About the webinar
In this talk, participants learn how to develop their own Personal Learning Networks (PLNs) and become life-long learners and active online engagers. Huw briefly shares some of the things that Salford University MA TESOL students did in the 2015-2016 academic year as part of an assessed module.
He illustrates how online CPD can be developed using the research orientated resource of www.TESOLacademic.org and more practical-based resources such as the British Council’s https://www.teachingenglish.org.uk/, IATEFL webinars and recordings from the annual conference http://www.iatefl.org/ as well as blogs from highly regarded practitioners such as Scott Thornbury https://scottthornbury.wordpress.com/. With all such resources, teachers are asked to do more than just read and\or watch as passive recipients; engagement is required by adding comments, posting a question, making a recommendation, adding a link etcetera. This can be done for example on the YouTube Channel for TESOLacademic, or the British Council website, on a blog post. Importantly talks, ideas, teacher critiques etcetera are also shared on TESOL related Facebook pages and on Twitter where the use of appropriate #tags such as #IATEFL and #TESOL encourages practitioners to reach a wider audience than their personal followers and helps them to develop their own global PLN.
Huw's talk specifically addresses the following Professional Practices themes and related elements:
- Supporting and mentoring teachers.
- Providing advice to teachers on: the location of sources of information relating to teacher development; the range of professional developmental activities available.
- Encouraging teachers to share practice through participation in national and international teaching networks/forums/associations.
- Researching and contributing to the profession.
- Networking and sharing practice through forums, webinars, conferences, etc.
- Taking responsibility for your own professional development.
- Using technology to facilitate own professional development.
- Keeping up to date with developments in relation to the professional practices of teacher educators and of teachers.
About the speaker
Huw has 34 years of experience in language education as a teacher, teacher educator and researcher. He has skills and expertise in a number of areas but his two niche specialisms comprise a post Computer\Mobile Assisted Language Learning (CALL\MALL) era of Mobile Assisted Language Use (MALU) and Social Media for Continuing Professional Development (CPD) in Teaching English to Speakers of Other Languages (TESOL). He has published widely and delivered many plenary talks on MALU and has recently worked with Stephen Krashen and Rod Ellis in this area. His CPD work draws on his eight years of experience as the founder and editor of www.TESOLacademic.org which he has taken from a Web 1 dissemination-based platform of video talks to a Web 2 interactive-based resource with unrivalled outreach via: a Facebook group of over 10,000 members; a Twitter feed with over 2,500 followers; a YouTube channel with over 70 talks and 37,000 views in the last year; and a LinkedIn networking outlet.
Huw has just taken early retirement as a Senior Lecturer in TESOL, but his work very much continues. He is looking forward to further developing the above areas with universities across the globe, Ministries of Education and other supporting agencies.