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Editorial

Dear HLT Readers,

Welcome to the December issue of HLT. December? Already? You must be joking!

As usual I will start with Pilgrims News. This time we will share with you a transcript of an interview Mercedes Pérez Berbain conducted with Chaz Pugliese, Director of Education and Teacher Training at Pilgrims, and Hanna (Hania) Kryszewska, Editor of HLT mag, both Pilgrims trainers, on the subject of humanism in language teaching today. The interview was originally recorded for an asynchronous online course we have created and built online for Orient BlackSwan, India. So far Pilgrims trainers have developed 3 courses for Orient BlackSwan: Leadership for Teachers, 21st Century Skills, and Teaching the Whole Person: Humanising Language Teaching. At the moment we are working on our fourth course: Teaching Young Learners. All the courses are to be used for Continuous Professional Development (CPD).

To continue with the theme of Teacher Training (TT) and Continuous Professional Development (CPD), in this issue you will find the following articles: Telegram as a Tool for Remote Teacher Training by Juana Sagaray, and Maria Teresa Fernandez and Wendy Arnold, What is Important in Teacher Education voices collected by Hanna Kryszewska, How a Teacher-coach Can Instil Intrinsic Motivation by Emmanuelle Betham, and What is ‘Zoom Fatigue’ and How Does It Affect Language Teachers?, by Lindsay Clandfield and Jill Hadfield.

There is more on using IT in education in: Using Microbreaks in Online Language Teaching by Lindsay Clandfield and Jill Hadfield, Flipped Classroom by Edpuzzle in the Context of Freshmen’s Learning ELF by Mai Tran Thi Thanh, and Using Netflix in the EFL Classroom – An Example by Anna Pereszlényi.

Other themes in this issue are culture and intercultural communication (Lessons in Intercultural Communication … from Teenagers by Paul Dummett, and Samir Salama, and  Similarities Found Between Cultures of Korea and Manipur by Ahanthem Romita Devi) and collaboration (Metacognitively Speaking: Collaborate, Communicate and Connect by Michael Yosef, and Peer Feedback in Formative Learning by Valentina Batagelj).

There are two contributions on pronunciation: (Ways to Learn Different Accents of English by Robert Macro, and Mid-Atlantic English in the EFL Context: Research into the Linguistic Mixing of British and American English, reviewed by the author himself - Andy Mering).

he C Group have contributed 4 articles to this issue: Flash Fiction by Jamie Keddie, Making Short Stories out of Your Life Experiences by Andrew Wright, The Efate Novelists by Brian Tomlinson, and Growing Up by Péter Medgyes.

Some of the C Group members are involved in organising or will be presenting or attending the MATSDA Conference. For more information look below.

 

The MATSDA/Bilingual International School Conference

Materials for Testing

Wednesday June 21st - Thursday June 22nd, 2023

 

Villa di Poggio Reale in Rufina near Florence

 

Plenary Speakers

Dave Allan      Neus Figueras Casanovas      Alan Maley

Hitomi Masuhara        Barry O’Sullivan

Brian Tomlinson                 Carolyn Westbrook

Conference Focus

The Conference will focus on the development, adaptation and use of materials for testing. The materials could be designed to facilitate learner preparation for tests, learner participation in tests, the evaluation of learner performance and/or feedback on learner performance and the provision of learner follow up. For the sake of the Conference a test will be considered to be any activity which aims to discover useful information about learner performance in a target language. The test could be informal or formal, formative or summative, low stakes or high stakes, in a classroom or in an examination hall, with a pen and paper or with a computer.

Parallel Presentations

There will be over sixty parallel presentations lasting thirty minutes each. To submit an abstract for a presentation please send a 100–150-word summary of the proposed presentation to Brian Tomlinson at brianjohntomlinson@gmail.com

Poster Presentations

To submit an abstract for a poster presentation please send a 100–150-word summary of the proposed poster presentation to Brian Tomlinson at brianjohntomlinson@gmail.com

Conference Fees

Two Days

Participation fee = 175 Euros (including lunches, coffees and teas)

MATSDA members, members of MAWSIG, members of LEND and members of TESOL Italy pay 140 Euros. Students pay 140 Euros.

One Day

Participation fee = 95 Euros (including lunches, coffees and teas)

MATSDA members, members of MAWSIG, members of LEND and members of TESOL Italy pay 80 Euros. Students pay 80 Euros.

To enrol for the Conference and to enquire about methods of payment please contact Kristin Lanese at formazione@centrostudimugello.it

MATSDA Membership:  To join MATSDA contact Siv Sears at siv.sears@gmail.com

The Venue

Here is a link to the venue for the Conference: https://www.comune.rufina.fi.it/villa-di-poggio-reale

See you in Florence

 

Finally, we offer some ideas for Christmas themed classes - Christmas Fun: Nativity Scenes by Hanna Kryszewska, and The Song on Speak Up: All I Want for Christmas Is You by Mariah Carey; and we offer a bit of humour in The Dalai Lama Joke by Jamie Keddie, and some fun activities for any time of the year - Fingerprint Art - Creative Writing by Valentina Batagelj, and Bringing Pub Quizzes into the Classroom by Anna Pereszlényi.

Enjoy the December issue of HLT, See you in 2023.
Hania (Hanna) Kryszewska
HLT Editor
Email: hania.kryszewska@pilgrimsteachertraining.eu

Tagged  Editorial