Federico Riva

Methodology, Approach, Method and Technique, what are all these terms and how do they relate to my teaching ESL in the classroom? We take a look at these concepts and explain their meaning.

The receptive skills of reading and listening, generally get less attention than the other skills of speaking and writing. Here we look at some of the reasons they are avoided and why e should overcome these fears.

In this blog post, we will consider three different categories of speaking activity. For each we look at where each individual type is used and then look at some general ideas for delivering any of the three types of activity.

We can quote people through what's called direct speech. In written form it would look like “Corey said we're moving house next week”. We've used quotes and we've quoted Corey directly, i.e. used the exact words that he used. There is however another way we can quote people, and this is through reported speech. We don't quote their exact words, but we simply let people know what has been said.

In this blog we will consider how best to use the teaching material course book that often accompanies a course. There are a number of stategies we can adopt to get the most out of the book in different situations.

What are conditionals? In simplest terms, they say “if this happens, then that happens”. They're commonly referred to as ‘if' sentence structures’.

In this blog we will show how a simple speaking interview with the student, can be used to place them in one of the five ESL teaching bands, from Starter to Upper-Intermediate. Using a process known as progressive questioning, we can easily determine the student's level.

In this blog we will look at the ever popular ESL exams known as the Cambridge suite. It has exams at five levels, we will look at each and relate them to our typically ESL teaching group levels. What should you expect when teaching for these exams?

The receptive skills of reading and listening, generally get less attention than the other skills of speaking and writing. Here we look at some of the reasons they are avoided and why e should overcome these fears.

What are some of the considerations needed for students to complete a writing lesson? Here we outline some of the types of activity you can produce and major issues to be aware of.

The wipeboard in all its' forms is a ubiquitous tool in the classroom. What should we think abour during our lesson planning and delivery, in terms of the material to be presented on the wipeboard?

In this blog post, we will consider some examples of visual aids, such as real objects. We will then look at ways in which thay can be useful in the classroom, such as for eliciting information.