I spent a fantastic two weeks as a participant of the Pilgrims teacher training course ’Teaching Advanced Students of English’ at the beautiful Canterbury campus of the University of Kent between July 17 and 30, 2016. The course was held by Magda Zamorska, a well-known Pilgrims teacher trainer. In our enthusiastic multicultural group of 13 English teachers there were participants from Austria, Holland, Spain,Poland, Russia, Slovenia and Hungary, all with the required language level of C1. As well as the well-planned and perfectly scheduled course content it was my intelligent, motivated, inspired, open minded groupmates that I could learn the most from, sharing our knowledge and teaching experience.
The course focused on advanced methodology and language development, using up-to-date, creative, motivating teaching methods. We learnt about the theory of multiple intelligences, about learning through the six senses, how to use arts, literature and drama in the advanced language classroom through numerous language examples and good practices.
During the two weeks we were given loads of homework for the following day (reading newspaper articles and reflecting to them, doing several language tasks, browsing on the internet with some special focus etc. ) We also found time to investigate the beautiful town of Canterbury and even though I was there for the second time, I must say I was even more impressed than before! We visited an evensong and a chorus concert at the world famous cathedral, enjoyed the wide selection of food and drink at Canterbury pubs, visited some charming seaside towns nearby at the weekend. Last but not least, I continued making invaluable friendships with fellow teachers from all over the world, just like last summer, and we all have been keeping contact sharing teaching material and memories ever since!
