The KOTESOL International Conference

I didn’t update my blog for a week. No thanks to a very hectic schedule that occupied even my weekends. I was down with a cold last week that I was only able to attend the Sunday session of the KOTESOL International Conference. There I finally met Nhemskie who traveled all the way from Busan. “Incheonites” Jehan and Anne brought a friend, a Filipina Professor in one of the universities here, from whom I learned a lot.

It was a very productive Sunday as we didn’t only enjoy the lectures from Prof. Tim Murphey and Marc Helgesen (author of English Firsthand), but we also “hoarded” free stuff – books, pens, folders – from different book publishers. Costco was there to provide coffee, cakes and chocolates. A few overseas universities also provided information on their TESOL courses. How I wish there were business plan consultants for people who’re interested in having their own hagwons.

I was quite surprised to see a number of Filipino attendees at the conference. Most were at the YL sessions. I was also at those sessions since I thought I needed to learn more about teaching YLs, since the TESOL course I took last year is more applicable for teaching YAs and adults. My companions took the time to have their pictures taken with Prof. Murphey and Hegelsen They also “hoarded” the books at Language World and Longman’s. Jehan and Anne both had three bags of ESL stuff, while I only had six YL books to bring home.

Next Saturday, there will be a symposium on Extensive Reading and it will be held at Sookmyung University’s Injeguan Building. You can find more info on this at KOTESOL’s website.

Tagged as: filipino english teachers, kotesol, teaching english in korea