It's The Most Wonderful Time of the Year...

It’s hard to believe that we are at the beginning of December and another Covid Christmas is soon to be upon us. I’m not quite sure where November went. December is a short teaching month and we all have our favourite resources for the month and for the holiday season.

As always, we’d like to thank all the teachers that shared resources. A special shout out to Kate for sharing her lesson plans for December. They are very helpful. 

Here is the link to the resource from Haleema:

Your English Pal | All ESL Lesson Plans A - Z.

There are a lot of free lessons geared towards higher level learners.

Here is the link to the resource I found:

ESL Literacy Readers (bowvalleycollege.ca). This one is for lower level learners. 

This is a link to some fun winter activities in Ontario: 

https://ivebeenbit.ca/things-to-do-in-ontario-in-winter/. You may want to share it with your students or check it out for yourself. 

Danielle also posted some helpful sites in our Google Classroom. Take a look if you haven’t yet. 

Also, Danielle will be holding an Avenue 101 Part 2. She has sent the Zoom link. I’m sure it will be full of useful information. 

Please make sure to check out the emails and folders that Carolyn shared for uploading our monthly narratives, TESL certification and other administrative forms.

Don’t forget about our Zoom get together on DEC17th for some Christmas cheer. Details to follow.

Merry Christmas and Happy Holiday. We wish you all the best for 2022. Enjoy your well deserved break and downtime!

Your PBLA Leads

Hello November!

 

We are in the throes of November, and it seems like time is flying by! Thank you to all our instructors who continue to share great resources and links. Last month, we had some great links and resources shared by Tracy: Canadian Culture - Fall holidays part 2.pptx (sharepoint.com) We had the Halton Library Presentations, and Joy shared a great video from Bob the Canadian teaching English at the Library for our learners: https://youtu.be/R7-hD4EW4Tw

And, if you are looking for some great lessons aligned with PBLA, Marina found a great resource for multi-level modules: Multilevel Modules – PBLA Practice Guidelines (language.ca)

In November, we have our winter driving presentations for the classes. Valerie shared a page that she assigned her students from liveworksheets.com See it here: Being ready for a winter drive worksheet (liveworksheets.com) Kate shared a video for lower levels on winter driving, see it here: https://www.cbc.ca/learning-english/winter-driving-level-1-1.4514903

Also, please find Kate’s lesson plans for November here:
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1ueZFKTqi2zKc7ZsFNzotpZ_hhT8m8W2n/edit?usp=sharing&ouid=107273558239383471398&rtpof=true&sd=true

As usual, thank you to our AWESOME team of instructors for sharing!

We hope you had an enjoyable experience at this year’s virtual TESL Conference. Please remember to share any good information/resources that you learned about with our team. For our “Techy Teachers” who love to discover new digital tools and platforms, you may want to check these out:

Poll Everywhere Tutorial - Bing video

Create and Collaborate | Canva for Education

Finally, congrats to our Avenue Lead –Danielle, who will be hosting another Avenue 101 workshop this Friday at 1:30pm for anyone who couldn’t join the last time. Please reach out to her for the zoom link if you want to join.

Have a wonderful month,

Haleema and Marina

Welcome to Fall!

Personally, this is my favourite time of year - cooler days and the natural beauty of the leaves changing colour. You may also be thinking of starting assessments and, as always, remember to keep it simple both for your students and yourself. We all regularly use many real-world reading and writing tasks with our classes, but we just have to remember to make them skill-using activities with holistic feedback and count them as artefacts for our students’ portfolios. Keep track of everything in the assessment logs. (this is copied directly from last October’s post because I thought it was important).

Haleema and I will be holding a PBLA review on October 15th. Details to follow.

Thanks to Valerie for sharing her Fall Reading Assessment. Thank you to everyone who shared resources for National Day of Truth and Reconciliation. I found it quite moving to see our students dressed in Orange.

Here is a blog that Kate shared: https://youglish.com/ This is helpful for pronunciation.

You can also check out https://www.learningchocolate.com/ This is a great resource for lower level students.

See Valerie's Fall Fun Assessment navigation website (CLB 3/4) here. Answers here.

Also, a friendly reminder to register for TESL Conference if you haven’t done so already.

Here are some useful links to already made assessments:

Real World Task Bank

Curriculum Real-World Tasks CLB 1-8 from Tutela

Are there other ones to share??

Your PBLA team Haleema and Marina

Here We Go Again!

Welcome back to online teaching everyone! It’s hard to believe this is our second September we are starting back in our virtual classrooms. Perhaps we can agree that we’ve officially made the shift from this being our new norm, to just our norm. Whether we are online or in-person, the start of the new school year can feel overwhelming with lesson planning, and just getting back into a groove. Remember there are all kinds of resources available (browse through our blog!) to help you navigate your way to smooth start. You may want to check out this blog post about ideas on how to start the year using Zoom:

Five practical ideas for starting English lessons with Zoom | National Geographic Learning: In Focus (eltngl.com)

Here is an activity you can use to get your students familiar with the zoom buttons:

Zoom Button Tutorial Activity - Google Docs

Thank you again to all of our instructors who continue to share with our team. Special shout outs to Danielle and Kate for their helpful videos and planning tools. Thank you also to Carolyn for sending out the LINC instructor handbook, schedules, assessment logs, etc. and everything else we need to help keep organized! (A quick reminder: Be sure to sign that you understand the expectations of the handbook and scan back to Carolyn by September 30th.)

Here is the link for resetting your classes on Avenue:

http://learnit2teach.ca/wpnew/Avenue_Files/Stage_2/06-Ending_a_Courseware_Delivery_Cycle/01-Resetting_a_Course_Avenue.pdf

Here is a link to a video on setting up Google Classroom:

How to Set Up a Google Classroom Tutorial

 

Here are Google Doc calendars (morning & afternoon) you can COPY to share with your students to sign up for one-on-one time with you. (Please click on File, Make a Copy to save to your own Google Drive; these are the General ones for ALL teachers!)

 

Mornings: - https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1DLvo5UjLwOPODtBM3k8eWdJBA6YlILurnfhOtKML3Og/edit?usp=sharing

 

Afternoons:

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1C2OWT9i7cTriVWUk_dZ3Jyw6QXTBN4Qaoe_o9wok-70/edit?usp=sharing

And last but not least, Kate's Lesson Plans for easy planning:

Lesson Planning for CLB 3-5

Lesson Planning for CLB 5-8

Wishing everyone a safe and successful 2020 - 2021 school year!

Haleema and Marina

Welcome to May!

Can you believe it? Hopefully the spring showers will give us some May flowers.

May brings with it a lot of topics that are fun to cover in class. We have Mother’s Day and Victoria Day. May is also a good month to teach about gardening, plants and insects, Canada and Lyme disease. We also have World Laughter Day on May 7th (who doesn’t need a good laugh right about now). For more ideas on themes and topics, visit www.eslmadeeasy.com here!

  

Thank you to everyone who shared resources this month. 

Here is the link from Kate about Ontario Parks: Ontario Parks Store

Also, Kate has shared her lesson plans for the month: https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1EtatsiKdw9FGIYY38RxU46vBbJq-7bHv?usp=sharing

Thanks for sharing Kate, they are so helpful for planning the month.

As Carolyn mentioned in our meeting, you can share student success stories with Yatza at yatsa.smajovic@centreforskills.ca. Thanks Lara-Lyn for sharing the story of your student.

Have a fabulous month!

Marina and Haleema

Spring is in the Air!

Sunny and warmer days are finally here, and I’m sure many of us have a little more spring in our step!

If you haven’t done so lately, take a moment to give yourself a pat on the back for teaching online for over a year! If we reflect on the late nights trying to figure out how to deliver a lesson on this thing called Zoom, searching for good online teaching resources, and learning how to engage our not-so-tech-savvy students, we’ll realize just how far we’ve come in our teaching with tech journey. We made it through yet another month, and now we can look forward to a well-deserved “March Break” in April! 

This month has lots of fun and maybe not so fun (it’s tax time – yuck) topics to discuss with our students. A few topics you could teach in April are April Fools’ Day, Easter, Ramadan, spring cleaning, the environment, Earth day, banking/financial literacy, and taxes in Canada. To get into the spirit of spring try teaching your students “Spring Idioms” with this worksheet good for intermediate or higher level students:

Spring Idioms

Thank you to our amazing team for sharing resources with each other!

Here is a great video resource that is useful for many levels and covers a range of topics shared by Marcella: https://m.youtube.com/channel/UCWjV1ynd_zqWlXZA5dfJ4Wg/playlists

For those of you who teach the lower to intermediate levels and are tackling the topic of teaching taxes, here are some helpful resources:

http://en.copian.ca/library/learning/incomtax/incomtax.pdf

41760_Volume02.indd (settlementatwork.org)

Also, don’t hesitate to get in touch with our SIS team Maria and Wendy who created an excellent presentation on taxes in Canada. Here is a Listening/Reading Skill-Using Activity you can use to go along with their PowerPoint: 

Taxes - Listening and Reading Skill Using Activity

At our last meeting Cathy shared a great idea to have a set of instructions for the students, just in case there are any problems with Wi Fi or other tech issues. Check out her handout here:

Internet Issues and Zoom

Marina shared a useful link to find out more information on the Covid 19 vaccines in Halton: Halton - COVID-19 Vaccine Resources

Also, be sure to check out our Google Classroom which is always being updated by Danielle.

As Carolyn mentioned, please share the registration link for the Halton Newcomers Day (hosted by Centre for Skills - April 9th) with your students: Webinar Registration - Zoom

Finally, for our new teachers (and anyone who wants a refresher) Marina and I will be hosting a PBLA Bootcamp. Save the date: 11:00 am on April 20, 2021.  Zoom link will be sent out closer to the date.

Have a wonderful month,

Haleema and Marina

Welcome to March!

It’s hard to believe it’s been a year (almost) that we’ve been in some variation of lockdown. When I reflect back on the year, I am amazed at all that we have accomplished especially with all the changes, challenges and permutations to online teaching we’ve been through. As a team of incredible instructors, and of course amazing leadership, we should be proud of all we have accomplished. Not only have we all survived but we have thrived through a very unpredictable year. To say it’s been a challenging year would be a huge understatement but we made it!

As I tell my students at this time of the year, we made it through the worst of winter and we can now look forward to brighter and warmer days. So, let’s get through March and make it to our well deserved April Break this year. 

Stay tuned because Haleema and I will be holding a PBLA boot camp for the new teachers!

As always, it’s so helpful to receive links and resources. Thank you to all the teachers who have shared these resources with us. 

Don’t forget to take a look at the Google classroom where Danielle has been posting resources. There are lots of goodies to explore!

This is from Valerie https://continuingstudies.uvic.ca/elc/studyzone. This site offers activities at different levels.

Here is an older PDF version of Oxford Picture Dictionary: http://homepage.ntu.edu.tw/~karchung/OxfordPictureDictionary.pdf

With Women’s Day, the start of Spring and Daylight Savings, St. Patrick’s day, National Potato Chips Day (yes this is a real thing) all in March there are a lot of fun and interesting topics to cover with your students. 

Stay safe and healthy.

Marina and Haleema

Fun in February!

Well, we have all been very busy changing CLB levels, filling out logs, doing reports and conference summaries, and if you’ve finished or are near the finish line – bravo! This is a friendly reminder to take some time out during your Zoom classes to have one-on-one conferences with your students. You can do a quick review of their strengths and suggestions for improvement. It’s easy to pull each student aside while students are busy with their groups in the breakout rooms, and a couple of minutes per student are all it takes!

As usual, it’s always helpful to receive links to different websites and resources. So, thank you teachers for sharing great resources with us! 

Suja shared a great reading activity on the State of Emergency in Ontario: 

State of Emergency in Ontario

Shared by Joy:

An excellent resource for teaching your students about digital literacy (password is Diglit4T): Digital Literacy Curriculum Resource | ISSofBC (issbc.org)  

Also, Google has a very good phishing quiz which you may want your students to try: https://phishingquiz.withgoogle.com/?

Some very useful resources From Danielle:

An excellent place to find some pre or post-teaching activities for the presentation on frauds:

 Home (antifraudcentre-centreantifraude.ca)

Historica Canada has lots of programs, videos, PDFs etc. All very useful for our classes:

PROGRAMS | Historica Canada

 

You can find a  kit designed to help respondents whose mother tongue is not English or French understand and complete the 2021 Census here: 2021 Census Adult Education Kit

Now that the busy “reporting season” is coming to an end, you can enjoy some levity with some fun in February! This month lends itself well to so many great topics– Valentine’s Day, Family Day, Canada Flag Day, and Black History Month just to name a few. Something which all students have great fun talking about is marriage customs from their countries. A great topic to create an assessment in all four skills - you can talk about the customs, food, clothing and so much more! Check out a list of 12 wedding traditions from around the world here: How weddings look different around the world - Insider 

For all the movie buffs here is a list of the top 10 Movies for Valentine’s Day according to IMDb (Internet Movie Database):The 10 Best Valentine's Day Movies Of All Time (According To IMDb) (screenrant.com)

Things will be a little different on Family Day this year with social distancing. So, keep your eye on the community events calendar to know if there are any virtual events for your students to enjoy on Family Day:

Burlington Calendar 

Family Day (oakville.ca) 

Events Calendar - Town of Milton 

Family Day - Halton Hills

Stay warm and safe,

Haleema and Marina

Happy New Year!

Welcome back! Hopefully you had a restful holiday break, took some time for yourself and did a little digital detox. Or at the very least, unplugged for a few days.  Let’s welcome in 2021 even though it’s been off to a bit of a rocky start. Fingers crossed that it’s a major improvement to  2020. 

This year is starting off with some exciting new changes. Carolyn will be taking on the role of Interim Coordinator and we know she’ll be amazing! Also, I’m looking forward to being your PBLA lead.

On January 19th, we’ll be hosting a ‘What the Heck Do I do on Harts Again?’ workshop. We’ll be offering an optional refresher on how to complete progress reports on Harts. For our new instructors, who may not be familiar with Harts, this will be a good opportunity to learn how to complete progress reports on it.  Stay tuned for times and Zoom invites. 

As always, thank you for sharing useful links and resources.

Check out a fun link that Danielle shared: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCsxqJMylBN-0x6a-8RT8pAg

Dawn shared a great link to teach Future tenses: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2LSBme2M4Qo

Your PBLA Leads!