ELT Publisher of materials for TEFL & ESOL teachers. Resource for humanistic, personal, and professional development with articles by Jay Leonard Schwartz, et al.
ELT Vista, the original project that later evolved into ELT Visa, has now been re-established in the United States. The new website can be found at www.eltvista.com.
Much of the content first published through ELT-Vista periodical in the early 2000s and appearing on this website has been revised, expanded, and incorporated into the newly released book, What About the Teacher? – A Humanistic Guide to Self-Actualization for TESOL Teachers, now available on Amazon in both digital and paperback editions.
Published in September 2025, What About the Teacher? offers a reflective and non-linear exploration of teaching that blends practical TESOL methodology with the deeper human dimensions of professional growth. It emphasizes the teacher’s own development as central to the learning process—addressing not only how we teach but why.
The book carries forward the humanistic and arts-inspired spirit of the original ELT-Vista periodical while expanding its reach through new reflective sections, professional tasks, and thematic explorations of learner autonomy, identity, and self-actualization.
To learn more or to read the full article about the book, please visit the updated ELT Vista website at www.eltvista.com.
Here is a warm, intellectually engaging LinkedIn post that matches your reflective tone and explains both the article and your larger project:
What can teachers learn from hypocrites, fools, and avant-garde artists? Quite a lot, it turns out.
In my latest article, Truth from Fools: Polonius, Dada, and the Teacher’s Path to Authenticity, I explore how inner alignment—not perfection—can be the foundation for meaningful, humanistic teaching. From Shakespeare’s famously hypocritical Polonius to the absurd sincerity of the Dadaists, I examine what it means to “be true to oneself” in a profession often overshadowed by institutional expectations and performance.
This piece is part of a broader reflection as I edit my forthcoming book on self-actualization for language teachers. It’s also a nod to my ongoing attempt to reconcile two wildly divergent parts of myself: the teacher-trainer grounded in pedagogy and the Dadaist at large who still believes in poetic license and honest contradiction. To this end, despite being TESOL related, I decided to post the article on my creative sandbox blog. More soon on the book—and, with any luck, a new Lost Florida novel. Both will be published on Amazon. – Jay Leonard Schwartz
Sidewalk Fail is a humanistic oriented educational multimedia project which includes video, audio, music, and text-based content. It’s main aim is to provide English as a Foreign or Second Language (EFL/ESL) students with a lesson that promotes civic responsibility and engagement, as well as citizen journalism.
The teaching approaches combines integrated-skills work and as aspects of ‘social emotional learning’ to teach empathy for citizens who require special needs with regards to mobility, such as the physically disabled, the visually impaired, and the elderly.
The context of the lesson addresses sidewalks and pedestrian paths that are hazardous and inaccessible because of their poor condition due to government neglect, poor city planning and obstructions such as parked cars left by indifferent drivers.
The lesson tasks include, video work, integrated reading and listening comprehension, integrated reading and writing work, integrated pronunciation and sentence syntax work that is music based, and theme-based vocabulary and ‘use of English’ tasks. Speaking practice is facilitated through pair work tasks and class-level discussion with the teacher.
The lesson as a whole also serves as a call to action for a ‘citizen journalism’ type class project to address other local issues or problems.
“Who is more to be pitied, a writer bound and gagged by policemen or one living in perfect freedom who has nothing more to say?” – Kurt Vonnegut
“Fear of corrupting the mind of the younger generation is the loftiest form of cowardice.” – Holbrook Jackson
Ask yourself the following questions:
How open-minded are you?
What role do you have in terms of choosing material or designing the syllabus?
To what extent do you censor yourself in the classroom?
What sort of topics are you most likely to censor?
Who died and left you free rein to censor anything?
Why are you stunting your students’ growth as individuals in society?
Oh, do I have your attention now? Good! Welcome to the real world and a discussion on banning censorship in the classroom, with a view towards helping you ‘occupy’ your teaching practice.
ELTvista is participating in a research project on teachers’ attitudes to a phenomenon known as ‘Foreign Language Anxiety’ (FLA) with regards to oral tasks in the classroom and on proficiency langauge exams. FLA is most often characterized as a feeling of uneasiness experienced by non-native speakers when using or learning a foreign language.
Research studies into the circumstances of FLA has suggested it is generalizable to both a classroom form, sometime referred to Foreign Language Classroom Anxiety (FLCA). As form of performance anxiety, it is also often linked general exam anxiety.
Following the conclusion of this specific research, a series of articles will be published on this website presenting both the findings of the study. It is hoped that the conclusions of this research will shed light on and yield practical suggestions for helping teachers help their students overcome FLA.
It’s the holidays again, a time when EFL teachers go scrambling for holiday flavored gift ideas. Well, in the spirit of the season of giving, here’s an emotional intelligence laced speaking task that will also appeal to students with visual and kinesthetic learning styles.
Consider the following quotes and decide which statement is more aligned with your views of learning:
(A) “Never interrupt your enemy when he is making a mistake.” – Napoleon Bonaparte
(B) “Competition has been shown to be useful up to a certain point and no further, but cooperation, which is the thing we must strive for today, begins where competition leaves off.” – Franklin D. Roosevelt
Suffice it to say that I guess you all know where I’m going with this post! To what extent would you agree that competition is ‘healthy’ in the classroom?
This post is part of an ongoing series on Quality Management for language schools.
In my last post on quality management for language schools, I put forward some ideas on how to address a school staff when undertaking the development of a ‘home grown’ quality management scheme. I also covered questions aimed at teachers that should be included on a survey with a focus on the academic administration of a school. In this post I will continue to discuss such a survey and questions that relate to all employees concerning the school’s administrative and marketing operations.
To be honest, these two points may raise some hairs on the heads of school owners, specifically because they cut right to the core of a school’s management in terms of control and honesty, otherwise known as fair dealing. It’s true that leaders don’t normally like their authority or ethics questioned. Nonetheless, in relationship to ensuring quality no one is above reproach.
The following are some drama based ideas that incorporate the use of hand gestures for communication purposes. There are probably a zillion reasons to try some of the following activities, but some of major ones include:
Pair or group work.
Students get to be creative and use their imaginations.
Students will personalize their contributions (give them some contexts to work with to make things more achievable, and keep their more attentive.
The tasks support varying learning styles: visual, kinesthetic, tactile.
The tasks support the Total Physical Response (TPR) approach.
They’re fun!
For Younger Learners (but not limited to) Level: beginner, elementary Language targets: animal vocabulary, present continuous
Ask students to study their hands. Instruct them to wriggle their fingers, open and close their hands, and try to move them in all ways possible. This warm up task helps get their imaginations going, while at the same time locks their attention levels on target.
Prompt your students to make animal or other creature figures with their hands and then ask a partner what they are making. You might want to demonstrate a few first, though. Start with a rabbit or a spider. I usually begin with a spider and then make it crawl up my arm, shoulder and eventually stopping it on my head. I not only ask students what it is, but also what it’s doing. Hopefully, “It’s sitting on your head!” is the reply! Make sure students answer at sentence level.
Making animal shadows on a wall is a timeless activity for young and old! In the classroom, you can that old overhead transparency projector or a newer powerpoint projector to get the job done.
You can also ask students, in pairs, to create a new animal or creature. They can come up to the class and not only demonstrate it, but also instruct the other students how to make it.
Standby tasks for all learners Level: Intermediate and above
What I’m suggesting here is basically a form of charades or miming tasks. All levels and ages tend to enjoy such activities. The focus here is on hand gestures and on trying to express ideas with one’s hands, or at least mainly with one’s hands. It’s not the end of the world if you incorporate facial or other body parts. Afterall, it’s only natural to do so in real life!
To get you started, study the following images. Some are naughty and some are nice. I leave it up to your discretion as to which you might ultimately use with your students!
The following photos reflect movements that stem from the dances of various cultures. Try some of these hand gestures and see if you can relate the gesture to some form of English expression. This is also something I’ve tried to do with my students, in a sort of free association type task.
At some point, what I try to do is get students to combine various hand gestures to express a statement, hopefully not a rude one! To a certain extent this may seem like mimicking ‘sign language’ for the deaf, which is another source that can be exploited, while at the same time fostering a greater appreciation for the hearing challenged.
Here are some basic example sentences I’ve used in the past:
How much does it cost?
It’s in the back.
I don’t hear you!
Stop, look and listen.
This stinks.
Watch the time!
What time is it?
I’m not listening.
Be Quiet!
Oww! That hurts!
Wait a minute!
Just a bit.
You’re crazy!
What were you thinking?
I should have known better.
I’m waiting.
I can’t wait!
Forget about it.
We’re number one!
Bring him/her/it over here.
I said, ‘here’!
No, not here, there!
Come on! Let’s pray together.
Please sir, may have some more?
Shame on you!
You’re in trouble!
Here is a video to also give you some ideas. This was produced by an organization teaching American Sign Language. Note here that the emphasis is on communicating at sentence level, which is really what we should be occupied with for the most part:
Lastly, try to incorporate music into the mix! Take a lesson from the following video. Go for more than just the title. Try incorporating the lyrics! Turn down the sound and see how many statements the mime is making. Try giving students the lyrics to a song and see if they can mime them.
These are just a few ideas you can do that involve hand gestures to get students involved using their bodies, while at the same time taking into account varying learning styles. It’s important to have fun with such tasks, but to also put the emphasis on communication and to manage the time appropriately. Charades, for example, is great fun. However, much non-productive time can ensue from students ‘performing’ and ‘observing’ as opposed to actually ‘speaking’. Therefore, it’s important to keep the balance time and fun wise. I hope these ideas work for you. If you have any related suggestions, please comment below.
This post is part of an ongoing series on Quality Management for language schools.
So, you’ve decided to jump into the ‘quality’ pool. Your reasons for doing so may be varied, but most likely, if you are a school owner or have been charged with the task of establishing a system of quality management at the behest of the school owner, you are probably wondering where to start. Answering this question is what this post is about.
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