The second in a two-part series focusing on equity and access to learning for all. Following up on Episode 89 on 'Universal Design for Learning' (UDL), this episodes looks more at differentiation; what we can and should be doing inside our language acquisition classrooms in order to support all learners and ensure they all have the tools needed to access the learning. I provide a list of some of the ways I try to differentiate the learning in my own language acquisition classroom and discuss how these approaches work in practice. 

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In this first of a two-part series focusing on differentiation, equity and how to ensure all learners have access to the learning, we look at the Universal Design for Learning (UDL) and its applications in the language acquisition classroom. This episode goes over the 3 main priorities of UDL and their 9 principles, using an example from the world languages classroom to show how we can apply some of these principles to ensure all of our learners have access to the learning and not just some of them.

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This question and answer episode features some great questions from listeners about: What we do when new students come into our CI or acquisition focused classes when they're coming from what may be considered a much more 'traditional' learning environment? How do we adapt our lessons for adult learners and what about those 'difficult' classes, what suggestions are there to make them run smoothly? I try to give my take on these great questions in this episode but I'm sure many of you have much better ideas than I have. Please get in touch and let us know!

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This episode of The Motivated Classroom podcast focuses on going back to school. I go through eight of my top strategies or goals to ensure both we, the teachers, and our students have a motivated year. Most importantly, there is a particular focus in these strategies on teacher and student well-being. Let me know what you think of them and what your goals are for a motivated year in school!

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This episode focuses on eight of my favourite activities designed to instil a love of reading among your language acquisition students, including a particular emphasis on the much requested "reading diary". Reading is the central and key element in language acquisition, yet many teachers are unsure about strategies to use in order to motivate our students into eager readers. Hopefully these eight, low-prep, activities will be of help!

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The wonderfully talent teacher, presenter and author of easy-to-read literature, Margarita Pérez García, joins us in the episode of The Motivated Classroom to talk us through how she uses novels in her classroom to motivate and engage beginner language students. As we know from decades of research, reading is a crucial and central element to language acquisition, yet teachers are often unsure how to use reading with beginners. Margarita goes through her favourite low-prep strategies in detail in this episode! A must listen for all #language #teachers!

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As a follow-up to the interview with Dr. Stephen Krashen, in this episode we look at a very common question among language teachers: Can we use a Comprehensible Input approach or with 'Acquisition Driven Instruction (ADI)' when it comes to intermediate or more advanced learners? This episode takes a slightly different angle as I demonstrate what CI would look like in my classroom for both beginners and intermediate or advanced students. I hope you find it useful!

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Professor Emeritus Dr. Stephen Krashen is one of the most important and influential language acquisition researchers in history. His research over 40 years has completely revolutionised our understanding of how languages are acquired. Dr. Krashen has been cited in over 23,000 peer reviewed research journals and has authored more than 560 publications. The 'Input Hypothesis', which showed us how languages are acquired naturally through comprehensible inputs has had a huge impact on how languages are taught in classrooms across the globe. The episode includes a variety of references to insightful research and of course, also has many of Dr. Krashen's famously entertaining, language acquisition anecdotes and stories! An absolute must listen for all #language #teachers! 

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The third episode in the mini-series on "Teaching with Comprehensible Input (CI)" is a Q&A episode with some great questions from you wonderful listeners on CI being more inclusive than grammar teaching, what we talk to parents about when we teach with CI and what do we do when students miss lots of inputs through absence.

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In this second episode in the mini-series on "Teaching with Comprehensible Input (CI)", we discuss the big debates around CI teaching: Whether it is inherently more inclusive but often perceived as less authentic? What do we even mean by 'authentic' and 'inclusive' in the language classroom in the first place? Join me to find out my take on all this!

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