Teacher Training on September 9 & 10, 2023

ESLIM's fall training sessions for teachers have been scheduled for Saturday, September 9 and Sunday, September 10. They will be led by Rob Simmons, who has taught ESL classes for many years and is an experienced teacher trainer.

Designed for new teachers, the September 9 session will be held at Centreville United Methodist Church from 9 AM to noon. This workshop will teach the fundamentals of planning good lessons, motivating learners, and using assessment to measure progress. Techniques on how to use audiovisual content to maximize learner comprehension will be introduced as well.

For returning teachers, the Sunday, September 10 workshop will be presented via Zoom from 2 to 4 PM. This session, entitled “A Picture Is Worth…,” will focus on using everything from photos and pictures to recipe books and comics in a class to engage learners, enhance classroom communication, and reinforce vocabulary development. This approach can be adapted to all levels and has been utilized successfully in a variety of settings. Participants will be offered numerous opportunities to practice strategies that they can use in their classrooms.

To register for either session, teachers from ESLIM's member programs should email office@eslim.org before Wednesday, September 6. Contact information should include which class they are registering for and where they will be teaching this fall. All registrants will be acknowledged with additional relevant information, and reminders will be sent prior to the class.

Teaching Tip: Picture Word Inductive Model

The Picture Word Inductive Model (PWIM) is a great way to start a class and establish a routine that students will like and learn from. This activity is very effective with lower levels and can be adapted to fit more advanced classes, too.

Before starting class, project or make copies of a picture related to the content you will be teaching. Ask students to describe what they see. Responses can be categorized in a variety of ways, depending on which level you are teaching. For example, a beginning class may come up with naming words to describe what they see in the picture: park, water, girl, dog, etc.; these words can be categorized as nouns, while the next session may offer words to describe the actions seen in the picture: swimming, sleeping, eating, etc. 

Color-coding responses (using sticky notes) may help students to begin to write sentences. Using a familiar and simple sentence pattern will provide a framework for simple sentence writing: putting the noun before the verb. The expected outcome will depend on the class and what you want to accomplish, but the first few minutes of class will be more productive if you use this or another focused routine in the same way every time, so learners will know what is expected, and where the activity should lead.

There are numerous articles online to further describe this approach, and you should be able to find one that will help you to decide if this method will work for you and your class.