An educational practioner talk for UN World Day to Combat Desertification and Drought - 5 things that happened after environmental lessons in Mali - Patrice Kané

The 17th of June is UN World Day to Combat Desertification and Drought and to mark this day the Language Centre, School of Languages, Linguistics and Film at Queen Mary University of London will be hosting a webinar from an educator from the frontline of the urgent fight against desertification. This talk should be of interest to all those interested in language teaching and learning in the Global South and the intersection between language teaching, sustainability and citizenship.

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Patrice Kané is EFL teacher and pedagogical advisor at secondary schools in Dioïla in the Koulikoro Region in western Mali . He has delivered many training sessions for teachers under the British Council's English Connects project. He has written articles for the IATEFL GISIG and is interested in global issues and ELT and developing ICT in education in Mali. Patrice was the recipient of the 2022 Transform ELT Scholarship for Global Change for IATEFL in Belfast.

The webinar - Friday 17th of June - will last for an hour and starts at 1pm UK (12pm Mali) on Zoom.

All very welcome - register here.

Abstract for Patrice's talk: 5 things that happened after environmental lessons

In Mali, teaching environmental lessons in a language classroom remains a problem at secondary school, because the syllabuses don’t include environmental content and teachers are not trained on this area. I embarked in a project of writing my own materials focused on environmental content I shared with colleagues.

My presentation will offer guidance how I addressed the challenges with the issues about teaching environmental content in English classes and come to 5 positive changes which are:

Adapting and integrating: after the teachers got the first experience how to teach environmental content, they adapted the content to their local problems and integrated environmental problems in their classroom.
Sharing experiences in COPs: many teachers were engaged in environmental content and were willing to share experience in their community of practice.
Getting support: the teachers and their students got support from schools’ administrators to fund planting trees activities, even those who were reluctant the first time.
Planting trees at schools: the lessons raised students’ awareness of global environmental crises and they planted trees in their schools.
Getting into activism: many students started getting into environmental activism as they regularly posted their posters’ photos on Facebook and WhatsApp. Then people like and share.

My talk will last for approximately 30 minutes with the remainder of the time for questions and discussion.

Register here.

Patrice Kané Webinar - Friday 17th of June 1pm UK/ 12pm Mali on Zoom

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