British Council: TeachingEnglish - series 2 overview
In our second series of this ten-part podcast series from the British Council, we try and provide solutions to some of the key questions being asked by English teachers around the world. Each episode explores a specific topic through interviews, a focus on recent developments and reports on British Council initiatives in English language teaching.
For each episode, an activity booklet, practical show notes and transcripts in English and Arabic are available to download at the bottom of the page.
Episode 6: Why and how should we teach English in crisis and emergency situations?
Many parts of the world are currently experiencing significant levels of violence and conflict. The role of education and language learning in these areas is very important, and can provide short and long term benefits for people in these situations. This episode is released on the first anniversary of the Russian invasion of Ukraine, and in recognition of this our field report focuses on a British Council programme entitled “Teaching and Learning in Difficult Times”. This programme has, to date, provided training in trauma-sensitive pedagogy to more than 1,000 Ukrainian English language teachers. In our interview, we talk to Diana Abu Zayed, a teacher in Gaza in the Occupied Palestinian Territories, who shares with us some of her practical experiences of teaching in a conflict area.
Show notes
Each episode contains downloadable show notes. These include the following:
- Ideas for how you could use the podcast in your teaching
- Detailed notes with extra information about the contents of the episode
- Useful links
Using this podcast for lessons or training
- You can download a transcript of the episode from the podcast homepage. To help you and your learners with preparation and language analysis, all words at the B2, C1 and C2 CEFR level have been highlighted.
- There is an ‘activity booklet’ for this episode, which contains activities you can use in your classroom. The activities focus on speaking, listening, grammar and language. They are available in both pdf and in editable PowerPoint format, in case you wish to edit them to make them more relevant for your specific classroom.
How to listen or subscribe to the podcast
You can listen and subscribe to the podcast in the following ways:
- Download the episode below
- Subscribe wherever you get your podcasts - just search for 'British Council: TeachingEnglish' and subscribe, or paste the RSS feed URL below in to your podcast platform: https://feeds.captivate.fm/british-council-teach/
- Listen on Apple Podcasts
- Listen on Google Podcasts
- Listen on Spotify
- Listen on YouTube
Downloads
Download the following resources at the bottom of the page.
- Episode 6 audio file
- Episode 6 Show notes
- Episode 6 activity pack
- Episode 6 Transcript (Arabic and English)
Production team
- Hosts: We'am Hamdan and Chris Sowton
- Producer: Elizabeth Dyer
- Executive producer: Kris Dyer
- Arabic language consultant: Sawsan Abu Qare