You may know that LSI/IH Portsmouth was recently awarded the maximum 14 out of 14 points of strength by the British Council and this made us the joint number one ranked school in the UK. Our teaching was one of the points of strengths, and we’re really proud of our great group of quality teachers.
One way that we keep up-to-date with the latest teaching methods and ideas is by going to various teaching conferences. This year, our Exams DOS, Lewis Richards, spent three days at the IATEFL teaching conference in Liverpool. While there he attended various seminars and talks, to bring back ideas to share with the teachers. Anyone who isn’t sure what IATEFL is, have a read below for an explanation.
He also gave a presentation as part of a forum on IELTS Writing, attended by around 100 teachers. His talk was on ‘tips for lower-level IELTS writing’, presenting some of the ideas from his new course book, ‘Build up to IELTS’, which is coming out in the next few weeks.
Above is a picture of Lewis in action (there were lots of people there, honest!). He was even asked to sign a copy of his previous book, ‘IELTS Advantage Writing Skills’ by a teacher from Russia – fame at last!
What is IATEFL?
IATEFL is the world’s largest English-teaching conference. It’s held at a different city in the UK every April, over four days. Virtually all the top writers, speakers and teacher-trainers in English-teaching attend, and give talks on different aspects of teaching, from how to improve students’ pronunciation, to new teaching methods, to ways to teach reading, to how to deal with large classes of students.
IATEFL has been going for 53 years, and has become a truly international conference, with speakers and attendees from all over the world. This year, key speakers came from Chile, Poland, New Zealand, the US, Uruguay, India, and many other countries. Several thousand people attend each year, and there are over 300 talks during the week.
Note from Lewis:
For me, IATEFL is a great way to keep my teaching up-to-date, and to find out about new developments in teaching. When I go to a really useful seminar, I bring back the information to share with colleagues, either by presenting the ideas in the conference in a workshop at LSI/IH Portsmouth, or just by talking about what I’ve seen in the staffroom. I’ve presented five times at IATEFL, and presenting also makes me think about what I’ve learned over the year about teaching, and what ideas I can share with other teachers from all over the world. It’s also nice to bump into old colleagues and friends as well!
Lewis