In this guest post, Patrick Gallagher outlines how he uses the WORD / CHUNK OF THE DAY sections of this website with his students. We hope it'll give you some ideas for how you could explore and exploit these texts…
Author Archive
Twenty things in twenty years part eleven: we’ve been in thrall to the cults of Learning Styles, NLP and Multiple Intelligences for way too long.
It never ceases to both depress and astound me when I see quite how many conference talks, articles, books and courses on Neuro-Linguistic Programming, Learning Styles and Multiple Intelligences are still out there in mainstream ELT. Philip Kerr recently alerted…
Back to school Part Five: challenges and homework
As if to prove the point about procrastination and failing to do stuff outside class that I made in my last post reflecting on my own language learning experiences, I'm almost ashamed to begin by admitting it has been over…
Chunk of the day: having some work done
Those of you who follow my ongoing series of ONE-MINUTE ENGLISH videos on YouTube or Instagram may have noticed that I've recently started filming them from the chaos of my attic. You'll have seen the piles of boxes behind me,…
Word of the day: whitewash
By the 18th of June 1984 – thirty-seven years ago today – miners in England had been on strike for three months. In what has been called "the most bitter industrial dispute in British history", the National Union of Mineworkers…
Phrase of the day: How the other half lives
May has been a truly miserable month with the rain bucketing down day after day, the wind howling like it was the middle of March and temperatures more akin to November than the onset of summer. When will it all…
Word of the day: Blimey!
I have to begin with a bit of a confession: I'm quite a nosy person! Sometimes I can probably be a bit too interested in what other people are doing and I always want to find out more about them!…
Phrase of the day: What’s the damage?
Last month, I had to take my car in to the garage to get the annual MOT done. An MOT is basically a check you have to have done every year to ensure your car is still roadworthy – it's…
Chunk of the day: Needs must
After class yesterday, I popped out to grab a bite to eat from one of the little cafés near where I live. As I was walking back, I bumped into an old friend of mine who I hadn't seen for…
Twenty things in twenty years part ten: the main point of focusing on pronunciation in class isn’t to improve pronunciation!
Pronunciation is quite possibly the most neglected area of language teaching. In many of the classes I’ve observed over the years, I’ve seen little or no attempt to work on pronunciation and where it IS focused on, it’s often instinctive…