Two Teachers Talking

Wrestling with the multi-layered difficulties of something that deserves to be (should be, needs to be) so simple: capturing a thought or idea for later retrieval. Oh, yeah, and that managing that steaming pile of “stuff I have to remember to do.”

A new academic year has begun and brought with it a slew of new opportunities to screw things up. What we’re doing differently to try to save our students and our sanity.

Paul Nation, one of the leading researchers in ESL/EFL, discusses the importance of extensive reading, vocabulary testing and acquisition, the flipped classroom, and implicit and explicit knowledge. Part 2 will be aired later in the year. Mentioned in the podcast: What Should Every ESL Teacher Know http://www.compasspub.com/eng/compass/level_view.asp?h_seq=1721#  Paul Goldberg’s Xreading http://xreading.com/

In the tradition of rushing in where wise men fear to tread, Tony and Charles make predictions for the future, predictions that will no doubt return to haunt them. What are we looking forward to? What are we dreading? Hold 'em? Fold 'em? Also, a reminder that next month we will be interviewing Paul Nation. Don't miss it. Finally, still some chances for free e-book teaching material from Chris Cotter's Heads Up English (see entry for Episode 71 below).

We sit down with Chris Cotter of Heads Up English (headsupenglish.com), a resource site for English teachers to talk about the road that’s brought him to his situation as academic director at a private English school and the man behind the web site. Interesting insights on the alternate dimensions of teaching English in Japan. Chris has generously offered sets of materials from his collection to ten of our listeners. Send an email to twoteacherstalking@gmail.com with “HUE” in the subject line. The first ten folks to respond will get one copy of each: 1001 Grammar Discussion Questions (https://gumroad.com/l/1001Special) 101 Pre-lesson Worksheets - General English  (https://gumroad.com/l/101General)

You’ve been assigned a new class. No problem, you’re a TEACHER, dammit. You’ve done this. You reach into your bag of tricks and come up with...air. OK, now what? Happy new year! 明けましておめでとうございます！

An attempt to answer the question of whether we're learning and getting better at teaching or if our best years are behind us. Not a simple question, we find, as we wrestle with various vectors of change.

An interview with Prof. Kim Kanel of Kinki Univerity and a look back at the changes that have snuck by in almost 40 years of English language teaching in Japan.

The sometimes obvious and sometimes not-so-obvious ways that teaching in Japan can be very different from what you might expect, and how those differences can affect your teaching. Never assume. Mentioned in the podcast: You are not so smart podcast, Episodes 52, 53, 55 http://youarenotsosmart.com/

What does successful learning look like? When you compare that picture with your and your students' accomplishments, how similar are those two pictures? Determining what success is, how to increase chances of achieving it, and how to measure it.

An Interview with D.J. Condon, Headmaster of Canadian Academy. Charles sits down with D.J. Condon to discuss the International Baccalaureate World Schools, assessment, mentoring, student empowerment, and the future of education.

The failure of tech. Why hasn’t tech transformed education? Why do our classrooms remain essentially unchanged from those of the nineteenth century? Why are these the wrong questions to ask? And where are our flying cars? Tony and Charles flail.

Who let the nerds out? Tony and Charles get their tech geek on and talk about the tech that they use (and don’t use) in the classroom. Practical advice and bigger thoughts on the use of tech in learning and teaching. Links to stuff mentioned at http://twoteacherstalking.com.

Teaching without communication…and only with “appropriate" materials, of course. Tony and Charles work hard at not boiling over in their attempt to understand some new impediments to learning and teaching. (Links at twoteacherstalking.com.)

Another academic year is upon us. So, what did we learn from all the mistakes we made last year? Listen as we struggle to make ourselves seem wise in charting our new routes for the upcoming year.And… Happy anniversary to us! April 21 will mark the end of our third year of Two Teachers Talking. Thanks for listening and thanks for your support.

Great Expectations. Raising the bar for our students and ourselves: what can we do, how can we think to help students perform better than their best. Yes, easier said than done, as you’ll hear. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pygmalion_effect http://www.npr.org/blogs/health/2012/09/18/161159263/teachers-expectations-can-influence-how-students-perform http://www.education.com/reference/article/teachers-expectations-affect-learning/

It's not just the classroom.  The entire physical environment where teaching and learning happen matters and affects the teaching and learning profoundly. Right? Well, we think so, but... Very special guest Prof. Alison Kitzman from Kindai University. http://twoteacherstalking.com

明けましておめでとうございます！A Very Happy New Year to you all. This month, we address BURNOUT: little ones, big ones, how to tell the difference between a bad day and a sign of something much more serious. Symptoms to look for and ways to deal with the stresses that can lead any of us over the line. No magic, but a solid look at the realities we face as teachers and why burnout is such a prevalent, insidious danger. For those of us winding up the academic year in Japan, some timely help.

Holiday reboot! A do-over for the old farts and a look back at the last year of the Two Teachers Talking podcasts. What did we say, what do we want to take back, what do we stand by. (More interesting than it sounds.) Happy holidays to all!

So, what exactly is Student Centered Learning and what does it really mean for foreign language education in Japanese universities. Forget the trend of the moment; how do we help our students learn as best they can.