Today is my last working day for this academic year. Sort of…I am back for a week w/c 18th August to do resit marking and resit speaking exams (presentations and seminar discussions) but other than I am freeeee until 18th September. It has been a year of unexpected change – restructure, voluntary severance scheme, colleagues leaving – and I find myself finishing ADoSing/coordinating the January cohort for the final time (in theory – nothing is set in stone…) with a view to switching to coordinating the September cohort from when the next academic year begins. I feel like looking back and looking forward as a suitably calm and organised way to round off a chaotic year!

What I have been learning about and doing this year:

• Generative AI (somewhat inevitably…): I’ve attended a number of development sessions both internal (ELTC-based) and external (webinars and the like) – thus a number of my recent blog posts have focused on it. This has fed into the course development I’ve been co-doing ready for the September semester, when we will be rolling out the new syllabus with integrated focus on ethical and effective use of AI.
• Instructional Design for Language Teachers: That 10 week course I did in the September semester (seems approximately 10 lifetimes ago…!). I’ve not made any Articulate RISE or Storyline content since then, but it’s been helpful from the perspective of giving feedback on the content that the TEL team have been developing to support the new syllabus (focusing on a new formative assessment, focusing on ethical and effective use of AI in relation to each of the assessments the students will have to do). The focus on effective use of Google slides has also been helpful in terms of the materials development I’ve done for the new syllabus.
• Group Dynamics: Thanks to Sandy Millin’s Delta Newsletter, I read her blog post about, and watched her recording of a talk she did about, group dynamics. My interest was sufficiently piqued as to acquire Group Dynamics in the Language Classroom (not an affiliate link, I’m not that clever) by Zoltan Dornyei and Tim Murphey. I was aware of its existence but had sort of forgotten about it, and the newsletter was a timely reminder: our groups of students have changed quite a bit in the last few years, from consisting predominantly of students from mainland China to a more diverse demographic, including a number of students from the Middle East and an increasing number of first language speakers of English from a range of countries (African countries, Asian countries, the U.S…). This has posed various challenges to teachers, including in this last January cohort, which had some “difficult” groups in it. I shall continue to read the book over this summer, in the hopes that if I get a challenging group I will be better equipped to work with it, and if one, or more, of my teachers does, I will be better equip to support them with it.
• Neurodiversity: I’ve done a lot of research into Neurodiversity in the last few years, and this year in April was ‘diagnosed with autism’ (or better, identified as being autistic). One of my students in my most recent group was neurodivergent and I feel I have been better able to support her due to my increased awareness. I have a research idea relating to neurodivergence and autism which I am exploring with a view to starting an Ed Doc possibly in 2026-2027 academic year (that sounds like an impossibly high numbered year for being next calendar year’s academic year beginning!).
• New Blackboard: We are moving from old Blackboard to Blackboard Ultra in September, so I have been doing a self-study course (piecemeal, when I could find time) to try and prepare for that. There was a selection of new vocabulary to get to grips with (e.g. “document” has a new meaning in the context of Blackboard Ultra!) as well as how to do all the stuff on it that we were accustomed to doing on old Blackboard.

What lies ahead:

• Navigating the new cohort and syllabus: After all our work on it, it will be awesome to roll out the new syllabus and content, and I get to be in the ADoS/coordinator (our name is in flux, can you tell?!) role for the first cohort of teachers and students to use it! I’m excited!
• A change in contract %: I am going down to 80% starting next academic year. I will have Tuesday morning and Friday afternoon off (splitting it up like this enabled more timetabling flexibility and lets me spread out my workload while also enabling slightly earlier finishes on campus). Hopefully this will be a positive move for my work-life balance and working with my autism rather than against it.
• New AI policy: The times of “You must not use it. The End.” are now over. Hopefully our new syllabus will enable us to teach our students how (not) to use it and the value of engaging with sources and the process of writing themselves. (I remain optimistic!!)
• Applying for the Ed Doc: Hopefully…maybe…Semester 1 will give me a good idea of how amenable my new contract percentage is to my energy levels and possibilities of taking on something like an Ed Doc.

The above lists aren’t exhaustive but they are what I’ve picked out in the time I have available! I won’t now say goodbye till next academic year because my extended, if slightly fragmented, break means I might actually have time to write the odd blog post – stranger things have happened! Including this post, I’ll be on 6 for this calendar year, last year in total I managed 7, so I am likewise optimistic about increasing that total for this calendar year. Watch this space! 🙂

And to finish, for now, one of my favourite memes, because it is about right: