An inspiring Convention

What makes a convention successful? What makes a convention a great experience? Well, I suppose the fact that an attendee feels the need to write her reflections on it even before the Intercity Express sets out for the journey back to Athens is an indication, isn’t it?


I left the Diakonia Conference Hall without attending Nick Peachey’s plenary “The challenges of using technology with teens and younger learners” because I had to catch my train back. I’m sure it would be as informative and inspiring as his workshop dealing with “Digital tools for developing digital literacy” which I personally found digitally enlightening. Let me go back to the start of the Convention, though.

Day one started with registering, renewing membership, greeting old friends, exchanging warm hugs and kisses and Julia Tanner-Bogia (the TESOL Macedonia –Thrace Northern Greece Chair) welcoming all of us to the 18 Annual Convention of the Association.

Lindsay Clandfield was the first plenary speaker who with his talk on “Keeping the fire going – Teacher Burnout” gathered us all in the big, comfortable and fully equipped Amphitheatre of the Diakonia Conference Centre. His reference to the causes, symptoms and consequences of teacher burnout made many faces smile and nodding heads definitely assured him that he was talking to the right people! His suggestions for individual as well as institutional solutions offered some relief and hope to all of us. Most welcome was his urging us to share our experiences with other teachers through the various social networks together with his final advice to “take it easy, take it as it comes!” and his reminder that “It’s never too late” to fight Teacher Burnout.

The first slot of concurrent sessions offered a variety of topics to the members, but… Yours Truly had to wonder “What about teaching difficulties?” since it was my time to present and share my thoughts on the issue. Despite some technical difficulties at the beginning the nice audience and valuable feedback made the experience worth the effort.

Feeling relaxed after my presentation was over, I had the chance to take a deep breath and join the people who were waiting for Nick Peachey to guide them through the thrilling maze of the digital tools - as I have already mentioned. Among them: batlyrics, posterous, wallwisher, twurdy, mailvu, bookr etc will let you explore them and be as creative as you can! And all this for free! Needless to say I’m looking forward to experimenting with them as soon as I arrive home and get my Internet connection. (See, I’m not that… digitally literate yet...:-))

It was soon time for the second plenary presentation and we all gathered in the Ampitheatre to meet the SEETA panel of speakers and Anna Parisi, its current leader. We were informed and updated on its past and forthcoming events and were given the chance as well as the challenge to join another interesting and very active online community.

Then it was time for the second slot of con-current professional presentations. The title “Using computers and the Internet in the classroom” made me feel jealous and wish to meet the teacher who - unlike me…- had such an opportunity! Dragana Vujkovic-Bukvin from Serbia emphasized the need to change our teaching methods and showed us ways that we (digital immigrants) can use to actively engage our learners (digital natives) in the learning process by letting them design materials they like and be our partners.

The next presentation was given by a very friendly, polite and always smiling professor Dr Mohammed Sadegh Bagheri who had come all the way from Iran to share his ideas with us. His talk entitled “The relationship between emotional intelligence, motivation and the vocabulary size” sounded interesting to me. Unfortunately, the specialized terminology, the abundance of statistics and figures plus the fact that I’m not personally an expert in the field made it very difficult and rather tiring for me to follow. Never mind, though.

The following slot of presentations flowed smoothly, as I learned later on, but found me relaxing in my room and trying to manage my nervousness about what was coming up shortly: the Pecha Kucha evening. My participation in it had been really challenging as I had to prepare 20 slides for which I had only 6 minutes and 40 seconds to present! Wow! No matter how many times I had rehearsed, the slides were always ahead of my speech! My students who had helped me with the rehearsals were enthusiastic about it but I was too nervous to share their enthusiasm….

Anyway, the time had come. Lindsay Clandfield was the most helpful host who urged the audience on to support us and warmly applaud since it was the first time that TESOL Macedonia-Thrace organized such an event and some of us were doing it for the first time too. He gave a presentation himself first to give the audience a “tester” and …the show began!

Kathryn Lukey-Coutsocostas was first. She gave us a wonderful and touching presentation on how to inspire our learners and light their fire! The warm applause and cheers from the enthusiastic audience made me feel slightly less nervous… Roger House followed explaining why he speaks “Londrezika”! A hilarious interactive presentation that received a loud applause too! Then, it was my turn… My notes in my shaky hands, there I am on the podium and I hear my voice from the loudspeakers confessing that I learned English because I fell in love with Elvis, how I got involved with teaching it later on and how Sport Billy gave me the idea to have a “magic” bag with which I could always “work miracles” for my learners! And that’s it, folks! The show is over and I’m so very happy with people around me smiling, clapping and congratulating me! I felt exhilarated!

Marisa Constantinides followed with advice on how to be nasty, strict and harsh on our students who want their autonomy, their needs satisfied and their wishes fulfilled! Ha! The end of her presentation left the audience roaring with laughter! And there was more to come! Luke Prodromou shared with us the reasons that make him grumpy in such a way that I’m sure we all wished there had been a thousand more so that he would keep rocking!! Finally, Anna Parisi in a humorous and equally entertaining way persuaded us that the ideal group of students is the pensioners! When our host, Lindsay Clandfield invited all of us back on stage, not a single person in the audience was sitting. They were all standing, applauding, cheering! Well, the first Pecha Kucha night had been a great success! Well-done, TESOL Macedonia-Thrace!

A rich buffet, wine and live music were waiting for us as we came out of the Amphitheatre. Our appreciation for the nice food and drink was obvious as we were all feeling ready for more fun and literal … Pecha Kucha (= chit-chat in Japanese).

Convention day 1 sent me to bed pleased, relieved and happy!

Convention day 2 started with a nice breakfast followed by Lindsay Clandfield calling for “Critical thinking in Action”. After explaining the terms Critical Thinking and Critical Literacy he gave as many useful ideas for practical applications but time is never enough for an interested audience.

Maria Sachpazian was the speaker I went to listen to next. She was going to speak about “Change in ELT: Shaping the Brave New World” and promised to answer some crucial questions about how this change could happen. The questions were indeed answered and the need for change in teaching methods and attitudes couldn’t have been voiced in a better way.

Then it was time for the first plenary of the day. Dr Antonella Sorace from the University of Edinburgh and Visiting Professor at the University of Thomsa, Norway opened “Doors to cognitive enhancement: new research perspectives on early and late bilingualism”. She most effectively showed us how research has proved that the cognitive benefits that bilingualism brings can be lifelong ones. She also crossed out some common myths about bilingualism and stressed the good reasons for keeping minority languages alive. A most enlightening plenary!

It was already time for a lunch break after which we all gathered in the Ampitheatre once again. This time it was Paul Shaw and Katie Quartano who showed us how “Getting involved in the Disabled Access Friendly Campaign” can help our disabled friends, relatives, co-citizens with their daily life. They also suggested ways in which we - EFL teachers – can help.

Julia Tanner-Bogia then presented the members of the Board and the volunteers who helped them to organize this Convention and it was show time again: “Dave ‘n’ Luke” most delightfully performed “Hard Times”. Their entertaining sketches left the audience with a smile and some food for thought.

The next and last presentation for me was given by Marisa Constantinides: “Recharge your Professional development with the power of PLN’s”. We were informed about a number of interesting networks for EFL teachers which we can join and share views and ideas. A great way to use technology to our benefit!

When these concurrent sessions ended it was time for the last plenary to start and me to leave, the Diakonia Conference Center, TESOL Macedonia-Thrace friends and Thessaloniki.

The train is approaching Athens right now and I’m summing up or repeating to be precise: What makes a convention successful? What makes a convention great? Well, I suppose the fact that an attendee feels the need to write her reflections on it even before the Intercity Express sets out for the journey back to Athens is an indication, isn’t it?

A big “Thank you” to TESOL Macedonia-Thrace Northern Greece Board Members and friends who made the 18th International Convention an inspiring experience! See you all next year!