Friday, March 25, 2016

37th TESOL Greece International Convention: Reflections


Another year, another wonderful convention! A chance to meet old and new friends, to learn something new.
This year the convention was somehow different - more interesting poster presentations, more "group" talks - colloquium, interactive plenary, street theatre techniques, CLIL and lots more!!

My highlights:


Saturday morning's colloquium about creativity in all sort of ways. With master guru teacher trainer Marisa Constandinides, the wonderful poet - educatorAlan Maley, the enthusiastic Carol Read, the exam expert George Vassilakis and our very own art "expert" Chryssa Papalazarou, talking about the C-Group (Creativity group), using poems, art, Bloom's taxonomy, covering students' different needs.
Jeremy Harmer's plenary talk: "Can students learn on their own?" talking about learner's autonomy, mentioning Sugata Mitra and his experiments, talking about his experiences in Cuba and about the strength and courage of learners. Very inspiring indeed!

Coming to our own talk - "We take exams personally" - we explored creative ways how to "prepare" students for exam, but not in the traditional way, always using a "book". Of course, we did have some "reactions"  that we are more focusing on communication and not on accuracy, but to tell you the truth, that was our intention. Language IS alive, we have to realize why we actually learn. Not to pass the exam, but to USE the language itself.
It is the first time in 3 years that I have not been to Theodore's workshop (due to my early flight back home)- was tehre in spirit, though!. He talked about critical thinking and promoting positive educational messages, used CLIL and from what I have heard, he did a wonderful job and I am really very proud of him!
Conventions are great for mingling, meeting new people, get new ideas and inspirations and have fun!!
Once again, thank you TESOL Greece for a wonderful convention.




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