Talk to the Clouds

Talk to the Clouds archive (to be removed soon)

  • Twelve Days of Christmas: Google Wave Guide and Invitations

    Day One: A couple of Lifehacker editors have written a guide to Google Wave, the amazing new still-in-progress collaboration and communication service that I think could be really fantastic for teachers, writers, people working overseas, and just about anyone. You can read a version of the guide free online: The Complete Guide to Google Wave…

  • Twelve Days of Christmas

    Stay tuned… I’m going to try to do Twelve Days of Christmas here at Talk to the Clouds. That means that starting on December 25th, I’ll post a useful and/or fun free resource every day for twelve days! The Twelve Days of Christmas does traditionally start on Christmas, and isn’t the twelve days before, as…

  • Getting on the Same Page: Book Gifts for Friends and Family

    Is it just me, or do friends, family members, and random strangers sometimes make strange assumptions about us once we become English teachers? They may think we support English-only policies, are ashamed of our first languages if we are multilingual, are constantly judging them on their use of English, etc. They may resent us for…

  • Low Pay, High Qualifications

    I’m working on a post about English-related books you can give as gifts. However, I just had to post this cranky message first. I just took a look at the current issue of Ohayo Sensei (a new one should be out in a couple of days). OS is probably the best source for non-university teaching…

  • Solving the Blogging Sword of Damocles

    Especially when living and working overseas, it’s easy to plan to blog and then fail to, whether because of too much pressure or not enough opportunities to get online or an increasing backlog of photos and excursions to write up or too many options when it comes to the actual blog itself. I think I’ve…

  • Where are you and where do you want to be? (a poll)

    [poll id=”4″] Click on the “Polls” category below or to the right to view and vote in the previous poll. Comments are welcome! I work in the US currently but have not yet given up on my original plan of working in Japan, at least for a year or so. Shorter-term projects in Taiwan would…

  • Online TESOL Certificates, By Popular Demand

    For a long time, people on internet communities have been asking whether TESOL (the international professional association) accredits or endorses any online certificate program, or whether they offer one themselves. The answer was always no, and so people always wound up advising against nearly all of the online TESOL (the profession) certificate programs. Most seemed…

  • 10 Ways to Make the Best of Your Time in…

    At The View From Over Here there’s an excellent post on “How to Make the Best of Your Time in Korea” with some great specific advice for people teaching EFL in South Korea. The other writer has kindly agreed to let me borrow her list framework as a springboard for my own general EFL list,…

  • International Kindle at Last

    So, previously I posted some caveats about the Kindle, but the fact remained that it was and is a very appealing piece of technology for internationally travelling teachers who don’t want to carry suitcases full of books with them. Even if you didn’t experience the USB issue that my friend experienced, though, the fact was…

  • Quote of the Day

    Non-British English-speakers, I have a weapon for you: Language … cannot become bastardized in any country where intelligence is active and where there is no obstacle to progress. It will change, yes, and by changing, it will simply follow the current formed by the passing of time, which is revolutionary and irresistible.” This was quoted…

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