drop down menu. But choose July or any month in 2010...North American humorSome jokes to share with students. I think I managed to pick relatively clean clips but with so many dirty jokes out there you never know. Actually the one with a collection of jokes about McCain / Palin definitely gets...Some music for ESL classesHere's a link to Don't Cry by Guns n Roses. Here's a link to some simple vocab matching and cloze exercises Here's a link to Boy in Ohio. Here's a link to an online vocab & cloze class....A public forum debate example from a US high schoolPublic Forum Debate is one of the three popular forms of academic debate in America and I think probably the best for EFL classes. here's a video from a US high school debate on the following resolution / topic: Resolved:...Honest, funny poster ad conversation activityOne neat speaking activity is to have students design ads for whatever products they choose. I like to show some scenes from the movie Crazy People to get them in the mood to be creative and funny. I ask that...What would you do if you were going to teach unreal conditionals?I'd use the Bare Naked Ladies' song, "If I Had a Million Dollars": Sometimes Youtube disables music so make sure it's working before busting this out in class. Most Youtube videos of this song have some improv when they talk...English language jokesDo you talk about jokes in your ESL classes?A very successful lawyer parked his brand-new Lexus in front of his office, ready to show it off to his colleagues. As he got out, a truck passed too close and tore...
