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00:00:03

[Viviana Paz]

Hello everybody.

[Will Rixon]

Hi Viviana, good to see you.

[Viviana Paz]

Thank you so much, Will. I'm so excited. Hello everyone.

Good morning here from Argentina. Good afternoon. Good evening. We have people from many parts of the world. I am so excited to get speaking with you, right?

[Will Rixon]

Absolutely. So you're based in Argentina, Viviana. You are a technical translator, educational coach.

[Viviana Paz]

Exactly. I'm based in Buenos Aires, Argentina, and I'm an educational coach, and I am an English translator as well.

And I have been teaching adults mostly in companies for like more than 20 years, and I am so happy to be here to be a new Macmillan Voice.

[Will Rixon]

Thank you so much, Viviana. I can't wait. I will hand over to you. Have a lovely talk.

See you.

[Viviana Paz]

Thank you. Before we start, let's categorize how we are feeling today, right? Which cat matches your mood?

00:01:02

Okay, right. So there is something interesting about this little question. I didn't tell you which cat to use. You chose the one that represented you because relevance is personal. And that matters enormously when we teach adults.

What feels relevant to us as teachers may not feel relevant to our learners. So let me ask you something: what if your trainees don't need more English? They need a reason to make English matter. I am Viviana Paz, and today I want to share the principle that changed the way I teach adults. Welcome to the immediate relevance principle, because when trainees realize, "I can actually put this into practice tomorrow," English is no longer just a lesson.

It becomes a tool to communicate, to solve problems, to handle difficult situations, and to get things done. And that's where the real learning begins.

00:02:12

Let me take you back to the beginning. Picture this: it's day 1, I'm standing in front of a room full of adults, successful professionals, busy people, but yet I could see it. The glazed-over eyes, the distracted faces, the occasional phone check. Under the desk? They were physically there, but mentally they were someone else.

Have you ever experienced this? Please write in the chat box.

Some yes, some no, either. Okay, so I thought, okay, maybe I need better slides. More energy? Got it! More interactive activities.

00:03:09

But eventually I realized something. It wasn't about making English more interesting. It was about making it matter. And now these people didn't come into my classroom thinking, "Oh, I can't wait to learn the third conditional. This is going to be so useful in my next meeting." Spoiler: it wasn't.

They came in carrying real problems from real jobs, meetings, clients, deadlines, presentations, really very difficult conversations, and I wasn't connecting the English on the page with the reality for them outside the classroom. So then it hit me. Mm, yeah, I realized I was starting with the English, not with what they needed to do. I was asking myself, "What English topic do I need to teach today?" But those busy professionals sitting in front of me were silently asking, "How is this going to help me in my next meeting?" That was my breakthrough. I realized I had to stop leading with the syllabus and started leading with their real-world challenges.

00:04:30

And the moment English helped them solve a problem they were actually facing at work, something completely changed. They stopped seeing English as something they had to learn and started seeing it as a professional tool.

So if English was going to become a professional tool, I had to make my sessions reflect that. I stopped starting with "Today we are going to learn." Instead, I started with "What you need to do in English at work." A meeting they had to lead, perhaps a difficult client, an email. The real challenge came first, the English came second. What do you think are the benefits when English feels relevant for learners? Do please write in the chat box.

00:05:27

What do you think are the benefits when English feels relevant for learners?

Okay.

Right? So I may say, for example, that they participate more, they feel more confident, they communicate more effectively, they transfer learning to real work, and they also feel less anxious about using English. So how do we make that shift from learning English to actually needing to use it.

So knowing that relevant matters isn't just that enough. What if you could walk into your very next class and make English immediately useful, something your trainees need, not just they are expected to learn? Today I'm going to give you 3 practical strategies you can use right away. No theory, no complicated methodology, I swear. Just 3 simple shifts that can change the way your adult learners engage with English.

00:06:46

Those are the 48-hour audit, problem-first framing, and the application contract. So let's move into the first one. This is the 48-hour audit. Just tomorrow morning, ruthlessly audit your lesson plan. Ask yourself, "Can my learners use this exact skill in real life within the next 48 hours?" For example, suppose your lesson focuses on giving a project update.

Don't just teach them how to describe the progress. Ask yourself, Where will they actually need this? Maybe one of your learners has a project meeting on Thursday, so instead of a generic speaking activity, give them a real situation: the project is on task, but one task is delayed and the client needs to know. Now they have to explain what's done, what is delayed, what the impact is. And what happens next.

00:07:55

That skill can leave the classroom and go straight into their next meeting. This also applies to grammar. I stopped treating grammar like a formula on a whiteboard. Instead, I turned it into a functional tool. For example, instead of a worksheet on the past simple, have learners give a 2-minute project update "Yesterday I resolved the vendor delay." Instead of completing sentences with "must," "should," or "might," put them in a real stakeholder situation.

"Could we move the deadline to Monday?" "We might need an extra 2 days." The grammar is still there, but now it has a job. And what happens when every minute of class has a purpose? Less time on exercises that go nowhere, more time using English for something that matters.

00:08:57

Ready for the second strategy? This is Problem First Framing. I stopped starting my sessions with grammar, vocabulary, or theatre. Instead, I start with a problem, something my learners might actually face at work. For example, I might put an angry client's email on a screen and say, "You have 2 minutes.

How would you respond?" Or I might give them an awkward small talk situation before an important business meeting. "You're about to walk into the meeting. What would you say?" And then I let them have a go. They try to solve the problem with the English they already have. And very quickly they discover that gap.

00:09:45

I know what I want to say, but I don't know how to say it. And that's the moment I want, because now they are ready to learn. Not because I have told you, you need this language. They experience they need themselves. So When I introduce the vocabulary, expressions, grammar, or communication strategy they need, it no longer feels like abstract information from a textbook.

It feels like the missing piece. That is Problem First Framing. Create the need first, then teach the solution.

Our final strategy is the Application Contract. I never want a professional to leave my session thinking, "That was a good English lesson and Viviana was great." I want them to leave thinking, "I know exactly where I am going to use this, and of course Viviana was great." So in the final 5 minutes, I ask them 3 questions: Where will you use it? When will you use it? And with whom? Not someday, no, yeah, I'll try to use it.

00:11:07

A real project, a real moment, a real person. Because if English doesn't make it back to their desk, what's the point of learning it? This is the application contract I use with my trainees. It turns classroom learning into workplace action. This is the application contract I hand to my trainees, and you are going to have it then as well.

So let me take you back to those professionals I told you at the beginning. Remember the ones who looked English and thought, why do I need this? They were sitting in a classroom, but their minds were already at work. So the very moment I started asking, "How can I make this matter to them?" something changed. They started coming to my class with real problems.

00:12:05

"Biviana, can you help me answer this email?" or "How do I handle this client?" or "I have a presentation on Thursday. Can we practice?" And then, suddenly, came the question that told me everything: "Viviana, can I use this phrase in a negotiation I have on Thursday?" Wow! Think about that for a moment. They were asking: "Can I use this in my real life?" That was the transformation. The session had become more relevant.

And when English becomes more relevant, they have a reason to care.

So let me leave you with just one question. What will your learners need to do with English tomorrow? Maybe they need to challenge an idea in a meeting, handle a difficult client, present a result, Make small talk with a colleague? Start there. Build the language around the action.

00:13:15

And tomorrow, try these 3 simple tools. Can my learners use this skill within the next 48 hours? That's the 48-hour audit. Start with the real-world problem before teaching the language. That's problem-first framing.

And end by asking when, where, With whom will you use it? That's the application contract. So we're coming to the end of our journey today. Look at this phrase: We have already been speaking about in this last minutes. How would you complete it?

[Will Rixon]

Okay.

[Viviana Paz]

Very good. And that is the heart of the immediate relevance principle. Thank you so much.

00:14:13

Thank you so much, Viviana.

[Viviana Paz]

You're so very welcome.

[Will Rixon]

One thing I've got to say, Viviana, you are a very well composed person. You're very well composed. You're so calm and just, it's just very easy to understand what you're saying because you're just, you're delivering it so calmly and confidently in a really lovely way. So thank you so much for, for your demeanour, but also for putting the talk together.

It was wonderful.

[Viviana Paz]

Right, thank you so much, Will.