Author Archives: Adam Simpson

About Adam Simpson

Adam has been living and working in Istanbul for the past five years. All of this time has been spent in the tertiary education sector. After several enjoyable years working at Bilgi University's English preparatory school, he has now joined the School of languages at Sabanci University. He is currently involved in the development of the School's language syllabus. Outside of the profession, he loves composing music, and is slowly coming to grips with being in his thirties, helped along by his wife Çagla and his son Aslan.

Task Based Learning

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1. Introduction

At the outset of my teaching career, I readily adopted what little teaching methodology I was aware of to my classroom practice. As with most new teachers fresh from the CELTA course, my lessons followed the PPP (presentation, practise, production) model, or slight variations thereof. However, as my teaching quickly developed on a steep learning curve, so did my awareness of other methodological possibilities, and also the shortcomings of the method I had thus far applied. Nevertheless, I persisted with this method.

Whilst the PPP method offered a comfortable and safe framework1 for me as a newly qualified teacher, I nevertheless soon realised that i) it is important to meet the specific needs of ones learners, and ii) an authentic context will enhance the learning experience. A failure to deliver on both of these counts is one of the major reasons why the PPP method is criticised. This is also the reason why I have chosen to examine an alternative to this model: Task-based learning.
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Using PowerPoint for ELT

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Power Point

Introduction

PowerPoint is an incredibly popular piece of software, mainly because it comes with Microsoft packages. PowerPoint files are easy to create and can be e-mailed as attachments. They can be posted on or downloaded from websites. Not only can PowerPoint presentations be traded and exchanged, they can also be modified to fit any individual classroom setting. Although PowerPoint has been around for years, it’s just begun to spread to schools and ELT classrooms as more and more classrooms and teachers have access to computers and the hardware to use PowerPoint. For these reasons, PowerPoint is becoming an increasingly popular medium in ELT.
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The Internet Chat Room as a Learning Tool

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During the recent conference at Bilkent University, an issue that was repeatedly mentioned was the dilemma of getting students to use language in real time situations. This article 1) discusses the implications of getting language learners to use internet chat rooms for language learning purposes, and 2) aims to prove that the author wasn’t asleep during the conference.

Advantages of Chat Rooms

Firstly, they allow learners to interact in an authentic context with native speakers without being restricted by location. In many ways, this is an unprecedented learning opportunity. Language students can use a chat room at any time to interact with any number of people anywhere in the world.

Secondly, Chat rooms can promote learner autonomy. This is primarily due to the fact that the teacher’s role is minimized. Transcripts are generated which are useful for studying the language used. Every line of conversation is recorded, and can be seen in full thereafter.
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Landmines and the Campaign to Ban Them

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A reading comprehension lesson plan in PDF/Doc format.

Extract:

During 2002, India and Pakistan have been laying landmines along their disputed border in Kashmir, according to the International Campaign to Ban Landmines (ICBL). The ICBL says it is possibly the largest deployment of mines in decades. Mary Wareham, the Landmine Monitor Report’s global coordinator, recently said: “Mine-laying in India and Pakistan is startling because of the length of the border and the length of the minefields and their proximity to villages and farming land.”

Numerous civilians and soldiers have died as a result of the landmines laid on both sides of the Line of Control in the disputed region of Kashmir. After declaring ceasefires (stopping fighting) in 2002, both Angola and Sri Lanka have stopped using landmines. However the ICBL has reported that the government of Russia and to a lesser extent Georgia continue to use the device.

PDFlandmine_reading PDF

Wordlandmine_reading DOC