OBEC is making headlines again.

Here are 2 posts from the Bangkok Post. First OBEC wants the millions of tablets back that it passed out to Thai schools. I wonder how many of these tablets were actually used for real educational purposes? click on the links below.

http://www.bangkokpost.com/news/general/607480/obec-wants-back-1m-tablets-given-out-in-yingluck-scheme



Next OBEC plans to reduce class sizes. Smaller class sizes are a good thing so teachers can spend more time with students on an individual basis. 

http://www.bangkokpost.com/learning/learning-from-news/607260/thai-schools-to-cut-class-sizes 

Upcoming Industry Events

The TESOL International Association is sponsoring a conference in Mexico. It is supposed to focus on the changes and innovations in our industry in the last 10 years.  Click on the link below. 

http://www.tesol.org/attend-and-learn/academies-conferences-symposia/upcoming-symposia/2015/06/16/innovations-and-breakthroughs-in-english-language-teaching

More from the TESOL Blog

Here are three posts from the TESOL Blog. We as educators must constantly keep up to date in new trends in our industry. This first link is a reading list of books and other sources for teachers.

http://blog.tesol.org/hot-summer-reads-for-esl-teachers/



If you are like me you might sometimes have a student hand in a writing assignment that seems much higher than the student's usual writing abilities and is suspect. Here is a post that deals with plagiarism.  


http://blog.tesol.org/stopping-plagiarism-before-it-becomes-a-problem/


Let's face it, it is very hard to teach sentence structure in any class. It is boring and most of the time students don't like it. Here is a post that gives some interesting strategies for teaching with visual metaphors.  


http://blog.tesol.org/2-visual-metaphors-to-teach-about-sentences/

ESL Email Subscriptions

We all know there are a lot of people out there wanting to send you junk emails. These emails fill up your inbox and are generally annoying. Well I found two ESL subscriptions that just might be worth a look. You will have to sift through the emails that don't interest you, but you might just find something that could be useful in your classes. We are just starting the school year here in Thailand, so icebreakers are a good way to start. 

Jackie Bolen has 5 activities that she has on her Google docs. If you like what you see subscribe to her emails and you can get more. Here is the link:

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1Jxl_TXSnVEiuVdnGUpb-56wWlRyFY_z5p9Mudrr33oo/edit?pli=1 


Next is a subscription from the TESOL blog which is part of the TESOL International Association. This post is about teaching short stories in class. The good thing about the TESOL International Association is that it is a sharing of what educators are doing all over the world. You can post comments and even get in touch with the blog contributors. Just click on the link below. 

http://blog.tesol.org/teaching-short-stories/#more-5680



   

More resources for the weary teacher.

Here are two more sites that make it easy for teachers to do their job. The first is a worksheet website with no registration or memberships all you need is a PDF reader. 


 


http://englishwsheets.com/ 


The next site is 50 tips for tired teachers. This site is more about easy activities for the class room that are low cost, easy to plan and prepare. 





http://community.eflclassroom.com/m/blogpost?id=826870%3ABlogPost%3A316119

Two Posts from the TESOL International Association

 

The first is about 9 ideas to support an English learners social and emotional learning. Some of these ideas could work but in Thailand they are so into their "Thainess" that some of these ideas wont work. I think these ideas are geared more towards students learning English in foreign countries.


http://blog.tesol.org/9-ideas-to-support-els-social-emotional-learning/


The second post is about blogs and digital storytelling in teacher education. 


http://blog.tesol.org/blogging-for-learning-in-tesol-teacher-ed/ 




 

Teaching English and thinking skills.

I'm not a big fan of puzzles and word games, but some teachers claim it works really well. Here are some resources from esl writing .org.








http://www.eslwriting.org/13439/teaching-english-critical-thinking-thinking-vocabulary-knowledge-games-puzzles/ 

Teachers like free teaching materials!

Here are some free teaching materials from the Elastic Community. Just click on the link below, go to their Facebook page and hit the "like" button.






http://www.elastic-training.com/teaching-materials-lets-get-started/

Do you ever get stressed out in your classroom?

Here is a story from the Voniz website about managing stress in the classroom. Please click on the link below and chill out.

https://www.voniz.com/articles/7-ways-to-manage-stress-in-education/

Do you need some worksheets?

Sometimes I have to plan a class in a hurry and I don't have time to log in and create an account on the web. So here are some free websites that offer worksheets on many educational topics.

https://www.voniz.com/articles/top-10-free-websites-forworksheets/