¡Teachers being taught!

¡Training Courses!

Many times, and I repeat, many times, we may forget the importance of being updated all time. Cultural, social, medical changes are happening very fast. Sometimes faster than our own rhythm.

For example, the last two years we have seen an income of newly arrived migrants. Entire families who are searching for shelter in our country. They bring children who need schooling. ¿How can we, as teachers, improve our placement in our classrooms? 

"Cultural diversity in you classroom - Rerun"  

From Belgium they have organized a second round of this course. It is an online version of offering an opportunity do teachers to access useful resources and exchange with peers on the challenging topic of cultural diversity in the classrooms. 

In this first course of the series, participants will have the opportunity to share their experiences of working with a culturally diverse student body, to discuss different scenarios of the positive use of cultural diversity as a learning context, to analyse teaching and other resources under the prism of effective intercultural communication, and last but not least to develop classroom activities that will potentially recognise and strengthen the class community as a culturally diverse environment.

I think that by this way we can learn from so many different experiences and we can share good practice amongst teachers. 

¿Don´t we always tell our pupils that we ave to learn from our errors? Well, this is a great opportunity for us to learn from our experiences! 

I hope to attend!

See you around!

Limitations!

"The thing that is not evaluated, it will be devaluated"

Dear readers,

If you, as a teacher, could choose between evaluating your pupils or  not, what would you do? Have you ever thought about it? 

In each country, depending on the educational system, your are limited by the demands of the national/regional curriculum. They are the ones who decide what you have to teach, and in some way or the other, how you have to do it.

Sometimes I ask myself where is the barrier for the public institution to decide what we (as teachers)are obligated to teach our pupils. Is it fair to our pupils and parents to decide for them about what kind of ethic contents they are obligated to listen to?

Well, In my opinion: I don´t think so!

One of my subject is Anthropology. If I could choose with all my liberty to teach my subject on my way, I would show them all point of views.I would even dare to give them my point of view. I would encourage them to critical thinking. By this way they learn to make their own criteria. Many times I get disappointed listening to the lack of criteria pupils of +18 years old. Than I ask myself,¿How are they going to cope setbacks?

My students are happy to attend my anthropology classes because I give them the opportunity to think about their lives, about the importance of their acts and responsibilities. We talk about the lack of commitment in our society and the consequences of this lack. 

Knowing that we are obligated to assess our students, you can ask yourself: ¿How do you assess these kind of subjects?

I love to assess with portfolios. It´s important in these kind of subjects that the students feel respected in their opinions and so they don´t feel obligated to think one way or another. That´s why I think it´s so important for them to create their own criteria. 

Each pupil will present in their portfolio with different interactive tasks their opinions, defending them with a reasonable criteria.

I encourage you as a teacher, even if you give biology, socials or any other subject, to insist in critical thinking in your pupils. I'm convinced they will gain in maturity!

    

European Language Portfolio

Dear readers,

As you know, I’m a teacher. During some of my classes I have to speak in English, depending on the subject. In my experience, this is not a very easy task with a class of 25 different persons, and each of them with a different level of linguistic competences. I’ve thought a lot about how I could optimize my classes and so, preparing my materials, I read about the ELP (European Language Portfolio). Maybe you’ve never heard about it or maybe you did. For those that haven´t heard about it I’ll give you a brief explanation.

The ELP is a paper that gives you information about your linguistic competences and at the same time it may motivate you and encourage you to improve foreign languages. It’s a document of personal experiences of language learning and experiences with other cultures. This portfolio needs an active participation in learning and as you may notice it is very personal. There are three parts in an ELP: the language passport, the language biography and the language dossier.

While I was gathering information about the ELP, I was thinking about possible advantages. Well, I’ve noticed that it may help students to recognize their different learning styles. That’s how they can detect problems and discrepancies between the different ways of learning a language. On the other hand, it encourage the pupils to set their own learning goals, so the progress is more formative rather than summative. It encourage the students to improve their autonomy and their reflection and self-assessment. As you know, self or pear-assessment are the most effective ways of learning!   

I’ve noticed that there are quiet a lot of pedagogical functions and advantages about the ELP. But looking to the practical way, are there also some practical functions? Well, in an ELP you can complete the academical information provides by official diplomas. For example, if you have ever presented yourself for official exams of a foreign language, you can introduce the grade of your exam in your ELP. On the other hand, it may also facilitate mobility between countries. If you’ve ever thought about going abroad, it could be interesting to prepare your ELP, so the school, university or company where you will stay can have a better idea of your language competences. 

In conclusion, if you’re a teacher and you’ve ever thought about using the ELP, don’t hesitate! It improves so many abilities in your students that it can only be very positive. It also can give you an other perspective of getting to know your students in an other way. They will have to be very creative and start to reflect about their own experiences. You may get to know them better in a personal and academical way! 

Good Luck!