8/9 Free Time/ Hobbies

Week Three

TEACHING RESOURCES

Thanks to David Fobair for picking these up:

Google Drive: Resources for Teaching Free Time/Hobbies (old wiki)

A blank game board

TEACHER READING

This also qualifies as "Teacher Thinking." Do you have a teaching manifesto? If you share yours in the comments section, I'll send you a gift. 

CLASSROOM SHOWCASE

From Lianne Smith:

I'm sending on some photos of a project that I did for all of my classes that I thought other teachers might want to try out sometime.

Topic:   Learning How To Learn;   
Subtopic:   Vocabulary Mapping - WIOA at Harlem & Tompkins Square,  and Level 2-3 at Chatham Square

• Using the "Vocabulary in Use" book, students examined different ways to keep a vocabulary notebook in order to help them remember new words.  (You can see these units at the beginning of all of these books in the series:   Bubbles, tree branches, lists, opposites, collocations, colors, etc.)
• Level 5-6 students were then given homework to organize a list of subway vocabulary words and then presented their individual results in small groups in the next class.
• Level 2-3 students:  I adjusted the project by using the easier "Basic Vocabulary in Use" book.  They did a comprehension page for homework.  Then in class, they received a shorter list of words and they did the projects in class instead of as homework. Groups presented by standing in a circle and showing and explaining their diagrams and connections.

• Of course it's great for getting students to experiment with ways to organize information, but the BEST part is that it shows how every learner is different and how they can learn from each other.  It's also a nice short project that gives students a chance to practice presenting information.  It puts the students in the driver's seat the very first week of class, and that really helps to move a class forward.    (Note:  an added bonus for the teacher is that for the individual projects, it can also act as a visual representation of each student's learning style.  A great "secret" assessment tool!)

We just used regular paper & pen, but teachers could make it a bit more exciting with large poster paper & colors if they wanted to do it as an in-class project.

Try it out!  You'll be amazed at the results.   

Please send me pictures, and be sure to include the branch name and level. I need them by the end of the business day on Wednesday. If I already have enough submissions for the week- that just means your pictures will be published the next week. Personally, I think the pictures that you share are the best part of the blog.

Thank you! elizabethschade@nypl.org

CALENDAR

Summer 2019 term finishes August 25

Fall 2019 term: September 30 - December 16

2020 Dates
Winter: January 27 - April 5
Spring: April 27 - June 30
Summer: July 27 - August 23
Fall: September 28 - December 16

PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT

Watch our latest webinars on YouTube

If you weren’t able to join us live for our recent webinars for teachers, don’t worry – we recorded them and added them to our YouTube channel so you can watch them at a time that suits you. 

Using Write & Improve with your students 

We show you some of the different ways teachers use Write & Improve to motivate and inspire their students to practise their writing skills and be more proactive in their learning.

Watch now

Developing your teaching practice: moving on with your CPD

Presenters Anoushka Üzüm and Clare Williams from the Cambridge Assessment English Teacher Development and Curriculum team look at three different routes that teachers can take to career development: by yourself, with your peers, and further training courses.

Watch now

Our next free teacher webinars focus on planning the school year around Cambridge English Qualifications, and ideas and strategies for teaching the revised A2 Key and B1 Preliminary qualifications in the classroom.

To make sure you don’t miss out on future webinars, see our full programme.

GOOGLE RESOURCES

Priority Page in Google Drive is a feature that will display what Google's algorithm determines to be your most important files at any given moment. Read about it in the Free Tech for Teachers blog post here:

Google Drive Priority Page

Thank you for all that you do! Have a great week!

TEACHER HUB is a weekly blog of resources and information for instructors and staff of the English for Speakers of Other Languages (ESOL) and Adult Literacy (ABE) programs of the New York Public Library in the Bronx, Manhattan and Staten Island