Ricard Garcia

English teacher, teacher trainer, freelance ELT & 2.0 consultant, web editor and author. I have been always trying to keep the gap with my students as small as possible. I think it is the only way to be able to get to them and help them in their learning process. Motivation and engagement are paramount for success in education. ICT stepped into my professional life as a blast of fresh air. Since then, videogames, as well as collaborative and creative applications have been always a helpful way to keep that gap nearly closed. Today, web 2.0 applications give us diverse and rich solutions to motivate our students. We can help them to enhance their foreign language skills as we also help them raise their self esteem. The feeling of "I've done it! And all by myself" pumps confidence into our students, and that is paramount when learning a language! But we must also make sure the agents have the skills to do that. One of my goals is to make sure those applications that we can find on the Internet reach the classrooms. And we can do that by showing teachers how easy it is to learn them and what they can do with them. Currently working as a pedagogical technician at the Catalan Department of Education in Barcelona and as teacher at the University of Barcelona (UB) and the Pompeu Fabra University (UPF).