Book news

For those of you who know me, I'm soon going to be a published author. I have spent over a year writing an editing a teacher's resource book called THE CREATIVE CLASSROOM. It will be published by Lynx Publishing in a few months. Here's the Lynx website:

www.lynxpublishing.com

If you would like to see a preview of part of the book go here --->

http://www.hltmag.co.uk/may05/teach.htm

A little bit more about the book: it's a series of games and activities for language teachers who want to develop their students' creative skills. Most of the activities are for getting students to come up with interesting ideas on a subject. Although the projected audience is language teachers, I think teachers of any subject could use the activities to promote discussion.

preparing to go

I've spent the last few weeks preparing for my move to Hong Kong. I've done this by studying Cantonese (I can speak a few simple phrases, that's it), reading travel guides, and browsing some of the websites for expats in Hong Kong such as www.geoexpat.com, www.hkexpats.com, and www.batgung.com. However, it's hard to know how much this preparation will really help. I'm going to be hit in the face with reality in a few weeks, and this will probably vary quite a bit from the mental model I have created from all this "research". I wonder if it would be better to go with no preparation, no preconceived idea of what to expect.

countdown begins...

It's now less than a month before I leave for Hong Kong. I'm still searching for information about getting settled in. The university I'm going to be teaching at has a well-organized orientation program. I am very impressed so far.