Online Teacher

Community
Launch event
19 November 2020

www.britishcouncil.org
Event agenda | 19 November 2020
Time Session name Speakers
09.45 – 10.00 Introduction to the Future English Simon Etherton and Maja Mandekic
Online Teacher Community event

10.00 – 10.45 Communities of Practice as a road Paula Rebolledo

to empowerment
(including a 15-min Q&A)

11.00 – 11.30 Introducing the Online Teacher Cristiana Osan and Teodora Naiba
Community

11.45 – 12.30 Research into TAGs and the positive Simon Borg
role of CoPs in continuing
professional development (including a 15-min Q&A)

12.30 – 13.00 BREAK BREAK

13.00 – 13.45 Adapting Dogme/Teaching Scott Thornbury

Unplugged principles to
online/remote teaching (including a 15-min Q&A)

14.00 – 14.45 Online Teacher Community: benefits Maria Jose Galleno, and Nataliia
of developing an e-portfolio and Naiavko
owning your professional
development

15.00 – 15.15 Community engagement Roy Cross

and introducing Harry Kuchah

15.15 – 16.00 Building opportunities for language Harry Kuchah

learning and teaching through a
pedagogy of partnership (including a 15-min Q&A)

16.00 – 16.15 Wrap-up and invitation to join the Simon Etherton and Maja Mandekic
Online Teacher Community.
Upcoming programme
Session outlines

Communities of Practice as a road to empowerment

Among the many things that we have learned over the years from educational
research, is that successful professional development initiatives are self-directed,
reflection-oriented and encourage peer-learning. This talk will examine the concept
of communities of practice and argue how they exemplify such features and
furthermore, have the potential to bring about self-empowerment.

Paula Rebolledo – Paula has taught at primary, secondary, undergraduate and

postgraduate levels and in INSETT programmes in various countries. Her research
interests include teacher education, professional development and teacher-
research. She has led teacher-research initiatives such as the Champion Teachers
programme and the APTIS Action Research Award Scheme. She is co-founder of
RICELT, the network of ELT research in Chile.

Introducing the Teacher Online Community

This webinar will welcome you to the Online Teacher Community platform and will
show you the main features available. Join us to discover how you can develop
professionally as a member of the online community. The practical tips we will offer
will help you navigate the platform and make the most of it.
Christiana Osan – After working for 11 years as a teacher, Cristiana became a
DELTA-certified teacher educator. For the last 12 years, she has worked as a teacher
educator, a trainers' trainer, an online moderator, an examiner for international
certificates, and a materials writer, thus collaborating in various projects with
thousands of teachers around the world. A great believer in the empowerment of
teachers, Cristiana is looking forward to being a member of the Online Teacher
Community.
Teodora Naiba – Teodora has been teaching English for almost 20 years in Cluj-
Napoca, Romania. She became a teacher educator in 2007 and started working as
an e-moderator and e-mentor for British Council online courses ten years ago. She
has worked in different projects with teachers all over the world and she is very
excited to be part of the Online Teacher Community.

Research into TAGs and the positive role of CoPs in continuing

professional development
Several professional development projects delivered by the British Council in
recent years have used a community of practice (CoP) model called Teacher
Activity Groups (TAGs). In this talk I will discuss what a CoP is and provide examples
from projects around the world to illustrate both the benefits of TAGs and the
conditions that need to exist for TAGs to achieve their potential.
Simon Borg – Simon has been involved in language teaching and teacher education
for over 30 years. As an educational consultant, he specialises in the design,
implementation and evaluation of teacher professional development programmes
and policies in a range of international contexts. Details of his work (and his blog) are
available at http://simon-borg.co.uk/.

Adapting Dogme/Teaching Unplugged principles to online/remote

teaching
Dogme ELT (also known as Teaching Unplugged) is an approach that aims to
reinstate the principles and practices of communicative language teaching by
‘exploiting the learning opportunities offered by the raw material of the classroom,
that is the language that emerges from the needs, interests, concerns and desires
of the people in the room.’ But how can such lofty goals by achieved when there is
no longer a ‘room’ – a shared physical space with its characteristic social dynamic?
In this talk, I aim to show how these principles can be adapted to the challenge of
online/remote teaching, while at the same time cautioning that teachers must make
their own decisions as to what works best in their particular context.
Scott Thornbury – Scott has taught and trained in Egypt, UK, Spain, and in his native
New Zealand. Until recently he taught an online MA TESOL program for The New
School in New York. His writing credits include several award-winning books for
teachers on language and methodology. He is also the series editor for the
Cambridge Handbooks for Language Teachers, and a trustee of the Hands Up
Project, which promotes drama activities in English for children in under-resourced
regions of the Arab world.

Online Teacher Community: benefits of developing an e-portfolio and

owning your professional development
Continuing professional development is and should take a paramount role in any
profession and as teachers this can have many different forms. Are there specific
steps you need to take in order to reach your professional goals? What exactly is
meant by taking a CPD ownership? Join us in this talk where we go through the
different possibilities that the platform can bring in order to tailor your professional
development to your needs and activate your networking skills to build a wider
educational community.
Natalia Naiavko – Natalia has been a teacher educator since 2007. She was a
teacher of English for 24 years in Ukraine. In 2016-2017, Natalia was a teacher
trainer at the Ministry of Education and Science Programme “Teachers of English as
Change Agents” and one of the developers of the new Ukrainian school curriculum
“New Ukrainian School”.
Since 2009, she has been an e-moderator for the British Council and has conducted
online courses on teaching worldwide.
María José Galleno – María José has been teaching English since 2003 and she is a
British Council online moderator. Previously, she worked as a remote teacher in Plan
CEIBAL providing English lessons through video conferencing to public schools in
Uruguay. She is also the Learning Technologist at St Brendan's School where she
works with primary and secondary school teachers in the use of technology in the
classroom. She holds an MA in Digital Technology and Communication and Education
from the University of Manchester and another MA in TESOL Teacher Education from
the same university. She is a Cambridge ESOL oral examiner for YLE, KET and PET.

Building opportunities for language learning and teaching through a

pedagogy of partnership

The hegemony of ‘Centre’ generated ELT pedagogic practices has increasingly

come under scrutiny recently, owing to the growing understanding of the influence
of contextual factors on language teaching and learning. Classroom realities
continue to suggest that even the ‘best’ methods are often challenged by lack of
student engagement and motivation. How do we make English language learning
relevant to our students and consistent with the cultural realities of their learning
environment? This presentation will show how adopting a pedagogy based on
partnerships which take account of learner and teacher agency can provide
contextually appropriate solutions to local challenges.

Harry Kuchah - Harry is Lecturer in Language Education at the University of Leeds,

UK. He has also been involved in a range of teacher education and materials
development initiatives in sub-Saharan Africa, South East Asia and Europe. More
recently, he has served as a consultant with the Council of Europe, in Albania, with
Windle Trust International in South Sudan and with the British Council in Afghanistan,
Cote d'Ivoire, Guinea and Senegal. He is one of TESOL International Association’s ‘30
upcoming leaders’ in ELT and President of IATEFL.