Professional development for teachers
Here you’ll find a wide range of free, self-access training and resources designed to help you build the skills and knowledge you need as an English teacher.
All TeachingEnglish professional development resources are aligned with the British Council Continuing Professional Development (CPD) Framework for teachers, to help you plan your learning and develop the areas most relevant to your professional growth.
You can explore resources in a way that suits your goals:
- by professional practices – to focus on specific areas of teaching where you want to deepen your skills and expertise
- by professional development levels – to find resources matched to your training and experience and see how they can help you progress within each area.
Each resource includes a timer icon to show how much time you’ll need, helping you plan your learning effectively.
Second language acquisition (SLA)
Second language acquisition, or SLA, has two meanings. In a general sense it is a term to describe learning a second language.
Self-assessment
Self-assessment is where learners assess their language proficiency, rather than a teacher doing it.
Self-correction
Self-correction is when learners correct themselves instead of a teacher doing it.
Semantics
Semantics is the study of how meaning is created by words.
Sensitise
To sensitise learners is to make them more sensitive to specific language or ideas before doing an activity.
Sensory acuity
In a general way sensory acuity means how good your senses are at doing what they should do.
Sentence stress
Sentence stress is the pattern of stressed and unstressed words across a sentence.
Short vowels
Short vowels are vowel sounds that are pronounced in a short form.
Silent period
The silent period hypothesis is the idea that when a language is learned, there should be a period in which the learner is not expected to actively produce any language.
Silent way
The silent way is a methodology of teaching language based on the idea that teachers should be as silent as possible during a class but learners should be encouraged to speak as much as possible.