Carol Rainbow is an online tutor for The Consultants-E. She has been a teacher for over 40 years and has been teaching online since 2008. Carol shares advice on using video conference platforms for teaching online. In this blog, she explains how video conference platform Zoom can be used to recreate the classroom environment.

            I love my language app! This is coming from an English language teacher who fears for her job in an era when technology can provide personalized instruction 24/7. I can’t help it though. I pick up my phone and interact with characters in a dialog. I can listen as many times as I want, I can speak, and my phone will give me immediate feedback without the stress of a grade. I’m on a 97-day streak, so I’ve interacted with it daily for over three months, so it’s clearly working.

I hate learning a language!              

ANSWER:  Obviously, young learners in pre-primary and primary levels will feel inclined to speak to you in their mother tongue.  What we need to do as language teachers is to create an English-speaking environment in class.  One of the best ways to keep English as the official language of the class is to interject, throughout the lesson--before, after and in-between planned activities-- short and catchy rhymes and chants that will involve the children in listening, miming, speaking and rhythmic clapping. 

Συνηθίζουμε να λέμε πως μία εικόνα ισούται με χίλιες λέξεις. Με πόσες όμως λέξεις ισούνται 9,2 εκατομμύρια δολάρια; Με μόλις τρείς! Τρανό παράδειγμα το πασίγνωστο σλόγκαν Just Do It της εταιρείας Nike η οποία το 1988 και μέσα σε μόλις ένα χρόνο κατάφερε να αυξήσει τις πωλήσεις της παγκοσμίως κατά 25%. Ένα σλόγκαν αποτελεί αναπόσπαστο κομμάτι της εταιρικής σας ταυτότητας και επικοινωνίας και όχι τυχαία, καθώς μέσα σε ελάχιστες γραμμές μπορείτε να αναδείξετε, να ενισχύσετε και να ανανεώσετε το branding και το μάρκετινγκ της επιχείρησής σας.

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ANSWER:  "Listen for a bit and jot down notes" is an easy and light supplementary activity,  which could well become a ritual in your f2f or online lesson.  This activity, appropriate for upper-intermediate and above, requires intensive listening and note-taking.