Spring 2014 Professional Development Workshop

Date: Saturday April 12, 2014

Site: Biola University | School of Business Lecture Hall | 13800 Biola Ave., La Mirada, CA 90639

Theme: Serious Fun: Creativity in the Language Classroom
Presenter: Christopher Stillwell

Creativity is integral to learners’ development of the ability to interpret and communicate in a foreign language, and it is no less essential to language teachers as they seek the best ways to tailor their practices to suit learners’ needs. Focusing on creativity in the classroom can enhance language learning by capturing attention, stimulating the senses, and tapping into our natural tendencies for exploration. This session will explore ways of harnessing creativity to energize language classrooms, including brainstorming techniques that foster fluency and flow. Participants will learn ways of reframing ordinary content in attention-getting contexts that help learners make discoveries for themselves. Additional areas of exploration will include simple uses of technology to capture seriously educational elements of seemingly frivolous activities, useful language teaching insights that can be found from crossing borders into distant fields, and general classroom practices that support learners’ creativity.

Christopher Stillwell has taught ESL/EFL for more than 18 years, and he has worked as a teacher educator at Teachers College Columbia University, at the UC Irvine Extension, and at various schools in Japan and Laos. In Japan he also worked as assistant director of a large university EFL program. He has presented extensively, with two invited speaker presentations receiving “Best of JALT” awards, and he is listed on the U.S. Department of State’s database of English Language Specialists.

Christopher has contributed dozens of publications on language teaching to edited volumes as well as to such peer-reviewed publications as ELT Journal and The Language Teacher, and he is the editor of two books for TESOL, Language Teaching Insights from Other Fields: Sports, Arts, Design, and More and the upcoming companion, Language Teaching Insights from Other Fields: Psychology, Business, Brain Science, and More. He is presently a doctoral student at UC Irvine’s School of Education.

Call for Posters. Proposals due March 9, 2014. A flyer with submission information is available (PDF).

Online registration is available. You can also download the registration flyer (PDF) to share with colleagues.

Remember 'Minimal Pairs' When Introducing a New Activity

When you are introducing a new activity, make the first content- the first iteration simple and accessible to your students. They are already learning a new thing, that is, the new activity. Don't compound it by adding difficult content on top of it. Remember the minimal pairs in pronunciation teaching? They are minimal to prevent the learner from getting distracted by the other extraneous sound patterns. It's Beat vs. Bit. not treat vs. trick.