With the help of this Erasmus grant I took part in a 5-day course in the city of York from 19th October to 23rd October 2015. My course at the York Associates was titled Dyslexia in the teaching environment and it was lead by an amazing teacher, an expert on the topic, Martin Bloomfield.
I set off for my great journey on the 18th October. I headed to Manchester by airplane and could spend a whole day wandering and discovering the city before my train left for York. I arrived in the evening and could easily find my host family's house. They had already been waiting for me and I was immediately offered some hot tea and invited for a chat. It turned out that my host was working for the school I was to attend the following week so I was told a lot of important information about the school, the course and of course the city itself.
On Monday morning, first day of my one week course after having done all the necessary administrative tasks I had the chance to meet my teacher and peers in the lounge of the school. Actually, that was the moment when it turned out that my course was going to be a one-to-one course which means I was the only participant that week. Fortunately, many other courses were running during the week so I had the chance to make friends and share experience with Belgian, Norwegian, German, French and Turkish participants. Lessons lasted from 9 till 4 or 5 depending on how long the lunch breaks were, which, as all teachers and students had lunch together was an amazing opportunity for networking.
The fact that I was the only student at the course made it possible for me and my teacher to tailor the material to my needs keeping the specialities of Hungarian education system, bilingual education and special needs students in mind. Having started with some theoretical background to dyslexia and dyslexia in teaching we moved on to how to look for traits of dyslexia as a teacher or how to create dyslexia-friendly lesson plans, tests and materials. We looked at some dsylexia-friendly websites and fonts and we even went on a field-trip to the streets of York discovering it with a 'dsylexic.eye'. I was also shown and asked to analyse some texts written by dyslexics and I had the chance to listen to some interviews made with dyslexic people, their tutors or relatives.
At the end of the week all of the students of the school gathered and shared what they had learned throughout the week. These courses ranged from using applications and websites in teaching or effective communication to presentation skills ets. Thus, I could further widen my perspective of what I had learned over there.
During the week we could choose from a variety of programmes (none of which I would have missed out on). Participants took part in a ghost tour of York, listened to an interactive presentation on the history of York, visited some traditional restaurants and pubs, listened to some folk music and took part in an Evensong in the picturesque Cathedral of York (seen in the picture below). To make the most of my journey at the weekend I visited most of the biggest museums of York, spent half a day in the city of Scarborough and on my way home I again had a few hours stopover at Manchester that I used for visiting two museums. Whenever I visit foreign cities I always stop by at some libraries and bookshops to look for some treasures needed for my school work or to enlarge my home library so I did the same this time. What's more, at an Oxfam store I found some really good board and card games I will be able to use at my English classes.
It has been an amazing, once-in-a-lifetime experience to spend a whole-week in York and a really valuable professional development I got from York Associates. The moment I got back home I started gathering and organizing all the material I got from my teacher and sat down with other participants of the Erasmus programme to share it with. I encourage everybody to be part of an Erasmus programme at least once during their career and make the most out of it by spreading the word by sharing the gained experience.