MMLT online and face to face training for language teachers

In the recent months we put a lot of work and dedication in a project we are the UK partner for. Being a part of  the MMLT project, changed the way we visualize our company's  future of English language training courses. One of the most significant and sustainable results of the Montessori project is our recently opened Language Cafe. 

You have probably read quite a lot about it on here and on our website/social media platforms. We are extremely proud of this achievement and believe it genuinely improves the lifestyle of many local foreign nationals and also improves the quality of the service we can offer to our European students during their stay. 

During the piloting part of this project, Almond Vocational Link was to deliver teacher training sessions for language trainers in both face-to-face and online version. We received a tremendous amount of feedback, and those who managed to complete the training, admitted they will continue to use Montessori as their preferred method during language training. 

Two members of Almond's team participated in the training sessions delivered by Mrs Karen Corne. Valentina took part in the face-to-face training, Kamila participated in the online course. Both of them are actively involved in the running of our Montessori Language Cafe, therefore receiving training and giving invaluable feedback on the matter was very important to us. As a part of their training, they were asked to prepare lesson plans for a group of adult learners. Our trainees delivered their lesson plans to the students during our Language Cafe with great results.

We managed to capture some of the lessons on camera and we would love to share it with you. In addition to this, we also asked a local company to create a video documenting one of the lessons. Please take a look and feel free to share, its a fantastic opportunity to see how our students from Turkey and Portugal interacted and worked together during the class. 

               

                                     

Language Cafe in Plymouth Herald

Hope you all had a great Easter break, we most certainly did :) Just before Easter we had a little visit from local newspaper - Plymouth Herald. We sent an email to one of the reporters, explaining what our Language Cafe is all about and how it can improve the  Plymouth community and the relations between people of different nationalities with the locals. Sian Davis - the reporter, decided this was worthy of a news story and the ball went rolling from there.  Just before Easter we had a Plymouth Herald photographer joining us for the Language Cafe to take some pictures of our students, we had a great laugh :) Below you can find the news story itself, which appeared in Herald on Bank Holiday Monday 21/04/2014

Photo by Plymouth Herald

A LANGUAGE cafe is bringing together foreign speakers to help them integrate into the Plymouth community.The cafe, at City Business Park, Somerset Place, in Stoke runs on Thursdays from 5pm.

The free cafe brings English lessons into a social environment to help adult learners get to grips with the language more effectively – and give them a chance to get to know each other. Foreign students attend the classes, along with people who live and work in Plymouth and want to be able to integrate better into the community. 

Kamila Bielawska, who works for Almond Vocational Link in Plymouth said one of the main aims of the cafe is to help increase the learners’ confidence to practice their English outside the classroom. Kamila said: “The project aims at implementing the Montessori teaching style into an adult environment to help them learn language more effectively.

 “As a part of this project, we started our own language cafe. “The cafe is aimed at foreign language speakers from all backgrounds, who would like to improve their English. 

“During the meetings, we use Montessori teaching methods, meaning that the ‘classes’ are very interactive, fun and free-flowing but with a set goal to achieve each time. 

“The classes are becoming very popular with our European students but also with other foreign nationals who are living and working in Plymouth. “Many of them often mention to us that they feel too afraid to make a mistake and sound silly whilst speaking English. 

“This is often the reason why they stay silent and in fact avoid the opportunities to practice their English language. 

“Some of the participants even mentioned that the Language Cafe is one of not many opportunities they get to improve English, because they are too stressed to use it spontaneously. “

We are trying to boost their confidence, eliminate the stress, and convince that showing the will to communicate is always better than remaining silent.”Games and interactive activities help the learners get to grips with their language skills, according to Kamila. 

“We use a wide variety of resources, organise many fun activities and simple games in teams,” she said. “Because the participants are of mixed ability and of different nationalities, they have to use English in any way they can, to communicate and consult each other during the tasks and games. “The environment is very friendly and relaxed, which helps those with lower abilities to open up. 

“Many of our local participants believe that improving their language skills will help them to integrate better and get closer to the Plymouth community – and we are always looking for more people who we could help and who would like to join us every Thursday.”

  Source: Plymouth Herald 

Photo by Plymouth Herald

Photo by Plymouth Herald

Certificates in February

Certificates in February

This February, we bed farewell to some of our European students. All of them received Almond Vocational Link Certificates for their participation and completion of the programme.Here are the photographs from the Certificate Ceremonies of groups from Germany, Romania and Belgium. 

                               

www.almondvoclink.co.uk

MMLT Teacher Seminar

Saturday 1st March / Sunday 2nd March

 

About MMLT

 

This project aims to provide a framework through the Montessori Method (MM) and hopes to achieve this purpose by using the  MM’s theories and practises in language teaching environments, both remotely (through e-learning and ICT based training) and supported by face-to-face workshops.

 

It is believed that this will achieve the four strategic objectives set out by the Education and Training 2020 (ET2020) framework (Europa Summaries of EU legislation, 2009) as follows:

• Making lifelong learning and mobility a reality
• Improving the quality and efficiency of education and training
• Promoting equality, social cohesion and active citizenship, and
• Enhancing creativity and innovation, including entrepreneurship, at all levels education and training



Montessori Principles

Teacher Training

 

After series of introductory and organisational meetings we have now reached the Teacher Training Stage of the process. The first face-to-face meeting was held on Saturday 1st March and led by our teacher Mrs Karen Corne. 

 

 

We  invited a group of 10 qualified language teachers (divided into 2 groups of 5) to help us in the process of piloting the MMLT project and participating in the research phase. The invaluable feedback we received will be crucial to creating a successful manual. During the Seminar, our teachers engaged in series of lively debates, talked about advantages and disadvantages of being an adult learner. We recognised that stress is the most common factor preventing  adults from learning a foreign language. Karen talked about how Montessori  Methods can help with minimising stress and maximising the potential of an individual.  

 

          

 Please go to our website to find more information about MMLT 

Partners in this Project:

Programmes and Projects

   In recent years, we have gained a vast amount of valuable experience in dealing with large       scale, EU supported educational programmes. We have worked with partners from across Europe     and actively participate in projects that help to educate, integrate and give access to gain new skills and widen horizons of our participants. 

ERASMUS +

LEONARDO DA VINCI MOBILITY

LEONARDO DA VINCI PARTNERSHIP

GRUNTVIG

VETPRO

CITIZENSHIP

ERASMUS

All of the above programmes are a part of the European Comission’s Lifelong Learning Programme. Our company strongly believes in working closely with other European Partners towards improving and developing educational methods, influencing others to remain in education and gain knowledge through new experiences. These projects improve integration, develop and implement innovative teaching methods, break language barriers and give others a great chance to explore new opportunities, gain new skills and qualifications. Almond Vocational Link strongly believes in the objectives promoted by these programmes and with many years of experience and dedication in supporting those, we are proud of our achievements.

STAFF SENSE LdV Mobility Project

“Increasing the quality of the STAFF responsible for the period of SEN Student’s vocational Education, STAFF SENSE”. Almond Vocational Link was involved in this project alongside with other participating institutions from countries like Turkey, Germany, Spain, Poland, Italy, and Greece. Staff Sense was aimed at students with Special Educational Needs who wish to continue their education in a vocational high school to gain a profession and become independent in their adult lives.

VETPRO LdV Mobility Project

European Union Countries Experience of Vocational Practical training planning by educating qualified workers for hotel, restaurant, and public catering enterprise. Almond Vocational Link hosted 8 guests from Lithuania, representatives of the catering industry and Chamber of Commerce in November 2011.The focus of the programme was to provide an insight of the UK catering Industry and Training of the Hospitality staff.

P.I.T.A.G.O.R.A Grundtvig Project

  Almond Vocational Link was responsible for coordination of this project. Potentiate Integration and Task for Adult learners giving them Opportunities for Relations All over Europe The PIT-GOR project aims at promoting education, cooperation, interchange and the mobility of disadvantage adult group (immigrants, ethnic minorities, etc. ) coming from European areas at risk regarding social exclusion, focusing on maths as a skill needed to be potentate. This project was focused around adult learners, teachers, trainers and education staff

MMLT (Montessori Methodology in Language Training)

 MMLT is another project funded by European Commission’s Lifelong Learning Programme that Almond Vocational Link is proud to be part of. In this project, we focus on the already successful Montessori teaching methods and exploring the ways to implement these in adult language training. This project involves working with partners from Hungary, Greece, Italy, Poland and Romania.

"Europe for Citizens” Programme

Europe for Citizens is aimed at ethnic minorities, promoting debate and reflection on existing    policies in Europe, specifically European Strategy 2020, bringing them closer to the objectives    and guidelines, strengthening active citizenship in their community. One of the objectives of this  programme was to enhance tolerance and mutual understanding between European citizens  and give the participants opportunity to interact and help constructing a tighter-knit Europe,      united and enriched by its cultural diversity

                                

                                www.almondvoclink.co.uk