Steve's ELT Blog

  Teacher Trainer, Steve Hatting, at the training venue setting up before commencing a session Tabuk, Kingdom of Saudi Arabia – Steve Hatting, in collaboration with the Professional Development Unit of the University of Tabuk, is thrilled to announce an intensive 12-hour training marathon led by the renowned teacher trainer, Steven Hatting. This special event, dedicated exclusively to faculty members of the University’s International Languages (IL) Department, aims to empower educators with the latest tools and technologies to enhance teaching and learning experiences. The event will take place over a period of 3 days (June 18-20), at the University of Tabuk’s state-of-the-art campus which welcomes faculty members from various units within the IL Department, including the Curriculum Unit, Professional Development Unit, Assessment Unit, and representatives from Quality Education Company. Around 20 educators are expected to participate in this hands-on training session. Steve Hatting...

TRIZ (Theory of Inventive Problem Solving) is a systematic approach to creative problem-solving, primarily used in engineering and technology fields. However, you can adapt its principles to teaching English as a foreign language (EFL) by applying its structured methodology. Here's how you can incorporate TRIZ into your EFL teaching: Identify problems and contradictions: Analyze your teaching methods, materials, and the specific needs of your students. Identify issues, contradictions, or gaps in their learning experience. Use the 40 inventive principles: TRIZ offers 40 inventive principles that can help solve problems and contradictions. Review these principles and brainstorm ways to apply them to the issues you've identified in your EFL classroom. Some examples might include: Principle 1 (Segmentation): Break down complex grammar structures or vocabulary lessons into smaller, more manageable parts. Principle 13 (The Other Way Round): Reverse the order of a lesson or activity t...

Hey there, fellow English language teachers! It's been a while, but I've think I've got a pretty new and interesting idea for you. Are you looking for creative ways to enhance your lesson planning and classroom activities? If so, you're in the right place. In this blog post, we'll introduce you to TRIZ, a systematic approach to problem-solving that can revolutionize the way you plan lessons and design activities for your English as a Foreign Language (EFL) students. With real-life examples and a sprinkle of TRIZ magic, let's dive right in! What is TRIZ? Originally developed for the engineering and technology fields, TRIZ (Theory of Inventive Problem Solving) is a powerful tool that can help you identify and solve problems in your teaching methods. With 40 inventive principles and a contradiction matrix, TRIZ encourages innovative thinking and can help you create engaging, dynamic lessons for your EFL students. How can TRIZ be applied to EFL lesson planning? By a...

From June 7th to June 18, I had the privilege of co-hosting several new and potential teachers for the purpose of training them up. There were a total of 3 sessions per day with one of them being a practical application 45 minute session. Participants were learned and applied several techniques both unique to language teaching as well as for other subjects such as mathematics, biology, and chemistry. During the first week, topics included general classroom management skills like classroom discipline, giving instructions, and interaction patterns as well as a session of how to use inquiry-based learning in teaching. During the second week, another teacher trainer, Svitlana Bulkina, joined us to deliver trainings mainly dealing with lesson planning and the importance of learner-centeredness in teaching. Participants had more practice as several actually had to teach a lesson or portion of a lesson in front of other participants were they received constructive criticism on what they did w...

How do we start a new activity with our students? Well, clearly one of the important aspects to consider is about giving directions. Our directions are what tell the learners what we need to do for the next task and can help bring some sense of logic to the lesson being taught. Take for example, if I just threw several handouts at you, would you know which ones to do or how to do them? Probably not, but if you did you'd likely spend lots of time trying to sort through them first, or give up on them at some point. This is why we, as teachers, should take our directions very seriously. Avoid situations like these: In fact, one of the biggest takeaways for me from the sessions that I helped co-host with Svitlana Bulkina was something that she said in the second week. She pointed out that she has a 7-word limit for giving directions to an activity. While, as a teacher, I think I've been quite good at giving directions, this gave me something to consider and takeaway for my own teac...

I just presented in my first webinar ever and my first teacher training of this year. This is something that I've been wanting to do now since last year, so I was really grateful for the experience. Thanks, Linguist! And I hope to have many more. If you're interested in viewing what we discussed, you can find a pdf version below the pictures. Hope to see you all in the next webinar. I will make announcements here, I think. You can download the pdf version of the presentation for your own viewing by clicking " Download ."

One of the most useful little tools I've been using in my online teaching so far has been Telegram Polls. If you have a group of students in a Telegram group, you can send polls in a "quiz mode" to students in order to check their knowledge. This can be done during class or even after or before to utilize a TTT type lesson. Here's how you set up a poll. If you're using your phone with Telegram, open a group chat or channel. Then tap on the paperclip in the lower left-hand corner. Select poll. Then you can write your question and include up to 10 possible answers for students to select. Before you post it, make sure you select "quiz mode" if there is only one correct answer. In group chats, you also have an option for making your quiz anonymous or not, so you can see who is struggling the most in your class. This is also a good way to replace monitoring in your normal face-to-face class since you can't always see if they've gotten the right answer...