English Teaching professional blog from Michelle Ocriciano

Recent events in the US involving George Floyd may have brought up topics such as racism and discrimination to our ELT classes. Some of us embraced them, whereas others questioned what ELT has to do with this type of topics. So, let's talk about social justice.

As we go back to the new normal, schools are starting to think about ways to increase their number of students. An unfortunate and unethical way of doing it is by advertising their "Native English teachers”. Read on and find out a better way to advertise courses with product differentiation and design thinking.

As remote teaching becomes the new norm, we may be shifting our attention from how to use technology to teach online to what we are teaching and how students are responding to it. Not following deadlines or completing tasks can be closely related to the collective trauma the world is facing right now.

As we adapt to the ‘new normal’ in the Covid-19 virtual world and beyond, issues related to the use of L1 have emerged with some teachers feeling uncomfortable as learners slip into L1 in breakout rooms when using Zoom or similar tools. But Michelle’s motto is ‘Let it go!’ Read her blog to find out why.

In these tough and unprecedented times, many teachers are also faced with adapting to new online teaching challenges - and some of us are feeling anxious and overwhelmed. Here, Michelle Ocriciano shares some simple techniques for dealing with anxiety.

I only truly understood the importance of feedback and counselling when I started teaching IELTS classes. Some learners would panic, even cry, during their speaking practice, so I knew I had to provide something more than just corrective feedback …

When Michelle Ocriciano first moved to Australia she realized that her students kept saying ‘But English here is very different, right?’. Find out about different varieties of English, and its use as a lingua franca, and enjoy all the resources!

Language teaching is a particularly demanding subject and can drain teachers emotionally. Teachers are often concerned about students’ wellbeing, but tend to neglect their own. After the holidays in December, January is often seen as a good time to reflect, make some New Year’s resolutions and map out the year ahead or new term. So, if one of your resolutions is to take better care of yourself (or should be!), read Michelle Ocriciano’s straightforward tips on how to improve teachers’ wellbeing.

When Michelle Ocriciano (one of our new bloggers for English Teaching Professional) started teaching, she had a 5-year degree in Linguistics and teaching, and thought she could conquer the world. She felt that she basically knew two things very well: 1) language teaching is social and 2) knowledge of how language works is essential. But the fact is that she still had many questions, and the more she taught, the more those questions bothered her. Read on to find out what Michelle discovered about the way students really learn.