APPI, AssociaçãoPortuguesade Professores de Inglês held its 27th Conference: ELT! From Strategy to Action, the25th, 26th and 27th of April in Lisbon.

The ISCTE venue had excellent, well-equipped rooms and adequate space for exhibitors (the most important ones and some local bookshops as well.)

I was impressed by the level of English in Portugal. I was told that this is partly due to the fact that foreign language television programmes are broadcast in the original version. If this is indeed the reason, it seems to work.

After the fantastic cocktail party on Friday evening, I watched a theatre performance in Portuguese, believing (naively) that I would understand it given that I understand Gallego and could speak it fluently some years ago. I was wrong.

The programme included 85 sessions with over 600 people in attendance.I attended most of the plenary sessions. These were held first thing in the morning and afternoon and had large audiences. Among the plenary speakers were Alan Maley, Jamie Keddie, Brian Tomlinson and Chaz Pugliesse, who spoke about Multiple Intelligences.I chose to attend sessions on writing and speaking (areas I am most interested in) and some on new technological tools.On the final day, I found Peter Dyer’s plenary “Encouraging the students to talk” very interesting.

My return flight meant that I was not able to attend the closing plenary by Penny Ur, “Where do we go from here? An overview of English teaching methodology in 2013”. This was a pity, not only because of what Penny Ur no doubt had to say, but also because it was closely related to the theme of next year’s TESOL-SPAIN convention 21st Century Teaching; Always on the Move.However, I did manage to get to an interesting session by Filomena Martins “Learning/ Teaching and the 21st century”. She talked about strategies to follow and changes to bear in mind in the world of education today.

During the breaks, I was at the TESOL-SPAIN stand, promoting the Madrid 2014 Convention and talking to speakers to encourage them to come to the convention and write articles for our e-newsletter or journal.I would especially like to thank Cambridge University Press for making me feel so welcome.

Blanca Díaz

TESOL-SPAIN Secretary