Get out there and grab!

I’ve recently completed the Leadership for ELT course run by OxfordTEFL. It was part of the Senior Teacher Development program, which is an initiative of Kaplan International English and aims at preparing Senior Teachers to take on a leadership role when an opportunity arises. I found the course very practical. It provided me with opportunities and guidance in reflecting on my own practice and skills. I got to know several tool which helped me define where I am and where I’d like to be in the future. I would recommend it to anyone either being in or taking up a leadership role.

One of the tasks that I found extremely useful was a visualization in which you imagine your retirement party: venue, music, food, crowd, speeches. Having done the task I’ve realized not only what I’d like to be recognized for (a great teacher, supportive colleague, motivating and empowering leader) but also what I’d love to have achieved by the time I retire. This helped me identify some of my long and short term aims, for instance: starting a blog, giving a talk at a conference, writing an article, publishing materials… So I asked myself why wait?

• Given a little nudge by Louise Guyett, I started the blog and I’m just about to publish my 5th post 🙂
• On April 12th, I gave my first ever talk at an ELT Ireland event. You can read about how it went and watch it by clicking on the link in this blog post.
• Finally, as part of the Leadership course, I’ve written an article about the importance of positive feedback which was published on the Oxford TEFL blog and can be accessed here.

 

All that made me realize that there are countless opportunities out there and so many ways in which ELT teachers can develop. If you are serious about your career and it’s not only a way to make money to be able to do something else, get out there and try different things.

• experiment with new tools and ideas
• experiment and share
• initiate projects within your institution
• do action research (you’re teaching anyway so why not experiment and record the outcomes, even by writing reflections)
• care about feedback, get it and reflect on it
• create your own materials (I bet you do it anyway) and send them to a publisher or share them on a teaching website
• deliver a teacher training session (your colleagues can definitely learn something from you)
• join a teaching association
• attend a conference (an amazing opportunity to learn from others and network)
• start a blog (it’ll help you reflect on your teaching practice and not only)
• write an article

Set yourself SMART goals and start ticking the boxes!