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Hello Dorothy, hello to all people on this course! I'm Elena Metaxa Kalofonou and I live and work in Halkida, Greece. I've been an English Teacher and a Language school owner for 35 years and I'm so excited to be attending a second course by iTDi! The first one was this July, concerning "Creating ELT Materials" and was a fantastic source of knowledge and inspiration! Katherine Bilsborough has been a fantastic Tutor and always helpful and supportive . Barbara Sakamoto ,the Director, and the staff of iTDi have always been there any time , to help and deal with anything occurred!

Psychology studies and Coaching are among other studies I've done. As I
mostly work with young children and teenagers aged 5 - 16, years when they develop as personalities, I love creating materials and activities that give them the opportunity to express their feelings, their fears or their doubts, materials that motivate them and also give them cultural and social skills and knowledge.

Publishing has been at the back of my mind for some time now, as something I could do parallel to or as a next step of my teaching career. At the moment I have only a vague idea of what material I would like to publish. I have also studied Psychology (Children Development ) and Coaching, and I love creating materials that combine all three subjects. So I would like to publish materials that are easy even for the busiest teacher to use, enjoyable for the students, or which can help them develop their critical thinking and social skills, and grow into independent learners. I expect this course helps me clarify and focus on what I most like to do.

One drawback for my attending this course will be the fact that it's the beginning of the academic year for my school, which means that for the whole month I will be having a lot of demanding obligations such as meeting parents, making enrolments, starting classes and welcoming new students. I was very skeptical before enrolling for this course, but I decided to take the plunge. These things considered, I hope I can manage to attend this course properly without delays in my assignments.

And please, if I am not very responsive to comments, please do not take things personally, I'll be trying really hard to keep up with the demands of the course as well as the demands of my school obligations.

I'd love to be connected with all of you in the group and help each other develop as writers and/or educators. Please feel free to contact me at:
Email: metaxa.lena@gmail.com
F/b : Elena Metaxa Kalofonou
I hope we all enjoy this course!