CATESOL24

John McWhorter, linguist of Black English, claims 'loving your language means a command of its vocabulary beyond the level of the everyday.' Many teachers send their students, armed with a vocabulary list, diving into the dictionary as a first contact. While that may offer a start, words are like onions (and ogres) and have layers, and command of vocabulary requires facility with the corresponding layers of each word. In this presentation, participants will explore layers of vocabulary words from denotations to collocations and discuss strategies for assisting students to develop a strong command of words.

This practice-oriented session presents evidence-based pedagogical strategies to promote language development of adolescent multilingual students for academic writing. The strategies and activities are contextualized within close reading of a complex text and a source-based analytical writing and are tied to a cognitive strategies readers and writers access for meaning making.

Grammar doesn't have to be boring! The editor of three well-known resources, The ELT Grammar Book, The Grammar You Need series, and the Zero Prep series, shows how engaging, accessible content mixed with corpus-based and active-learning approaches transforms grammar instruction from lifeless to lively. Materials provided.

CATESOL attendees are invited to showcase a new corpus-related app, platform, or digital resource that you have tried out this past year -- or think you might try out in the near future.

This is really informal and low-stakes: Just be ready to take 3-5 minutes to highlight the app/digital resource and a classroom or online activity idea. Then, each of us can follow up with people about the items that resonate the most.

Let us know if you are interested in highlighting a tool: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1Vefd7bJWRPzzzMqnUVmO4ds268TJdmHMjJnztTAQm6Y/edit?usp=sharing. Or just show up ready to roll!

And bring your devices, questions, and snacks.

Students often struggle to use academic words accurately and fluently in situations where it matters. In this workshop, participants will get theory-based ideas on how to lay the groundwork for interactive, fun games that increase academic word-knowledge depth and fluency. Participants will get sample materials and instructions to actually practice playing four different adapted and simplified popular commercial games they can use to teach academic vocabulary, cohesive devices, and collocations with their own word lists. Participants will also have the opportunity to discuss and brainstorm the use of other popular games that can be adapted to increase academic word fluency.

This session explores integrating humor in ESL/EFL classrooms to enhance language acquisition and student engagement. Attendees will learn practical strategies for using puns, jokes, and idioms to create an engaging learning environment. The presentation provides actionable recommendations for lesson planning, activities, and assessments, demonstrating how humor can empower student voices and improve educational outcomes.

This study used a written interview format to ask several large language models (LLMs, specifically, Claude, Chat GPT, and Gemini) about their ability to write reading passages restricted to particular vocabulary lists, and with specific restrictions on text complexity. The presentation outlines the background of the study, particularly features that might be included in passage specifications, and provides options for setting specifications in a particular context and/or at a particular level of English proficiency. It outlines the various capabilities claimed by current versions of the LLMs that were interviewed.