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AN ANGLO-BRAZILIAN TALE
Some things make total sense. Other things make no sense at all. Some things make total sense until the day they don’t anymore. My favourite recent film is the tale of an ex-veteran desperately trying...
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WHO MOVED MY PUDDING?
Learning is a multi-faceted process and I’m a strong believer in so-called vicarious learning - learning that occurs as a function of observing others. From this perspective, teacher trainers (like...
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ANOTHER BRICK IN THE WALL
Once upon a time there was a man who wondered: What would happen if I decided to embed a computer onto the wall of a slum? Skeptics may decide to go for the worst: the computer wouldn’t be there long...
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DYNAMISM IN ITS MANY FORMS AND SHAPES
An old Turkish saying teaches us: belief not transferred from the dimension of mind and heart to the dimension of action is like a fruitless tree. That explains why it’s so hard to discuss dynamism....
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AS A WORD OF INTRODUCTION
I´m new at SCOOP IT. I’m here thanks to the encouragement of a colleague and friend Giselle Santos, who is a fully-fledged curator around here with literally thousands of followers. In case you don’t...
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BLUFFING MY WAY INTO WORDS
(Dedicated to the likes of Bernardo Carvalho, who can weave words into worlds.) This thank-you note is long overdue, but I’d still like to say I had a great time in Porto Alegre three weeks ago. I was...
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HAPPINESS IS A WARM GUN
Contardo Calligaris was the first one to draw my attention to the study of happiness as a source of academic endeavor. The idea is corroborated by a number of social scientists, mainly in the USA....
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BE BRIEF, BUT PLEASE, DE-BRIEF
I’ll try and be brief. Some three months ago we conducted a few meetings with teachers and trainers with a view to deciding what could be changed in the existing pre-service course we offered to new...
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CHECKTHIS & THE EFL CLASSROOM
Every now and then I come across an Internet tool that is easy to use and has got a real “communicative” purpose in mind. When that happens, I like to share it with fellow teachers in the hope that...
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SCENTS OF WOMEN
(This editorial was originally written in 2006 and reflects my love for the cinema. It may be irrelevant for teachers today, but I had lots of fun re-reading it, so I decided to publish it anyway.) I...
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TAKE A PICTURE: IT WILL LAST LONGER
As far as I can remember, Márcia Nogueira (Learning Factory Senior Editor) was the first one to talk to me explicitly about multi-modality and the way our students “read” the world as a combination of...
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DROWNING BY NUMBNESS
(To all those who are not afraid of water and allow themselves to get wet.) Like many English language teachers in Brazil, I was first met with the challenge of reading HAMLET during my university...
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ONCE IN A BLOOM MOON
I realised it was the full moon while I walked back home from the parking lot last night. When I finally went to bed, I dreamt I was reading a watermelon. I can still picture myself flipping through...
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YOU MUST REMEMBER THIS
As I’m beginning to prepare the editorial to be published next week (now this week), it suddenly dawns on me that I’m one year older. One year added to other fifty years I've already had is, to a...
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MY BUNNY LIES OVER THE STUDENT - TOO BAD FOR HIM/HER
One of the things I like most about online training is that you can always go back to materials for further insights. The internet, being a powerful repository of information, will help you store the...
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IT'S ABOUT TIME
Time has become a most coveted commodity in today’s world. Not only do we not want to waste it, we keep struggling to make the “top most” of the “little” time we actually have. In order to do that, we...
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BRAIN AND TEACHING - PART 1
When I’m hungry my brain gets angry. When I drink too much my brain gets groggy. When I’m not learning anything new, my brain gets restless. Over the last few months I’ve befriended my brain in a way...
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WHERE HUMANS FEAR TO TREAD
Cíntia ( Twitter ID: @cintiandrade) was the first to break the news to me this morning: Maurice Sendak is dead. She probably remembered seeing his book “Where the Wild Things Are” on my coffee table...
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BRAIN AND TEACHING - PART 2
I have good news and bad news for you. First, the bad news: Learning is inhibited by threat. Good news: I told you that in PART 1, so, at least in theory, that doesn’t qualify as bad news. It’sjust...
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BRAIN AND TEACHING - PART 3
In the beginning there is a potentially functioning brain just waiting to be used. And, if all goes well, there’s love. (The word comes much later.) In the beginning there is the stimulus. There are...
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