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World Language Classroom



This is mainly to point out the existence of a very good blog site for language teachers. It's called World Language Classroom and it's maintained by Josué (Joshua) who sometimes posts Periscope videos on Twitter, in which he discusses issues to do with language teaching. Josué is from the Boston, Massachusetts area, has an MA in applied linguistics, teaches, runs workshops and raises money through his resources for two schools, one in Haiti, one in Nicaragua. He also spends time volunteering in those same schools. Busy fellow! His blog has had over 1.2 million views too.

His blog posts feature subjects such as grammar teaching, planning, task-based language teaching (where he outlines a definition of the difference between "exercises" and "tasks"), modes of communication (based on the ACTFL's model - Interpersonal, Presentational and Interpretive), target language use and Project based Learning (PBL).

One interesting post about grammar features the so-called PACE model (Presentation, Attention, Co-construction and Extension). This has things in common with other inductive grammar teaching models where focus on meaning and input precedes rule formation and further practice through doing a communicative task.

Another interesting post is a recent one about types of feedback you can give to students.He classifies feedback as Appreciation, Coaching and Evaluation before explaining the difference in applied linguistics between mistakes and errors, then suggesting ways to coach students when they make mistakes.

You can tell from his posts that Josué likes to see the emphasis on comprehensible input and doing communicative tasks. Inexperienced teachers should find very useful guidance here.

His teaching resources can be found here on the Teachers Pay Teachers site (more popular in the USA than in the UK). He has many colourful resources for French and Spanish. I cannot vouch personally for their quality, I'm afraid, but they look impressive from a distance.

Note for UK teachers

ACTFL = American Council on the Teaching of Foreign Languages. You can find their Proficiency Guidelines here.

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