Building a programme
E-marking issues
From discussions in workshops, it would appear that few English B teachers are familiar with the e-marking system by which most assessment components are now marked. This is not surprising since once...
Blog
About being a teacher Free
At an English B workshop many years ago now, someone in the group cheerfully circulated this graphic. It caused much amusement, as well as wry recognition, and I recently came across it in my files (which...
Building a programme
Nov 2020, reviewed
In the context of the Covid pandemic, the session of November 2020 was the first involving the new Subject Guide which was 'normal'... but only relatively so. It was more normal than the May 2020 session...
Building a programme
Nov 2021, reviewed
The Report opens with a comment that component grade boundaries are not included, due to the continuing problems caused by the Covid pandemic - most particularly because some students were still forced...
Blog
Why Language Acquisition? Free
What is the purpose of a Group 2 Language Acquisition course? This question is on my mind at present because I am a member of an IB working party tasked with brain-storming ideas about the design and...
Building a programme
Variation
. This is, in a sense, different from the other four conceptual understandings, in that 'variation' is about describing or classifying language while the others are more concerned with explaining how...
Activities
About articles 1 Free
Articles - the + a/an - can be annoying things. To start with, many languages simply don't have them, so articles just seem like an unnecessary complication. Or ... your home language does have articles,...
Blog
Truth & War Free
Reactions to the conflict in Ukraine have included the well-known quote “The first casualty of War is Truth” – but it would seem that Truth has been seriously endangered in the Peace of our interconnected...
Language
Vocabulary & concepts
The teaching of vocabulary is a significant issue in all sciences, as discussed in Language in science - subject-specific words in science are "necessary compressions of complex concepts" without which...
Activities
Expanding vocabulary
Vocabularies are crossing circles and loops. We are defined by the lines we choose to cross or be confined by. from Possession A.S. Byatt (1990) The teaching...