Welcome to Mindful Monday, where we bridge the gap between Second Language Acquisition research and the practical realities of both your classroom and your business. Each week, Leo and I share research-backed insights to help you sharpen your classroom teaching while building the freedom to work on your own terms.
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Happy Monday all! Hope you’re enjoying the long weekend if you have one – Leo and I have our shorts on. It’s 28C today and we haven’t felt that here since….well, it’s been a minute.
In this week’s Mindful Monday, you’ll see:
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New podcast episode with Jonathan Newton
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Leo’s webinar recording on TBLT
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Stories of resilience and appreciation in language learning
Hope you enjoy this week’s edition.
🎙️ Do your learners have choice?
Jonathan Newton tells us what actually happens when learners communicate using a TBLT framework
“Choice generates agency, agency generates engagement, and engagement is where learning begins. If you aren’t ‘falling over’ as a teacher, you probably aren’t pushing yourself or your learners to take ownership of the language.”
We sit down with the esteemed Professor Jonathan Newton.
Jonathan has published over 100 articles, most dealing with how a task-based approach to learning helps students learn languages. In his 30 years he’s worked alongside other greats in our filed like Paul Nation and Rod Ellis – making the New Zealand ELT team a very strong one indeed.
We are so excited for you to join our conversation with Jonathan as we go inside the human brain and examine exactly what happens when learners genuinely communicate – and, of course, what teachers can learn from this and how teacher training can be more informed.
Watch here:
Jonathan is an Associate Professor at Victoria University of Wellington, where he leads postgraduate programs in TESOL and Applied Linguistics. With over 30 years of experience, his work focuses on the “black box” of classroom interaction and how task-based language teaching (TBLT) can foster learner agency and ownership. He has published over 80 articles and several seminal books on classroom interaction and task-based pedagogy.
In this episode, we chat about:
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The “Black Box” of communication: understanding the actual mechanism that explains how learning occurs during interaction.
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The power of choice: why giving learners agency is the most direct path to motivation and ownership.
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Unlearning the security blanket: moving beyond rigid PPP formulas to embrace the “falling forward” of real teaching.
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The “Magoo” (MG-O-O) criteria: a simple heuristic for tweaking textbook activities to strengthen meaning, gaps, and outcomes.
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Tasks for absolute beginners: why input-based tasks are the perfect entry point for learners with zero English.
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Negotiation for meaning: measuring the tangible acquisition of vocabulary through group-work interaction.
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The “Atlas Complex” in teaching: letting go of the burden of being the sole source of authority in the classroom.
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The desk as the enemy: how small physical shifts in the classroom can reignite learner engagement.
*Spotify release coming later this week – we promise!
FOR MORE FROM JONATHAN NEWTON:
We hope you enjoy the episode. Would love to hear your thoughts.
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🎙️ Webinar Recording: Did you see it?
We sent out the recording of Leo’s session on TBLT as a mindset last week – did you see it?
If you happened to miss it, here’s the full recording again:
The post includes 5 takeaways from the session and a reflection task.
One Actionable Step from the Session
The 1% Move: Don’t try to redesign your entire teaching identity overnight. Choose one small interaction to change: wait three extra seconds before filling a silence, or move the desks into a circle to disrupt the “compliance” mindset.
We’ll be having a bit of a more relaxed summer schedule, but look out for our announcements for upcoming workshops coming up over the next 3 months.
🎙️ The Power of Appreciation in Learning
“When learners know they are being appreciated, learning can take place so much more easily.” – Dr. Angelica Galante, McGill University
I’m teaching a class now where one of the themes we’re exploring is stories of resilience, specific to newcomers in a new country. It’s been an important point of reflection – for them and for me – on how resilience shows up in our day to day lives.
It has reminded me of when I was a newcomer and, of course, my students now are newcomers themselves.
It also took me back to our conversation with Angelica Galante – a professor at McGill University in Montreal and a at one time a newcomer herself to Canada – and her emphasis on appreciation in learning.
Perhaps we as teachers need to put our students in better situations to succeed – to be resilient – as many people do give up on language learning early in the process.
Here’s an excerpt of our conversation:
That’s all for this edition. Talk next Monday,
Leo and Andrew
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