Notification: Since the recording of this episode, funding for TESOL for all government employees, which includes Ixchell, was pulled. We are looking for ways to still make TESOL happen.

Please be aware that some of the information or events mentioned are up in the air or may be cancelled if we can’t find a way to get Ixchell to California. We are considering options, so please keep an eye on our socials for updates.

Regardless of what happens for us, we hope that the excitement we express in the recording can encourage you to have a good experience at TESOL 2025.

Ixchell Reyes 0:00
Coming to TESOL, 2025 in Long Beach? We’re sharing about what we’re presenting, what we’re keeping an eye out for, and how you can join us.

Brent Warner 0:20
Thank you. Welcome to the DIESOL podcast, where we focus on developing innovation in English as a second or other language. I’m Brent Warner, Professor of ESL, and I’m here with the wonderful Ixchell Reyes, teacher trainer extraordinaire. Liver of life, multiple lives.

Ixchell Reyes 0:45
A lover of lives? Great. How are you Brent?

Brent Warner 0:46
What are you making?

Ixchell Reyes 0:48
What do you mean what am I making? What am I making?

Brent Warner 0:51
We’re trying to keep the the making things going thing.

Ixchell Reyes 0:56
Oh, what am I making? Oh, what am I making? Presentations, evidently, because I gave one yesterday.

Brent Warner 1:05
Yeah, presentations? Well, that’s all for today’s conversation. After this, I’m going to be making some meat sauce for pasta, so that’ll be a little bit for me.

Brent Warner 1:17
So today we got a lot to talk about.

Ixchell Reyes 1:19
Yeah, finally gonna see you.

Brent Warner 1:22
I know it’s been well, I thought I was gonna see you around Christmas, New Year’s, but you decided to fly to the other side of the world, so which was cool, (laughter) but now we’re gonna see you in March. So that’s good.

Ixchell Reyes 1:37
TESOL, that’s right, TESOL, I’ve been waiting for TESOL.

Brent Warner 1:42
Alright, tell me, what are your plans for TESOL? You’re coming.

Ixchell Reyes 1:45
Oh my goodness, I’m coming. And I’m so excited, because obviously you and I are presenting, and we haven’t presented together physically in years, right? We’ve had, like, online presentations, overseas presentations, but we’re going to be together for the first time in quite a while. Yeah, exciting. But you’re asking me, what are you asking me?

Brent Warner 2:06
Well, I mean, you’re going to be in Long Beach.

Ixchell Reyes 2:06
I’ll be in Long Beach, yeah.

Brent Warner 2:06
So, I think we’re pretty excited. This is our first time. So this is my first time to go to TESOL in many, many years.

Ixchell Reyes 2:06
Same.

Brent Warner 2:06
And partly, well, I mean, there’s a number of reasons. It’s hard to get the funding to go to all the—

Ixchell Reyes 2:23
I was going to say that it’s the funding.

Brent Warner 2:25
Yeah, funding can be hard. Timing can be hard too. I have a general policy that I don’t go to conferences during my class times, or I’ll only miss one day. But since TESOL is always a midweek thing, unless it falls on a break…

Ixchell Reyes 2:40
I know, I’m so bummed, because I’m actually—that’s the drawback is my class is graduating, a class of teachers, and I’m going to miss their graduation, and that’s such a—I know they’re going to be sad. So, yeah.

Brent Warner 2:58
Please move it. Move it to the weekend. Do a Friday, Saturday, Sunday, Thursday, Friday, even Thursday, Friday, Saturday. Like I can justify taking one day off from my classes, you know, from one class. So sometimes I can do that, but to be like, full week out, it’s like, I can’t do it, but I get it. I mean, it’s hard, it’s hard to get all these things going. So we’re going to be there.

So Ixchell, we’re going to kind of break down today’s show into two parts. One, because you and I are actually doing quite a bit at the conference this year. So we’re going to share a little bit about that, some preview of those things, and then maybe just a few other sessions that maybe we’re excited or potentially interested in. There’s a lot to choose from, of course. And so anyone who’s listening, if you choose not to come to our sessions, you will lose our friendship forever, of course, right? But there’s so many great choices out there to look at, and so we’re going to play around with sharing some of those, and kind of let you know where we’re going to be if you want to find us, if you want to come and chat with us, etc. So we’ll go in time order, Ixchell, is that okay? Like, the daytime order?

Ixchell Reyes 3:55
Okay.

Brent Warner 3:56
So I guess I’ll go first. And this is a conversation so there—well, okay, I guess I’ll say, it’s called “There’s an app for that,” and it’s a TESOL solution room. So TESOL does these things where they kind of have some general things that are going on. And then they have these things called a solution room, where basically they have someone kind of sitting in there. It’s an open exploration place, kind of like a playground. But this one is a tech playground, so people can come in and say, “Hey, I’m looking for something that does this, or I’m looking for something that does that. I want some advice on this or that.” And it’s not just me. I’m kind of facilitating the room, but anybody can come in and if you want some help with tech, that can kind of help you out, that can kind of do what you’re looking to do. Hopefully I can help out, but Ixchell, I’m asking you to come and help as well. If you don’t mind.

Ixchell Reyes 4:50
You’re inviting me?

Brent Warner 4:51
Yes, please.

Ixchell Reyes 4:51
Okay, please be my tech support, yeah.

Brent Warner 4:53
So that’s Wednesday, from 10 o’clock to 11:15 and that’s a little bit of a longer one. So there are other sessions that kind of overlap in the time. And so if you want to go to another session and come pop in for, you know, 10 or 15 minutes, that’s totally welcome. Whatever you want to do is great. So, but that’ll be the first thing that I’m doing.

Ixchell Reyes 5:32
That’s a really good way to start the conference, though.

Brent Warner 5:36
Yeah, yeah, that’ll be good. So, and then my second one is a panel presentation that I’m going to be part of, and Ixchell you and I are going to be on a different one. But this one is the first one, which is using artificial intelligence in EFL slash ESL materials development. And so this one is talking with a couple of different people about ways to use AI to help develop materials, hopefully in appropriate ways. I mean, obviously all of the teachers who are doing this are really trying to figure things out. So if you’re interested in developing materials, and I don’t think that necessarily means like, “Hey, I’m writing a textbook for students,” right? We could just be talking about, like, classroom use materials, etc. So where are the places that maybe this can help out, what are some of the considerations that you want to think about, etc? So I am pretty excited about that, to do that panel conversation. And that one is on Thursday, the 20th also in the morning, that one is nine o’clock in the morning to 10:15.

Ixchell Reyes 6:47
And then, if you aren’t tired of Brent by then,

Brent Warner 6:53
Okay, I’m done. Skip, skip, skip,

Ixchell Reyes 6:58
Brent and I will actually be on another panel. This one will be exploring the impact of AI generated artworks on language learning. And this is that afternoon, Thursday, from three to 4:15 and I think it’s worth coming to see what different people in the field are, how they’re using AI and what the impact has been. So I think it’s a really good way to kind of wrap up your day on a Thursday.

Brent Warner 7:28
And I think that one will be cool too, because Ixchell, you and I have talked a lot about that, like there’s so much interesting and unexplored potential with the image generation. We’ve done previous episodes about that as well. But yeah, okay. And then Ixchell, I’m going to hand this one back over to you for our Friday session.

Ixchell Reyes 7:45
Yes, and our Friday session is happening in the morning, not too early, because we’re covering writing. So from 10:10 to 11:15, we will be talking about writing with AI and sharing strategies to individualize writing for ELs. And I think this one’s going to be fun. Sorry, I have to toot our horn, because I know that writing presentations usually seem like, “oh my gosh, this is going to be…” but I think again, we look at writing and how to make it engaging for students, especially like higher ed, and then emerging students. Approach for emerging students, so emerging learners.

Brent Warner 8:28
Yeah, yeah. I’m definitely exploring with it a lot in my current writing class, and I share about some of these things, of course, online too, but I think for a lot of people, it’ll be useful just to be able to sit down and go, “Okay, let me see this. Let me see it in action, right?”

Ixchell Reyes 8:43
And I—we probably should have said at the beginning, if you’re currently wondering whether you should bring your device or not, do bring your device. Because often time the people that don’t, they end up wanting to look over at someone else’s but it’s just so much more fun if you’re engaging with the technology as we’re presenting, because then you start to see how much inspiration you’ll get just from trying it out yourself.

Brent Warner 9:11
For sure. Okay, so then I have a bit of a surprise.

Ixchell Reyes 9:14
What is it?

Brent Warner 9:15
Several months ago, even almost a year ago, I had suggested to TESOL—so I talked to some of the higher ups at TESOL, and I said, “Well, what’s going on with like podcasting at TESOL, etc?” And they’re like, “you know, what do you mean?” Basically, was the question. And I said, “Well, what is, you know, there are a lot of people out there that are doing podcasting stuff in the TESOL field now that it’s growing, right? I think you’ve probably seen some of this. There’s the teacher think aloud podcast out there now. There’s TESOL pop. There’s, like, all these other things. I’m like, Well, you know, some of these people might be coming, like, what if you set up a booth for us to record at and just do something? Live at TESOL.” And they’re like, “Oh, okay.” And then they told me recently, they’re like, “Brent, we’re doing the booth. We’re putting it together.” And basically it’s an open place. So we can go there, anybody can go there when they want to, and just kind of sit down and start doing recordings or making shows, or whatever else it is. I’m not sure of all of the details. I think they’re finalizing a little bit of it here in the last minutes, but that means that you and I are going to record a show live at TESOL, which is pretty cool.

Ixchell Reyes 10:28
Yeah, yeah.

Brent Warner 10:29
So last time at CATESOL, you know, I walked around asking people for a few things, but this one’s going to be like a maybe more of a live, actual show. We don’t know exactly the time, so you’ll have to follow us on, you know, Instagram or something like that. We’ll post about it and kind of clarify the details. But it’s going to be awesome to be able to sit down, have people walking by, grab people that might have ideas to share and record our episode in the session. So this is kind of, this episode is kind of our pre-TESOL session and then that means that the next episode that comes out will basically be, you know, a live at TESOL recording episode. And that’s going to be fun, something we haven’t done exactly before. So I’m looking forward to it.

Ixchell Reyes 11:17
Look for us, cool. And then I will be at some point at the exhibitor booth for the Defense Language Institute. So come say hi, even if I’m not there, come check out career opportunities and teaching just like what I do. I think it’s, if you’re looking for a full time job, it’s a place to go and just talk to some of us. And if I’m there, if I’m not on any other sessions, I’m happy to share with you.

Brent Warner 11:45
You’re going to be hustling all over the place.

Ixchell Reyes 11:49
That’s right. I want all the good teachers to come for me, work with me.

Brent Warner 11:55
Alright? And then here’s the last one, Ixchell, which is kind of unofficial, totally unofficial, but we’re going for it. So we are going to do a drinks with DIESOL.

Ixchell Reyes 12:09
Yay! We haven’t had our drinks with DIESOL since the pandemic. Yeah, it’s been years, born out of the pandemic it was.

Brent Warner 12:14
Yeah, so getting everybody online kind of just getting like-minded people together who are into what we’re talking about. So Wednesday, this will be a Wednesday night. So we’re starting early, right? Not early in the day, but early in the conference.

Ixchell Reyes 12:28
Yeah, first day.

Brent Warner 12:28
First day, yeah. So hopefully people still have juice. They’re excited about everything. They’re ready to go.

Ixchell Reyes 12:33
Come unwind.

Brent Warner 12:34
Yeah, come unwind with us. Come hang out. So we’re going across the street. So straight across the street from the convention center there is a movie theater and like a kind of Plaza over there, and there’s an Irish pub called the Old Dubliner. That’s A-U-L-D Dublin O-R, D-U-B-L-I-N-E-R, and I think we’re just going to show up there from 5:30 to 7:30. Is the plan. So Ixchell, what party favors are you going to be planning? Three seconds to prepare for this answer.

Ixchell Reyes 13:23
DIESOL patches and DIESOL stickers and DIESOL patches and DIESOL patches, which is a new swag. We have DIESOL patches.

Brent Warner 13:33
I’m holding it up right now. Also drinks with DIESOL coasters.

Ixchell Reyes 13:36
Oh, yeah, nice.

Brent Warner 13:37
So if you can bring some of those, that’s great. So we’ll be giving away some stuff. If we can get a little section, maybe we can plan, like, a little, like, do a little trivia game or something like that, back in the corner, like we used to do something, something fun, if it works. If not, we’ll just be hanging out with fun people, like-minded people, just unwind and yeah, and at the very, very least, it’s going to be you and me, but maybe, maybe a couple other people too. And so this is an open invitation: walk across the street, show up to join us. 5:30 to 7:30 so that’s still like, “Hey, if you just want to have one drink, if you just want to come and say hello, wonderful.” If you want to extend the party longer than that, you can go do whatever you want to do. You could try and invite us and see what, see what mindset we’re at the moment, how willing we are to keep going, but I’ll probably be ready for dinner after that. I guess maybe, maybe during that. I’m not sure, but that’s why—

Ixchell Reyes 14:37
We have our workshop a little later in the morning.

Brent Warner 14:40
We need our—we need a little recovery time on Thursday, from Wednesday night to Thursday, so we can’t go too too crazy, but we’ll have some fun. So if you’re wanting to join us, please do that. Would be awesome. Drinks with DIESOL Wednesday the 19th, 5:30 to 7:30 at the Old Dubliner.

Alright, Ixchell. So I have a—I guess this is another surprise.

Ixchell Reyes 15:03
Yeah, this is full of surprises this time.

Brent Warner 15:05
So you know that I’ve been working on my book for ISTE for a while. What you might not know is that at the same time, I’ve been doing a project of equal size and scope for TESOL, which is not a book, it’s an online resource, but in terms of content, it’s like the exact same length. It’s like 200 pages of work, and, you know, all these ideas. And so what I have built is called the ELT toolkit. It’s going to be released through TESOL basically, right as the TESOL conference is opening up. And so this is for teachers who want a starting guide to many different tools that can help them out in the classroom.

Ixchell Reyes 15:43
And so I’m really excited about this.

Brent Warner 15:45
I’m so excited about this too.

Ixchell Reyes 15:46
Yeah, it’s been a lot of time and effort working on this, trying to get everything put together. We’re working with TESOL, like, what’s going to be the best thing? So they’re kind of in charge of all the stuff. I’m just in charge of the content, but it’s a lot, you know, just like the idea here is, “Hey, I want to know what tools are out there that can help me be more productive, that can help me work with my students, that are good for, you know, whatever, different purposes.” And so every activity or every tool, basically it’s a tool guide, but you click on every tool, and I’ve given a whole walk through, like an introduction to the basics of the tool or what we might need it for. I’ve also gone a getting started guide on every single one that’s like, you know, 5, 6, 7, 8 steps on, like, how do you actually just use this thing on the first basic level? So just again, get your—how do you get your toes wet with the different tools? And then I did, like, a little section called a deeper dive. So everything is like, “Hey, if you want to get more into it, here are some things that you can do.” Then there’s also similar tools. So “Hey, I don’t exactly have this tool, but maybe my school pays for another tool. Can I use this one?” So a couple of related types of tools and also extra resources. So if there’s, like, communities, or, you know, videos, or if, you know, like I had written a blog post, or if there’s an old TESOL connection article about it, or whatever else it is. So it’s pretty massive. I mean, there’s been a lot of work going on, and so I am excited about this. And so if you, or if you have colleagues that are like, “Hey, I want to get—I want to know more, like, how do I keep up with tools,” this is going to be one way that you can do that. And I really hope it’s useful for people.

Ixchell Reyes 17:38
Brent, you can purchase it at the conference, right?

Brent Warner 17:40
Yeah, I think so—

Ixchell Reyes 17:41
So bring it. So bring it to the DIESOL with drinks booth. If you get yours, maybe he’ll sign it.

Brent Warner 17:49
Well, it’s not—you can’t sign it. It’s all digital. So—

Ixchell Reyes 17:53
Maybe you can sign the receipt.

Brent Warner 17:54
Yeah.

Ixchell Reyes 17:54
Take a picture with the author.

Brent Warner 17:55
Yeah, I’ll take a picture.

Brent Warner 18:02
Unfortunately, it is not—because of the nature of being online, right? So, because it’s all tools, so we need to be able to update it more quickly. So we’re like, “Well, if we need this as a book, it’s not really going to be accessible,” or, you know, it’s accessible, but it’s going to run out of ideas. It won’t be evergreen, right?

Ixchell Reyes 18:17
They can purchase it even before.

Brent Warner 18:22
We’ll have to see, I don’t know. My guess is that they’re going to be launching it, like a day or two before TESOL. So it’s coming out very, very soon. Obviously, if you’re a member of TESOL, you’ll get emails about it and see if you’re interested. But also, part of that first session is in connection with it. So doing that, “There’s an app for that” is kind of, you know, also helping people see a little bit about that too. So if you want to come into that session and see what’s going on, there will be some shares around that.

Ixchell Reyes 18:50
Awesome.

Brent Warner 18:51
I think they maybe said there will be discounts if you’re going to buy it during TESOL, etc. So the ELT toolkit, I think this is the first time it’s officially announced, and I really hope it’s of value to you or to your colleagues out there, so give it a check out and see. Let me know what you think.

Ixchell Reyes 19:10
Alright, so we are also going to be checking out a few sessions, and we’re going to list some that we thought might be interesting to check—we’re probably going to check these out, and they may be of interest to you. So, Brent, I think you have an early one.

Brent Warner 19:25
Yeah, yeah. So one that I was interested in, and I don’t think these overlap with my own session. Maybe they do overlap a little bit. Maybe it does. Sorry, I can’t go. The first one was exploring not ignoring social justice issues in the ESL classroom. And so this is going to be on Wednesday morning. Maybe I can’t make it to that one. Maybe I can’t, but it did seem pretty cool. So they’re kind of talking about the ideas of, like, controversial subjects, and how do you bring them into the classroom? And especially, hugely important right now, right? I mean, that is—things are going crazy all over the place, and so I am really interested to hear what they have to say. If I can’t make it, I encourage you to go to it—to anyone listening to go to it if that’s something you’re interested in. But if not, you know, they said it was really interesting. They’re saying like, “Hey, there’s issues like houselessness, Black Lives Matter, LGBTQ issues, Japanese American internment.” I mean, all of these different things that can be hard to talk about, even in the past, they were hard to talk about. Now they might even be harder. So I’d be interested to know what some of the techniques for doing that are.

Ixchell Reyes 20:34
And my Wednesday session is a noon session. It’s called “Education, language and the brain, how neuroscience fosters learning.” I’m very much into brain and learning. So that’s happening Wednesday, at 12, so like lunch time or so right before lunchtime, 12 to 1:15pm so be there.

Brent Warner 20:59
Um, so I found this one Thursday, which I thought was kind of interesting to me. It’s called “Empowering older adult ELs with digital literacy using smartphones.” And so I was like, okay, that might be interesting, like, so I definitely do have some students that, you know, they use their phones, and that’s kind of it, right? They’re not techie people. But when I looked at it as, like, I don’t know exactly if this is, like, a, you know, a sponsored session or not, but basically said, “Hey, this guy built, like, basically a paper first course.” Is what it’s called a paper first course, but like, helping people understand a little bit of how to use the technology. And so if you’re working with adults, and especially with older adults, but you know, any level of beginner techie people, this might be a really interesting way to approach it. So it’s like, “Hey, what are you familiar with? And how do we bridge that gap?” I like that idea because, you know, we all have students that are like, trying to get along in the modern world, trying to learn English a little bit more, but maybe feel intimidated by a little bit of the harder core tech. And so I like that this is a like a simplified approach to it. So I think that’s going to be on Thursday at one o’clock, and I’m interested to check that out.

Ixchell Reyes 22:17
Okay, so my Thursday session is called “Attitudes towards Saudi English among Saudi university students and educators.” And I’m interested in that because, as many of you know, I recently was in Saudi and I’m also taking Saudi Arabic at the moment, and so I’m just really interested about this topic. And this is happening in the afternoon, actually, late in the afternoon at the end of the day, 3:30pm to 4 o’clock. That’s just a 30 minute session.

Brent Warner 22:51
Very cool. And then my last one here for Friday is called “An AI integrated vocabulary learning framework for a reading classroom.” So obviously that kind of lines up with a lot of things that we talk about. But I think one thing that, you know, I often kind of have mixed feelings about, like, “Oh, do I already know about this, or do I not?” But like, if I can pull out one good nugget of wisdom from a session, something that’s going to be valuable—I’m really interested to see, especially with a little bit of research, I think this one is, and so building vocabulary learning out of a reading classroom with AI Friday afternoon, 12 o’clock to 12:45, not super long. And so that’s one that I will be trying to get into and see what they’re talking about over there.

Ixchell Reyes 23:45
Cool. And my last one for Friday, it’s an afternoon one. It’s called “Incorporating Four C’s into language classes with military students in Ukraine.” And right now, it’s quite relevant. So that’s happening from 12pm to 12:45pm again, right before lunchtime, I guess. And I’m excited to see what—I believe it’s teachers, higher ed teachers that have been working in Ukraine or Ukrainian teachers, is what I read. So I’m excited for that, because I could probably learn a lot.

Brent Warner 24:20
Very cool, very cool. Alright, so there’s a lot of stuff going on, obviously, like, not everybody who’s listening—you’re going to have your own choices. Please choose the things that are most interesting and valuable to you. But these are some of the things that we’re looking at, and it’s cool to see a big variety of conversations, right? You’ve got some of the traditional conversations, right? Like, you know, “Idioms in the classroom,” it’s like, okay, cool. Like, those are fine. And also, like world issues and, you know, tech issues and all these different things. So there’s a really interesting and useful cross combination of things that I think anybody should be able to find several full days of sessions that will keep them interested and engaged.

Ixchell Reyes 25:05
All right, it is time for our fun finds, and this time, I have discovered Mama Lycha plantain chips, and I am hooked on them. They’re about $1.25 a bag, and I realized I’m hooked on them because I’ve purchased, like, 14. But it’s a small bag, so it’s kind of, you know, you can justify that little snack. And, yeah, plantain chips, they have sweet ones and they have salty ones.

Brent Warner 25:34
Nice. Plantain chips are good. Yeah, I’m a fan. So cool. Okay, so mine is, I think I told you, we bought a car that can do some off-roading. And so there’s lots of off-roading opportunities in Southern California. There’s tons of, you know, mountains and ranges and all these different places. And so one place we went a couple of weeks ago was on the South Main divide, off of the Ortega highway. So if you’re kind of either in the Lake Elsinore area or San Juan Capistrano area, you drive up the top of the Ortega highway, and then you can go in two different directions. You can go either north or south from there inside of the Cleveland National Forest. And we went south all the way down, you know, as far as it goes, I think, past Murrieta, and it was really great. Lots of fun little roads, not you don’t have to be a hardcore, you know, know all your stuff about off-roading. And then they also have inside of there—it wasn’t open, I think, because of the rain. But there’s the Wildomar OHV Area, which is, like, actually, kind of like a skate park for your off road vehicles, right? And so they have all these crazy paths that you can go test out and see, and kind of get a little bit of a sense of how to do that driving. And so there’s a few cool things out there, if you’re interested, that’s South Main divide, and or the Wildomar OHV Area.

Ixchell Reyes 27:03
Very cool. All right, for the show notes and other episodes, check out DIESOL.org/117 for Episode 117. You can also find us on YouTube or Instagram at DIESOL pod.

Brent Warner 27:23
That’s right. And you can find me on the socials at @BrentGWarner.

Ixchell Reyes 27:28
You can find me currently on blue sky at @Ixy_ixy, that’s I-X-Y, underscore P-I-X-Y.

Brent Warner 27:36
Alright. Everybody definitely come find us for drinks with DIESOL, if not, we’d love to see you all around. I think you know I’m definitely, I’m told that I stand out, and so I should be easy enough to find. Ixchell, we’ll make sure that you’re easy enough to find. Let’s put you in giant cat ears or something.

Ixchell Reyes 27:58
Yeah, if you see me, approach me. Don’t be scared.

Brent Warner 28:01
Yeah, please come say hello. Please do feel free to join us for drinks with DIESOL, and we would love to see you. We got stuff to give to you for joining us on this crazy adventure we call the DIESOL podcast.

Ixchell Reyes 28:15
All right, see ya.

Brent Warner: 28:19
Bye.