NEAS is delighted to welcome our team of ATB interns. The team includes Manoli, Wei Ching, Maya and Sabrina. They are all studying TESOL and all want to pursue a career in the AMEP. They are working with us to tidy up the ATB including mapping all of the tasks, increasing their level of compliance and ensuring they are all formatted consistently. We are so excited to have them on board and so far they are doing a fantastic job. We are so grateful for their enthusiasm and commitment.

North Metropolitan TAFE in Perth, WA, has developed two new photocopiable CSWE resources that provide AMEP teachers with practice tasks for use with their students in the classroom.  Aligned to the 2013 Certificates in Spoken and Written English, these resources give students essential experience of what their assessment tasks may be like, since they are presented in a format familiar to AMEP providers using the Assessment Task Bank. Developed by highly experienced AMEP teachers, the tasks have been designed specifically for students settling in Australia and are the result of extensive trialing and input from colleagues.

The CSWE I Practice Listening Task book and CD contain up to 6 tasks for each of the six listening outcomes in the certificate. Each task consists of a listening, the transcript and comprehension questions with answer key. The listening texts cover topics students may find useful or interesting in their first year of life in Australia.The themes can be discussed and expanded on in class prior to or following the listening tasks.

The CSWE III Practice Reading and Writing Task book contains 2 tasks for each learning outcome, many of which have accompanying visuals. The tasks focus on practical and relevant topics which encourage students to develop useful literacy skills. The reading tasks include a text, questions and a marking key which is matched to the assessment criteria. The writing tasks include a model for each learning outcome.

The authors (CSWE I Listening Task Book: Veronica Ribbons, Michelle Marzo & Jennifer Davis; CSWE III Reading and Writing Task Book: Shirley Haak & Katherine Seal) have enjoyed the process involved in creating these resources and are proud of the resulting products.  It is their hope that other AMEP providers will find them valuable additions to their CSWE teaching resources.

They are available for purchase by contacting the Bookshop at North Metropolitan TAFE.       Phone: (08) 9427 1592  Email: bookshop@nmtafe.wa.edu.au

From time to time we have enquiries from users who find the ATB freezes on them as they are trying to log on. Typically, this is experienced by users of Internet Explorer. We don’t know why, but we find that the problem is resolved by using Google Chrome as the browser rather than Internet Explorer. If you have difficulty, trying Chrome can often fix your problems nice and quickly.

It is with much sadness that this quarter we farewell one of our most valuable National Working Group Representatives. Meredith Hill from TAFE SA is moving on to other opportunities within the AMEP program. We thank Meredith for her commitment to the National Working Group and the Assessment Task Bank and both Ana and myself (Margaret) appreciate everything we have learnt from Meredith.

However we are thrilled to be able to welcome Karen Watson who will be taking over Meredith’s role on the National Working Group. We are looking forward to working with you Karen.