So, this is coming to the end of 2024, which started well and finished not so well.
You might have seen on social media my recent wobbles, particularly when it comes to my own health and the health of my mum. The photo to the left is me in my mum’s house after a day and night awake, after two paramedic teams, a 4-hour and a 12-hour wait for each team, a trip to A&E in an ambulance, 7 hours in A&E and a taxi ride home.
It all started at the end of November with a phone call from my mum’s neighbour, who has a key and was called by mum’s lifeline provider. I also got a phone call, which went to voicemail, which basically said ‘Mama is screaming for help.’ – not particularly helpful, or wise, for a son who was two and a half hours’ away.
Anyway, things are looking better, I’m back home and constantly in touch with mum. She’s coming to me for Christmas.
I want to say thank you to those on socials who commented, emailed, messaged and phoned. I really have built a wonderful community around me, and not just those in English Language Teaching.
Needless to say, mental health hasn’t been great of late, especially after doing so well – so I’m determined to get back on track and recover the focus and drive I had to return to where I was and not fall back on bad habits. The resolve is slowly coming back.
This also leads me to reflect on the year of work. It hasn’t been as productive or lucrative as previous years, and I don’t really know why – I feel I’ve worked just as hard. I also see a distinct decline in DEI/DEIB work in ELT, although there remain glimmers of hope. It feels to me as if the ELT industry has taken a step away from DEI to focus on other things, such as AI – and it concerns me that very little appears to be changing. This year, I’ve had very little work on DEI, so I’m unsure if this is a telling sign. Of course, I know I’m not the only one working in DEI in ELT, but this is just my personal opinion. What this means for 2025 and beyond, I don’t know.
One thing that has struck me in a recent phone call is my distancing from different things. I made the decision to deactivate Facebook (for four main reasons – to avoid seeing certain personal posts; to avoid seeing ads; to avoid unmoderated hate speech; and to distance from Meta), I deleted Instagram and Threads, and Slack as well. I also made the decision during my health problems to step back from public speaking for a bit – of course, I’d forgotten that I’d agreed to do a panel discussion for CATESOL, which went ahead in November – you can see the recording here.
My main socials will be LinkedIn, Mastodon and Bluesky, and will probably remain so for the foreseeable.
I suppose I have been distancing myself somewhat – and it has certainly helped. It remains to be seen what I’ll do in 2025. I’ve made the decision NOT to attend IATEFL in Edinburgh, for a variety of reasons. One being cost. However, I do plan to go to the Freelance Publishing Professionals meet-up at 2pm next week.
I am not a taboo! still exists, although at a slightly less pacey pace. I’m still immensely proud of what it is, and what it could be, and I plan to continue working on that through 2025.
One thing that has taken a back seat is my Existence collection of resources. I think after the publication of the resource book, exhaustion set in. I started writing a new resource earlier this year, but didn’t have the energy or motivation to finish it.
But I’m pleased to say that I finished it yesterday, and is now on the website – if you’re on my subscriber list, you should’ve got an email yesterday with a discount code to download it for free. If not, it’s paid, I’m afraid. It’s called Circumstances, and is aimed at CEFR B1 level students, looking at the past perfect. I’m really pleased that I can represent pansexuality in this resource. It’s not a deep dive into the sexuality, but is designed to be an introduction and raising awareness. You can buy it here in the shop. I’ll also be doing social posts to shout about it too.
I have noticed that downloads and purchases of the resources have definitely slowed, and whether this means I’m charging too much, I’m not sure. I’d welcome any feedback on this – bear in mind that it takes time and energy to create them, but I do want them to be seen, downloaded and used by more people in the industry.
People have asked me about a new book, and it’s something I’m thinking about. Possibly in 2025, I’ll work on a new collection aimed at a particular CEFR level, probably B1 – hence Circumstances is B1. I may update and improve on some of the free resources, while retaining the free versions.
If you haven’t seen it, Vanesa Polastri wrote a wonderful review of the Existence collection for the Argentinian Journal of Applied Linguistics, and it’s available to read here.
So, well done if you’ve reached the end of this. I knew it was going to be a long one, but possibly didn’t realise how long it would be. I know there’s probably stuff I’ve left out, but wanted to mention, but I think it’s too late now.
So, whatever you do in December, stay safe and I send you hugest best wishes.