For those of you that know, the first half of 2016 was an incredibly difficult time for me. Luckily it ended being quite wonderful.
Especially all the workshops, the live events plus all the chats, coaching sessions and emails, Thank you!!
Here is some of what we went through …..
January – start of the year in New Zealand
Queenstown in New Zealand has been amazing every January for the last few years.
As for the last few years in January I started out in New Zealand, getting ready for the New Year’s materials. For all of you wanting a quick start to the term I went over all my Best of the Games of the Year in Part 1, Part 2 & Part 3 plus a Silly Phonics Review & I asked you You can fly????! along with Margit’s tips for super stressed teachers Antarctica: For super stressed or “got no time” teachers!
And following on the idea of taking family fairy stories and genkifying ( and simplifying) them we had the Goldilocks & The 3 Bears: A4 Cards & Mini Play
February – Buy one, give one free + Phonics & Games
I officially opened up the “Buy one, give one free” program so you can help me help some of these students and many others like them around the world.
After many requests I wrote up the Genki English: Buy One, Give One Free program where you can help with some of the most important projects I do in the developing world (the real passion of what I do). And activities wise we had New Game: I wanna …… but I gotta……, Yoga + Genki English Special Class & How to use the computer games with small classes?
Still in New Zealand and after amazing concerts from Madonna & Simply Red (and just missing out on seeing Prince live!) I started out with How to make grammar drills less boring & added the New Phonics Stories Covers – they are great to put on your wall and impress the parents – a whole story after just 25 minutes of reading!
Whilst being quite stressed myself, I brought you the Being Happy: “The Reverse Gap” and we had lots of posts on Start Your Own School: Who is your avatar? ( + how to crush your competition) and I reopened the Start Your Own School & Double Your School’s Income – Guaranteed! Coaching Program.
March – Crazy times & Super Long Flights in Dubai
The world’s longest commercial flight, 17 hours from Auckland to Dubai.
March was supposed to be wonderful, but ended up being some of the hardest weeks of my life. So I got on the worlds longest flight – 17 hours non-stop to Dubai.
I got some wonderful words of support with Just Extraordinary!, and I found time to write up Get Fluent Quickly Tip 2: The Hidden Benefits of Getting Fluent and of course the events Easter Egg Hunt + Games & Last Minute Genki St Patrick’s Day Ideas.
Another bumper month for activities, we had New Game: Question Balls, 2: Who knows? Appliqué Game & the 10 Best Review Games for Teaching English plus Where is it? Minicards & Do you want the Phonics First Curriculum? & Junior High School Genki English (New Horizon)
And on a brighter note Takasaki City because the latest City to adopt Genki English for every school in the city.
April – Crazy Americans (!) Arizona
After many years I finally found time for a few days vacation – in Sedona & the Grand Canyon
In April I was over in Arizona for a very genki conference with nearly a thousand teachers of all subjects from all over the world. If you’ve never been to a professional conference in America, try it, it’s like Genki English with a thousand percent more genkiness!
And for the first time in a long time had some time off, so I went to the Grand Canyon!
We had A few quick Icebreaker ideas…, I teased the Brand New Genki Phonics iPhone App?? we had New Levels 9 & 10 Jumbo & Incredible Workbooks, How to get students to think in English. New Genki Spanish Songs the Junior High First Lessons Top 5 Tips & Bigger Please Pizza.
May – UK & France
This was actually route 66 last month in the US, but it kind of looks like France. 🙂
In May I started doing the the Facebook Live sessions, it was so good to see so many of you joining in. Wow here’s the recording of the first session – that was pretty cool! & The second one – lots of amazing Q&AI! plus a popular request was to see me actually teaching kids in video so I dug up some footage and showed you How to teach Genki English to kids – in video and How to create amazingly engaging lesson plans? (+ Jelly Beans)
Unbelievably it was May that I first started planning the Online Teacher Training Academy – What would you like to see included? – hopefully that will be released in January this coming year. It does take a long time to get things ready!
Lesson planning wise we had The Genki English Awesome Lesson Formula & What to do in your very first minute of English/ESL/EFL class.
For activities we had a great blast from the past with Do you like …? Hippo Worksheet Game
Plus Thank you, thank you, thank you!, getting more students with “Are you as Iconic as Route 66?” & The number one question from my students ….
June – I was back in Japan
Up early at 5AM to catch the sunlight filming in Japan
In June I was beginning to get back on my feet a little bit. And I relaunched the the School Owners Coaching Program with a Mini Video series with so many comments:
- Video 1: How to get more students? My Top Tip
- Video 2: How to Grow (or Start) your School? My Top Tip
- Video 3: The No.1 Mistake that all School Owners make
Plus we had Workshop News + Tokyo Meetup
For those of you struggling to balance the demands of “grammar” teaching with teaching speaking I asked How does a frog jump? and we had a big Facebook session on Teaching English: What are you afraid of?
One thing I didn’t want to do, put you all pushed me, was after many years of teasing I finally brought you the Phonics First Curriculum for those of you who (feel you) have to introduce reading too early.
Plus a quick Quick Genki Phonics Overview Posters & Snakes & Ladders
July – On tour in Vietnam!
These teachers were being presented with prizes for being some of the best teachers in the city. And just look at their outfits!
Thank you so much to all the girls who made the Vietnam tour quite amazing. South East Asia certainly does these huge teacher training events with a lot of style. Over 2 weeks and several cities we had one workshop with Five Hundred Teacher Workshop in Hanoi, the First day in Vietnam & Teacher’s Meetup and It’s out! The Genki Phonics Homework iOS app! – That was a big month!
I talked about how The world is desperate for great teachers like you and the Summer Heat & Vietnam
I was also back in Japan with the awesome COFFET teachers – and a few very cool Genki English fans – for the Tokyo & Okazaki Coffet Awesome Workshops, a New Game: Samurai Hats & Ninja Communication Skills: Hi I’m …..
To give you a little inspiration, from Korea I introduced The English teacher who earns $500k and I also relaunched the Double Your Impact. Grow (or Start) Your English School in just 6 Weeks. Which even with a much bigger price tag, was amazing to see the growth from the teachers.
Wow, that was a busy month!
August – Ultimate Genki Confidence Live!
For the biggest workshop this year it was an Ultimate Genki Confidence program – using all the Genki English philosophies, songs and games to get “big kids” i.e. adults hyper motivated!
I had more live FAQ video sessions with Teach English FAQ in Video: Staying Motivated / Exams vs. Games / High School /Adults and for the new term Best ESL English Demo Lesson to Get New Students and Tell your friends how to get my free Superhero Teaching Email Course
Some of the feedback on my workshop photos prompted Is learning English for girls only? and I threw away the teacher training to do a huge Ultimate Genki Confidence Workshop – This is how you motivate a huge room full of people, the news was also full of Japan’s Plans for Primary School English and for those of you doing teacher training there was an excellent quote on Ships to inspire ….
September – in LA!
You can tell it’s a good photographer when they can make my photos look this good!
I was full on answering hundreds of emails from you all. Plus on the blog there were lots of things for the new term including My Top 5 Games for the New School Year & Lights! Camera! Action! Why multiple intelligences, pictures, music and movement are so important in language teaching
Lots of tutorials with How to get the Genki English Worksheets – and how to use them and another Teaching English/ESL Q&A Live from LA
To get you pumped up for the weekend there was Energise your weekend with the Law of Attraction Genki Rules of Life and
Another popular request for non-native speaker teachers I wrote up the Start Your Own School: But I’m not a native speaker!
The Teacher’s Set went up in price – it’s crazy how much is in it now – and I did bring you the Installment Plan to make it easier to spread the cost.
As always there was International Talk Like A Pirate Day and the biggest session was on Fear: What it is, how it’s holding you back and how to vanquish it!
Plus for beginners we had How to start your first ESL / English class? & This week’s Teach English FAQ: Harry Potter, iPads, become more innovative & getting more energy.
October – Photoshoot and recording in LA!
I’m not sure if I’m supposed to be so genki when it’s just audio work?
Along with lots of work on the blog, I was also in the studio recording new levels for the Genki Phonics App – free updates coming soon – and also had a photoshoot in Hollywood – which is just crazy!
We got in a little early with Last Minute Tips for a Smooth Halloween (or Xmas!) Event, Halloween Spinners!, My Top 3 “No Prep” Halloween Ideas & The Monster Guide to Halloween Teaching Ideas
A friend of mine, Luis, A Teacher Like You Just Won a Ferrari …… by talking about What’s your transformation? from the conference I’m about to learn … in L.A.
And I also talked about Teacher’s Set Price is going up now & Why it matters
November – On Tour in Ukraine, Kiev and Christmas wonderland in Lviv!
It was like coming home to a family of friends with the amazing teachers in Kiev.
After a quick week in France, making yet more videos for you:
- First 2 Minutes of Your Awesome Lesson : “How to teach English” Free Online Workshop Video 1 ( which was very popular!)
& Online Workshop Video 2: Chaos to Awesome – Top 2 Discipline Tips + PDF (which wasn’t very popular! But hey, you can’t win them all 🙂 )
I was in Ukraine in the beautiful snow for The Best Ever Genki English Workshop in Kiev 2016 & Lviv Christmas Wonderland Workshop
Seriously Kiev was like coming home to a family of friends. And Lviv was just the most amazing Christmas experience – you have to visit!
Christmas wise we had Amye’s Amazing Christmas Book! , What are you thankful for?, Monster Guide to Christmas Activities! &
On other activities we had Affirmations & Meditation: Genki Relax & the Daily Routines: Little Red Riding Hood
Plus after the huge event in LA last month, I wrote up the Complete Guide to Genki English for Adults
December – Winter Sun in Cyprus!
The teachers in Cyprus were again so amazing!
Finally we were in December with the amazing teachers with the Winter Sun Workshop in Cyprus!, Magic Christmas Game, I’ve got no time!!!! , 12 Genki Days of Christmas in Video and lots more to come.
And on to 2017 ….
As I say that was one of the most emotional years I’ve had in a long, long time. And I so thank all of you for being there, supporting Genki English in the events, in emails, on Facebook and everywhere else. You are all awesome!!!
You really kept me going through the first half of the year. And really brought joy back to me in the second half.
I thank you all.
I appreciate you all so much.
There is so much more to come next year, with new Hip Hop Songs, the online Teacher Training Academy, new teaching challenges for you and hopefully live events in Greece, Vietnam and maybe Italy.
I wish you all a wonderful, wonderful 2017!
Be genki,
Richard
I am also very thankful for finding your blog this year and comming into contact with you! You are like a mentor to me – you inspire, encourage and teach me soooo much! Right now I’m in a difficult position, but just wait a little and I’ll report back about all the awesome impact you’ve had on my life. I am so happy to be a part of this big, genki family of so many like-minded teachers who want to be the best teachers! What a wonderful community!
I wish you a happy, successful, energetic, but peaceful, fulfilling 2017! 🙂