ACEIA 2016, Seville: a resounding success!

Over 700 enthusiastic teachers from all over Europe attended the ACEIA 2016 conference in Seville on Saturday 12 November.

Antonia plenary

Under the banner ‘Creative Minds Inspire,’ the event was headlined by Pearson’s Antonia Clare, one of the award-winning authors of Speakout 2nd edition, with her inspirational plenary session ‘Language, Learning and the Creative Mind.’ Antonia examined the ways in which learning a language is in itself such an inherently creative task and looked at how to engender creativity, both on the part of the learner but also on the part of the teacher.

With the curtain having been raised, teachers were treated to 44 different talks and workshops. Many of these sessions considered current trends in ELT, such as ways to apply new technology, the importance of exams and certification and the changing profile of our students today: all hot topics requiring creativity and adaptability on the part of the teacher. The conference’s hastag #KeepOnLearning was certainly an apt one.

Pearson was well represented in these sessions: Antonia followed up her opening plenary with a workshop entitled ‘The Power of Video,’ considering why video is such a useful tool and proposing practical activities to exploit it in class. Elena Merino was also in attendance with the session ‘From the Classroom to the Wider World,’ a thought-provoking workshop looking at ways to instil inter-cultural awareness in young learners. Finally, Michael Brand gave the talk ‘B2 exam classes: success and fun it can be done,’ equipping teachers with engaging ideas to break up the routine which can typify exam preparation classes.

ACEIA 2016Many teachers dropped by our stand to have a look at our materials, ask for some advice, or to try and strike it lucky with a roll of our giant dice, with prizes ranging from teaching diaries to chocolate bars to Jeremy Harmer’s  ‘The Practice of English Language Teaching’ for those lucky teachers rolling a six!

At Pearson we would like to extend our congratulations to ACEIA for such a fantastic event and thank all teachers for attending and helping to make the conference the success that it was. See you next year!

 

 

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