Feel free to take a look at the slides.

Check all the free professional development opportunities available for teachers in Argentina and abroad.

Looking forward to learning and sharing together.

1) In May

Free webinar for teachers on Saturday 26th of May – 10 am. Contact events@cambridgeesolargentina.org to sign up. No more vacancies !!!!

2) In June

June online course No more vacancies!!!

New online course on Educational Blogging with Young Learners offered in June. This course is sponsored by ESSARP in Argentina, ETAS in Switzerland and JALT Teaching Children SIG in Japan.

To enrol please check this link http://www.essarp.org.ar/cursos/coordinador.pl?editar=1&id_cursos=2861&r=i9Q4IatxM3ejQzZ .

It´s free for ESSARP memebers.

June 1st

Free workshop for Teachers of English at Essarp offered by Jennifer Verschoor
Learn how to use the English for the Games material created by the British Council.
Limited vacancies. To register please click this link https://www.essarp.org.ar/cursos/registro.pl  No more vacancies!!

June 2nd

No more vacancies!!

Come and join our first webinar on Podasting. To enrol send an email to tics@sbs.com.ar

June 16th

First ever IATEFL BESIG Satellite event in Buenos Aires.
For free enrolment, please check the following link http://tinyurl.com/besigevent

Today after reading Isil´s blog post I got inspired to write about an online course I have just finished moderating at Essarp.

This is not the first time that I give an online courses at Essarp. Two years ago together with ETAS English Teachers Association in Switzerland we offered a joint online course with Illya Arnet Clark for teachers in Argentina and Switzerland. It was such an enriching experience to unite teachers from different cultures.

These last two weeks several teachers attended an online course called ICT in the classroom to learn how to integrate and create different web 2.0 tools. Some teachers had already taken other courses with me and knew how to manage our online space. For those teachers who enrolled for the first time it was quite overwhelming at the beginning.

When teachers are motivated to become better teachers and are willing to innovate it is just amazing to see their creativity and talent in full swing. These teachers were able to create really inspiring e-portfolios. Some participants immediately tried the new tools with their learners and others shared these tools with the rest of their colleagues.

I would like to share some reflections made by the participants:

- Society is changing fast and it seems to me that education is following far behind!

- Parents believe that computing equals playing.

- Life is online, the school can`t stay offline.

- The whole education system is trying to change and it is not easy. I think we are in a transition era as educators. Little by little things are changing.

- It´s a great challenge of becoming digital teachers although we were not digital students ourselves !

- Technology not only can engage them but also let them be so creative!

- As teachers, that our most daring challenge is to turn the 19th century classroom into a 21st century one!

- The challenge  is for us to become digital teachers when we are part of this transition.

- If students don´t take action in their learning process they will never develop different abilities.

- Students want teachs to teach the how to think.

- Let´s create a blended environment.

I would like to thank this amazing group of teachers for their active participation and enriching collaboration.

Please check this PhotoPeach to take a look at some of their creations.

In June we are going to offer another online course together with Japan and Switzerland

As a teacher trainer from Buenos Aires, I devote a lot of time to ongoing personal and professional development. In the new era of collaboration and sharing, I have joined several social networks to enhance my learning opportunities. As a result, I was able to fulfill my purpose of connecting with like-minded teachers in a culturally sensitive way. Beyond getting great ideas for teaching and staying excited about my profession, I find that I am not alone in wanting to innovate, learn and grow. This required me to leave my comfort zone and become a life-long learner exploring ways to integrate digital tools to enhance teaching and learning.

Knowing that the future of education is not teaching but learning, teacher development is essential for our students’ success in order to keep up-to-date on the lastest trends in ELT. It is necessary to learn new methods, techniques and strategies so we can be better equipped to face 21st century challenges.

This year I was awarded the IATEFL BESIG facilitator scholarship to attend IATEFL in Glasgow. To be part of such a prestigious team as BESIG is truly a privilege. As a scholarship winner, there were several moments to celebrate this award. IATEFL invited all the scholarship winners to attend a tea party and there was a scholarship stand in the exhibition hall showing posters of all the scholarship winners.

Being a member of several social networks such as Twitter and Facebook has allowed me to understand that learning is a social process and it requires people to collaborate, share ideas, seek answers and build new insights throughout the process. Social media has become a valuable and free educational tool for my professional development. In recent years, I have been learning and sharing on-line experiences integrating technology with several teachers worldwide. This has been a key ingredient for me to constantly meet like-minded teachers.

My first day at IATEFL was at the BESIG PCE. Attending so many interesting sessions was really inspiring and overwhelming at the same time. At IATEFL I kept bumping into teachers I´ve been networking with for the last 2 or 3 years and from the beginning I felt instantly comfortable and at ease. There were no kilometers separating us. We all mingled immediately as a group to build relationships and connections worldwide.

How could a teacher that lived so many kilometers away from Glasgow feel at home in such an enormous conference? Bonds had already been established with many amazing people. There were more than 800 teachers attending this conference and I immediately felt I had known many of them for several years. The effect of social networking has been the most rewarding experience I´ve ever had as a teacher.

If I had to define my whole experience attending IATEFL, I would say that it has helped me reinforce my world-wide connections and has shown me how alike we all really are.

The 5th Virtual Round Table is a 3-day free conference offered to teachers who would like to start integrating language learning technologies. Several teachers worldwide attend this amazing conference organised by Heike Philp, Shelly Terrell, Steven Herder and Berni Wall.

My “Jazz up your Language classes with Technology” proposal has been accepted. I shared several ideas on how I am integrating technology with my students in Buenos Aires. Feel free to explore the slides and check the links.

I would like to thank all the wonderful participants who attended my presentation.

Please check this link to view the links shared during the presentation.

I would like to thank Shelly Terrell for inviting me to give my first free webinar for American TESOL. Today I spoke about how to Jazz up you EFL classes with technology.  During the webinar I introduced some free and simple tools to start integrating technology in your teaching scenarios. Teachers need to provide digitally rich learning opportunities if they want to move forward and motivate their students. Then I showed some classroom examples on how my students are using digital storytelling tools in their classroom.

Looking forward to sharing more ideas in the near future.

Please check the following links http://www.att.com/Common/images/safety/game.html and http://www.phewmsg.com/

Below you will find some comments on my presentation

This year I was awarded the BESIG facilitator scholarship to attend IATEFL in Glasgow. As a scholarship winner, there were several moments to celebrate this award. IATEFL invited all the scholarship winners to attend a tea party and held posters on the IATEFL wall.

The same day we had our scholarship tea party, IATEFL online interviewed some scholarship winners. Take a look at our live interview together with Erika Osvath and Bruno Andrade.

This conference has been a turning point in my career. Not only was I able to finally meet several teachers of my inpiring PLN (Personal Learning Network) but also had to opportunity to attend thought-provoking sessions throughout the week.

My presentation was on March 22nd at 15:40 pm. In preparation for my presentation, I did everything by the book and finished with a tango called Caminito. I wanted the audience to understand that teachers in Latin America are asking for a change.

University of Cambridge ESOL Examinations helped me spread the word on a short survey I created for Business English teachers. The results of the survey clearly show that teachers want to start integrating technology and need to learn new skills and software applications.

One attendee did comment after the session that most teachers in his country do not know how to teach online and if it would be possible to train teachers online.

As always after attending an International conference, there were several great ideas I gleaned from the sessions attended that will be incorporated in my classes.

Below you will find the slides from my presentation.

Thank you to the BESIG team for making my dream come true and to be able to join such an amazing group of talented teachers.

Finally the book I have co-authored with Ozge Karouglu has arrived in the labs. This means that you can take a look at the free sample and download it.

The e-book is a part of theround that is founded by Lindsay Clandfield and Luke Meddings. I would like to thank both of them for their constant support and encouragement. They´ve made our dream come true!

We´ve been working hard and discussing the best web tools need to become a successful 21st century teacher.

The feedback we received has been really positive and we are looking forward to writing more ideas on how to integrate technology with young learners.

Feel free to download our sample version from this link http://issuu.com/theround/docs/digitaljourneylabsversion and start using these ideas with your students.

We hope you enjoy this journey as much as we did.

This is the second time I deliver a presentation for TeachMeet Int’l hosted by Arjana Blazic and Bart Verswijvel.

TeachMeet features free “micro” presentations from teachers around the world. It is an unplugged an informal gathering of teachers who show and share incredible ideas and activities for your classroom. Today there were 33 teachers from 20 countries willing to learn from each other. For more information about this event please check
http://teachmeetinternational.wikispaces.com/

My presentation was about how to use Moshi Monsters with young learners. I´ve been using this virtual game with them for a long time and the results are amazing.

Here is a screenshot of my 3 minute presentation.

Feel free to explore my slides and start integrating virtual games in your classroom.

Teaching has changed dramatically in the 21st century with the advent of Web 2.0 tools like wikis, blogs and podcasts just to name a few. Technology has modified the landscape of information and knowledge. Learning in this scenario poses new questions for teachers. Anyone with access to Internet has the ability to create videos, text and audio that can be shared with a global audience.

How can teachers be inspired to gradually start incorporating technology in their daily teaching?
Internet has become a big challenge for teachers and if used correctly is an empowering phenomenon. But most teachers internally ask themselves why should I start using technology. My answer to this question is that technology is here to stay. Integrating technology is not putting computers in the classroom without teacher training. Technology should be used effectively and efficiently to allow students to learn how to apply computer skills in meaningful ways. Consider the power you have as a teacher to start sharing students work with a real audience that is considered to be any student from the world.
Recently ARCALL (Argentine Computer Assisted Language Learning) has been relaunched with the clear goal to help teachers integrate technology. We know that there are many compelling reasons to start integrating technology .

ARCALL is a group of innovative language teaching professionals from Argentina which aims to:
teaching professionals from Argentina which

• increase the use of educational technology in EFL (English as a Foreign Language),

• collaborate in the integration of ICT in Argentina in ways that are effective and appropriate,

• assist teachers in integrating ICT into their daily practices and as a means of developing themselves professionally,

• train teachers on using computers and the Internet in English language teaching,

Another possibility is to create your own blog and share your experience with other colleagues. As head of a blog, I should say that the journey on how to integrate technology in your classes is full of obstacles and rewards. If you are about I´d like to invite all teachers, who have not already incorporated technology in their classrooms, to give it a try.

I hope you enjoy the ride.