Latest News....

We are delighted to announce some great news:

Tessa Woodward will be taking part in a conference

at Christ Church University, on May 5th 2012. Tessa Woodward is a teacher, teacher trainer, and the Professional Development Co-ordinator at Hilderstone College, Broadstairs, Kent, UK.  She was President of IATEFL from 2005-6. She is the author of many books and articles for language teachers and trainers. Her latest book is Thinking in the EFL Class Helbling Languages.  

In this workshop Tessa will give you a taste of Thinking in the EFL Class by trying out some of the practical ideas in it with you. These ideas are useful in secondary and tertiary classes. They help you to set an atmosphere conducive to thinking (your own as well as your students!). They require little preparation and no new technology (unless you WANT to use technology to do them). There will be plenty of fun and time to discuss the activities tried out as well as the whole idea of working on thinking in language classes.    

Venue:
Christ Church University
North Holmes Road
Canterbury
Kent
CT1 1QU
UK

2012 IATEFL Annual Conference and Exhibition in Glasgow

“Tessa Woodward and Seth Lindstromberg will be attending the 2012 IATEFL Annual Conference and Exhibition in Glasgow.  The conference and exhibition dates are 19 – 23 March and the venue is the Scottish Exhibition and Conference Centre, Glasgow, Scotland.  Tessa and Seth will each be giving a 45 minute presentation at the conference on Thursday 22 March.”

Her Majesty the Queen's visit Margate

The Queen and the Duke of Edinburgh visited Margate on Friday 11 November 2011 and received a very warm welcome.  The royal couple visited the Old Town to see the regeneration which has taken place and then visited the new Turner Contemporary gallery.  Their last engagement of the day was to the RNLI (Royal National Lifeboat Institution).  Thousands of local people lined the streets and the visit was a great success for the area. 

Olympic torch comes to Thanet

As if our courses, teachers and the sandy beaches weren't enough to make you want to visit Broadstairs in Summer 2012, the Olympic flame will be passing by on July 19th! Remember if you are visiting the UK in Summer 2012 to book your courses and flights early.

Tessa's book -

Thinking in the EFL class... Click here for details

Tessa Woodward at the AnglistInnentag Conference in Vienna in November

We are pleased to let you know that teacher trainer and educator, Tessa Woodward, has had another book published! Tessa will be travelling to Vienna in November 2011 to promote her new book Thinking in the Language Class and to give the plenary at the AnglistInnentag Conference (“English Teachers’ Day”).

The Conference will take place at:

University College of Education
Grenzackerstraße 15
1100 Vienna
Austria

The plenary - Thinking in the EFL class
How can we language teachers promote our own and our students’ thought flow and use it positively in the class? What does ‘teach for thinking’ really mean?
This talk will explore the background to the current renewal of interest in working with students on creative and critical thinking.

The workshop - Thinking in the EFL class: activities for blending language learning and thinking
In this workshop Tessa Woodward will give you a taste of her new book, Thinking in the EFL class, published by Helbling Languages 2011. She will try out with you some of the practical ideas explored in the book demonstrating how you can encourage thinking in your class. All activities require little preparation and no new technology (unless you WANT to use technology to do them) and are suitable for both secondary and third-level education. There will be plenty of fun and time to discuss the activities tried out.

August International Show

Click to visit our Facebook page and go to Photos then Vidoes and also on our new Youtube channel to see the acts from the evening.

Peter and Julie retire

The college marked the retirement of Peter Worley as Principal and Julie Parker as Vice Principal in June with a wonderful party. Friends and colleagues past and present attended a memorable evening which included moving speeches and entertainment provided by staff members.

Peter and Julie both worked for Hilderstone College for over 30 years and contributed greatly to developing it into the friendly, respected and popular college it is today.

Jon Burton, who originally comes from Broadstairs, has now taken over as Principal and is looking forward to meeting old friends and new as Hilderstone College goes forward.

Please click here to see our facebook page for some pictures from the evening.

Arabic Culture and Food Evening

This was held on Tuesday 31st May, and was well-attended and greatly enjoyed. Many thanks to Salem and Sultan for their interesting presentation on Qatar and to Ahmed for his on the UAE – as well as for his organisational skills! Thanks must also go to Jungwoo from Korea and Iman from Iran for their help with the technology!

We were all very impressed by Abdullah (from Saudi Arabia)’s excellent chicken biriani; the tea, Arabic coffee and fruit brought by Abdullah (from the U.A.E., who also wore his national dress); the delicious sweets brought especially from London by Saif and Yousef and Hesham and Khalfan (also the chief photographer!).

Everyone there really enjoyed the evening and appreciated the work and effort that had been put in to make it such a success. Click here to see our Arabic party!

Spanish Evening!

Judith Baker, one of our host families, is a Food Technology teacher at a secondary school in Broadstairs. Lynn, our Social Organiser, and Judith regularly arrange for Hilderstone students to host a themed Food Evening in the school. The school has excellent modern cooking facilities so we are very lucky to have this arrangement.

On 24 May, Judith kindly hosted our Spanish Evening. Our 4 Spanish students: Raul, Alain, Alberto and Ricardo prepared Paella, Tortilla Española, Pan Tomaca, fruity Sangria and a selection of Spanish meats and cheeses for more than 40 students, many of whom had never tried Spanish cuisine before.

Thank you to all the chefs, Judith and Lynn for organising and hosting such a fun evening. And a big gracias to Maria Dolores, our Deputy Director of Studies’ wife, who oversaw the making of the Paella! Hemos disfrutado mucho! (“We had a great time!”)

Click here to see photos from the fiesta!

Dutch CLIL teachers

We recently welcomed 13 Dutch CLIL teachers from De Goudse Waarden School in Gouda, Holland. The teachers who are from a range of subject areas such as: Geography, Music and Physical Education spent a week developing their teaching skills with our Teacher Trainer, Deborah Robson. Click here to see them enjoying more than just their afternoon break (Deborah is the one in white!)!

For further details about our tailor-made CLIL programmes and Group Packages, please contact Nancy Card at: nancyc@hilderstone.ac.uk  

TESSA WOODWARD SPEAKING AT APPI LISBON

The 25th APPI Conference (Associação Portuguesa de Professores de Inglês) was held in Lisbon from 6 - 8 May 2011. We are delighted that our very own teacher trainer and educator, Tessa Woodward, gave the opening plenary at the Shaping The Future of ELT conference - and it was a great success!

Below is a summary of Tessa’s talk:

The Professional Life Cycles of Teachers

As we come together for this conference, we will find ourselves in workshops, discussions and social events with teachers of all kinds. We may wonder at times why people seem to be going on about something that we are not ourselves so concerned with. This plenary offers a framework, collated from several research sources, that helps us to make sense of the differing needs and concerns of teachers at different points in our careers.

For further details about APPI and the conference itself, please visit www.appi.pt

Hilderstone College in Japan!

Our Senior Marketing Officer, Yasmin Yarwood, had a successful promotional visit to Japan, in March 2011, building and renewing relations in Tokyo, Nagoya, Osaka and Kyoto. Yasmin also met up with some former Hilderstone students for some nostalgia and English practice!

Highly Trusted Sponsor

The UK Border Agency has awarded Hilderstone College the status of ‘Highly Trusted Sponsor’. This means that the UK government trusts us to provide an efficient, accurate and safe procedure to assist students applying for a visa. We understand that it also means that students who receive our visa documentation have a much better chance of obtaining their visa to enter the UK.

Centre of Excellence

Hilderstone College has been named as a ‘Centre of Excellence’ by the EL Gazette, scoring a huge six points of excellence from British Council inspectors. We are extremely pleased to have achieved this recognition.

Broadstairs now closer to London!

In addition to the normal direct train link from Victoria Station London to Broadstairs, there is now a High Speed train service from St. Pancras International London to Broadstairs.  This reduces the journey time from 1h 50 to 1h 20, making travel to and from London even easier!

Laptop Wireless Access

We have some excellent news: Hilderstone College now has wireless internet access throughout the college, for the exclusive use of Hilderstone students. Current students are already taking the opportunity to surf the internet, send emails and complete homework on their laptops, and are enjoying being able to do this with a coffee in the Common Room or while sitting in our sunny garden. We would like to encourage all future students to bring their laptops with a wireless card and make use of this new facility!

Download our brochure

The Hilderstone College brochure is now available and can be downloaded by clicking here. If you would like to receive a copy by post, please give us your details by clicking on "Send an Enquiry" (left column).

You can find all details of Dates and Fees for 2011 by clicking here.

We hope you like the new brochure!

See a student's view of Hilderstone!

To see the website and photos created by Massimo, from Cagliari (in Sardinia, Italy), click here.

Tessa Woodward's latest publication

Tessa Woodward, one of our teacher trainers, has just published a new book entitled "Headstrong: a book of thinking frames for mental exercise" - for more information, click here. (PDF image)

Seth Lindstromberg's latest publication

Seth Lindstromberg, another of our teachers, has just recently published his new book "Teaching Chunks of Language" - for more information on this book click here.

Contact us for more information