RELO Roundtable Discussion

Photos of RTDs

2006-07-17T22:04:00.000-07:00

Almost 8 months ago, my computer crashed. I lost everything, including all the pictures. Here are some of what I could compile afterwards. All about RTD. Check it out.

The Participants:

The facilitators:

What They Did:

After the Sessions:

60th RTD: Proposal Writing

2006-07-17T21:59:00.000-07:00

'How can I express myself in only 250 words?' someone asked.
'We are shy to brag about ourselves, it is against my believe,' the other said.
"That's the art of writing proposal when you apply for scholarship," an answer came.
"So, Damon, guide us..."
"Yes, please lead a workshop on this.."
"We urgently need that skill, Damon.."

So, then, we decided to hold a "Workshop" on Proposal Writing
on Wednesday, July 26. It also marked our 60th round.

The session was oversubscribed only in 3 days after being announced. Up to the last day, we had rejected over 15 disappointed participants. And..believe it or not, on the D-day there were still 3 participants who simply tried their luck, they attended the session anyway. There were 37 participants in all.

After a short theoretical introduction, D assign the participants to write a short self-introductory paragraph. Five minutes was over, some did not even know what to write, though it was about ourselves. Then Damon explained and give pointers of the need to draft and revise and revise and revise and finalize.

The workshop went on for 2,5 hours, and the participants seemed to have gone nowhere. We really did not want to stop, but time was running. Damon had to leave for the airport to catch a flight.

"Judging from their short paragraph I read around, they need at the shortest a 3-day intensive workshop, Kun, " Damon commented.

So?

59th RTD: Using and Writing Poems in the Classroom

2006-07-17T21:24:00.000-07:00

As our 59th RTD, we have Drs. Bambang Yudi Cahyono,M.Pd,MA, Ph.D coming from Universitas Negeri Malang to lead a workshop on 'Using and Writing Poems in the Classroom'. The lively session was attended by 23 participants.

Everyone tried, everyone shared. Here is a Haiku I wrote:

Damon Anderson
A keyword for search engine
of English Teaching

Some of the participants commented that the poems I wrote in that workshop were too scientific. I called it too 'technology oriented'. But then, ... it was another proof, that even technology can give ideas to poem writers.

Here is one of the masterpieces:

The poems written and shared and read were all beautiful and inspiring.
Now we know...there is a certain part in us..

If you would like to contact Pak Yudi, here is his email address:
yudic2000@yahoo.com

Thank you, Pak Yudi.

58th RTD: IIEF: Doors for Scholarships

2006-07-17T21:05:00.000-07:00

IIEF: Doors for Scholarships

On June 21, the RELO Center was packed with 34 RTD participants (37 including us, then) attending a session by Diana Jahja and team from IIEF on 'Doors for Scholarships'. Guess everyone was eager to know about chances to get scholarships.

There are things we just learned, there are also an encouragement we got from the session, especially after learning there are some chances for scholarships open for those whose TOEFL scores are not high enough yet, and also those without age limit.
The biggest challenge is on 'writing the proposal'. So, most of the attendees requested Damon Anderson to give a workshop on Proposal Writing.

As everyone is so eager to try applying the different scholarships, there are a lot of questions coming up in the discussion. And so, at the end, most of them still lingered after the session, all gathered around Diana and the team.

If you want to get more and updated info regarding scholarship, please do not hesitate to contact Diana via email at diana.jahja@iief.or.id

Thank you, IIEF.

57th RTD: What and Why TOEIC ?

2006-07-17T20:49:00.000-07:00

On June 7th, 2006 the TOEIC team from Indonesia Test Center came and lead the discussion on "What and Why TOEIC?". Victor Chan, the CEO of ITC himself led the team.

The session was attended by 25 participants of different background, and everyone was given a complete package of brochure and sample test CD. It was a lively session and there was a lot of questions from the participants since the popularity of TOEIC is still way behind TOEFL.

At the end of the session Jenny Lee, the Marketing Director of TOEIC Indonesia promised to send a TOEIC Prep Book to the RELO Center as to complement the collection. The book is now at the Center, and quite used by the visitors.

If any of you would like to contact TOEIC Center or to know more about TOEIC,
please feel free to contact Victor at victorchan@toeic.or.id

Thank you, again, to Victor Chan, Jenny Lee, and team.

Special RTD with Highschool Students

2006-06-03T00:43:00.000-07:00

May 11, 2006 - Teenage Life After School

Whenny, a frequent RTD Attendee, had the initiative to hold a special Roundtable Discussion for her students. It was a chance for the highschool students studying in her Language Center to practice their English with native speakers. The topic chosen was: "Teenage Life Outside Schools".

RELO Damon Anderson and ELF Coord Mike McCoy patiently encouraged the students to talk. It was hard at the beginning, but after a while the students started to melt, and they were brave to say a word or two.

Teenage life after school is similar. They spend their time doing sports or their hoobies. The culture of going out with their friends are also similar. They have to ask permission from their parents, and they have a certain curvew to follow.

Hope the discussion really gave those students encouragement to learn and practice their English.

56th RTD: Adapting Materials by Damon Anderson

2006-06-03T00:35:00.000-07:00

56th RTD - May 17 - Adapting Materials

Attended by 27 participants, Damon Anderson started the discussion with self introduction and the reasons or expectations from everyone. It was obviously stated, then, that the skills of Adapting Materials into classroom use is something really needed by the participants.

Damon then continued the discussion by giving some pointers of considerations when adapting materials. The most important consideration is always the students: their age, interest, competence, and objective. So, to be able to cater the demand of the students, we need to know them. In the day-to-day activities, most teachers do not have the freedom to choose the materials but only use what is available in the textbooks. Then, it is the teachers responsibility to provide scaffolds for the students. By doing so, the teachers bridge the world of the material writer, the authority who had the decision of textbooks selection, so that those strange and (sometime) complicated world is more accessible by the students.

The discussion was able to open more doors for ELT practitioners so that they understand the points of adapting materials better. However, the 2-hour discussion was only able to make the participants ask for more hands on practice. So, the next plan is to hold a one-day workshop to really give it a try to adapt materials, and make the discussion comes true in the life of the participants.

At the end of the discussion RELO presented a birthday cake for Mike McCoy, the Fellow Coordinator.

55th: Roundtable Discussion- Maximizing the Availability of Multimedia in ELT

2006-05-03T21:47:00.000-07:00

Teaching English using Multimedia? Wooow...!!!

When hearing the word Multimedia, what came to our mind is the sophisticated internet, glossy powerpoint presentation, video conference, etc. While actually multimedia is the combination use of two media or more in teaching. Stick figures, realia, tape recorder, TV, leaflet, poster, all can be used. They are called multimedia and they are around us. The question is now, how can we maximize the use?

Gumawang Jati from ITB Language Center, known as Mr. Technology, came all his way from Bandung to lead the discussion. There were 23 participants, mostly wanted to know more about the use of multimedia, some claiming fro being lagard, others complain for not having any mutlimedia facilities. Jati underlined that sometimes we were so focused on the media and forgot that media is just media, while the focus should be on our teaching.

The discussion was led around Dale's Cone of Experience with the objective of trying to bring our teaching activities towards the lower layer of the cone. If you are interested to know more about the discussion and / or the topic, please feel free to contact Gumawang Jati at jati@melsa.net.id

It was a very animated session, and the networking was even stronger. People stayed for a while afterwards, and laughters were bursted here and there. Another merry and joyful Roundtable Discussion Day.

54th Roundtable: Teachers Behaviour VS Students Motivation

2006-05-03T20:56:00.000-07:00

April 12th, Itje Chodidjah from Learning Partnerships led the discussion and played the role of the RELO hostess as well, while Rizal was the host. Damon and Kun were in Yogya leading a 2-day workshop on Multimedia in UGM.

Attended by 17 participants, the discussion went around the fact taht motivational strategies cannot be employed successfully in a 'motivational vacuum' - certain preconditions must be in place before any further attempts to generate motivation can be effective. Three important points were: 1. Appropriate teacher behaviours and good relationship with the students; 2. a pleasant and cupportive classroom atmosphere; 3. a cohesive learner group with apporpriate group norms.

A survey revealed that the teacher's own behavior is the single most important motivational tool.

To get to know further about the discussion from the resource person, feel free to send email to karce@cbn.net.id

53rd - Tidbits from TESOL Tampa 2006

2006-03-26T05:18:00.000-08:00

A group of 12 grantees from Medan, Padang, Jakarta, Semarang, Yogyakarta, Surabaya, Malang, Makassar, Manado attended the TESOL Conference in Tampa, Florida, together with Damon Anderson and Kun Herrini. The trip itself was a thick-book-long story to tell, that it will be worth publishing in a blog of its own (being created, I swear). But in short..you can imagine...traveling with 12 different teachers... People said it was easier to travel with 100 students....

Damon opened the session by explaining about TESOL COnference and he also described about how it was organized, the sessions, etc.

YM Harsono (Your Majesty? No, Yohanes Mujiyo), the TESOLer from Atmajaya University Jakarta followed Damon by sharing around the Writing and Reading Skill sessions he attended. In the preliminary talk he said that in terms of academic level, Indonesian Univeristies were not left behind (if it was, not so much), but maybe in terms of research, yes, we needed to cathch up.

Nida Husna, TESOLer from UIN Jakarta shared about the invaluable experience she learned, academically and culturally. She attended some sessions on leaderships and professional development and she shaed the alternatives of PD one can choose from.

I myself shared more about all the fun we had together, the experience of leading a group of 12 novices and the lessons learned from the conference from the angles of design, administration, roles of each committee, protocol, and others. I really thought that we needed to learn from them, and that there should be a workshop on organizing a conference. I ended up the sharing sessions by promoting and encouraging people to write a proposal and attend the TESOL conferene 2007 in Seattle.

In the session, there were two most important people for the TESOLers 2006 program, those who worked really hard from recruitment up to pre-deperture orientation, Diana and Wahono from IIEF. We used the chance to really express our gratitude. Thanks a lot Di & Wahono. Our thank you is never enough.

52nd - Overcoming the Language Barrier through Modern Toys

2006-03-26T05:16:00.000-08:00

Damon and I were away in Tampa,Florida, attending TESOL Conference. It was the first try, holding Roundtable Discussion without either one of us around.
Have not heard anything about it yet, but soon as I got information, I will update you with the news.
Or....any of you who attended would like to write about it?

If you would like to know more about this topic, please feel free to contact Obert Hoseanto, the facilitator, who also work for Robotic Indonesia, via email at obert@cbn.net.id

51st RTD - Teaching Literature - How to Make it Interesting

2006-03-26T05:15:00.000-08:00

Grace Wiradisastra from Univerity of Indonesia started the discussion by sharing what she did in her classrooms, especially how she made her students attracted to literature and how to bring literature closer to the students' world. The examples of her students' works were also brought and displayed all around the room for participants to see. They came from Grace's classes in Atmajaya University and University of Indonesia.

Then, animated discussions and sharing here and there just happened as always. Grace also made us work in small group and then shared, showed, read whaterver masterpieces we created. And...it seemed impossible at the beginning, but...at the end...we made it. Why was it suddenly so easy?

The 50th Anniversary

2006-03-26T05:12:00.000-08:00

The first time I brought up the idea of a Roundtable Discussion, Damon did not believe it would work. I postponed it for 2 months trying to convince Damon, and then begged him to give it the first five. If id did not work, we would simply stop.

I could not believe, we reached the number of 50. It really called for a celebration. So, the Indonesian nasi tumpeng was made. Matched! The topic of the discussion was "Culture: Where does it fit in the CBC". We celebrated the golden anniversary in the Indonesian culture.

Hope there would still be another 50 sessions to come, and another 50, and another 50. And with a regular roundtable discussions being held in GajahMada University in Yogyakarta, now in Universitas Negeri Jakarta, and other places, we felt so proud to make the roundtable discussion round and round and round.

Cheers!!!

RTD Jan 25: Still Teach Grammar these Days?

2006-01-11T18:49:00.000-08:00

Today, the demand to teach English communicatively is understood well and translated into integrated teaching tecniques. However, if look at the reality of the English Language Teaching activities in Indonesia, grammar is still emphasized. It comes up not only at the evaluation stages (say UAS, UAN) but also in the daily teaching activities. The problem is, how should we teach grammar these days?

Gloria Kismadi and Sandra Sembel from Learning Partnerships led the animated discussion. Most of the participants agreed teaching grammar was still necessary, but the challenge was then changed. It was 'how to make the teaching of grammar communicative'. And that was challenge. The teaching of English was then realized as was not merely teaching the system.
Sandra then indirectly demonstrated some techniques. The participants enjoyed playing the role as students and at the same time learned the teaching technique.

Pamela Dragovich, the Regional Director of IRC (am I right?)was present and also enjoyed the role of student. Ade Farida prepared some website addresses that can provide resources for teaching grammar.

First RTD in 2006: KangGuru Radio English, IALF

2006-01-11T18:37:00.000-08:00

It was a great 2006 Roundtable Discussion Series kickoff. Attended by 18 participants, and started 20 minutes behind schedule, Kevin Dalton led a very informative session.

Kevin also goes around Indonesia giving training and workshops on how to make good use of the program. The materials published in accompaniment of the program are mostly free (by request) or if it is to be pruchased, it is very cheap. Materials are designed to be very teachers and students friendly.

Kevin Dalton is willing to cooperate with anyone anywhere in Indonesia. To contact him, simply send him email to kdalton@ialf.edu And to learn more about KangGuru, plese visit www.kangguru.org

At the end of the session, RELO Damon Anderson gave him a token of a Wayang figure, Semar, who is the teacher of teachers, Sir Guru.

Below are 3 pictures from the session. If you want to see more pictures or want to get your pictures sent, please send email to relojkt1@cbn.net.id

Kevin distributed free materials and handout and souvenirs to each participant:

Damon Anderson handed ‘Sir Guru’ Semar as a token:

Some of the participants posed together with Kevin and Damon:

Roundtable for January 11, 20056

2006-01-08T21:19:00.000-08:00

To kickoff the series of 2006, we will discuss "Teaching English Through Broadcasting Media", and the session will be facilitated by Kevin Dalton from Kangguru English Language Program, Australia.

This will also be a real action of cooperation in the world of ELT, RELO feat IALF. There is also a plan of inviting British Council, and other donor organizations.
We hope this will inspire everyone to keep the nertworking wider and stronger.

So, if you know anyone who might be benefitting from this session, please forward the message and simply ask them to be contact the RELO Center at 62-21- 352-0622 or sms to Kun at 0812-100-6190.

Cheers,
Kun Herrini

Reminiscenses of RTD 2005 Series

2005-12-28T02:46:00.000-08:00

With the heart still felt painfull everytime I remembered that all of the pictures were gone with the crashing of my computer, I fumbled my CD file collection, and found some of the RTD 2005 pictures. At least.....

Here are some from "Mentoring..." facilitated by RELO Damon Anderson

With participants from Surabaya, Yogyakarta, and Bogor also coming:

Also some from the 4-hour workshop on Writing Stories for Young Learners by Mathilde Tumenggung

And some more on hands-on worskshop on Utilizing Students Blog to Enhance Writing Skills by Gumawang Jati from ITB Language Center

Remember that one of the discussion was about: "Teachers Hiding Behind the Masks" to celebrate Halloween?

Here are some of the 'Teachers behind the Masks'

The Phantom, Batman, and Whatever You Call Them:

Thanks to all the facilitators and participants in the round of 2005. If you have any suggestions on topics or names of potential facilitators or would like to facilitate one? Please send email to relojkt1@cbn.net.id or call Kun Herrini at (62-21)352-0622. Looking forward to seeing all of you in the RTD 2006 Series.

Photos of the Potluckers 05

2005-12-21T07:20:00.000-08:00

Here are some photos of the potluckers. Maybe you are familiar with some or any of them.

Damon opened the session by thanking everyone for their participation all year long:

A vip visitor from IRC, US-Embassy, Ade Farida. For the next RTD, IRC will always provide weblinks for the topics. It will surely add upt to the quality of the discussion. Thanks, Ade.

Itje Chodidjah underlined Kun's opening remarks that one of the RTD's objectives is to promote leverage and self esteem in the hearts of the in-country professionals, echoing: If not us, who. If not now, when? If not here, where?

Special guests: Hee Jung and Hyo Jun, among the others, added the merriness of the end-of-year gathering.

RELO Roundtable Discussion

2005-12-21T06:50:00.000-08:00

Regional English Language Office, US Embassy Jakarta holds a Roundtable Discussion (RTD)every other Wednesdays. This is a forum where ELT professionals from different institutions and levels meet and talk and share their experiences and best practices, also discuss and exchange ideas reagarding ELT matters. This forum, then provides chances for wide networking. It is a free service provided by RELO - US Embassy in the efforts of developing ELT in Indonesia.

Topics ranges from TEYL, Teaching Teachniques and Methods, Approaches, Learning Styles, Assessment, ESP, Parents Empowerment, etc. Topics are coming from the participants and most of the time also facilitated by one of the participants.
Leaflet for upcoming RTD is circulated by email and fax. RSVP is requested to help the administrative and logistical preparation. If you would like to be or suggest names to be included in the mailing list, please send an email to relojkt1@cbn.net.id

If you are already a Roundtabler, please send your suggestion to make this program better or suggestion of topics to discuss or suggestion of a potential RTD facilitator, please send email to relojkt1@cbn.net.id, or publish your comments on this blog.

Please feel free to contact us at The RELO Center, Balai Pustaka Building 6th Fl, Jl. GUnung Sahari Raya No. 4, Jakarta. Phone 62-21-352-0622, Fax 62-21-351-6919.

Cheers,
Kun Herrini