TEFL Commute

TEFL Commute

TEFL commute is a podcast for language teachers. It is not about language teaching though inevitably it might crop up. All three of us are avid podcast listeners and like playing around making our own. TEFL commute is meant to be a light-hearted listen aimed at brightening your daily commute to class. Each episode is built a round a topic that you could use in your teaching and the podcast will have page on this site that will link you to articles, questions and resources you can use with your students. You can even get involved by recording your snippet of mp3 for inclusion on a future episode or leaving us a suggestion on this site.We had fun making and developing the idea so we hope you enjoy the listen.Lindsay, Shaun and James

Episodes

December 12, 2025 14 mins

.....in which we change the AI asking us questions and as a result find out what would be in a staffroom vending machine, as well as  talk far too long about board markers.  We also discuss which model verbs, and rename the present perfect…..towards the end we go bananas

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.......in which the chatbot combines two of our favourite things - board gaming and teaching English. Among other things, we answer what game mechanics might work best in the classroom, and whether teachers are dungeon masters! 

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November 14, 2025 12 mins

....in which the chatbot makes us consider irregular verbs, what our teacher face looks like,  and what phrases we over use. We also find out why water and toilets play part of our teaching routines and if we correct our friends grammar. 

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October 31, 2025 12 mins

....in which the chatbot throws up questions about ELT as a reality show  and a fictional novel. It also asks how we'd explain ELT to an alien using only mine and gets us to explore our stick figure board work.

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October 17, 2025 16 mins

It's been a while but we're back. Welcome to season 17 of the TEFL commute in which a chatbot decides the content. In this episode amongst other things  it asks us about a new language we'd like to learn, if we could speak in passive for a whole day, the rise of edutainment, what our whiteboard writing reveals, and what we'd befriend on a desert island.....

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January 23, 2024 36 mins

In the deep mid-winter it’s time for the TEFL commute to talk about snow.  Lindsay, Sandy Shaun bring you a snow-filled this episode,  considering what has happened to Snow days, discussing words for snow as well as brining you staple commute fair such as quizzes and jokes.

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December 26, 2023 36 mins

Given its holiday time we thought it was apt to give you all a gift - a new episode on the topic of gifts and gift giving. In this episode Ceri, Lindsay and Sandy discuss the ethics and their experiences of gift giving for educators, before discuss and rating various types of gift. Happy Holidays listeners!  

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December 12, 2023 39 mins

Despite 15 seasons talking of all things ELT, the podcast has never tackled the ELT staple of sport   so this episode rectifies that. Ceri, Lindsay and Shaun tackle (see what I did there😉)  the topic deciding how sporty they are, and what they love and hate about teaching sports.  They also talk about sports words and idioms before unbelievably letting shaun talk about cricket! 

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November 27, 2023 30 mins

It's time for season 16 and the 108th episode of the TEFL commute. We kick off the new season by revisiting our very first episode - commute.  Lindsay, Shaun and Ceri  talk about what has changed since then, and what the commute to work looks like now.  We examine some of the things we said in episode 1 and wonder why we aren't now commuting by jetpack! 

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March 28, 2023 40 mins

Greetings commuters, here’s an another episode in our eclectic look at things related to English teaching. In this episode Lindsay wants to discuss military language, which leads Shaun to go all woke and discuss something he found on violent language before the resident tefl commute nerd, Ceri, gives us a lesson on portmanteaus. 

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March 6, 2023 28 mins

Our latest episode is a bit like the old days - just Shaun and Lindsay both with something to get off their chests. Shaun gets all sweary by considering if certain words are still taboo or not, and  Lindsay's  turns part film reviewer with his overview of the film the whale. Listen to find out what he thought of the portrayal the English teacher within that. 

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February 14, 2023 46 mins

We'll call this one the lost episode, it was recorded in December last year but for various reasons it got forgotten about and never got uploaded. In it Sandy, Ceri and Lindsay talk continue our eclectic topic for this season bringing you chat about AI, wonky English and erm Taylor Swift. 

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December 14, 2022 40 mins

In episode 4,  Lindsay provokes memories of first resource books, and reintroduces us to a profound dictation about guns. Ceri, avoids world cup fever by talking about dominant grammar and teaching us some Welsh, and Shaun explores the different chosen words of the year. NB this episode was recorded before one dictionary announced their choice.

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November 22, 2022 42 mins

It’s episode 3 and in it you’ll find Lindsay talking about vegetables, in particular vegetable metaphors. We’ll also discover Ceri spends a lot of time on Tik Tok  allegedly researching quiet quitting, and Shaun has more than a small bone to pick about the prefix micro.  Enjoy our latest eclectic gathering.

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October 31, 2022 41 mins

In episode 2, Ceri, Lindsay, and Shaun once more bring an eclectic mix of topics to the table.  Ceri wants to talk Literacy, while Lindsay tells us about a simulation he has been running, and Shaun shares his refound love of interactive fiction. Add into all that a quiz and some algorithm and hat’s your episode 2 sorted.  Enjoy.

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Episode 101 of TEFL commute opens season 15 of your favourite ELT podcast. Join Lindsay, Sandy and Shaun as they chat have a somewhat eclectic chat about things that interest them, and for them has some bearing on English language teaching. This episode finds Sandy talking about the Queen, Lindsay revisiting Elves, and Shaun learning training lessons from Cricket. Enjoy.

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Season 14 episode 7: Numbers is the last episode for this season and marks the 100th episode of our podcast. To celebrate the 100, we've done an episode on numbers. In this roundtable each of the team brings some numbers related to teaching to discuss. Since it is a milestone episode we also look back over some of our episodes and Shaun quizzes the team on TEFL commute related numbers.  Enjoy our 100th episode and see you later i...

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February 22, 2022 39 mins

In this episode the team show they have the finger on the pulse of politics by talking about parties. Lindsay decides he wants to dissect 10 Downing street’s party invite and this leads into a discussion about the party vocabulary, the language of the parties, and ELT and parties (both political and the fun kind) in ELT. Get ready for the TEFL commute does discourse analysis! 

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February 8, 2022 45 mins

We’re back after our mid-season break and we’re getting all dramatic. In this episode Ceri, Lindsay and Shaun discuss drama and ELT.  Are they ELT thesps? Do they use drama? What are the benefits? In addition Lindsay tells us about academic drama and Shaun finds out if they other two can recognise a Shakespeare quote. 

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We reach the half way point of the current season just in time for the festive season. In this episode the TEFL commute gang foolishly leave Shaun alone in a zoom room so expect some terrible jokes at some point.   In a different type of episode each of the regular commuters has their own little section as the commute team get ready for their Xmas Breaks.   

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