Last year I was lucky enough to attend the PASE conference in Warsaw, where I saw a locally based teacher, Jonathan Marks, give a thought-provoking talk on phrasal verbs. Having long believed that this is one area of the language…
Author Archive
Phrase of the day: would’ve thought
Last Wednesday evening, I took a train from Preston back home to London. As we were nearing Euston station, I left my seat and went to wait near the door. A mother and her teenage daughter were already there, and…
Yet more thoughts on teaching grammar
I'm now four weeks into the Focus on Grammar course I'm teaching at International House, London, which means only two more weeks to go. It's been a strange and mostly fairly lovely experience, made much easier by having some really…
UCLAN, Preston: February 25th
ELT Ireland, Dublin. February 2015
Chunk of the day: the bottom line
In class yesterday, we looked at some vocabulary for describing different roles and duties people have at work. Students then went on to discuss which they had themselves, how good they felt they were at them - and which other…
Further thoughts on teaching grammar
Last week, I posted up a few thoughts I'd had on starting to teach (at IH London) a part-time, six-week evening course called Focus on Grammar. Following the second lesson with my lovely class last Thursday night, here are a…
Some reflections on the universal panacea
Last week I started teaching a six-week evening course at International House, London. For someone with such a keen interest in lexically-oriented teaching, the decision to go for the Focus on Grammar option may seem perverse, but I've long maintained…
Word of the day: pop
One of the best things about adopting a more lexical view of language is that you start to appreciate more clearly how words interact with other words, and you are then able to start passing on to students the message…
Still cutting up cards! Activities for storing and retrieving chunks
We're delighted to feature our very first guest post. At IATEFL Harrogate last year, one of the sessions we enjoyed was by a young teacher called Andrea Borsato, who was working at International House, London at the time. Andrea was…