Schedule, Teachers' Day 2020

“So what’s new in English language teaching?” – From ELF, languaging and global virtual teams to big data and multimodal interaction
Video:Keynote presentation, parts 1; Keynote presentation, part 2)
PDF:https://seafile.rlp.net/f/e5cbbd2a51154ef9a0c2/

Continuous change is one of the challenges, but also one of the most appealing features of English language teaching (ELT). Practitioners adapt their didactics, methodology and materials throughout their careers and are experts at connecting with heterogenous and diverse audiences. And one thing is sure, as the developments of the past year have shown: language teaching never gets boring. In my keynote I will provide an overview of key trends in applied linguistic research that are relevant for ELT:

• The “native speaker” disappears: English as a lingua franca enters curricula and textbooks and challenges our notions of “correctness” and intercultural communicative competence
• All languages – all the time: The Languaging approach transcends borders between languages and classrooms
• The web as a corpus: Corpus-assisted discourse studies provide data on real language use and materials for teaching and learning
• Virtual global teams: New genres appear in international interaction and present new challenges for English language teaching
• Multimodal interaction: Social media and multimodal corpora enhance our understanding of communication as a multimodal, social, interactive event in which meaning is negotiated and flexible
• Chunks of knowledge: Big data analysis reinforces the notion of grammaticalized lexis and provides further support for the lexical approach

Following up on the trends presented in the TD keynote, this workshop will provide hands-on examples of how to use key trends in applied linguistic research in the ELT classroom:

• The “native speaker” disappears: English as a lingua franca enters curricula and textbooks and challenges our notions of “correctness” and intercultural communicative competence
• All languages – all the time: The Languaging approach transcends borders between languages and classrooms
• The web as a corpus: Corpus-assisted discourse studies provide data on real language use and materials for teaching and learning
• Virtual global teams: New genres appear in international interaction and present new challenges for English language teaching
• Multimodal interaction: Social media and multimodal corpora enhance our understanding of communication as a multimodal, social, interactive event in which meaning is negotiated and flexible
• Chunks of knowledge: Big data analysis reinforces the notion of grammaticalized lexis and provides further support for the lexical approach

Dr. Daniel Becker: Global, Digital, and (Slightly) Scary: New Forms of English Literature in the EFL Classroom
Workshop presentation (PDF)
Overview: New forms of literature (PDF)

Are you familiar with chat-fiction? Or Insta novels? Or CliFi? If not, you are probably not the only one, as the world of literary texts in English has been changing rapidly as of late. In a global and digital age, new text types and formats appear left and right and, as a teacher, it is often difficult to keep up with these fast-paced developments. Yet many of these texts are quite popular with students and, thus, might serve as excellent teaching materials in your own classroom. In my workshop, we will take a look at some of the more recent trends in literature, both in the analogue and the digital realm. More specifically, we will examine how new types of literary texts, such as chat-fiction or technology-related young adult ‘horror’ stories, can be used in a competence-oriented EFL classroom. For that purpose, you will have the chance to work with concrete examples from a broad range of literary genres. The examples being used will mostly refer to teaching English in the Sekundarstufe I.

In today’s world, teachers need to embrace critical thinking: both in their own development and their learners’. This workshop is an opportunity to revisit some established beliefs in ELT, and look at how we can develop our own criticality in our approach to teaching. During the workshop we will revisit a series of EFL ‘mantras’ and re-evaluate them in the modern world. I will then show how this way of thinking informed the writing of Roadmap, the new eight-level general English coursebook from Pearson.

Even though technology has found its way into our classrooms, teachers often still plan and teach “lessons”. However, neither the use of technology nor the most careful planning of a lesson seem to be able to ensure motivation and successful learning.

How can this be explained? There is actually a very simple explanation: 21st century learning isn't about being taught lessons by a teacher. This is why we need to leave our comfort zone and find new ideas to help our students learn the skills they will need in their future lives to become successful and competent citizens.

Virtual, mixed and augmented reality as well as (digital) games can be used in almost all subjects and schools, they can even help students learn basic skills. What is most important in this context and especially in foreign language learning: students have to learn by doing, not by listening to us, and they need to create content themselves by cooperating and collaborating with other students. The projects they have created in this task-based learning environment can then be shared with other students, who can use them to learn even more.

I will talk about how 21st century learning can be achieved and how we can assist our students to reach the finish line. You will be shown examples of projects for foreign language learning and you will be given some theoretical background as well as an overview of tools and apps that can be used. If there is some time at the end, you will also have time to try out these apps and tools so it would be a good idea to bring your tablet (Android or iOS) or your laptop and a smartphone.

You will leave this workshop with three things: my PowerPoint presentation, a Padlet with lots of ideas and tutorials, and something to play with :)

As we mark the beginning of a new decade, we are confronted with the potential devastating effects of climate change and environmental destruction. In other words, global climate change is everywhere, on the page and on the screen. This development has also resulted in the creation of a new green youth movement (Fridays for Future) as the awareness of the fact that global warming not only threatens to make our planet uninhabitable but also to irreversibly change the fabric of our society and culture is growing.

The aim of this workshop is to jointly reflect how to integrate environmental issues in the EFL classroom. The first part of the workshop outlines how issues such as sustainability and eco-justice can be used to both raise students’ environmental awareness and develop their foreign language skills. The second part of the workshop then gives participants the opportunity to explore ways of discussing selected environmental issues through a variety of media.

Prof. Dr. Susanne Heinz: Mobile Enhanced Language Learning and Teaching: Connecting theory and practice
Klett Sprachen presentation (PDF)

The webinar will address the question how mobile learning (theory) and digital tools can be used for language learning purposes in and beyond the classroom. First, a brief overview of research on mobile learning in the foreign language classroom will be given. The focus of the webinar will be on best practice teaching principles and designs for mobile learning for the four key literacies of writing, speaking, reading and listening. The author will give examples from her own work with tablet classes and the Klett Augmented App will serve as further illustration for digitally enhanced language learning material. When discussing the important question whether digital tools do really constitute an added value for specific language learning goals, teachers are highly encouraged to share their own digital experiences with homeschooling.