Dear VDMIS Members,

I'm thrilled to be writing to you as our new chair for 2014–2015. This is a year when more English language teachers than ever before will make video and digital media central to their lessons.

In 2013, as our chair-elect, I wrote the following:

In the very near future...English language teachers and learners in classrooms "on the ground" and "in the cloud" will come to rely on digital media and benefit from its awesome power to promote communicative language learning in ways that books, audio CDs, and expensive, clumsy language lab software could not.

For some of you, your "very near future" may still seem a way off. Indeed, we, as the majority of ELTs, continue to teach with traditional textbooks, using video and digital media as supplements. The landscape is changing quickly, though, as prices come down, connectivity goes up, and digital tools become increasingly teacher-learner friendly. Driving the momentum forward: mobile technology and a cohort of students more familiar and comfortable with "learning on the go."

Communicative language teaching promotes teaching with realia to encourage students to practice in authentic contexts outside of the classroom. With advances in digital media, there has never been a greater opportunity to make this happen.

We in VDMIS have a wonderful opportunity to share and serve as guides for our fellow ELTs. Naturally, we can help our readers discover and understand new technologies; but more importantly, we can show them how to use digital media to create lessons that inspire learners to love English and seek out opportunities to use it.

I'm looking forward to meeting and working with each of you this year. Please do not ever hesitate to reach out to me with your questions, comments, suggestions, and ideas for collaboration.

Yours truly,

Jason R. Levine

Jason R Levine (Jase, for short) is Ambassador and Knowledge Entertainerat WizIQ. He has fifteen years of experience as an English teacher, teacher trainer, and materials writer. Jase is the creator of ColloLearn, an approach to English language learning based on the songs he writes and performs as Fluency MC. He teaches in the online MA TESOL program at the New School, publishes with Oxford University Press, and works as an English Specialist with the U.S. Department of State. He also maintains the ColloLearn YouTube channel and the Fluency MC Facebook page.