Remotely Together: Insights from Liz England

By Liz England

In accepting the kind invitation of Three Rivers TESOL to present a keynote address at TESOL Three Rivers 2020 Virtual Conference, I addressed the conference theme, “Remotely Together” by addressing and naming the challenges and opportunities participants have in this unexpected time of global pandemic.  With emphasis on teachers and their needs throughout their TESOL career paths, this presentation was designed to help teachers to feel connected, to identify things they are doing well and to offer suggestions for their use in teaching, research and service.

Starting with a definition of TESOL career path development, we explored a) five stages of TESOL career path development and b) five factors that have been identified in the research for having significant influences on how we proceed professionally.  I tried to focus on the whole teacher – his/her body, mind and soul – in presenting good ideas for teachers to consider as they anticipate both their current and future professional lives.  These points come directly from my recently published book (research completed prior to the start of the global pandemic) entitled TESOL Career Path Development:  Creating Professional Success (Routledge, 2019).

Knowing that happy students are the product of happy teachers and that students learn best when they are happy, I made a case for teachers’ attending to their own needs as well as to those of their students.

I closed the presentation with a wide range of resources available to teachers for keeping themselves healthy and balanced during these challenging times.  I also provided a few anecdotes for ways in which the pandemic, online teaching and learning have actually helped many teachers (my former students and old and new friends and colleagues worldwide) to find their way into new and interesting professional roles.  English teachers for the future have a secure role and status and my presentation will hopefully be helpful to all as they left the conference and have moved into the final stretch of this long year, 2020.  Congratulations to all on a great conference and thank you very much for the opportunity to be a part of it.

If you would like to talk about TESOL career path development, please write to me at LizEnglandAssociates@gmail.com

Liz England is part of the TESOL International Association Career Path Development Professional Learning Network. She taught at Shenandoah University for many years and is still an active TESOL member.