Call For Papers

The conference theme this year is ‘Back to the Future’: we will look back at the past 5 years of our industry and reflect on what we’ve learnt as a profession as well as look at what’s in store for us over the next 5 years and beyond.

We especially welcome sessions that deliver value for teachers, teacher trainers, materials writers, content designers, marketers, edtech experts, learners and anyone involved in any way with teaching and learning languages, that could apply the takeaways from your session straight away at their workplace.

Here there are the main areas we’d love to hear about:

  • Reflections on how political, social or economical changes in the future landscape could have an impact on ELT professionals: Brexit, cultural diversity, multilingualism, NNESTs, emerging markets… E.g How might the Post-Brexit landscape impact ELT?
  • Applications of new tech or innovative applications of existing tech that might influence the way we teach and learn. E.g Experiences of using wearables, AR, VR in the ELT classroom; How to make the most of Google Classroom; 5 ways AI is changing the way we learn languages
  • Innovations outside the classroom – on areas such as school management, content design, product development, business Eg. Lessons learned from applying Agile principles in materials writing; One year as a DoS: what I wish I new before
  • Initiatives, ideas and contributions from outside the ELT industry that can help improve our industry. ELT. Eg Crafting learner-centered lessons with design thinking; Busting neuromyths on language learning
  • New hard and soft skills that we might need to learn for the future: Creativity, leadership, coaching, lifelong learning, mindfulness, peer-learning, coding… E.g Future-proof yourself with lifelong learning; Coding skills teachers need to know
  • Any other ideas you might have that fit this year’s theme

Submission deadline

14th January 2019
23:59 GMT

What are the formats?

60-minute session with learners

These sessions will involve you teaching a class of 6–10 Spanish-speaking, B1/B2-level learners observed by delegates. The session should include opportunities for feedback and discussion of the lesson. The room will have an internet connection and a projector. The learners should be included in the feedback sections, which can be in groups or plenary or a combination.

60-minute session

Would you like to get your audience actually doing something during your session? Workshops should get attendees thinking and creating things themselves and in small groups. These sessions will be in rooms with internet connection and a projector and we can help you set up your room in the way that best facilitates your desired outcome.

60-minute drop-in session

These are a collection of one hour hands on sessions that will be running simultaneously. Attendees will be encouraged to move between them, dropping in and out as they explore the different sessions. There are few different types of session that work well in this format:

Clinic
This type of session is perfect for offering attendees the chance of engaging in a 1-to-1 format. You could offer 4 x 10min slots, which attendees will be able to book when they register for the conference.

Workshop / Self learning activities
Run a workshop with activities that attendees can drop in an out at anytime. It might work well to set up different activities in different tables, with handouts with the instructions of the activity which attendees will be able to read and set up by themselves.

Showcase of products
If you’d like to showcase your products, it would work well to lay your devices in different tables and perhaps set up tasks for attendees to do.

The drop in sessions are scheduled on the Friday evening.

30-minute session

These sessions will be in rooms with internet connection and a projector. You don’t have to involve your audience in your talk, but they should leave with some clear benefit of having spent their time with you.

Before submitting....

Deadline for submissions is Monday 14th January 2019 23:59 GMT

We offer speakers 50% off the standard ticket price, which helps us maintain InnovateELT as an affordable high quality event.

Make sure that your session fits the theme of the conference and is relevant for your audience.

English is the official language of the conference, but we also welcome a number of submissions in Catalan or Spanish.

Both successful and unsuccessful speakers will be contacted by the end of January 2019.

Are you ready?

All full paper submissions will be peer reviewed and evaluated based on originality, relevance to the theme of the conference, as well as the conference principles, that can be found in our manifesto.

If you are submitting a joint presentation, one speaker needs to submit the main call for papers form, and the other joint one/s need to submit this different form.