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ISSUE

03 Dec. 2014

Exploring new ways to teaching English language learners (ELLs) ...

Belize TESOL

Association

1. BelizeTESOL

Christmas

Message

2. Thank Yous

3. Announcements

4. Calendar of Events

5. Panama

Convention– A

Reflection

6. BelizeTESOL

Regional Seminar-A Reflection

7. BelizeTESOL Membership Form

8. Become a

TESOL International

Member

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BelizeTESOL Christmas Message from the President:

As we look forward to a prosperous 2015, a third anniversary of Belize

TESOL and to the distinguished privilege of finally taking BelizeTESOL to the

level of ‘affiliate’ of TESOL International, we reflect on all the joy and excitement

that Belizeans and people of the Central American and Caribbean Basin enjoy

during every Christmas Season.

It is my pleasure to extend season’s Greetings to all our dear friends,

supporters and members of BelizeTESOL. Your unflinching support has helped us

on our journey to fulfil our mission of making a difference in the lives of fellow

Belizeans, especially our young teachers and students.

Thank you for your support. We ask that you continue to support us. We sa-

lute you and promise that we will try to do even more than we have done in the

past. We extend to you a happy holiday season and a peaceful, fun filled, sunny,

joyful and productive year.

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Ms. Ethnelda Paulino and Mr. Amilcar

Umaña launching the Belize TESOL

Association at the UB Gymnasium.

Story Telling Pictures Below... Belize TESOL

Belize TESOL Regional Seminar

BelizeTESOL Thank Yous...

Regional Seminar Presenters in Punta Gorda

Deputy Mayor, Francis Roches

MC-Mr. Sheldon Ramirez

Jane Locario

Cynthia Topsey

Emma Villanueva

Emily Ramirez

Stephen Sho

University of Belize, PG, for Venue

Your tremendous support means a

lot to us!

Central and American Caribbean Basin Group

Host: Janet Miriam Godoy & Family

Uli Schrader

Joel Alvarez

Maria Trapero

Josue Alejandro

Pia White

Luisa Cristina Alvarez

Evelin Ojeda

Grazzia Maria Mendoza

Ana Madrigal

Antonia Albert Batista

Edward Torres

Joanne Pyra

Zuleika Zapateiro

Estella Marquez

Ana Palencia

Jean Italien

Mary Allegra

Miguel Angel Carranza

Official Members of BelizeTESOL

Margaret Enriquez

Dorine Vanzie

Amilcar Umana

Delmarie Fuller

Blanca Cowo

Armin Cowo

Abigail Leslie

Blanche Boles

Cynthia Ellis Topsey

Erica Aguilar

Tritia Stuart Gordon

Tiffany Hope

Carol Martin

Barbara Nunez

Indira Cayetano

Anicasio Garcia

Myra Arzu

Janine Frazer

Abigail Hoare

Diane Ozaeta

Agnes Menzies

Alejandro Hernandez

Rebecca Hernandez

Noe Smith

Endevora Jergensen

Rose Cox

Howard Reyes

Beth Palacio

Rosalie Witty

Lourell Arzu

Sheldon Ramirez

Carolyn Bardalez

Claret Jacobs

Ann lopez Uyi

Alberita Enriquez

RELO United States Embassy

Jen MacArthur

Brenda Barnaldez

Jose Manuel Villafuerte

United States Embassy, Belize

Emilia Adams

Mirsy Ponce

Support

Blanche Boles

Silvaana Udz, 2015 Kriol kalinda

Cecile Ramirez

Carmen Ramirez

Knuwani Martinez

Sharon Palacio

Mr. Roy Polonio

Glen Enriquez

Battle of the Drums Committee

Mr. Darius Avila (tickets)

Desktop Publisher/Designer & Editor

Erica S. Aguilar

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COMING SOON!!

1. Story Telling Festival March, 2015

2. General Meeting and Regional Seminar, Progresso, Corozal

3. Wall of Fame: Call for names of Garifuna Pioneers (Teachers of English)

4. WEE (World English Experience): Students of Baptist High School, Belmopan

Belize will visit historical landmarks in London and participate in six competitive elements in April 2015.

BelizeTESOL Announcements!

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BelizeTESOL Calendar of Events

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The Annual Congress 2014 & CA/CB Conference

The Annual Congress 2014 & CA&CB was held in Panama in September, 2014. It was entitled : Re-

newing and Exploring New Practical Trends. This year, the conference was ‘fusioned with the Central

American and Caribbean Basin Conference.

The symposium featured interesting and relevant to TESOL topics from all the countries of the Cen-

tral American Basin. Present at the Conference were Vice President of BelizeTESOL, Dr. Rita Enriquez

and President of BelizeTESOL. Presenting on behalf of Belize was Mrs. Ethnelda Paulino who spoke about

The Green Initiative. The Green Initiative eliminates the use of paper and sitting in a classroom, but in-

cludes the learning of English and qualifying to attend through the online high school.

BelizeTESOL Panama Story

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BelizeTESOL English-The Language of Instruction in Belize

According to Crystal, English is taught as a second language in countries across the world, and it is the official language in many countries, especially in post-colonial territories. In his discussion of the us-es of English, he posits that the English Language has many uses. It is used by the press, in advertising, broadcasting, motion pictures, sound recording, transportation and communication. For example, English is the language that is used for communication in aircrafts (air speak), it is the international language of the sea (sea speak) and in special aspects of safety (emergency speak). It is also used for labels and safety precautions on agricultural products and it is the dominant language for computers.

Based on the language diversity that exists in Belize, it is highly possible that the attempts made by Belizean adults to obtain mastery in the English language are influenced by one or more of the languages which they constantly use and hear. If this is the case, then the Belizean education system has succeeded in mass producing teachers, instructors and other groups of educators who share the language problem with students and the citizenry. Globalization and regional integration pose great opportunities for everyone and teachers and educators are automatically included among those whose task it is to chart the course for Be-lize to do business with the rest of the world. To achieve this goal, teacher-trainers are expected to encour-age student-teachers to become innovative and productive professionals.

This present generation of teachers was schooled to appreciate the various languages of Belize. In many cases, Belizeans who do not belong to the Kriol community have shown preference for their own mother tongues but, almost invariably, each has added Kriol to his/her repertoire of languages. Each Beliz-ean ethnic group is represented in the student/teacher populations of Belize and this creates additional chal-lenges for educators in their quest to address the needs of their students who are learning English as a sec-ond language. Many teachers and indeed student-teachers perceive English as the language of the coloniz-er and behave as if though it has no business in the classrooms of Belize. As a result, English has not been emphasized and as ironic, as it may seem, many people have been able to conduct English classes in Spanish or in Kriol. Of course, this poses manifold problems for the entire Belizean education system. There is indeed a struggle to make Belizean students and teachers cognizant of the value of learning Eng-lish and the importance of being able to identify and understand the differences between Kriol and English, especially when they make attempts at writing the latter. Craig (1964) noted that "urgent measures were necessary to deal with this problem" (p. 62). He felt that "confirming their written work in language lessons to what is right, helps the students to link their written language to the language of their books and, progres-sively, their speech" (p. 17).

In the Belizean situation, English has basically been reduced to a written language (Paulino, 2011).

The foregoing is one of the challenges with which educators are confronted in Belize. Hence our reason for promoting BelizeTESOL and for grappling with the feat of trying to encourage Belizean teachers to understand the necessity of maintaining a support group for all Belizean teach-ers who are all teachers of English to speakers of other languages, even if we do not care to admit it.

—-Excerpt penned by Ethnelda Paulino

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BelizeTESOL First Regional Seminar

The The first BelizeTESOL Regional Seminar got off to a slow start on that drizzly Saturday morning, November 15, 2014 at the University of Belize -Toledo Campus, inside the thatched conference room. By nine o’clock, the Master of Ceremony, Mr. Sheldon Ramirez and BelizeTESOL Vice chair, Dr. Alberita En-riquez were already at the venue to welcome Deputy Mayor of Punta Gorda Town, Crispin Roches and the presenters. Deputy Mayor Roches, himself a high school teacher graciously welcomed the participants who had by then joined the seminar. He, in his opening remarks, emphatically reminded us all about the critical role TESOL plays in our education system.

There was never a dull moment during the seminar as the presenters and participants including Be-lizeTESOL Chair, Mrs. Ethnelda Paulino and Treasurer, Mrs. Margaret Enriquez engaged in lively and meaningful discourse. The adept and eloquent presenters, Mrs. Jane Locario, Mrs. Emma Villanueva, Mrs. Cynthia Ellis Topsey, and Mr. Stephen Sho basically led the participants in discussion around the need for awareness of a wide knowledge of TESOL methodology and gave examples of some. Naturally, there was also discussion of the curriculum and the possibility of writing and compiling our own local lesson plans and textbooks to suit our specific needs in TESOL given our multilingual population. Educators were encour-aged to write their own stories concerning journeys they and others have experienced in learning and teaching English. This should be preconditioned by a strong sense of cultural identity as visualized in an ice-breaker conducted by Ms Emily Ramirez. There was also a lengthy exchange of ideas concerning the recognition and honoring of pioneer Belizean teachers who were successful English teachers, most of whom have passed on.

Above all, all educators were greatly urged to teach in English within their settings. They were reminded that a second language as English is to us takes many years to learn in its fluency. To learners there is usu-ally the silent period while they listen keenly to English vocabulary and sentence structures, followed by ex-tensive practice and repetitions in speaking, reading, and writing leading on to eventual proficiency. In the end, the seminar was regrettably brought to a close at 4:00 p.m.

Alberita Enriquez Ed.D

Vice Chair BelizeTESOL

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Become a TESOL

International Member

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Dr. Alberita Enriquez, Educator

and Co-founder of Kaina Online

High School.

BelizeTESOL

Membership Form Become a Member of the BelizeTESOL Association TODAY!

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RAFTS Strategy for Essay Writing

RAFTS is a differentiated instruction writing strategy that assists students to comprehend their role as a

writer, the audience they will address, the varied formats of writing, and the topic they will explore.

Furthermore, when using this writing strategy, teachers motivate students to become creative writers and

critical thinkers. It is always a wonderful idea to give students options, to give them the freedom to consider

a topic from a different standpoint, and to procure practice writing for diverse audiences.

Why Use RAFTS?

It includes writing from different viewpoints.

It helps students learn important writing skills such as audience, main idea, and organization.

It teaches students to think creatively about writing by responding to the following prompts:

R-Role of the writer: Who or what are you as the writer? Artist, Botanist, Gamer, Ballet Dancer, a

Jaguar? You can write using many roles/perspectives as long as you research enough to write/know.

A-Audience: To whom are you writing? A friend? Your teacher? Readers of a newspaper?

F-Format: In what format are you writing? A letter? A poem? A speech?

T-Topic: What are you writing about? Why? What’s the subject of the point of this paper?

S-Strong verbs: Insure to write in the active voice and use strong verbs to keep the reader engaged.

It can be used across various content areas-not just in English class AND can be used across all

levels-even with Infants.

Reference: Reading Rockets. (2014). RAFT. Retrieved from: http://www.readingrockets.org/strategies/raft

BelizeTESOL Association

December 20, 2014

Newsletter Editor/Organizer:

Erica S. Aguilar (hi.aguilar@hotmail.com)

To contact the BelizeTESOL

Association please call:

501-601-8081

501-632-2488