Month: January 2013

Where I’m Going in 2013

Human beings love making resolutions, especially at the beginning of the new year, but how many of those resolutions are focused on professional development?  If you’re like me, your New Year’s resolutions are probably focused on your personal life, but take a moment as I have done to think about where you want to be in your professional development at the end of 2013. Here’s where I’m headed.

Learn, Share, Change.  These words are at the top of my list for 2013.  As a teacher, I feel  have a  responsibility to share what I have and exchange ideas and maybe change together and change the world in a better way and maybe as Stephen Krashen says, we can make the world a better place immediately? As we are teachers, I believe that we have that power, to change the world with small but strong touches on people’s lives. Because of all these reasons, my number one is learn,share and change. I will never stop learning from others, learning and sharing what I learned with others and do little changes in education world.

Expand The Community  Recently, a teacher friend of mine asked,  ‘’Why are we sharing our knowledge with teachers who are already in our communiity? It is like a circle. We must reach out to others who are not already in our community and give them motivation and courage, too.  That’s collaboration. Otherwise we’re just passing things around the same circle all the time.”  She’s right. There are lots of great educators from all over the world who need our support. We need to reach out to them. Why not today? Why not you ?  All you need to do is to believe in yourself and take some action. By doing so, we can make our community bigger and bigger day by day and truly collaborate.  It’s in our hands.I feel that I have the courage and motivation to do this and if you are reading this blog post and involved in iTDi, it means that you have the same couage and motivation as well! Let’s start now and work together to help others outside of our current community.

Unplugged vs Connected  I’d always felt that I have to use  as much technology as possible until I attended a teacher training workshop called  Unplugged and Connected : Where Ideas Meet led by Luke Medding and Burcu Akyol. On the second day of the course, a fellow participant shared something a students of hers had said:  “I am not here to learn technology. I’m here to learn English.” Those words had a huge impact on me. Yes, we should use technology but there are other great ways to teach English. Teaching unplugged is one of them. It is communicative, engaging, and fun at the same time. Technology is just a tool — not the whole part of our teaching life. This year, I will make the most out of technology but I will try to be more unplugged as well.

The Things That Could Be Better List   I’m again the organizer of The Istanbul Bilgi University ELT Students Conference which will be held in Istanbul on March 9th and 10th this year.  This year’s focus is on Outliers in ELT, and I’ve been thinking a lot about how to make this year’s conference even better.  I’ve been thinking about this since the moment that last year’s conference ended. That very day, I sat down and started writing a reflection on what had gone well and what hadn’t gone so well.  As soon as I started writing, I began to see things that could have been done better, and so I created a list of those things.  I’ve been refering to this things that could be better list as I prepare for this year’s conference and it’s been helping me a lot.  Now I’ve decided to create a similar list at the end of each of my teaching days this year. As soon as I get home, I’ll think about what I did well, what I did wrong, and what things could be done better. I’m sure this list to help me better see where I am and where I want to be.

Perhaps you’d like to join me? Even if you’re in a very good place now, there are always things that could be better.  Let’s reflect, learn, share, and change together and end this year in an even better place.

I Am A Teacher. An Artist

“Why do you go away? So that you can come back. So that you can see the place you came from with new eyes and extra colors. And the people there see you differently, too. Coming back to where you started is not the same as never leaving.”  ― Terry Pratchett

It has been a few weeks since the time when we were reflecting upon the past year — our achievements, our mistakes and beliefs. Now, already in a new year, I come back again thinking about what I want from the time that will come. Yet, I don’t have any new year’s resolutions, really, because first of all, there is never a clear line between what was and what will be, and secondly, because I would probably fail from the beginning if I made resolutions. It’s better to build on what’s been learned.

Over the last two years or so I’ve learned a lot about myself. I’ve learned how important it is to respect myself and also a thing or two about the spiritual journey I’m on. I’ve learned it all starts here and now, and that it is about change and respect. Besides that, I’ve learned that change is constant and that you can’t give what you don’t have.

But of course I have new goals and dreams that come from what I have learned, and most of all, I wish to work on the way to build all that I have learned so far into practice. That could be my goal then – to be more organized but not giving up what I need to do in order to stay true to myself — to let go of my fears and situations that stop me from doing the things I can in a way I really want to do them.

What would you think if I said, “I am a teacher – an artist

What? You don’t think we, teachers, are artists? I will believe you if you say you are an artist, too! And I would even hug you in joy because I know what that means. It means you trust yourself and love yourself and that you have learned to pass on that love and respect.

“What is an artist?” I asked a friend recently. Who is an artist?

I don’t think an artist is necessarily a painter, a poet or an actor. These are the most common examples, I guess, but certainly there are more possibilities. An artist could simply be someone who understands feelings and who has a way or two to express and work with those feelings. An artist could be a teacher who is true and authentic in his or her teaching. An artist could be a student who rebels not to prove the teacher wrong but to be heard.  If you think of yourself as an artist, then as an artist you don’t want your students to mindlessly follow your instructions. As an artist you want others to grow into artists as well.  As an artist, you don’t want to hide yourself behind what you don’t even understand just because others say they do. Do you remember? You can’t give what you don’t have. Give what you do have. Don’t be afraid. Aim at being an artist!

With this aim in mind, I would like to be even more present in the classroom this year — with less talking time for me and more talking time for my students. I would like to understand what it really means to teach with your mouth shut, what it really means to teach unplugged – but not by doing activities and techniques in a certain way, but by truly accepting and working with the people who are there. . I want to understand myself more. I want to put more of me into my work as I work to understand others more and see them as the artists they are. This is how I want to do my work better this New Year

Click on any of the thumbnails to view the posts.

Barbara Sakamoto	Sevim Açıkgöz	Malu Sciamarelli
Yitzha Sarwono	Josette LeBlanc	Vladimira Chalyova