September saw the start of a new seven-part webinar series aimed at inspiring English teachers across ASEAN. The first edition, hosted by Viet Nam, also featured teachers from Indonesia and Thailand. This month’s topic? How to motivate learners, which is also the theme of a brand new MOOC (massive open online course) from British Council. This self-access course started on 21 September and lasts for four weeks, so if you haven’t already, you still have time to register here.
The first webinar, on the same theme of motivating learners, and indeed teachers, covered a range of topics, including the challenges of motivating learners, both in classroom settings and online, as well as some suggested activities and techniques to help with learner motivation. Our expert teacher panellists (Ray Rahmadhani from Indonesia, Tor Wilat from Thailand and Phan Do Quynh Tram from Viet Nam) shared their experiences with facilitator Davide Guarini Gilmartin from British Council Viet Nam. They were joined by over 100 teachers from the three ‘host’ countries as well as other ASEAN countries, including Cambodia, Myanmar and the Philippines, who joined either via Zoom or livestream on You Tube. To date, more than 700 people have viewed the session. If you haven’t seen it yet, it’s not too late. You can watch the recording here.
Further MOOCs and webinars for teachers across ASEAN
Each month, from now to March 2022, the British Council will be making MOOCs available to teachers. You can expect a diverse range of courses, each free and four weeks long, covering topics such as remote learning, gender in language education, as well as how to teach communication, primary learners and pronunciation. To accompany each MOOC, British Council teams in Indonesia, Thailand and Viet Nam will be collaborating and partnering with teachers from across the ASEAN region to bring you webinars which will focus on the theme of each month’s featured MOOC, but from an ASEAN perspective.
October webinar and MOOC – Climate Action in Language Education
The next one, due to start on 19 October, is a repeat of the Climate Action in Language Education (CALE) course, in the run up to COP26 in Glasgow, UK. Earlier this year we ran this CALE course as three individual modules. We were delighted that in total over 4250 teachers enrolled for these modules from over 120 countries. Indeed, Viet Nam was well represented, with over 213 registrations, placing Viet Nam in the top four countries globally.
The next ASEAN teacher webinar in the series will take place on Tuesday 19 October (4pm VN time) and you can register for the webinar here. On the same day, the CALE course will open, again for four weeks, and you can register for the course here.