Empathy, which has been beautifully defined by Roman Krznaric as “the art of stepping imaginatively into the shoes of another person, understanding their feelings and perspectives, and using that understanding to guide your actions”, may be one of the qualities which distinguishes an average teacher from an excellent teacher in the eyes of the student. […]
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I have been teaching mainly older students (from about 55 to 85 years of age) for several years now. I love teaching them because of their enthusiasm, motivation, positive attitude and kindness. I’ve recently produced a short film about some of my older learners at UAB Idiomes Barcelona. You can watch the film below. […]
In my previous article I looked at the many benefits of extensive reading which include gains in reading and writing competence, oral and aural skills, vocabulary growth, and increases in self-esteem and empathy. It is also highly motivating for students to discover that they can read in English and that they enjoy it. […]
What is extensive Reading? In simple terms Extensive Reading is reading as many easy books as possible for pleasure, and can be contrasted with intensive reading which is slow, careful reading of a short, difficult text. Day and Bamford (1998), Day (2002), Prowse (2002), and Maley (2008 and 2009) have identified a number […]
Animated films are ones in which individual drawings, paintings, or illustrations are photographed frame by frame. Traditionally animated films have been associated with children, however, nowadays they are designed to appeal to everyone. With the increased ease of creating animations, there has been a huge rise in the number of animated films being produced, and […]
As many short films are artistic, they have limited appeal in the commercial marketplace and are funded from diverse sources. To make them easier to sell worldwide, they often contain little or no dialogue, which makes comprehension much easier. As a result, they offer intensely ‘filmic’ experiences, using images and movement, sequence and duration, […]
I’ve been writing lesson plans designed around short films for my website Film English for six years. Teachers often ask me how I find the short films I use in my lesson plans. The answer is quite simple: I’ve watched literally thousands of short films and developed an instinct for the type of […]
I am delighted to announce that the 5th edition of the Image Conference is being held as the pre-conference event to the 5th ELT Malta Conference. The Image Conference will be held on 6 October while the 5th ELT Malta Conference will be held on 7-8 October at the Mediterranean Conference Centre, Valletta, Malta. Both […]
As part of the launch of the website I’m organising a prize draw for my new book Film in Action. Everybody who subscribes to the website in the months of February and March will be entered into the draw. The Internet now offers students the opportunity to improve their lexical, listening and speaking skills […]
As part of the launch of the website I’m organising a prize draw for my new book Film in Action. Everybody who subscribes to the website in February and March will be entered into the draw. This is the first in a series of posts in which I will look at what I think […]