English Book’s Summer School 2013 Project

by Verica Amidzic, Bijeljina, Jasmina Spasojevic, Uzice, Ivana Mladenovic, Belgrade, Jasna

Jovanovic, Kragujevac, Dragana Jankovic, Kucevo, Violeta Velimirovic, Kucevo, Azra

Hadzihajdic, and Bijeljina, Nikolina Krstic, Bijeljina

key words: seminar, English language teachers, activities, motivation

The word of a fellow teacher/intro

“I have come to believe that a great teacher is a great artist and that there are as few as

there are any other great artists. Teaching might even be the greatest of the arts since the

medium is the human mind and spirit.”

John Steinbeck

On July 2nd 2013, Novak Djokovic was preparing himself for another victory on

Wimbledon, a lot of people in USA were buying firecrackers, one could buy 113,8482 dinars

for 1 Euro, the Egyptians were demanding their President to resign, Britain’s reporters were

on the edge of their tether waiting for the birth of the first child of the Duke and Duchess of

Cambridge, a Cambodian family was having a regular day in their life, and we woke up in

Kopaonik expecting inspiring lectures and a sunny weather.

The weather failed us, but Ken Wilson, Özge Karaoğlu and Tim Bowen most certainly

did not. “He who dares to teach must never cease to learn” said a New Jersey librarian John

Cotton Dana. Having that in mind, we came here to be students and teachers at the same

time and perhaps get a little confirmation that we were as good as we hoped and not as bad

as we feared.

The English Book has given us this wonderful opportunity to meet other teachers, talk and

exchange ideas and learn from inspiring lecturers during this seminar. We’ve felt like

students in the university again with Tim, laughed with him and learned a lot about

contrastive analysis and translation and got acquainted with new words of the ever-growing

English language. We’ve caught up with the new technologies and effective activities with

one of the most positive teacher trainers we’ve ever met – Özge, a brilliant and self-taught

young lady, who has increased our self-confidence immensely. We have created stories,

danced and had much fun with Ken who tickled us with the question “Is anybody listening?”

And we were, Ken. For what we have had the chance to learn in this seminar will always

echo in our future work. Thank you all.

Dragana Jankovic

Day I

SUMMARY OF THE LECTURES AT THE KOPAONIK 2013 SEMINAR 1. KEN WILSON, MOTIVATING THE UNMOTIVATED, TEN WAYS TO GET YOUR STUDENTS TO DO SOMETHING

Ken reminded us that we should be enthusiastic, have a good relationship with our students, encourage them to think for themselves, enjoy their progress and create positive and supportive learning environment. We should make them curious, challenge them and let them use their imagination and previous knowledge.

2. TIM BOWEN, ACTIVE PRONUNCIATION ACTIVITIES The most interesting piece of advice that Tim gave us was to start pronunciation activities with words that are similar in Serbian and English but have different pronunciation. For example: MADRID, HOTEL and APRIL. It is more efficient to teach a new English word through pronunciation than to show it written. 3. KEN WILSON, FIRST THINGS FIRST, IDEAS TO USE WITH NEW CLASSES

Ken presented and demonstrated some very interesting ideas as to how to activate students at the beginning of a course. A very amusing one is called T-SHIRT activity. Teacher writes 3-5 items / numbers related to his-her life on a pieces of paper and fixes it onto his-her shirt. Students guess what they refer to. Then the students do the same.

4. ÖZGE KARAOĞLU, BREAK THE ICE, WARM UP THE CLASS Özge demonstrated a few very useful and dynamic activities to warm up the class. They included very available practical additional material needed for them, such as newspaper and candies. There was a snowball throwing activity, quite expected for the seminar location. The activity called MEMORY GAME was the most engaging for everyone.

Nikolina Krstic, Bijeljina

Azra Hadzihajdic, Bijeljina

Day II

1. ÖZGE KARAOĞLU, WHEN LEARNING GOES MOBILE, DO YOU? SCREEN-BASED CULTURE is something we all have to become aware of, if we want to keep up with the rest of the world. It offers open and accessible learning environment which is digital and information-based. Every child has a mobile phone nowadays and we should make use of that, not forgetting, of course, that we still teach in the PAPER-BASED CULTURE classroom. 2. ÖZGE KARAOĞLU, FILL IN THE BLANKS WITH TECHNOLOGY Özge demonstrated a number of engaging activities which can be done by using various web sites, of which these might be useful: www.wordle.net (finding out about frequency of words in a text), www.easydefine.com (excellent for defining new words) and www.vocaroo.com (voice recording a story as a sequence of sentences produced by a group of students). 3. TIM BOWEN, TEXT TRICKS THAT ENCOURAGE LEARNERS TO READ Tim presented several extremely useful pre-reading activities. One of the best was a well-known gap-fill activity, which he modified into a gap-fill without gaps. Take out ten to fifteen adjectives and adverbs from a text, but do not make gaps. Offer the words in the correct order as they appear in the text. 4. KEN WILSON, IS ANYBODY LISTENING, SOME ACTIVITIES THAT MAKE STUDENTS REALLY LISTEN TO EACH OTHER In a classroom you can listen to the teacher, to a machine and to each other. Ken demonstrated an interesting palmanism activity, among others, which activates the whole class. One group is given questions and the other answers. The groups face each other standing in two lines. Those with questions have to memorize the answers, so as to match them correctly. When they do they can sit down.

Nikolina Krstic

Azra Hadzihajdic

Mr. ken Wilson – a real inspiration for English language teachers and learners

written by Jasna Jovanovic, Kragujevac

While attending Summer School for English language Teachers on Kopaonik this year, I got

the opportunity to talk to someone who made a fantastic impression on me as a Teacher

Trainer as well as a person.

Grew up in England, raised by very honest, hardworking class parents, Ken Wilson never

fulfilled his mother’s wish to become a bank clerk. Instead, he became a well-known song

writer, publisher and teacher trainer who was travelling around the world and sharing his

imaginative ideas about teaching. Although he became the youngest ELT publisher, he

could never say for himself that he was overambitious. Once he got into the field of

publishing, he became one of them with now more than 30 titles of his own.

The passion about the music Mr Wilson was sharing with his childhood friends while singing

in a church choir and then again he was lucky to live at the age of the Beatles. But, later at

the university and while working with the band who used to produce the teaching songs, he

started writing some of his own. He has written and recorded more than 150 ELT songs. His

collection of songs called Mister Monday is his most famous one. An interesting thing about

him is that he writes them and love having them integrated in the course books, but he rarely

sings them.

He remembers his traveling and likes talking about it. First time he visited Yugoslavia with

his Theatre as a theatre performer in 1976. Then in the last six years, he has been in Serbia

training teachers and implementing all his knowledge and experience he had gained in his

career into entertaining and useful lectures. Everything that Mr Wilson teaches, he has

already tried in his classrooms while working as a teacher. He sees a change in teaching in

Serbia, and the fact that Serbian teachers are becoming more enthusiastic about it makes

him very happy. He also believes that the people who chose to spend their summer holidays

in the summer school deserve a combination of being both entertained and informed.

When talking about the most interesting place he had taught, Mr Wilson has powerful

memories connected to Seville, Spain where he spent almost 20 years, but for him, all the

memories about the places are connected to the people he was talking to and not about the

architecture.

I assume that all of you now have clearer picture of this wonderful man we were lucky to

have in this summer school this year, but me, I was a bit more curious. I was wondering who

Mr Ken Wilson is when all the curtains go down? And here comes even better story, an

ordinary man who likes football, spending time with his family, working at home with his wife

but also a person who would spend the whole month in Canada without a phone and from

time to time would rather sit all alone for a while not talking to anyone. This is what helps him

regain his energy and simply what makes him being KEN. And for all of you who would like

to enjoy their teaching in the future, Mr Wilson has a clear message: “If you give your energy

and enthusiasm, you are getting it back. Put your personal lives behind the door, keep the

energy levels high and enjoy your relationship with your students because they will

remember you – even 50 years from now.”

Day III

DAY 3, July of 4th

Tim Bowen: New words and expressions and how they enter the language. The lecture

was about the changing of language its reflection on our daily life. The speaker pointed

VERBING as a tendency to turn a noun into a verb, then BLENDING (chillaxing,e-tailer,etc.)

also. EUPHEMISMS are very common in the language and class, so it should be something

worked on. What is important is WHEN some words did come up and WHERE are they

from! The purpose was that teachers could learn new tendencies in the language itself.

Ken Wilson: Five ways to make your students speak imaginatively. This was a great

way to memorize activities for our classes with our students. Fellow-teachers were involved

and they practically led the lesson. Mr Wilson showed the teachers that they are so

imaginatively, in speaking particular. Teachers enjoyed: the activity with books, the

superhero, picture stories, telephone conversation and “comedy store” activities.

Tim Bowen: False Friends and typical problems when translating from Serbian into

English. As always the teachers were given the exact facts and examples of some words

that they also mistake sometimes ( eventualno, nervozan, famozan…). Another pointed fact

was the wrong translations which are found in our everyday lives. Mr Bowen showed great

practical examples that the fellow-teachers can pass on to their students.

Ozge Karaoglu: Fresh Air in the Classroom with Creative Writing. Firstly, “A Banana

Dictation” was great ice-breaker and at the same time teaching the teachers one of the ways

for creative writing. The next was “Tree and Leaves” where pairs could practice writing on

the spot. The teachers got great ideas for form of writing also: a postcard, a letter, a story, a

story book… It’s really good that the teachers can do this with very young learners.

Jasmina Spasojević, Užice

Tim Bowen

Who’s Tim Bowen? I heard of the author before. The name was familiar to me from the

course book covers I used with my students. Here, on Kopaonik I had a chance to meet Tim

Bowen- a teacher trainer. I was delighted. And then I had a chance to meet him in person.

This is my portrait of this amazing man.

Word trivia 1. LATIN-the first word

he thinks of when you mention word teacher

2. OPTIMISTIC, REALISTIC, EXPECTING THINGS- Tim’s three word definition of himself

3. SRPSKI- the hardest Slavonic word for pronunciation

4. MORE- his son’s first word

5. CALON- is the Welsh word, he taught me, it means heart

TIM AS A PROFESSIONAL

-If you speak Latin, French, Spanish, German, Czech, Russian or Serbian you can have a

nice conversation with Tim.

- His high school Latin teacher motivated him to start loving languages

- Works four days at home and one day as a teacher trainer

- When you ask him what does he do he says that he works with language.

- Free –lance teacher trainer, author, and translator

- Cross-word puzzle and finding new challenging words make translating his favourite field of

work

- He started teacher training in the late 70s in Novi Sad, and form the 80s he works on

CELTIA on Cambridge University

- Prefers teaching adults ( thanks to energetic Portuguese pupils from the beginning of

career) and preparing students to become English teachers

-If you have 14-16 year-old students you can use “Straightforaword” or wait for “ Pulse” his

new project

_ Tim as a teacher is patient, calm, and enjoys interaction with students

-He worked in Novi Sad and Pristina from 1975 to 1980

TIM AS A TRAVELLER

- He visited a lot of countries including Kazasthan , Argentina, Russia, South Africa,

Brazil (but not on the carnival), Jamaica, etc.

- The next destination will be Australia or New Zealand

- Going to Tara rafting was the best adventure in Serbia

- Travelling experience blog is possible in the future

TIM IN FREE TIME

- He doesn’t like reading novels just book about real experiences

- His favourite book is Milan Kundera’s “ Unbearable lightness of living “

- He plays the guitar, the banjo and mandolin

- He likes blues, rock and folk and particularly White Lies, his son’s band

- He is a massive football fan of Shrewsbury Town and thinks that George Best is the

football player ever

- He likes watching DVDs Coen Brothers movies like “Fargo” and “Big Lebovski”

- He has a lovely mangal dog (“ the strange breed from Africa”)

TIM’S IMPRESSIONS FROM KOPAONIK

- It would be the location, Kopaonik reminds him of North of Wels

- Walking to Nebeske Stolice was very interesting

- The seminar was good

- His message to all of us:

DON’T WORRY BE HAPPY!!!!!!

So who is Tim Bowen? Teacher trainer Inspirational Misspelling, researcher Brilliant

Optimistic Welsh Eloquent Not nervous

DIOLCH YN FAWR, Mr Bowen!

Ivana Mladenović, Beograd

From - My Point of View -

It was a pleasant surprise when we got an invitation to come to Kopaonik and attend

these seminars. A mountain in the summer, with your colleagues is a great escape

from daily obligations. Fresh air is probably the best way to move all these teachers

and help them enclose this amazing school year (read hell)!

When I first got this task, my thoughts were: ” Oh, my God, I don’t want to work, I

came to listen. Please, give me a break!” Then, I realized that I have to make my

students do exactly the same, so I was really enthusiastic about this. The first

morning I saw all these poor fellow-teachers who looked at me as a bundle of

teenagers waiting to go out of the classroom, not into! There were a lot of young,

modern people eager to steal the tricks for a survival. We were welcomed by our

amiable hosts from The English Book. I hated myself for not being cooperative

enough, so that was probably the point when I decided to give this seminar a chance

(now you will say - who are you to give us the chance?!).

Anyway, let’s start with Mr Ken Wilson. “He’s smiling too much. A grey-haired man

with a wide smile. I can see his teeth! What’s the deal?!” The talk was about

motivation. The right topic in the right moment! It starts promising and usually it ends

there. But this guy’s amazing! Changing his voice, accents and languages! My smile

popped-up! He was moving; waving…it all looked like a language dance. I turned to

my friend, who is a grumpy Blondie, and she was laughing loudly. In a minute she

changed completely. Thank you, grey-haired man, thank you, thank you… You’ve got

me motivated! Mr Tim Bowen, pronounced with an OU. Calm, quiet and

professional. That was the first impression. No smile, just a curve. He started and it

was interesting ACTUALLY! In these few days, he, the man without laughter, have

taught me of some common mistakes and the ways of dealing with them. Some

experience other than classroom, I liked that! Mr Bowen you told us that you are not

a British, but every time we see you, we remember Hugh Grant. Ah, so British…and

finally, Ms Özge Karaouglu. I must say that I’ve never thought that someone can

look that way and have this great personality at the same time. I don’t have enough

words for this angel of English. Her approach to the teaching, her ideas, her praising

the colleagues is really, really rare. When I looked at my friends during her sessions

everybody were enjoying, playing and creating with her. And each time, we lacked

the time for everything that we wanted to do with her. AN INSPIRATION, that’s Ozge.

And in the end, when it comes to you, and I am writing to all of you teachers out

there, I can say just one thing - You WILL SURVIVE!!! Believe me.

Jasmina Spasojevic, Uzice

English book interview

ENGLISH BOOK TEAM

English book team was an excellent host and support. Three

lovely ladies Jelena ,Jasmina and Milena were our

coordinators and we had some questions for them.

How long have you been working for English Book?

Jelena: For about two years.

Jasmina: Six months.

Milena: Two years.

Were you a coordinator before?

Jelena: Yes, many times.

Jasmina: Yes.

Milena: Two times.

What are the best things about being a coordinator?

Jelena: You are involved in all activities; you meet new interesting people, and the

collaboration with them is a priceless experience.

Jasmina: meet a lot of interesting people, sharing wishes and ideas

Milena: Connecting people and making them work together, new ideas.

What are a good coordinator’s best characteristics?

Milena: Good organization, being communicative, being good at working with people.

Jelena and Jasmina: Enthusiasm, calmness, good social skills.

What are the highlights of this seminar in your opinion?

Milena: the workshops, our organisation and the walk to the Heavenly chairs.

Jelena: The collaborative projects of my group. I’m really looking forward to hearing

them in the plenary final.

Jasmina: Ӧzge, Tim’s plenary and the workshops we have organized. We enjoyed

every single activity.

Ivana Mladenović, Beograd

Recreational activities and photos

A visit to Marko’s rock

July 2nd, 2013

Ozge karaoglu’s workshop

July 3rd, 2013

Ken Wilson’s workshop

July 3rd, 2013

A visit to the seats of heaven

July 3rd, 2013

JUKEBOX LIVE 50

Thursday night serverd us some chicken

soup for the soul. Rastko Ćirić was the

host of the night who set some ground

rules and regulations as instructions for the audience as

how to pick a song. Songs by Sting, The Beatles, Led

Zeppelin, Pink Floyd were ordered by shouting the

number from the list provided to us. The audience

clapped, sang and enjoyed every single song. There

were couple of surpresises on the stage, as well. First,

Tim Bowen did a stand-uo comedy act, then Ken Wilson

played the guitar and sang one of his songs, and in the

end, out fellow teacher Božidar joined Rastko on stage

and helped him with couple of songs while The Rubber Soul Project documentary dedicated

to The Beatles was shown in the background.

Verica Amidžić, Bijeljina

Nikolina Krstić, Bijeljina

Azra Hadžihajdić, Bijeljina

Survey:

what are the three things /persons/events that made the biggest impression on you during

the summer school 2013?

*****

This writing project and report was written by by Verica Amidzic, Bijeljina, Jasmina

Spasojevic, Uzice, Ivana Mladenovic, Belgrade, Jasna Jovanovic, Kragujevac, Dragana

Jankovic, Kucevo, Violeta Velimirovic, Kucevo, Azra Hadzihajdic, and Bijeljina, Nikolina

Krstic, Bijeljina. They all share enthusiasm for English language teaching.

* We certify that we have permission to publish the above photos.