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teachers workshop

English as a second language (ESL) teacher training workshops

Since 2004, The Latin American Association (LAA) has offered Teacher Training Workshops with the emphasis of developing competent teachers for other organizations and to promote the best practices in ESL teaching.

Our ESL teaching curriculum is designed to demonstrate the best methods through 10 subject-focused training sessions, which are held one Saturday of every month from January to October. The ESL Teacher Workshops have proven to be a successful precursor into the profession of English teaching for those who lack formal training but demonstrate expertise in the English language. The teacher training workshops are for volunteer ESL teachers, new ESL teachers, as well as experienced ESL teachers looking for increased training to improve their skills. Over the years, the participants in this teacher training initiatives have represented various institutions and organizations across Georgia, such as: Asian-American Resource Center, Emory University, Fulton Public Library, International Rescue Committee, Kennesaw State University, Refugee Family Services, and World Relief.

The LAA’s teacher workshops are taught by qualified ESL teachers, teacher educators, and visiting instructors from colleges and universities. These qualified ESL educators maintain high proficiency in the English language, aptitude as a teacher and are knowledgeable of trends and research in similar fields, such as applied linguistics and cross-culture communication, and the impact these have on instructional execution and performance in an academic environment.

CONTACT:
Caitlin Webb
cwebb@thelaa.org

“A, E, I, O, U, and WHY?”
Date: Saturday, October 9, 2021
Time: 1:00-3:00 pm
Platform: Zoom
Presenter: Donna Blanton

WHAT IS THE COLOR VOWEL ® SYSTEM?
Many of us probably have early school memories of learning about English vowel letters (“A, E, I, O, U, and sometimes Y”) and their sounds (such as “long A” vs. “short A”). But perhaps you’ve noticed that English pronunciation really doesn’t fit neatly into these prescribed categories (for example, the “A” sound is different in the words CLASS, PAPER, and FATHER). We like to teach our students about the “rules” of English, but then we often find ourselves scrambling to explain all those “exceptions to the rule”, right? This is precisely where the brilliant COLOR VOWEL ® SYSTEM comes in!

Please join us for the upcoming ESOL teacher workshop “A, E, I, O, U, and WHY?” on Saturday, October 9 from 1:00-3:00 pm where Latin American Association ESOL instructor Donna Blanton will introduce us to this innovative pronunciation tool and demonstrate several activities that we can use immediately with our English language learners.

Bio of presenter:
A native of Atlanta, Donna Blanton is a lifelong language learner, educator, and human rights advocate. She is a graduate of Agnes Scott College and a veteran certified teacher of French and ESOL in grades PK-12 in public and private schools. Since her completion of the rigorous Global TESOL Certification Program at the University of Georgia in 2016, Donna has enjoyed transitioning from teaching primarily youth to working exclusively with adult English language learners. As part of her ongoing learning and development, Donna has enjoyed taking conversational Arabic classes at the Alif Institute in Atlanta as well as online coursework with English Language Training Solutions (ELTS) to become a certified teacher of the Color Vowel ® Approach pronunciation system.

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