A few weeks ago, I attended my first American Association of Applied Linguistics (AAAL) Conference. I first heard about it during my first year at the University of Iowa as some of my colleagues went there. They described it as a more intimate and research-oriented conference compared to the International TESOL Convention, which is now held immediately after AAAL in the same city. As a new PhD student, I still preferred the practitioner-oriented TESOL Convention as many of my ideas were in the mindset of a teacher. I went to a couple TESOL Conventions until my graduate studies and dissertation crowded out any opportunities for professional conferences. Now as my dissertation is near completion, I got my first opportunity to attend AAAL and it was really worth it. I came to AAAL wearing two hats. The first hat was my PhD candidate hat. With it, I attended presentations and roundtables about language & culture and language planning & ...
Attempting to bridge the research-practice gap in English language teaching with a focus on curriculum, instructional technology, and intercultural communication.