NELTA conference Boon for Nepal’s English teachers

NELTA conference

Any English teacher in Nepal who is concerned about their classroom is familiar with the Nepal English Language Teachers’ Association (NELTA). Established in 1992 as a professional, non-profit, non-political English Language Training (ELT) organisation, it has expanded to 32 branches in Nepal. NELTA’s 17th international conference on the theme “Beyond Binaries: Sharing ELT Practices and Creating the Future” saw 717 delegatesaltogether from 22 countries excluding Nepal. Held from Feburary 18-20 at St Xavier School, Jawlakhel, the conference had over 180 sessions in total. NELTA has become a common platform for all English teachers in Nepal, allowing them to interact, communicate, and share with foreign teachers.

The three key speakers of the conference were Algi Malderez, Honorary Senior Fellow of the School of Education, University of Leeds; Fredrika L Stoller, professor of English at Northern Arizona University; and Rod Ellis, professor in the Department of Applied Language Studies and Linguistics, University of Auckland.
The three days saw various sessions, all of which contributed to improving the classroom setting, be it through developing teachers, teaching techniques, improving reading and writing, among others.

The most popular session was “Consciousness Raising Tasks for Grammar Teaching” held by Rod Ellis. According to the NELTA chairman, Hemant Raj Dahal, NELTA had been inviting Rod Ellis for 15 years and through the joint effort of Oxford University they were finally successful in having him take part.
Dahal also said that NELTA aims to enrich the abilities within English teachers in Nepal with the assistance of their major sponsors. He also said that NELTA started with 12 members in its initial phase has now over 7000 members and is facilitating its member teachers by helping them to participate in international conferences on ELT in USA, UK, and other countries.
(published in The Kathmandu Post dated: 2012-2-24) link: http://epaper.ekantipur.com/ktpost/showtext.aspx?boxid=5320500&parentid=16164&issuedate=2422012