The Zone of Proximal Development is a concept that was introduced by Lev Vygotsky and is still one of the foundations for educational development together with Piagetian theory. I’m personally a big fan of the Zone of Proximal Development and it’s little brother, scaffolding. Whether this is teacher-initiated or self-guided scaffolding it doesn’t matter… finding your own zone or the zone for your students is integral.
Much as Krashen’s Input Hypotheses focuses on comprehensible input, the Zone of Proximal Development has this same notion at it’s core. Click here to read more.. »
Assuming you’re interested in be a professional teacher – as opposed to a backpacker that has no actual interest in teaching but needs to pay off student loans back home – then here are a few thoughts on different TESOL qualifications and how useful they may be.
First up, I may as well point out that to work in a lot of countries your don’t technically need a teaching certificate and just a BA/BSc will do… but you do intend on being professional right? Click here to read more.. »
What are the aims in the classroom when we teach pronunciation? Or more importantly, what should the aims be?
Many a school policy is designed to teach the “native” model of pronunciation, but is this a realistic notion? Not only does research suggest that the so-called “native” models of English are amongst the least intelligible but the model itself is often unattainable. Click here to read more.. »
Age old advice has been to keep a diary or journal as a way to improve your writing and general language skills. The problem with this advice has often been the inability to find someone to offer you corrections. Meaning that you’re quite often reinforcing errors.
That’s kind of a problem!
How to solve this mild problem… Use the internet to your advantage. There are dozens of language exchange websites and portals around these days and I’ve tried out quite a few of them over the last few years. Some are useful and practical, others not so. I’ll give you a few inside tips so you don’t waste time registering at some of the places I’ve found less useful…. But by all means, use other sources; you may have more success than I did elsewhere… maybe my profile just isn’t appealing enough 
Click here to read more.. »
When you think about it, the vast majority of people learn a language to speak it. It’s pretty obvious that that’s a big motivator. But a question that is commonly asked (“how can I improve my speaking?”) gets the all-too-often reply of “to improve your speaking you have to speak”. Sounds crazy right?
It’s not as stupid as it sounds though. And it’s a not a matter of only stumbling around in the dark groping for expressions in a conversation where the other party doesn’t seem too engrossed in your grasp of what foods you like nor about how the wind is blowing strongly today. Sure, these topics are great for idle chit-chat and you feel a sense of achievement when you can have these kind of basic textbook style conversations, but let’s be honest…. that’s not really what you want to talk about is it? Click here to read more.. »
