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Vol 22 No 3

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Teacher Trainer A PRACTICAL JOURNAL FOR THOSE WHO TRAIN, MENTOR AND EDUCATE TESOL TEACHERS

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A practical session plan on teaching grammar Comparing pronunciation to drawing – a novel approach Teacher and student online library and book club Course books written by the teachers who use them! How to organise a Pecha Kucha The several identities of a teacher What do CLIL teachers need to know? Late age language learning is perfectly possible

Includes regular series: Practical Training Session, News in our Field, Language Matters, Trainer Background, Training around the World, Article Watch and Publications Received

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Publication ISSN 0951-7626

Autumn 2008

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Contents Practical Training Session Ways of working with grammar Andy Caswell News in our Field Susan Barduhn

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Trainer Background Encouraging teachers and students to read more in the target language Chris Lima

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When teachers write course books Harsh Kadepurkar

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Thoughts on teachers’ professional identity 17 Sari Pöyhönen Training around the World Content and language integrated learning in Estonia Peeter Mehisto

Dear Subscribers and Readers, Welcome to the last issue of 2008, Volume 22 Number 3. I hope you enjoy this very full issue.

Language Matters 6 Pronouncing on the right side of the brain Helen Fraser

Improving conferences: organising a Pecha Kucha event Lindsay Clandfield

Editorial

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Now…..here’s the thing….! We haven’t raised the price of the journal for some eight years now. While prices of paper, printing, postage, et al have risen steadily (and sometimes meteorically!) we have kept absorbing them. But now that the pound is a little weaker we feel it is a good time to raise our prices so that we can cover our costs again. This is because the rise will effect other currencies much less than it would have done over the last few years. So our new rate for 2009 and beyond is: One year subscription £30 but don't forget that you can reduce this, as many of you already do, by subscribing for 2 or 3 years thus: Two year subscription £55 Three year subscription £80 All prices include postage to anywhere in the world! Thanks as ever to all our article contributors, advertisers and subscribers. It is fun working for you and with you all. Happy reading! Tessa Woodward Editor

Teacher development –a worm’s eye view 22 Amol Padwad Late age language learning Anita Pincas

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Article Watch

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Publications Received

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Tessa Woodward Editor [email protected]

Seth Lindstromberg Assistant editor

Marian Nicholson Administrator

Don’t forget to have a look at our website!

www.tttjournal.co.uk You can now subscribe online! This is a Pilgrims publication, published three times a year. Editor: Tessa Woodward Administrator: Marian Nicholson The Teacher Trainer, Pilgrims Ltd, Theatre House 4-6 Orange Street, Canterbury, Kent CT1 2JA, UK T: +44 (0)1227 762111 F: +44 (0)1227 459027 E: [email protected] Enquiries: subscriptions, advertising and contributions, please contact the Editor. Views expressed in the articles are not necessarily those of the Editor or Pilgrims. Designed and printed by the University of Kent, Design & Print Centre, Canterbury, Kent, UK.

About “The Teacher Trainer” The Teacher Trainer is a practical journal for those involved in modern language, especially TESOL, teacher training. Whether you are a teacher who tends to be asked questions by others in the staff room, or a Director of studies with an office of your own, whether you are a mentor or a course tutor on an exam course, an inspector going out to schools or a teacher educator at a university, this journal is for you. Our aim is to provide a forum for ideas, information and news, to put fellow professionals in touch with each other and to give all those involved in training, mentoring and educating teachers a feeling of how trainers in other fields operate, as well as building up a pool of experience within our own field. The journal comes out three times a year and makes use of a variety of formats e.g. articles, letters, comments, quotations, interviews, cartoons, spoofs. If the idea is good and useful to trainers, we’ll print it no matter what voice you choose to express it in.

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Practical Training Session Introduction The idea of this series from Andy Caswell is to suggest, to the less experienced teacher trainer or workshop leader, a possible approach to a number of popular topics often discussed in teacher training sessions.

Each plan is photocopiable, with reading references at the end which the trainer may wish to check out before giving the session. To pre-empt any possible confusion of terms in the plan, the trainer or workshop leader will be referred to as the trainer, seminar participants as Ps. The terms teacher and students thus refer to the players in the language class.

Plan no. 4a There are two parts to this training session. Part one, in this issue, starts with a historical overview of changing attitudes towards grammar teaching and then focuses on two different lesson shapes a teacher could use to practise a particular area of language. Part two, in the next issue, will explore more lesson shapes and conclude with a workshop.

Topic

Ways of working with grammar

Participants

Native or non-native EL teachers with some teaching experience

Length of session

60 mins

Materials

Visual display of a historical overview + criteria for reflections Hand-outs for individual lesson shapes

A historical overview The Trainer could introduce the session by giving a brief overview of changing attitudes towards grammar and grammar teaching over the past 50 years using a visual display. • ‘Changing attitudes’ could mean any of the following: • the very definition of grammar has changed • linguistics research has informed our work

• an individual pedagogue has provided a fresh insight or method • we have changed the materials we work with • the lesson shape or activity type has changed • the unit of analysis has got bigger or smaller e.g. sentence grammar vs. discourse analysis

All these various factors are involved in the angles presented below. It should also be borne in mind that often in practice remnants of earlier ways of working are still present in later ones. Thus, many of the separate points below emerge in hybrid forms in real classes. A Grammar Translation. Lessons might begin with an explicit statement of the rules (a deductive approach), followed by translation exercises. B Audiolingualism. Partly based on the Behaviourist view of learning as habit formation, the deductive approach was rejected in favour of an inductive approach, in which language structures were thought to be learnt through repetition, with no overt focus on grammatical rules. C Chomsky. Although insisting that his views were primarily referring to first language acquisition, Chomsky influentially stated that language learning was not habit formation but rule-based creativity. A child possessed an internal blueprint for language, and language learning involved a process of trial and error as the child experimented with rules. D The 3 Ps lesson shape ( Presentation, Practice and Production).This drew from A,B and C and was a modified inductive approach, involving firmly guided discovery of the grammatical rules on the part of the learner. E Communicative Language Teaching. The view that communicative competence consisted of more than simply the knowledge of grammatical rules led to the emergence of the functional syllabus and the use of communicative methodology, including meaningful tasks. This development coincided with a general movement in education towards studentcentred learning. There were weaker and stronger versions of CLT: in the weaker one, grammar still figured prominently in syllabuses even though it was disguised under functional headings. In the stronger version, known as task-based learning, grammar played a secondary role, or no role at all, and the syllabus was composed of a series of communicative tasks.

F Krashen and The Natural Approach. Inspired by Chomsky’s ideas of 1st language acquisition, Krashen applied them to 2nd language learning, drawing a distinction between acquisition – an unconscious process- and learning, a conscious one. According to Krashen, acquisition was central and learning only of limited value. Thus, grammar teaching was marginalised, and exposure of the learner to comprehensible input was the key element in promoting acquisition. G Discourse Analysis. As a reaction to what many felt to be a narrow focus by grammarians on grammatical structures in individual sentences, discourse analysts moved beyond the sentence level and explored the way language operated over longer stretches of authentic discourse, looking for patterns and trying to make useful generalisations. H The Lexical Approach. In recent years, there has been a growing recognition of the importance of lexis, and this approach derives from the belief that the building blocks of language learning and communication are not grammatical rules or functions, but lexis- namely, words and word combinations, including formulaic expressions such as ‘If I were you..’. Dave Willis, in a 2003 article, suggests that, instead of beginning with grammar, we should start by teaching words and phrases and encourage learners to make themselves understood with a minimal grammar. Gradually, they should be exposed to more demanding activities and input which will encourage them to extend their grammar. I The importance attached to collocation in the Lexical Approach – and the advent of large computerised databases- has led to the emergence of a Data-based approach. Thus, the use of concordance data has begun to appear on courses both for lexis and grammatical structures. This has proved to be a more reliable guide to what to focus on than teacher intuition. J A Grammatical Revival. Recent research has suggested that without some attention to form, fossilisation can occur. Related to this is the notion of consciousness-raising; despite Krashen’s claims, acquisition is felt by Richard Schmidt (in Thornbury 1999) to involve conscious processes, and thus pointing out features of the grammatical system may help learners to acquire language. This has also led to a reconsideration of the word ‘grammar’. Is it a set of rules as in Grammar Translation -or an emergent process within the learner as in Task-based learning – or both?

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For further background reading on this area, refer to Thornbury 1999, Richards and Rogers 2001. For a critique of task-based learning, see Swann 2005.

Two Lesson Shapes The aim of this section is for the Ps to compare two lesson shapes that are focusing on a similar language area, namely ‘have got’. In the 3Ps lesson, this structure is the sole language focus whereas the task-based lesson naturally involves more than just this one language pattern. The most interesting way to do this might be to divide the Ps into two groups and have one group read/reflect on one of the plans, and the other group reflect on the other. Later, the groups can share their ideas. To provide a clear focus for their reading, Ps should:a) try to identify the influences that are being illustrated, with reference to the historical overview above. Thus, for example, Ps might come to the conclusion that a particular lesson plan reflects a deductive approach, inspired by Grammar Translation, but the final speaking phase is influenced by communicative methodology. b) comment on the plans, considering the following criteria: • the level of students this particular plan would be suitable for • the language assumptions the teacher would be making about the students with regard to the grammatical area. For example, would this plan be an initial presentation, or would the teacher be assuming some familiarity with the target language? • the likely degree of difficulty of the plan for the learner • the amount of preparation time needed for the teacher • the roles the teacher and learners play in this particular lesson. For example, is it a very student-centred lesson? • the anticipated interest level of the plan for the learner

It might be helpful if the Trainer provided a visual display of these criteria. When both groups have collected their ideas, a representative from one group could present their plan to the other group, perhaps role-playing certain stages (to bring the lesson alive!). Next, a different representative from the same group could then summarise the group’s reflections and comments on the plan. This could then lead to general discussion. After this, it would be the other group’s opportunity to present their plan. The final phase of discussion could be to compare and contrast the two plans in the light of the criteria mentioned earlier.

Lesson Shape 1 Step 1: Begin the lesson by introducing the topic of housing and ask the students what factors about a property are important if you are thinking of buying or renting a house or flat e.g. size, location. Write a list on the board and ask the students to note down these factors. Now, explain that the aim of today’s lesson is to find out about different properties in a particular town, and later to try to decide which property would be most suitable for a particular family.

the other property e.g. How old is it? Once they have prepared their questions, combine two pairs who have read about different houses into groups of 4. The students should then exchange information about the two properties. At the end of this phase, the teacher should get some feedback on the task. Step 2: Now play a recording of 3 fluent English speakers discussing Text A and ask one or two gist questions such as: Which house are they discussing?

Organise the class into pairs and provide each pair with either Text A or B (both typical estate agent descriptions)

Next, hand out the transcript and ask them to find language that might be useful for the task e.g. questions. Then elicit ideas from the group and write them on the board. For example:

Sample Text A

When was it built?

Brown and Brown estate agents

• • • •

Address: Heath House, Portchester Rd, Fareham Situation: A 1930s semi-detached house in good decorative condition, situated in a quiet residential area of Fareham. It is within easy reach of shops, schools and a swimming pool, and only ten minutes from the town centre. Accommodation: Heath House has 2 double bedrooms, 2 reception rooms and a well-equipped kitchen. There is gas central heating, double glazing and a double garage. The house has a small back garden. The price is £245,000.

Sample text B Brown and Brown estate agents Address: Briar Cottage, Rose Lane, Valesham. Situation: Briar Cottage is a charming 250-yearold house, situated in the village of Valesham. It is 30 minutes’ walk from Fareham and ten minutes by bus. In the village, there is a shop, a pub and a post office. Accommodation: The house has three bedrooms, a bathroom and two reception rooms, one with an open fireplace. There is also an attractive large kitchen which needs some modernisation. The house has a large rear garden with apple trees. The price is £220,000. (This idea is adapted from Watcyn-Jones 1978) Students should read their text and take notes on their property with reference to the factors written earlier on the board. Having done this, they should then prepare a simple questionnaire to find out about

What kind of heating has it got? Is it convenient for public transport? How many bathrooms are there? Can you tell me if it’s got a garage?

Step 3: Divide the class into 3 preparation groups, with each group being given a new and different house description. The students now return to refine the questions they prepared earlier in the light of the new input. When everyone has done the necessary preparation, form new groups of 3 students, containing one student from each of the preparation groups (each student will have a different description). Explain to the newly formed groups that they first need to find out about each other’s properties, and then try to come to a decision about which property (including the two discussed earlier) would be most suitable for a married couple – David and Ann Robinson – who have just moved into the area. The couple have 3 young children of school age (2 boys and a girl). The Robinsons can afford a house up to £250,000. At the end of the discussion, the students should report back on the task with a view to seeing how much consensus there is in the class.

Possible reflections This is clearly a task-based lesson, drawing from the stronger version of CLT. The purpose of the lesson is to achieve a task outcome, and the language focus in the middle of the lesson acts as a resource which the students can draw on if they wish to. This particular plan would be suitable for a pre-intermediate class who should already be familiar with most of the question forms needed for the task. The lesson would be fairly challenging for such a group, as it would be for a teacher from a preparation point of view. This is clearly a student-centred lesson, with the teacher playing a back-seat facilitating

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role. The students would be very involved throughout, and if the texts were well balanced in their advantages and disadvantages, the students should find the lesson motivating. A possible criticism is that more grammatically orientated students might prefer a clearer and stronger grammatical focus.

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Step 3: Now, explain to the class that they’re going to ask questions to their partner to find out about their house or flat. Divide the students into pairs, and hand out this questionnaire:

Your partner

Lesson shape 2

House or flat

Step 1: Introduce the topic of houses. Ask the students where they live. Do they live in a house or a flat?

No. of rooms

Approaches and Methods in Language Teaching (2001) by J. Richards and T.Rogers (Cambridge)

Central heating View

Language Not for Talking (2003) by Dave Willis (from The Language Teacher July 2003)

Double glazing

Step 2: Highlight the form orally, including the natural stress and intonation and get the students to practise. Then, elicit further examples of the structure through pictures e.g. ‘It’s got 1,000 rooms, 18 lifts, central heating and double glazing in every room, and a beautiful view of the sea.’ Get the students to practise. Now, introduce a contrasting character through a picture e.g. Amy, an impoverished student living in London. She shares a small, cold 1-bedroomed flat with another student. Show a picture of central heating with a cross through it. Elicit the sentence: It hasn’t got central heating As before, highlight the form orally and get the students to practise. Follow this with substitutions e.g. ‘It hasn’t got a swimming pool, double glazing, a garden, but it has got a view of a car park!’ Next, elicit and practise some questions e.g. ‘Has the palace got a swimming pool? How many rooms has it got? Has the flat got a pool?’ Finally, write examples of the forms on the board, marking the stress and intonation. Highlight the rules of form e.g word order in positive, negative and questions.

At the end of the session, the Trainer could remind the Ps that the next seminar will continue with further lesson shapes to discover and discuss.

How to Teach Grammar (1999) by Scott Thornbury (Longman)

Garden

It’s got five swimming pools

If the Ps were unfamiliar with either type of lesson shape, they could be encouraged to try it out before the next seminar and then report back on the success of it.

Bibliography

No. of bedrooms Garage

Show a picture of a very rich man and a palace, and establish that this is the Sultan of Brunei who lives in the biggest palace in the world. Show a picture of a swimming pool. Beside the picture, write ‘x 5’ and elicit:

Follow- up

Swimming pool

The students should interview each other and jot down their answers in single words on the form. Elicit some questions first before they do the activity. Also, if the answer is yes to the questions, encourage the students to find out a little more information e.g. ‘What kind of view has it got?’ After the activity, students report back about their partner.

Possible reflections This is a typical 3Ps lesson – with a modified inductive approach. The lesson has a very clear language focus, and the student is led in a clear and controlled fashion from one stage to another, the lesson ending on a freer note. This particular material would be suitable for an elementary group who could be meeting the language structure for the first time. The lesson would not be particularly demanding for the student, nor for the teacher, from a preparation point of view. It is clearly a teacher-centred lesson, although there is some scope for creativity at the end. The context chosen is fairly memorable, so it should maintain the students’ interest. The main criticism could be that it is linguistically narrow in its scope – and very teacher-centred and controlled.

Legislation by Hypothesis: the Case of Taskbased Instruction by Michael Swann (from Oxford Applied Linguistics journal/Sept 2005/ pp 376-401) Act English (1978) by Peter Watcyn-Jones (Penguin)

The Author Andy Caswell is an experienced language teacher and trainer, currently working at Hilderstone College in Broadstairs, Kent. Previously a Chief Examiner for the Cambridge DTEFLA scheme, Andy has lived and taught in France, Spain, Austria, Romania, South and Central Africa. At Hilderstone, in a training capacity, he has worked with native and non-native teachers and his particular interest is drama, both in and out of the classroom! [email protected]

Having discussed the individual lessons, the session could end with a contrast between the two plans.

Don’t forget to have a look at our website! www.tttjournal.co.uk You can now subscribe online!

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News in our Field By Susan Barduhn, USA Hello Teacher Educators, I welcome you to this, my last contribution to this column. I have enjoyed searching out noteworthy items for you these past two years, but now it is time to make space for other responsibilities in my work, one of which concerns this first message:

Online teacher trainer development courses The Teacher Training and Professional Development Institute at the SIT Graduate Institute will be offering the following online courses: Autumn: September 29 – November 7, 2008 • Teaching Teachers to Reflect I: Experiencing and Describing • Teacher Training for the Peaceable Classroom Winter: January 26 – March 6, 2009 • Teaching Teachers to Reflect II: Analyzing and Taking Intelligent Action • Honoring the Mosaic: Helping Teachers to Discuss Culture and Social Justice in the Language Classroom • Principles and Practices of Mindful Leadership Spring: March 23 – May 15, 2009 • Classroom Observation: The Art of Observing and Note Taking • Educational Philosophy for Teacher Trainers • Participants who take six of courses from the Institute may earn the Certificate in Teacher Trainer Development. For more information, see www.sit.edu/tti.

Macmillan teacher training workshops in Bulgaria Between January and June of this year over 200 teachers were trained and networked in Bulgaria. Topics covered included: listening, reading, writing, speaking, drama, vocabulary, and project work. Reports on the workshops have been uploaded along with images, video and materials from the workshops at: http://www.factworld.info/bulgaria/ For more information about any of the workshops, contact: Keith Kelly (Education Consultant) email: [email protected]

New online journal on teacher education

Course dates: Option 1: January 25 – 31, 2009 Option 2: April 19 – 25, 2009

English Language Teacher Education and Development (ELTED) – ISSN 1365-3741 – is an annual peer-reviewed journal for the worldwide ELT community which is produced by the Teacher Education and Development Research Group of the Centre for Applied Linguistics (formerly, CELTE), University of Warwick.

These courses are included in the Comenius/Grundtvig catalogue of the European Commission. This means that any participants who come from a country participating in the EU educational programmes can apply for a grant to cover their participation in the course. The preliminary programme of the course can be found at: http://ec.europa.eu/education/trainingdatab ase/index.cfm?fuseaction=DisplayCourse&ci d=9769.

It seeks to provide a medium for the exchange of ideas and information on issues pertaining to English language teacher education and development. The journal is targeted at all those involved in English language teacher education and development worldwide, for whom, at present, there are very few published journals dealing specifically with this interest area. (The Teacher Trainer Journal is one of these and has a rich website with eonly articles on it now too!) All back issues and the current issue have recently been made available for free on the following website: www.elted.net Contributions to the journal on any aspect of English language teacher education and development, in the form of articles, reports, work-in-progress and letters or comments on previously published articles are always welcome. Contact Richard Smith ([email protected]) for further information.

The “Thinking Approach”: Course in Latvia The Thinking Approach is a new and innovative method of language teaching and learning, which aims at an integrated development of both language and thinking skills. One of its beliefs is that the modern language teacher is responsible not only for the language competence of his or her students, but also for their preparation for life. The TA project is additionally concerned with the development of the educational technologies necessary for this kind of teaching. You can find information about TA at: www.thinking-approach.org. Two courses on Thinking Skills in Language Education will take place in Jurmala, a famous seaside resort 20 km away from Riga, the capital of Latvia.

For further information contact Alyona Makhmadmusoyeva at: [email protected].

Join an Online Reading Group The ELT e-Reading Group was created by a collective of English language educators from all over the world with the support of the British Council, keeping in mind those professionals who work in special conditions; teachers who have little access to libraries and books in English; who work in remote areas or conflict zones where it is almost impossible to guarantee safety and the right to public gatherings and/or who cannot expect support to start a reading group in their workplaces. Four times a year one of the members will be invited to choose a novel to be read and discussed by the group. All texts are available for free to download from the internet. Books chosen may come from English and American literatures as well as other literatures in translation into English. For more information go to: http://www.britishcouncil.org/arts-literaturecreativereading-eltereading.htm (See also the interview with Chris Lima, the project co-ordinator, on page 9 of this issue!) Susan Barduhn, Associate Professor School for International Training, [email protected]

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Language Matters Pronouncing on the right side of the brain By Helen Fraser, Australia

The Background

Many English teachers avoid teaching pronunciation because they feel they do not have sufficient knowledge of phonetics and phonology to explain the rules of pronunciation to students (Macdonald, 2002). This is unfortunate, since knowledge of phonological rules is not essential to helping students acquire pronunciation skills. Indeed, too much focus on phonology can mean students end up knowing the rules – but stating them in pronunciation which violates those very rules. Readers of this journal will require little persuasion (Arnold, 2003; Ur, 1990) that what students most need is not information about the pronunciation of English, but practice in the doing of English pronunciation (by which I mean not just segmental articulation but all aspects of speaking clearly). This practice can be provided to a useful extent through classroom activities which simulate real situations in which students need to use English pronunciation (Ellis, 2003). As many teachers who use such 'implicit' pronunciation teaching methods will attest, however, just 'doing' is not always enough to enable learners to achieve the proficiency they desire. At certain points, a pronunciation teacher, like a coach of any skill (Morley, 1991), needs to provide explicit feedback and guidance on learners' performance. The question is, what kind of feedback and guidance is appropriate in coaching the skill of pronunciation? In this short article I would like to explore an analogy between teaching pronunciation and teaching drawing that might offer a way for teachers to develop answers to this question suitable to their own classroom situations.

The ‘Explanation and Model’ method Many readers will have been subjected to unsuccessful drawing lessons at some time in their education. For example, a drawing teacher who focuses on technicalities such as colour theory and the rules of perspective may help students with a skillbase that allows them to use such information, but others, even if they attain some proficiency in technical exercises, can find it difficult to translate the theory into the skill of drawing a cat that looks like a cat. To help with this, a drawing teacher might encourage students to copy masterful drawings, and observe how the techniques they have been learning are embodied in real art. Pronunciation teachers take a similar approach when they provide a native speaker model for students to imitate. They are sometimes puzzled, however, to find just how difficult it can be for learners to imitate the model (Fraser, 2006). Considering the analogy with drawing may shed some light on that puzzle. When students are asked to copy a drawing, it is assumed they are able to keep the model in front of them long enough to study it, and to refer back and forth to it while perfecting their copy. This assumption does not hold for pronunciation. An auditory model is very different from a visual model. The moment the model is heard, it is gone. Expecting a learner to imitate a pronunciation model accurately after one hearing is rather like expecting a student to copy a drawing shown to them for a few seconds then whisked away. The latter expectation is ludicrous. Yet somehow many

expect language learners to imitate a model pronunciation after hearing it only once or twice – and despairingly invoke a 'critical age hypothesis' if they can’t. This raises the first practical suggestion for teaching pronunciation by analogy with drawing. Language learners can actually improve their pronunciation considerably just by imitating model sentences. However, they need to hear the model many times, either via a recording, or via a speaker repeating the model in a consistent natural manner (i.e., without exaggeration). This is a particularly useful method in that it requires little specialised knowledge from the teacher – beyond the crucial knowledge to resist the temptation to 'explain' learners' mistakes to them. This is an ideal activity, then, for native speaker assistants working alongside a language teacher. Ideally, practice should be set up which allows the learner to listenspeak-listen-speak until they get bored – which, since copying pronunciation is no less challenging than copying a drawing, often takes much longer than a teacher might predict. Indeed, for some learners, Quality Repetition, in chorus, is all they need to acquire excellent pronunciation which translates well to spontaneous speech (Kjellin, 1999). In my experience however, repetition alone is not always enough. Just as with drawing, useful as it is to work from a model, the copy is liable to fall short of the model in ways which the student cannot identify and correct without guidance from the teacher. In the case of drawing, where the student has previously learned about colour theory, rules of perspective, etc, it can be useful for the teacher to remind the student of these explanations while pointing out differences between the copy and the original. Carrying this analogy across to pronunciation brings us back to the problem with which we started: the sense many teachers have that such explanations should be phrased in terms of the phonological rules of English. Explaining phonological rules can be useful at this stage of pronunciation teaching. However, it requires a number of conditions to be met, beyond the obvious one that the teacher must know the rules. First, it requires considerable linguistic and educational sophistication on the part of the learner. To see this, consider what it would be like to explain errors of perspective to a drawing student with very limited English, from a very different cultural and educational background. By analogy, complex phonological rules may be best suited to tertiary education situations where teacher and student share a language of instruction. Second, the teacher must have the ability to diagnose the learner's errors in terms of the phonological rules. I would suggest that this condition is far less likely to be met than the equivalent in drawing. Since the 1950s, phonological theory has developed in a very abstract manner. Explaining second language pronunciation in terms of phonological theory is problematic even for the theorists (Archibald, 2000). Indeed, there is considerable scholarly debate about which theory provides the best rules, or whether 'rules' are even the appropriate way to account for phonological behaviour (Gussenhoven & Jacobs, 2005).

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Finally, whatever rules are applied to the learner's pronunciation need to be translated into practical instructions that enable learners to improve their performance. Returning to our analogy – a drawing teacher needs not just the ability to diagnose what the student has done wrong, but the talent of communicating the rules to students in a way they can act upon to improve their performance. How to do the equivalent in pronunciation teaching is a topic phonological theory has addressed to a very limited extent (Levis, 2005), focusing as it has on learners' speech output rather than on interaction between teachers and learners, and many phonology theorists would readily admit to having no experience or skill in teaching pronunciation.

Drawing on the right side of the brain All in all, then, the 'explanation and model' method of teaching drawing does not transfer well to teaching pronunciation. Fortunately there is another approach to teaching drawing which might provide a more appropriate analogy for language teachers. This is the approach known as 'Drawing on the Right Side of the Brain' (Edwards, 1989). The idea is that, rather than directly teaching the student how to draw, the teacher helps students 'learn how to see' in a way that indirectly enables them to draw better. Of course this is a special use of the expression 'learn how to see'. The student can already see perfectly well. What they need to learn is how to see things in a way appropriate to the task of creating a visual representation of those things – as opposed to the normal way of seeing, appropriate to engaging with the things as meaningful objects in the world. Edwards urges students to switch off their normal or 'left brain' way of seeing things in relation to what they know about them – for example that tables have rectangular tops, or people have two identical eyes. With the left brain out of play, students can engage a new 'right brain' way of seeing things in terms of line, shape, colour and texture. In this 'right brain' mode, they can notice for example that unless you are directly above a table, its top has the appearance of a parallelogram not a rectangle, and unless you are directly in front of a person, the two eyes appear to have different shapes.

“…pronouncing is not primarily about doing things with tongue and lips but more about learning to hear speech in a different way.” Once the student starts to see tables, chairs, and people in terms of line, shape colour and texture, it becomes much easier to represent those lines, shapes, colours and textures with other lines, shapes, colours and textures on a page. Of course, this is only the beginning; it does not instantly turn the student into a da Vinci. However, Betty Edwards’ website (http://www.drawright.com/gallery.htm) holds many examples to show the improvement students can achieve in a short time simply by being given the idea that drawing is not primarily about doing things with pencils on pieces of paper, but more about seeing the world in a different way. This improvement provides a foundation from which students can work towards whatever level of proficiency they aspire to.

Application to teaching pronunciation: difficulties My suggestion is that similar levels of improvement can be achieved in pronunciation by helping students understand that pronouncing is not primarily about doing things with tongue and lips but more about learning to hear speech in a different way. To follow the analogy effectively, however, it is necessary to notice some important differences between drawing and pronunciation. Edwards' 'right brain' terminology is engaging in its context, and has helped many thousands of students learn how to draw.

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However it is slightly misleading in a way that is important to recognise if we are to use the analogy to best effect in teaching pronunciation. In 'seeing on the right side of the brain' we are not so much 'seeing things as they really are' as 'using a different vocabulary to describe what we see'. For example, rather than describing a table as 'a flat top supported by four legs of equal length, used for resting things on', we describe it in terms of lines, shapes, colours and textures. The latter is just as much a description of what we know as the former. It just uses different vocabulary – specifically, vocabulary suitable to describing the form of the table, rather than its meaning. Fortunately for drawing teachers, the visual domain has a readymade vocabulary for describing the form of objects. Certainly this vocabulary differs from language to language (Hardin & Maffi, 1997), but anyone who can speak even basic English can talk about line, shape, colour and texture as easily as they can talk about tables, chairs, and people. By using this vocabulary, a teacher can help a student 'learn how to see' in a way appropriate to the task of representing the form of objects in a drawing ('See you have drawn this corner of the table as a right angle. We know in reality it actually is a right angle, but if you look carefully you will see that visually it is only about 60 degrees.'). Difficulties of comprehension are relatively easily resolved by reference to the drawing and the things being drawn: all concrete, stable objects. Things are very different in the auditory domain. We have already noted that auditory objects are fleeting, but that is not the end of the problem. To learn pronunciation, as with drawing, students must learn to 'focus on form' (Doughty & Williams, 1998) rather than, as in normal understanding of speech, focus on meaning. However, there is no obvious equivalent to the 'shape, line, colour and texture' vocabulary that comes so naturally for describing the form of visual objects. To appreciate this, consider how you might describe a sound – say the sound a cat makes, the sound of a car braking on gravel, or the sound of running footsteps. We can use terminology like high pitched, rumbling, or rapid-fire, but these are nowhere near as objectively definable as square, yellow, shiny and the like. In many cases, there is no way to describe the sound except by referring to what makes the sound – i.e., to focus on the meaning of the sound rather than its form. For example, the description 'the sound a cat makes' is probably easier to understand than any attempt to describe 'the actual sound'. What about pronunciation? How would you describe the sound of a sentence, say The cat sat on the mat? More importantly, how would you describe the difference in the sound of this sentence pronounced correctly, compared to its sound when pronounced incorrectly by a learner? This, after all, is what is needed if we are to find an analogy to the 'right angle' example above. For most people, the description of pronunciation that springs most readily to mind is one based on the spelling of the word. Teachers with some background in linguistics may recognise limitations of spelling-based description (e.g., there is no 'g' sound in 'rough'), and prefer a description in terms of phonemes, or syllables – for example, 'you left the /t/ off the end', 'you used the wrong vowel', or 'you added an extra syllable'. However, though these descriptions may seem absolutely clear to the teacher, they can be extraordinarily difficult for the learner to act upon. The problem is that interpreting descriptions like this requires a level of specifically English phonological awareness that by definition a learner making such mistakes does not yet have. Phonological awareness (the ability to break words into parts, and describe the parts) is highly language and culture specific. It is acquired in early childhood (Berko Gleason, 2005, Brown, 1958), and varies greatly, not just according to which language is learned, but according to which writing system is learned (Olson, 1994). Thus, learners from a non-alphabetic literacy tradition may have considerable difficulty even dividing a word into individual continued >>>

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phonemes, let alone correctly identifying those phonemes, while learners with alphabetic literacy in a different language (than English) may divide the stream of speech into phonemes in ways quite different from those that come so naturally to English speakers (Fraser, 2004). In short, talking about pronunciation is much more like talking about politeness, family values, religion or other culture-relative topics, than it is like talking in the relatively neutral, objective terms of colour, line, shape and texture. However, while most learners with a degree of intercultural experience recognise that words like respect or democracy have significantly different interpretations to people from different language backgrounds, those same learners quite often believe their own subjective description of speech is somehow obvious, neutral and objective.

Not an insurmountable problem This in itself is not an insurmountable problem for language teachers. Being skilled at intercultural communication, they are generally well able to deal with situations where learners interpret information differently from native speakers, and these skills can readily be transferred to the very similar issues of meta-linguistic communication that arise when teachers discuss pronunciation with students. Where a major problem can arise, however, is when teacher education fails to alert teachers themselves to the fact that speakers of different language and literacy backgrounds can 'hear' a simple sentence like The cat sat on the mat in vastly different ways to the one that seems so obvious to native speakers. Without that alert, teachers expect students to understand 'simple' instructions like 'You said 'shuh' and it should be 'suh'', 'you put the stress on the wrong syllable', or 'compounds take stress on the second element when the first element is functioning adjectivally'. Such descriptions may be perfectly accurate, but still very difficult for students to interpret in differentiating between what they just said and what the teacher is telling them they ought to have said. A teacher who doesn’t realise this might conclude 'I can’t teach pronunciation', or 'adults can’t learn second language pronunciation', rather than simply ‘I need to seek a more effective way to communicate with this student about pronunciation'. Finding that effective way does not mean discussion of English letters, phonemes or syllables should be avoided, or other esoteric terms substituted. It simply means that teachers need to select a small vocabulary of meta-linguistic terms appropriate to their teaching situation, provide students with clear, practical definitions of those terms, then use the terms consistently, checking frequently that they are fully understood by students every time they are used. Some practical tips are offered in (Fraser, 2001).

Conclusion The most effective way to communicate about pronunciation, as with any communication, will vary dramatically depending on the learner and the context. There is no 'one right way'. The criterion is not whether the teacher has followed a manual, but whether the learner has understood the teacher in a way that enables them to modify their pronunciation appropriately.

References Archibald, J. (ed.) 2000. Second Language Acquisition and Linguistic Theory. Oxford: Blackwell. Arnold, J. (2003). How to ease students into oral productions. Humanising Language Teaching (www.hltmag.co.uk) March.. Berko Gleason, J. 2005. The Development of Language (6th edition). Boston: Pearson Education. Brown, R. 1958. How shall a thing be called? Psychological Review 65, 14-21.

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Doughty, C. & J. Williams. 1998. Focus on Form in Classroom Second Language Acquisition. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Edwards, B. 1989. Drawing on the Right Side of the Brain. New York: Tarcher/Putnam. Ellis, R. 2003. Task-based language learning and teaching. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Fraser, H. 2001. Teaching Pronunciation: A handbook for teachers and trainers. Sydney: TAFE NSW Access Division. Fraser, H. 2004. Teaching Pronunciation: A guide for teachers of English as a second language (CD-ROM, updated). Canberra: Commonwealth of Australia, Department of Education Training and Youth Affairs. Fraser, H. 2006. Helping teachers help students with pronunciation. Prospect: A journal of Australian TESOL 21, 80-94. Gussenhoven, C. & H. Jacobs. 2005. Understanding Phonology (second edition). London: Hodder Arnold. Hardin, C. L. & L. Maffi (eds.) 1997. Color Categories in Thought and Language. Cambridge University Press. Kjellin, O. 1999. Accent Addition: Prosody and Perception Facilitates Second Language Learning. In Fujimura, O., B. Joseph & B. Palek (eds.) Proceedings of LP'98 (Linguistics and Phonetics Conference) at Ohio State University, Columbus, Ohio, September 1998. Vol.2. Prague: The Karolinum Press. 373-98. Levis, J. 2005. Changing Contexts and Shifting Paradigms in Pronunciation Teaching. TESOL Quarterly 39, 369-78. Macdonald, S. 2002. Pronunciation – views and practices of reluctant teachers. Prospect 17, 3-15. Morley, J. 1991. The pronunciation component in teaching English to speakers of other languages. TESOL Quarterly 25, 481-520. Olson, D. 1994. The World on Paper: The conceptual and cognitive implications of writing and reading. Cambridge: CUP. Ur, P. 1990. In language teaching, which is more important, language or teaching? Teacher Training Journal 4, 12-3.

The Author Helen Fraser is a Senior Lecturer in Linguistics at the University of New England, Armidale NSW Australia. Dr Fraser studied Linguistics, specialising in Phonetics and Phonology, at Macquarie University in Sydney, and the University of Edinburgh in Scotland. She taught at the University of Edinburgh, Trinity College Dublin, and the School of Oriental and African Studies (University of London), before coming to UNE in 1990. She teaches at all levels in phonetics, phonology, psycholinguistics, history and philosophy of linguistics, and (Australian) English language. Her research expertise lies in the areas of phonetics, phonology, psycholinguistics, and writing systems (especially of South and South-east Asia). Her theoretical research focuses on the representation of speech sounds, both 'externally', in writing and transcription, and 'internally', in people's minds when they are understanding, learning and producing speech. Other research interests follow as applications of this theoretical work, and include pronunciation teaching, and forensic phonetics and transcription. http://wwwpersonal.une.edu.au/~hfraser ; [email protected]

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Trainer Background Encouraging teachers and students of English to read more in the target language… Chris Lima is the coordinator of the ELT e-Reading Group Project, developed in partnership with the British Council (BC) Literature and ELT Departments. She is an International Association of Teachers of English as a Foreign Language (IATEFL) Literature, Media and Cultural Studies (LMCS) Special Interest Group (SIG) committee member and the LMCS discussion list moderator. She is also the network coordinator of the Critical Literacy in ELT Project, for which she and her team were awarded the 2007 British Council Innovation Awards. Chris holds a Degree in English from the University of London and is currently involved in teacher education programmes and networking. TW: Why do you think reading in a target language is important for teachers, Chris? CL: I think for many teachers who come from countries where there isn't a strong tradition of reading books, reading becomes a sort of process of discovery. Once teachers have been exposed to texts they realise how much such experience can enrich them in personal and linguistic terms and a reading habit will develop. The tricky thing is to get people motivated to start reading. Whole books look very long to someone who doesn’t have a reading habit yet! So we have to give teachers the opportunity to engage with appealing and manageable texts, such as short stories and poems. TW: Where can teachers get hold of these? CL: There are some collections of good short stories and poems published nowadays in quite affordable editions. (See below) Teachers could create reading groups in their workplaces and even in their Teachers’ Associations. The British Council ‘enCompassculture’ website has a toolkit with very practical ideas and suggestions on how to set up a book club. (See address below) TW: And supposing there are no book clubs near them, how can teachers discuss what they have read with other people? CL: Many teachers around the world are in this situation. For one reason or another they do not have access to a book club or are in a context where they work in isolation, therefore, creating a book club becomes an almost impossible task. That is exactly why we thought of creating an online book club for teachers. The ELT ereading group is a virtual space where ELT professionals can discuss their readings of selected short stories and poems. There are many good and reliable websites on the Internet where you can download free texts, from whole novels to short stories and poems. In the ELT e-reading group we have been discussing texts that are published in the ‘BritLit’ section of the BC/BBC Teaching English website, and also texts from the New Writing website. Each month a new text is chosen and the link to download it is also posted on the group discussion board. TW: So, if I am a teacher wanting to read more, I can join your online book club. Each month I can download a new text, knowing teachers all over the world are doing the same thing as me! What happens next?

CL: You can decide to share your views on the story and perhaps respond to someone’s take on it via the website. Then other people in the group will probably respond to your ideas and share theirs with you and then it is where the discussion really happens. So, as an individual, you can be in on online book club discussion with other professionals! I like quoting Mostafa, one of our group members who said that ‘the most interesting thing about the reading group is to read other people’s readings.’ I think this is a perfect definition of the spirit of a book club and what we are trying to do in our group. To post your messages and join the discussion you have to register in the discussion board. It is a simple process, but if you have any technical difficulties in doing that, just send me a message at [email protected]. TW: Why do you think it is so important for EL teachers to get the reading habit? CL: Perhaps, the main message is that teachers cannot really motivate learners to read literature in English, if they do not do so themselves. You can not preach what you don't practice because students smell it a mile off! Besides that, it seems to me that it is time to start working on an EL teacher education programme that goes beyond concerns with methodology, approaches and isolated language development and moves towards a more comprehensive development process in which literature should definitely have a place. TW: Once teachers are actually doing a bit of target language reading themselves, how can they get their students doing some reading in English? CL: Perhaps the answer can only come to us if we put ourselves in our students' shoes. I asked my 18 year-old son this question and he said that everything depends on how teachers present the reading material to students. If teachers honestly show enthusiasm for the text and try to engage students, they are likely to respond in a positive way. Relevant text selection and giving students a menu of reading options is also important. What kills the joy of reading is to 'have to read a text you haven't chosen yourself.' TW: Students can also use a BC website, can’t they? CL: Well, another important aspect related to the previous question is that teachers sometimes feel insecure about how to approach literary texts in the ELT classroom. One of the reasons we have been using texts from BritLit and New Writing is that the websites also provide some supporting material, such as language worksheets, context and characterisation worksheets, glossaries, teachers’ notes and reader’s notes, which help teachers to feel more confident about the language, content and context. Once teachers have been through the process of discussing the texts themselves on their own discussion group they usually feel more comfortable and enthusiastic about working with the text in class and using the supporting material with their students. TW: Could you say more about this menu of reading options? CL: We usually choose a text each month; however, discussions on texts from previous months are still open and teachers can actually choose which of the texts selected they want to read and post on at the moment. So far we have discussion threads opened on the following texts: continued >>>

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‘Ullswater’ by Romesh Gunesekera ‘A House in the Country’ by Romesh Gunesekera ‘The Curse’ by A.C.Clarke ‘In the National Gallery’ by Doris Lessing ‘After sharp showers…’ by William Langland ‘Visiting Time’ by Emma Brooks ‘The Landing’ by Anita Desai ‘Clap hands, Here Comes Charlie’ by Beryl Bainbridge TW: And plans for the future? CL: Our next step in the reading group is to extend the scope of texts and start working with other genres, apart from short stories. We are opening two new sections in the discussion group, one for novels and another for poetry. In the Novel Choice section, a novel will be chosen each three months by a member of the reading group. Texts will also be available online for free download and group members will be invited to read and discuss the text, either after reading it or during their reading. The Poets' Corner will be open to everyone post their favourite poems at any time. Group members will be invited to comment on the poems or simply enjoy reading them. It is going to be a very flexible and democratic space! TW: Wonderful Chris ! I am going to log on to the sites! Thank you!

Useful web sites The ELT e-Reading Group http://www.britishcouncil.org/arts-literature-creativereadingeltereading.htm enCompassculture website http://www.encompassculture.com

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BBC/British Council Teaching English – BritLit http://www.teachingenglish.org.uk/try/resources/britlit British Council New Writing Anthology http://newwriting.britishcouncil.org The Project Gutenberg – free e-Books http://www.gutenberg.org The University of Virginia e-Library – free e-Books http://etext.virginia.edu/ebooks/ The Poetry Archive http://www.poetry-archive.com/ The Poem – Contemporary British & Irish Poetry http://www.thepoem.co.uk/

Useful books There are hundreds of collections of short stories and poems. Here are some of Chris’s favourites: Lavinia Greenlaw & Helon Habila (eds) New Writing 14. Granta Books. 2006. Bernardine Evaristo & Maggie Gee (eds) New Writing 15. Granta Books. 2007. A.S. Bryatt (ed). The Oxford Book of English Short Stories. OUP. 2002. Ra Page (ed) Comma: an Anthology of Short Stories. Comma Press. 2002. Douglas Barnes (ed). Harrap’s English Classics. Twentieth Century Sort Stories. Nelson Thornes.1999. Helen Gardner (ed) The New Oxford Book of English Verse. OUP. 1972.

When teachers write coursebooks... By Harshwardhan Kadepurkar, India

A story… A man once claimed that he had taught his parrot three languages. The news spread like wild fire. Surprised, a number of people living in the vicinity rushed to his house, expecting to see the performance. They waited and waited. But the parrot did not oblige them, did not utter a single sound in any of the three languages. Irritated, they took the man to task for telling them a lie. The man, however, said that he had not told them a lie; he had said that he had taught his parrot three languages, he had not said that the parrot had learned three languages.

Doesn’t the story illustrate the state of education in general? Perhaps, it has a special implication for English language teaching, particularly in the Indian context. Teachers teach and teach and sometimes overteach. And students? They learn or they don’t learn. In short, teaching does not necessarily lead to learning, does not always result in learning. In spite of all the research in the field, the gap between ‘teaching’ and ‘learning’ remains unbridged. Some of the reasons cited in the literature for this ‘gap’ are: • • • •

Inappropriate methodology Different learning styles Inappropriate materials Lack of ‘exposure’

• Lack of motivation • Inadequate environment • Top-down approaches • Lack of ‘resources’ • Negative wash back of exams • Cultural obstacles (Holliday 1994, Allwright 1981, Khaniya 1990, Tomlinson 1998 and others )

Almost all of these ‘reasons’ appear to be valid and all of them, and perhaps more, need to be considered while developing and implementing a new curriculum. A number of efforts have been made and are being made all over the world to bridge this gap. In Maharashtra, India, we made a similar effort in this direction. All the major components of the new curriculum – Aims and Objectives, Syllabus and Materials, Methods and Techniques and Testing and Evaluation – were looked into, ensuring the coherence of the curriculum (Johnson 1989).

Background Maharashtra is one of the largest states of India, with a geographical area of 307,713 Sq kms and population reaching 100 millions. Around 1.5 million students at Std X and around one million students at Std XII study English as a compulsory subject. In 18,812 secondary schools and 5271 higher secondary units, spread over the 35 districts of the state, thousands of teachers are

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engaged in teaching English. The numbers are alarming. The context is varied—from a small number of schools with all the required resources to a fairly large number of schools with no resources and no motivation. Between these two extremes are number of schools, where one can notice signs of positive change: enthusiastic and trained teachers, interested students, aware parents and a steady increase in the infrastructure facilities. Some of the other problems are: a multi-lingual context, social and economic inequalities, urban and rural divides and so on. Maharashtra has had a long history of English language teaching. Until 1960s, however, the approach was ‘Classical’, with an emphasis on grammar and translation; the materials used were typical of the times: ‘Golden Treasuries’ and ‘Prose Selections’, books compiled by the English and for English children. The methods of teaching were autocratic and paternalistic. Significant signs of change were noticed only during the sixties, when a structural syllabus was adopted. The revised syllabuses consisted mainly of grammatical items (called teaching points, not learning points) and vocabulary lists. Although the objectives talked about the development of basic language skills, the reality was that English was taught as a sequence of items to be memorized and this was supported by the examinations. This model persisted for some thirty years. Disillusionment with the structuralist model offering little to the real needs of India in the nineties was at the root of the curricular changes introduced in 1994-95. The roots of the disillusionment lay in the social and economic changes that were taking place in modern India. The problem was immense, considering the large numbers of teachers and learners involved in the process. How could we introduce an innovation that would be acceptable and doable by these teachers and students, without upsetting public opinion? The State Board, therefore, evolved a model, a homegrown model, which was a blending of structural and communicative models. That is, the syllabuses had the familiar structural base, but the materials and methodology would take a communicative/ interactive form. After a period of 10 years, in 2003-04, the Maharashtra State Board initiated the process of curriculum renewal. The Board of Studies in English considered the following aspects while designing the new curriculum: • the existing syllabuses of English for the classes I to XII. • views/ opinions of teachers and other stakeholders on the existing syllabuses • the curriculums of English in the other states of India and in other Boards • the NCERT model syllabuses • changing needs of learners and teachers • current thinking in curriculum development

This article, however, will focus only on one of the components of the new curriculum: materials development.

Materials Development in Maharashtra: the Rationale Coursebooks are usually designed and developed by ELT professionals. Teachers—the end-users--- are neither consulted, nor involved in the process. The Board of Studies in English took a bold decision to invite teachers with no coursebook writing experience to work as members of a writing team. Education researchers in the field speak almost with one voice when they stress that innovations in education are impossible if the teacher is not taken into account (Fullan 1991, Hargreaves 1994, Holliday 1995). In spite of all these warnings, ironically, while introducing changes, it is often the case that teachers are either taken for granted or simply ignored. There are a number of

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accounts of failures of projects caused by teacher resistance (Bowers 1983, Foster 1990, Hargreaves 1994, Holliday 1995). Bowers (1983) emphasizes the need to lay things open. He writes: ‘Quite often those who have a legitimate interest in the effects of an innovation are given little or no control over it or even perhaps information about it.’(116) The Top-down/ Bottom-up metaphor is frequently used, especially with reference to the initiation of change. Traditionally, innovation in education has been, and is, top-down; decisions are made in Ministries or Curriculum Development Centres and plans are handed down for implementation at school level. As Murphy (1995) points out, ‘ A frequent problem with the top-down innovation is that it is done without consultation and demonstrates for the bottom layer of the hierarchy how out of touch the top is. This remoteness and distance often contributes to the failure of initiatives.’ (1995: 15) It is ironical, however, that almost all accounts of innovation successes or failures in the literature are top-down innovations. Examples of bottom-up innovations are either rare or appear to be only a theoretical construct. The personnel at the top have obvious advantages: more expertise, better access to the latest information in the field, wider experience and exposure, control of resources and a broader vision of the policy demands and goals of education, necessary for planning the innovation in the broader context of education and the sociopolitical network. The implementers of innovation at the bottom do have a better knowledge of their own particular context, the classroom, but do not necessarily have the expertise and experience required for initiating a change that attempts to meet the requirements of varied classrooms. The issue of ‘top-down/bottom-up’ innovation recurs in the literature of language innovation. Protherough and Peterking (1995) start the discussion of the question ‘whose curriculum?’ with a story, that illustrates the problem relating to the National Curriculum in England and Wales very appropriately: A fairy story. Once upon a time in the land of Ing the people all did things in their own way, and they argued all the time about which way was best. The Good Fairy got so tired of all their squabbles that she waved her wand and up popped a Magic Curriculum. ‘That is the way to do it’, said the Good Fairy. ‘Hurrah!’ shouted the people. So then all did things the way the Magic Curriculum said, and they lived happily ever after. The end. (1995:1) However, in the world of reality, Ministries or Departments do not posses the magical powers of the Fairy. The writers, therefore, inform us that there have been so many revisions introduced in the curriculum, that it has become really difficult to know which one is the final, official document. This example suggests that if there had been a meaningful collaboration from the beginning, the need for so many changes might have been reduced.

“It is against this background that the Board of Studies (BOS) in English took a major decision to involve teachers in the process of change.” Appreciating the local rhythm is another aspect to be considered for ensuring successful implementation of innovation. The perennial problem with innovations is the difference between people working in different circumstances: people working in offices planning things and people in the classroom doing things. Unless serious efforts are made to bridge the gap between the two layers, by appreciating the local rhythms and incorporating them in the project design, innovations in education are not likely to be successful. continued >>>

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First Stage It is against this background that the Board of Studies (BOS) in English took a major decision to involve teachers in the process of change. Thousands of teachers teach English at this level. Involving all of them was obviously impossible. With the help of the members of the BOS and the Board officials, about 100 teachers were selected in the first instance. They were invited for ‘Teacher Development Programmes’, held at Nasik and Pune, in December 2003 and January 2004. The programmes were jointly sponsored by the Hornby Trust, UK and the State Board. Around 80 teachers were present. The mode of training was task-based and activity-oriented. The major focus of the programmes was on ‘making effective use of ELT materials’. The main contents were: • • • • • • • •

Brainstorming: The What, Why and How of Materials Identification of difficult areas in Materials Materials adaptation: principles and practice A Demonstration Lesson on Adaptation Support materials Using materials for teaching grammar Devising ways for adapting materials Materials adaptation: a demonstration lesson on simplification and ‘easification’ • Diary keeping, Interview, Lesson observation • Understanding the underlying principles of the prescribed materials and evolving proposals for new materials • Outlining the follow-up plan

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• approach to Materials Development: the overall design, the criteria for selection of reading texts, the unit design, the design of tasks, etc. • approach to the teaching of vocabulary and grammar • approach to teaching /learning procedures: the Role of the Teacher and the Role of the Learner • approach to Testing and Evaluation • the design of the Oral Test By the end of the workshop, participants had finalized the overall design of the Course books and the Unit format. Since 3 course books were to be produced, three separate teams of teacher-writers were formed. Each team had four members. The other members were kept in reserve. This article, however, will focus from now on only on the work of one of these teams: the writers of Std XI and XII Course books: Std XI/XII Course books in English

Objectives of teaching English at Std XI and XII To enable the student 1. to develop his/her language skills to a fair degree of proficiency 2. to acquire communication skills in English useful in real life situations 3. to enrich his/her vocabulary 4. to use English with appropriate grammatical forms

Each day ended with an evaluation of the day’s work, which was compiled and presented on the following day, by one of the participants.

5. to develop reference skills and inculcate self-study habits

“…these teachers were not aware that their names were being considered as members of a writing team!”

7. to cultivate a broad, human and cultured outlook

6. to use English not only as a library language but also as important language of communication

Overall Design of the Coursebook: Topical/Thematic Topics/ Themes

The members of the BOS, working as facilitators, were all the time making their observations on the performance of the teacher participants. These observations were based on: the teacher’s initiative, language competence, interest in materials production, innovative ideas, positive attitude, readiness to work with others in a team, and so on. On the basis of these observations 20 teachers were identified and were invited for a training workshop for writers of the new coursebooks in July 2004. Until then these teachers were not aware that their names were being considered as members of a writing team!

Second Stage The immediate task was to produce 3 Course books and 3 Manuals for the classes IX (one for the English medium and one for the nonEnglish medium students)and XI, to be prescribed from June 2006. In the following year, 3 more Course books and Manuals were to be produced for the classes X and XII.

1. Self

6. Nation

2. Family

7. World/ Universe

3. Society

8. Communication Revolution/ Globalisation

4. City 5. State Unit Format A. Preparation

C. Aids to Comprehension

B. Listen to the text/ Read the text The text Glossary and Notes

D. Language Study I Vocabulary II Grammar E. Communication Skills

Objectives of the Training Workshop

Third Stage

The broad objectives of the Workshop were to develop an understanding of:

The first major task was the selection of appropriate reading texts. In the context of developing countries, such as India, local educational attitudes and policies play a very crucial role, especially in determining the design and content of materials (Thanachanan 1984, Samah 1988, Alptekin 1993). Factors considered were: age group of learners, sex, social and economic background, needs, interests, aspirations, societal expectations, un-biased texts and so on.

• various aspects of the Approach to ELT adopted by the State Board • the curriculum framework and interdependence of the various components of the framework and the rationale behind it • the stated objectives of teaching/learning English and the syllabus content

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Since teachers familiar with these contexts were now part of the writing team, the task of selecting appropriate texts was less daunting. For example, look at the following text titles: 1. India 2nd in World Road Mishaps 2. Deluge in Mumbai 3. A Village Powered by Sun, Wind and Cowdung 4. Dreaming of a New India 5. An Indian Forest 6. To See Tukaram Shakespeare Came Over Look at the following titles of texts, selected considering students’ interest: 1. 2. 3. 4.

Is SMS Ruining the English Language? My Family and Globalisers Operation Cockroach Father’s Laughter

The main criteria for selection were ‘culturally appropriate texts’ and ‘communicatively relevant texts’.The other criteria were: length of the text, difficulty level, interesting, value-based, needs-based, authentic and ‘fresh’, that is, not used in other course books! It has been rightly said that though the selection of texts plays an important role in language learning, it is the activities generated by materials that assume central importance (Prabhu 1983). In the next stage of work, therefore, a number of pre-reading, whilereading and post-reading activities were developed, relating to the topic as well as the syllabus items. A conscious effort was made to make these tasks communicatively relevant, doable and interesting. (An example) The following check-list was developed for the help of writers: The Course book: Characteristic Features 1. Skills-based 2. Needs-based 3. Value-oriented 4. Learner-centred ( addressed to the learner) 5. Composite book: Learner’s Reader, Workbook and Teacher’s Handbook 6. Activity book (Task-based) 7. Inclusion of literary and non-literary texts 8. Authentic texts 9. Contemporary writing 10. Interactive/ communicative tasks 11. Interesting as well as useful texts 12. Appropriate to the context 13. Functional Grammar 14. Dictionary entries 15. Stress marks (in Glossary) 16. Illustrations 17. Clear Instructions to Teachers 18. Clear Instructions to Students 19. Inclusion of language games, puzzles, crosswords 20. Indian and British writers/ poets 21. The Unit Map 22. The cost factor

23. The cover page 24. The back page 25. Introduction (with all details necessary to teachers and students) Writers made sincere efforts to cover as many points as possible. Later, a detailed introduction to the course book was written explaining the rationale of change and offering help to teachers in making effective use of the course book. As soon as the manuscripts were ready, they were sent to ELT Experts for review. Practicing teachers, who were not a part of the writing team, but were a part of the pre-training programmes were also asked to go through the manuscript. After a careful consideration of their comments, the manuscripts were finalized and given for printing.

Feedback The Course books are in use now and will continue to be in use for the next few years. From the feedback received so far, the Course books have been very well received by all stakeholders. It will be interesting to see what students, teacher-writers and ELT Experts have to say about the new course books:

From Students: 1.…a very compact and comprehensive textbook. Neha Gupta 2. The Course book is learner-centred. Kartik 3. …a very innovative book…it stimulates the students to communicate with each other. Poonam Gaikwad 4. The cover page and the back page are well-designed. The book develops our language skills, enriches vocabulary, develops reference skills and self-study habit. Pradnya Mohite 5. The Course book focuses on learning rather than on teaching. It tells us to take active part in the classroom and to adopt the techniques of self-study. Deepali Sonwar 6. This book is designed considering the mental level and background of students. Jayant Kale 7. The book is very interesting. Priya Parbat 8. The coursebook is skills-based. It is practice-oriented. It is student-friendly. Snehal Dagale 9. In addition to the prescribed grammar items, several other grammar points have been covered. Therefore, I don’t need any other grammar book. Preparation section is useful for increasing my confidence and stage daring. The book provides a number of activities/ tasks which will prove to be useful in preparing for the Oral Test. Pradeep Raut

From ELT Experts: 1. “Thank you for giving me a copy of the Std XII Course book. I have now gone through it and found it both innovative in content and sound in pedagogic quality – something which takes a lot of time, thought and patient work. It not only conforms to but gets good value out of NCERT’s thematic syllabus; it boldly brings in new texts, new writers and new genres (with associated new features of language and usage); and it provides exercises in comprehension, vocabulary, grammar and pronunciation in timetested formats. It is a pleasure to see such devoted work over so many years.” Dr N.S.Prabhu, Bangalore, India 2. “I am now reading your wonderful books! Great! I love the texts especially. Gosh those students must be good!” Tessa Woodward, U.K. continued >>>

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3. “The books are fresh, up to date, simple to use, interesting and develop language skills quite systematically. I think they will be popular with teachers and pupils. One of the things I like most of all is that the books are clear that their purpose is to support the development of language skills ( not to deliver factual content), there is a strong focus on the development of values and aesthetics as well. It is this which makes the books interesting.” Diana Lubelska, Cambridge

From the Teacher-writers of Std XII Course book 1. “I have been teaching English since 1982 at Kurduwadi, a small

“(This experience) has given me insight into my classroom teaching and has increased my confidence in making it more effective.” town. I had no previous experience of working as a writer of course books. (This experience) has given me insight into my classroom teaching and has increased my confidence in making it more effective. The new course book is student-friendly and also teacher-friendly. In fact, it has become a resource book for me. As a teacher I really enjoyed working as a writer.” V.T.Patil (Kurduwadi) 2. “While dealing with the previous course books I was not that conscious about what might be the process behind it. I felt elated when I was selected as a writer of the course book for my students. The job was not easy. Selecting texts for the course book was the first challenge, as we had to consider the age group, background, needs, interests and other aspects. I understood that I must go to the level of my students—become a student myself and then design any unit.” S.S.Tiwari (Ambajogai) 3. “The teacher participants, selected carefully, were part of the workshops conducted by the State Board. We were not aware that these workshops were part of the selection process.” “The Convener was a tough task master, no doubt, but he was always encouraging and the atmosphere was very friendly. The whole process provided us immense opportunities to improve professionally and to polish our skills.” “Initially I was scared before the course books entred the market as that was the real test. Never before, I was expected to face such an academic challenge of fulfilling the demands of millions of students and to face a large number of expert teachers. I felt like hiding in a cave. But what happened was totally different. The course books were given a warm welcome and our efforts were appreciated all over the state. And the credit goes to the Convener, as it was he who had thought of this novel experience of involving us, the teachers, in the process of creating the materials that we teach and worked meticulously on every small detail that it involved. Hats off to him!” Pratibha Mistry (Aurangabad) 4. “It was a challenge because it was for the first time that teachers with not too many academic degrees and a halo of Degree College experience were entrusted with this job.” “It was thrilling to be a part of the process of selecting the text material. Emphasis was on selecting authentic material. Sometimes I would be boldly persuading why a particular writeup was worth selecting. At times the persuasion would turn into a fanatic stubbornness. But soon I learnt to check my enthusiasm and listen to others.” “The process of selection taught me 3 things. One, not to be too judgemental, two, not to view the text material as the blind in the story view the elephant, and three, to strive to come close to perfection not forgetting that perfection is still far away.”

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“By the time the actual writing of tasks started, we were thoroughly groomed into our new avatar of writers. As basically we were teachers teaching classes XI and XII, we could visualize the lesson as it would be taught in the actual class. The tasks not only became interesting and student-oriented, but also functionally rich. It was like a tailor stitching a shirt for himself, a task that is very much creative. Thanks to the Convener, who could think that teachers could prepare their course books.” “This assignment revived the student, the learner in me, and this, I think, is the most significant gain on my part. One thing which I admired about our Convener was the time and room that he gave us to understand and discover things on our own, a trait I still have to acquire.” Prachi Chitnis (Mumbai)

Conclusion To conclude, the Maharashtra Language Project has shown that when teachers write course books, contextually more appropriate and communicatively relevant course books can be produced. This exercise has generated confidence not only in the teachers who were part of the writing team, but also in hundreds of other teachers who were directly or indirectly involved in the project in the: scrutiny of draft syllabuses, review of course books, teacher training programmes, ongoing support activities, and so on. A question may be asked as to whether efforts were made to involve learners in this exercise. The answer is, No. Maybe in the next phase of change, that can be considered. But we always had in our mind the message of Acharya Vinobaji Bhave, philosopher and disciple of Mahatma Gandhi, Father of the Nation. Once a group of teachers went to meet Vinobaji in his Ashram. At the end of the meeting teachers requested Vinobaji to give his blessings and his message. Vinobaji blessed them all and asked, with a smile on his face, “What do you do?” Teachers said, “We teach.” “Don’t teach,”said Vinobaji. When he realized that teachers had not understood him, he explained to them that a teacher’s job is not to teach, but to initiate and support the process of learning. Teaching is artificial and relatively new in human history. Learning is natural and has been there for all time.

References Allwright,R.L. 1981. ‘What do we want the teaching materials for?’ ELT Journal Vol 36/1 (pp5-18) Alptekin,C. 1998. ‘Target-language culture in ELT materials’ ELT Journal Vol 47/2 (pp136-143) Bowers,Roger 1983. ‘Project Planning and Performance’ In Brumfit C.J. (Ed) Language Teaching Projects for the Third World, ELT Document 116.Pergamon. Foster,Pablo 1990. ‘The Tunician Textbook Project 1969-1977: Problems affecting materials production’ In Projects in Materials Design ELT Documents Special (pp198-206) Fullan,M.G. 1991. The New Meaning of Educational Change. London: Cassell. Hargreaves, Andy 1994. Changing Teachers, Changing Times. London: Cassell. Holliday, Adrian 1994. Appropriate Methodology and Social Context Cambridge: CUP Holliday, Adrian 1995. ‘Handing over the Project: An Exercise in Restraint’ System Pergamon, Vol 23 No 1 (pp 57-68) Johnson,R.K. 1989. ‘A decision-making framework for the coherent language curriculum’. In R.K.Johnson(Ed) The Second Language Curriculum. Cambridge: CUP (pp1-23)

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Khaniya,T.R. 1990. ‘The washback effect of a textbook-based test’ In Tony Lynch (Ed) Edinburgh Working Papers in Applied Linguistics Number 1. University of Edinburgh (pp48-58)

Thanachanan, Pranee 1984. ‘A self-appraising English syllabus in an EFL Country’. In John Read (Ed) Trends in Language Syllabus Design. Singapore: SEAMEO (pp 245-257)

McDonough,J. and Shaw, C. 1993. Materials and Methods in ELT: a Teacher’s Guide. Oxford: Blackwell.

Tomlinson, B. (Ed) 1998. Materials Development in Language Teaching. Cambridge: CUP

Murphy,D/F. 1995 ‘Developing Theory and Practice in Evaluation’ In Rea-Dickins P. and Lwaitama A.F. (Eds) Evaluation for Development in ELT: Review of ELT Vol 3 No 3 Modern English Publications in association with the British Council

Author

Prabhu,N.S. 1983. ‘Procedural syllabuses’ In John Read (Ed) Trends in Language Syllabus Design. Singapore: SEAMEO (pp 272-280) Protherough and Peterking (Ed) 1995. The Challenge of English in the National Curriculum. London: Routledge Samah,Abu 1988 ‘Materials for language learning and teaching: new trends and developments: the Malaysian scene’ In B.K.Das (Ed) Materials for Language Learning and Teaching. Singapore SEAMEO (138-145)

I have been teaching English to the undergraduate and post-graduate students at a college at Nasik, Maharashtra, India. Currently, I am the Principal and Head of the Department of English in B.Y.K. College, Nasik. I have also been working as Convener of the Board of Studies in English, for the Maharashtra State Board of Secondary and Higher Secondary Education. This is an honorary position. The Board is responsible for curriculum development and curriculum implementation at secondary and higher secondary level.

Improving conferences: organising a Pecha Kucha event By Lindsay Clandfield, Spain

What is Pecha Kucha? A Pecha Kucha event is one in which a number of presenters share their ideas within the course of an evening. It follows a 20 x 20 format. Each presenter is allowed 20 slides (on a programme such as Powerpoint), each shown for 20 seconds each. This results in a total presentation time of 6 minutes and 40 seconds on a stage before the next presenter is up.

The word Pecha Kucha (pronounced pechatchka with the stress on the second syllable) comes from the Japanese word for “chit-chat” and was invented by two designers in Tokyo. They were reacting against long and boring Powerpoint presentations: presentations with too many slides, or badly designed slides; presentations that depended more on the slides and not enough on what the person was actually saying. Jeremy Harmer wrote a great piece on the pitfalls of power point in this journal (see Harmer 2006). Pecha Kucha by contrast forces a speaker to “get to the point” and think hard about how best to convey a message with limited words and images. It has now become quite popular in the design, architecture and photography fields, but has recently stretched over to the business world. This year was the first time a Pecha Kucha evening happened in the field of English language teaching, at the 2008 International Association of Teachers of English as a Foreign Language (IATEFL) conference in Exeter, Devon, UK. I was pleased to organise and facilitate the event, which was called A snapshot of ELT. We invited eight well-known speakers from ELT and challenged them to “do” a Pecha Kucha each. The result? A great mixture of entertainment, serious content, humour and inspiration. Here are the speakers, and the topics they chose.

Gavin Dudeney

- An introduction to Web 2.0

Jenny Johnson

- Things I wish I’d known about ELT before I started

Adrian Tennant

- What’s wrong with ELT?

Susan Barduhn

- Teacher as learner, learner as teacher

Margit Szesztay

- Channelling group energies

Jeremy Harmer

- Ten things I know about TEFL

Rose Senior

- Key pieces in the classroom jigsaw puzzle

Scott Thornbury

- Eating for Specific Purposes

What the presenters thought Judging from the audience response, and the “buzz” at the conference the next day, it was a success. Here’s what some of the participants themselves had to say about it: Doing a Pecha Kucha presentation was one of the most terrifying and exhilarating things I have tried for a long time. The feeling of being ‘out of control’ as the slides clicked away relentlessly was extraordinary. Some people get high (sic) by climbing mountains. Pecha Kucha felt like a mountain, but it was fantastic once you’d reached the top. Jeremy Harmer

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continued >>>

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Nothing like having just under seven minutes to concentrate the mind! Scott Thornbury Remember Churchill's words – that it takes far longer to prepare a 5-minute speech than it does a two-hour one! Rose Senior The format of Pecha Kucha gave me a challenge, how to engage the participants within the framework of a 20 second slide. But it was great fun to take part in. Adrian Tennant Having to use 20 slides in such a short time pushed me to use pictures. Playing around with pictures got me to think in pictures and metaphors. Then it was the pictures leading, and the words fitting in (rather than using the pictures for illustrating wordswords-words.) Margit Szesztay I learnt that we need more of these kinds of evenings, more times when we get together and laugh and drink and heckle, with a bit of information thrown in. I learnt that a Pecha Kucha show is best done as a set of pictures allowing you to go where you want in the time allotted. That 6:40 is much longer from the audience’s point of view than it is when you’re doing the speaking. And finally that I would love to do it again, and again…. It was fun … a groundbreaking event in ELT. Gavin Dudeney It was an absolute hoot, and turned us all into instantaneous super stars. Even the hallway outside my session the next day was packed!! Susan Barduhn

Tips for organising a Pecha Kucha At the end of the event, I called on the audience to hold Pecha Kucha evenings at their local conferences. I’m happy to say that there has already been interest from two other countries. And Pecha Kucha will probably be repeated at the 2009 IATEFL conference in Cardiff, Wales. Could this be the start of a new conference phenomenon in ELT?

Lindsay’s tips for organising a Pecha Kucha at your conference 1. Choose a very general theme for the event. If you take something too specific (e.g. Global English), there is a risk that the presentations will be the same or very similar (or use the same images). You’ll need a big room for the audience, with PowerPoint projection facilities and, preferably, sound too. 2. Pecha Kucha evenings usually have up to 14 presenters. The event we did at IATEFL had 8, and it felt about right. 3. Let the speakers know LONG in advance about the event, and warn them that it takes quite some time to prepare. I kept communication open between all speakers so we made sure nobody did exactly the same topic. 4. Each presenter prepares 20 PowerPoint slides, and gets 20 seconds per slide. The slides cannot contain animation, or video, or music. As a presenter you need to know how to use PowerPoint, and how to set the slides so that they change automatically every 20 seconds. Get a computer-literate person to help you with that. I got all the speakers to send me their presentations three days before the conference so that I could put the timer on them and have them ready in one folder for the evening’s event. 5. Check the timer works on the presentations before the evening! Ours “broke down” a couple of times during the evening, which meant I had to time the slides with my watch and then click them forward manually while the speaker was presenting. This added some humour to the event though…! 6. A Pecha Kucha evening is also a social event. Therefore it’s best to have it in the evening, with refreshments available for the audience. We had a cash bar at IATEFL. This makes it feel a bit like a “stand-up comedy” night and sets an overall relaxed tone.

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7. It’s best to have a facilitator for the event. At IATEFL, I was the facilitator. The facilitator introduces the whole thing and explains what Pecha Kucha is. The facilitator then keeps it going and calls the speakers to the stage as their turn is up. He/she can also encourage the audience to clap, whistle, hoot with laughter and so on. At the end, invite all the speakers back onto the stage for a group bow. The speakers will feel like superstars! 8. While the evening is a social event, the presentations don’t all have to be funny. What many people liked about the Pecha Kucha at IATEFL Exeter was the variety. Some presentations were hilarious, others much more measured and serious. All of them felt right for the evening. 9. Schedule an interval between each batch of, say, four presentations. During our interval I told the audience they could go get another drink and chat/move around etc (we were in a large hall). During this time you could have a band playing, or show short funny films. We showed some funny films from YouTube (www.youtube.com) that related to English and English teaching. These were a lot of fun. 10. Finally, there follows some advice for presenters – courtesy of Rose Senior, who did a fantastic presentation at our Pecha Kucha: Have a simple, single message or overall theme Let each slide speak for itself Don't try to say too much for each slide (I reckon 60 words is about right – although there can be considerable variation depending how fast the presenter speaks) Keep in mind that your prime aim is entertainment Have confidence in your personal presentation style Practise on your friends before doing the 'real thing' Good luck and have fun! If you’d like to organise a Pecha Kucha evening for your conference and want more advice, you can email the author at [email protected]

Web links You can see a sample Pecha Kucha presentation here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9NZOt6BkhUg Or see the actual IATEFL event here http://exeteronline.britishcouncil.org/ There is also an interesting article about the phenomenon at Wired Magazine http://www.wired.com/techbiz/media/magazine/1509/st_pechakucha

Reading Harmer, J (2006) ‘Ten things I hate about PowerPoint’ in the Teacher Trainer Vol 20 No 3 Pilgrims publications

Author Lindsay Clandfied is a teacher, trainer and author from Canada. He works regularly with It’s for teachers magazines and the resource website Onestopenglish. His books include Straightforward (an adult course from Macmillan) and the awardwinning Dealing with Difficulties (with co-author Luke Prodromou, published by DELTA). Lindsay is a regular speaker at conferences and workshops across Europe. He is currently writing a column on ELT for the Guardian Weekly and is always interested in trying out new things – like Pecha Kucha for example!

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Thoughts on teachers’ professional identity It was at a conference in Rovereto, Italy in March 2008 that I shared a rostrum with Sari Pöyhönen and discovered how knowledgeable she is! Sari is a senior researcher in the Centre for Applied Language Studies, University of Jyväskylä, Finland. Her research and writing deal with notions of language and identity, linguistic and ethnic minorities and language education policies in Finland and Russia. Her doctoral dissertation in applied linguistics (2003) “Teachers of Finnish: Professional Identity in Transition” was an ethnographic study on Finnish language teachers’ professional identity at the peak of the transition period of Russian education. The teachers worked in state schools (primary and secondary) specialising in Finnish as foreign language. Professional identity was analysed through factors related to the teachers’ career paths, their relationship to their work and profession, and their position in Russian schools and society. Ethnographic studies during the transition period in Russia are very rare, particularly from the point of view of linguistic and ethnic minorities. TW: Sari, thanks for agreeing to be interviewed. I have found your work on teachers' professional identities really fascinating. As teacher trainers, educators and mentors we should think about this more deeply, I believe. Is it possible for you to prise some general thoughts for us away from the specific work you have done with Russian teachers of Finnish in St Petersburg and Petrozavodsk? SP: Yes, I’d be happy to do that and at the same time give a voice to the teachers who participated in the study, too. TW: First of all could you say a bit about the dialogical framework you used? SP: Dialogism is inspired by Russian language philosophers Mikhail Bakhtin and Valentin Voloshinov and developed further in the West. In dialogical interpretation, professional identity – or any identity – is inherently a social phenomenon: dynamic, multi-voiced, process-like. However, a dialogical framework doesn’t overemphasize the social dimension but also takes individuality into account: a person’s unique experiences and views on the world. This is why instead of one stable identity we could talk about several identities that have different meanings in various situations. This also applies to the relationship of different languages. In my study, for example, the teachers’ relationships with Finnish were multiple. To

some, it was the mother tongue while to others, it was a second or foreign language learned as adult. Also, their experiences of how the Finnish language was positioned in Soviet society or now in Russia differed and brought about various emotional relationships.

“Generally speaking, I believe that teachers we work with have several identities and various relationships with the language they are teaching.” TW: So for us teacher trainers then, it would make sense for us to think of the teachers we work with (and indeed ourselves) as having several identities and various relationships with the language that we are teaching? SP: Precisely, it was actually very interesting to observe in the classrooms and to discover in the interviews with them that instead of one Finnish language (in schools it was officially a foreign language) there were several Finnish languages in schools: mother tongue, second language, foreign language, “imported Finnish” etc. Therefore, the dualistic view of language as either “national” or “foreign” or “first” or “second” can be questioned. Also, we consider identities as being as flexible and multiple as possible. Generally speaking, I believe that teachers we work with have several identities and various relationships with the language they are teaching. TW: I know that you think that career paths are significant. SP: They are indeed significant from the point of view of professional identity at least in the case of teachers of Finnish who took part in my research. In the early 90s Russian society was in transition: many people lost their jobs and had to rethink their professional future. During this time some teachers “remembered” that they spoke Finnish and that had Finnish background. Perhaps they had spoken the language in their childhood and after a long period of not using the language they started to memorize and use it again. So, one of the career paths could be called returning to one’s ethnic and linguistic roots. The teachers’ previous occupations were varied: e.g. a retired ballet dancer, an engineer, a commercial artist, physics teacher. Changing occupation represented a very conscious choice to return to their ethnic and linguistic roots. It also made the teachers think very consciously about their teaching profession and the language they were teaching: for some it was a lost and found language while for the others it was

PB

a language of emotions and “the inner me” that they had had to be silent about for such a long time. Some teachers regretted that they had not wanted to use the Finnish language with their parents or talk about Finnish traditions or Finnish culture in general. For example, Alina wrote in her autobiography: “Only now, as an adult, I have come to realize that they [my parents] tried in every way to preserve the precious thing which the system had wanted to wipe out from their lives. […] Why didn’t I talk more about these things with them? Now, when they have passed away, I would like to know more about my own roots, but it’s too late. All I can do and have done is to teach the mother tongue.” TW: I guess teachers’ relationships to the English language might be a little different since English is in many situations a fairly high status language which in some settings is actually causing the decline of other languages? SP: The teachers’ relationship with the English language was distant but at the same time they had a lot of respect for it. Most of the teachers had studied English at school translating sentences from English to Russian and vice versa. Many of them said they could not speak the language at all. In their own work, however, they used professional literature for English teachers for developing their methodological knowledge. Especially when Finnish first appeared in the curriculum, Finnish teachers formed their own subculture that had poorer facilities than teachers of English. English was seen as a competitor and the teachers acknowledged that pupils would have preferred to study English. For many pupils Finnish was a difficult and an insignificant language. TW: Yes, I see. SP: Moreover, ethnic background distinguished the returnees from the other teachers of Finnish at school, for they were considered to have an ethnic duty to continued >>>

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enhance Finnish culture and to maintain the knowledge of Finnish in Russia. Also, the teachers themselves regarded it as their important duty to continue the tradition and to further the Finnish language. Those teachers who had a Finnish background were often considered a special group because their cultural capital and generally good command of Finnish distinguished them from Russian teachers. Finnish teachers were valued members of the teaching community. However, cultural capital could also be a cultural ballast. Another indication of the cultural ballast was that the authenticity of the Finns’ ethnicity could be in doubt, particularly if their command of the language was not at the same level as that of an imaginary native speaker of Finnish. Thus language and ethnicity were intertwined, which made the research on professional identity even more delicate. Dealing with emotions and sensitive issues of language and identity was challenging yet rewarding for both the participants and me as the researcher as well.

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TW: Were there other kinds of teachers in the teaching community, too? SP: Yes. These so-called career teachers had taken the straightest route to becoming teachers of Finnish. After finishing school they had applied to university as students of Finnish and after graduation had started working as teachers of Finnish. These teachers had a very strong professional identity and they were self-confident about the methods they used and the pedagogical thinking behind the methods. TW: So we could say that career teachers seem to have a stronger professional identity whereas returnees to their mother tongue and their own ethnicity may perhaps feel stronger emotions but potentially may feel more at sea pedagogically? SP: Exactly. The returnees felt they had to invent the wheel again and again, while career teachers seemed to have a clear picture of the goals and methods. They were a bit reluctant to re-evaluate their pedagogical thinking. This came up in the

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interviews. SP: The professional career paths of all these teachers (both returnees and career teachers) were formed by the choices of each individual in connection to important others. The members of the family, classmates, former teachers, colleagues and the society as a whole were involved in the decisions the teachers made, especially at crossroads in their career paths. These important others were supporters but sometimes also opponents. Tatyana remembers one difficult moment in her career: “In 1971, I got a job in the [--] junior secondary school where I worked as a teacher for eight years. At that time, people felt differently about the Finnish language. I remember that, during the first lesson, I had had no time to give homework to the children; the bell rang, the lesson was over, but I kept talking. The teacher of the Russian language and literature entered the classroom and gave me an order in front of the children: “Stop it now! A Russian lesson is about to begin in this classroom and it is more important.” I remember tears coming into my eyes. But, fortunately, times have changed.” TW: Gosh! That’s awful! SP: Yes, the memories were quite often very sad and painful, but at the same time they seemed to overcome all these troubles and be more confident about their career choice. They were very committed to their work as Finnish teachers. TW: Apart from finding out about teachers’ attitudes towards the language, ethnicity and pedagogy, were you also interested in finding out what kind of relationship the teachers had towards their work? SP: Yes. The views the teachers had on teaching and learning led me to the interpretation that learner-centred and teacher-centred cultures co-existed at schools. Even though the teaching culture showed signs of change, and particularly the younger generation teachers represented a more learner-centred view, the unofficial, covert school culture was still dominantly teacher-centred. This could also be seen in the hierarchical teacher-pupil roles which supported teacher-centred culture: the teacher was responsible for the learning process and his/her most important task was to give out information. To put it simply, the role of the pupils was to receive information and to do exercises. The teacher-centred culture was visible also in a teacher’s great authority. Although the younger teachers’ authority was sometimes questioned, it was a significant factor defining teacher-pupil roles. TW: So as trainers we should expect there to be multiple approaches going on in parallel classrooms in the same school?

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SP: A multiplicity of approaches is quite understandable, isn’t it? But sometimes it seemed that the various Finnish teachers lived in different worlds. According to school documents, the official, overt culture in schools specialising in Finnish followed the principles of a learner-centred culture. In the interviews however some teachers represented more learner-centred views whereas their teaching practices revealed more of the unofficial teacher-centred view. Those teachers who represented a more teacher-centred culture, had more consistent views and practices that also represented the school’s prevailing culture. However, they thus contradicted the official learner-centred view. In sum, I could say that the teachers of Finnish had an ambivalent relationship to their work. There are many reasons for this, but one good explanation could be that there were different values and attitudes coexisting in the schools and in individual minds as well. SP: It was also very interesting to find that the features of both teacher and learnercentred cultures became very apparent when I examined teachers’ views on the traits of a good teacher and good pupil. During the three years of the research I interviewed the teachers twice and often discussed this topic with them. In the interviews I asked them to characterize a good teacher and a good pupil. The most significant basic characteristics of a good teacher mentioned by the interviewees were professionalism and expertise, psycholo¬gical and interactive skills, ability to organise and educate, and personality. The views of the Finnish teachers on what makes a good teacher were thus partly fairly traditional, that is they regarded a good teacher as civilised, competent and good at organising. Nevertheless, their views also revealed values that reflected a more learner-centred culture, such as the good teacher’s

attempts to identify with their pupils’ position and to work as their colleague. In addition, a good teacher was considered a second, institutional mother and they were thus supposed to “love their children”. Their ideas about the traits of a good pupil also included features from both teachercentred and learner-centred cultures. A good pupil’s basic characteristics reflected teacher-centred thinking: a good pupil is hard-working, clever and obedient for example. Those characteristics connected to pupils’ communica¬tiveness, ability to be creative and to work on tasks independently also reflected a more learnercentred culture however. TW: What did you find out about the teachers’ position in society? SP: The Finnish teachers both in St. Petersburg and in Petrozavodsk considered their socio-cultural position in Russian society to be weak. The teaching profession is less valued in Russia than it was in the Soviet era, and teachers’ position as a professional group in general has become more and more marginalized. One reason for their weakened position could be that the field is dominated by women. In addition, in St. Petersburg the status of the Finnish language is not yet established and this was also reflected in the teachers’ unstable socio-cultural position. In Petrozavodsk the Finnish language has gained a stronger foothold but teachers still thought their work was not much valued. However, Finnish teachers regarded the status of the Finnish language as a more important factor than the profession itself in defining their socio-cultural position and social prestige. TW: What do you yourself feel about the relevance of your study?

transition happening within the Russian education system, thus reflecting Russian teachers’ situation in general. In this respect the findings of the study could be used as a basis for interpreting the role of transition in Russian teachers’ lives too. But I also think the stories and life experiences of the Finnish teachers give us much to reflect upon. They could help us to be more aware of the coexistence of professional and personal identities and the parallel realities we live in, as well as the many differing relationships we teachers have to the languages we teach and the pedagogy we use. TW: Thanks very much Sari!

References Bakhtin, M. M. 1981. The Dialogic Imagination: Four Essays by M. M. Bakhtin. Ed. And translated by M. Holquist and V. Liapunov. Austin, Texas: University of Texas Press Pöyhönen, S. 2008 (forthcoming). Ethnic Duty and Other Obligations: Multiple Identities of Ingrian Finnish Teachers in Russia. In Alejandro Cervantes-Carson & Ilse Josepha Maria Lazaroms (eds.) Contested Recognition: Cultural Claims and the Problems of Belonging. Oxford: InterDisciplinary Press. Pöyhönen, S. & H. Dufva 2007. Identity and heteroglossia: Negotiation of identities of Ingrian Finnish language teachers in Russia. In R. Alanen & S. Pöyhönen (eds.) Language in Action: Vygotsky and Leontievian Legacy Today. Newcastle: Cambridge Scholars Publishing, 160–178. Voloshinov, V. N. 1973. Marxism and the Philosophy of Language. New York: Seminar Press.

SP: Teachers of Finnish represent a very small group of teachers in Russia. However, their work is closely linked with the

Why advertise in “The Teacher Trainer”? There are many reasons why advertising in the Teacher Trainer Journal (TTTJ) is a good idea: • The journal has been going for twenty two years now and has always come out on time. • The journal goes out to named subscribers only so there is absolutely no wastage of copies. • Our subscribers, whether mentors, teacher trainers or educators, DOS’s, assessors…meet hundreds of teachers a year and are often turned to for advice on what books to buy and what course to go on so you will be reaching an influential group of people.

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Training around the world Content and language integrated learning in Estonia By Peeter Mehisto, Estonia

Estonian Context Now a member of the European Union, Estonia regained its independence from the Soviet Union in 1991. Estonia's population is 1.34 million. Estonian is the official state language. Today, there are both Estonian and Russian-language schools. Approximately 77 % of students attend Estonian-medium schools and 23% Russian-language schools. Publicly-funded universities offer the vast majority of programming in Estonian. Several private post-secondary institutions offer instruction through Russian or English. With the re-establishment of independence in 1991, the curriculum of Russian-language schools was harmonised with that of Estonian-language schools. The number of hours dedicated to the study of Estonian in Russian-language schools was increased. Estonian was taught as a second language beginning in Grade 1 for 45 minutes per day. Children usually enter Grade 1 at the age of seven. Standard second language teaching methods did not lead to widespread fluency in the state language among members of this segment of the population. Estonia explored language learning options and chose to adopt voluntary CLIL (Content and Language Integrated Learning) programming. Considerable work was done with a wide range of stakeholders to plan programming, raise awareness of the CLIL option and to reduce resistance to the innovation.

In 2000, Estonia launched a voluntary Estonian-language CLIL programme for seven year-olds in four Russian-medium schools. In 2003, a late CLIL programme was established beginning in Grade 6. The early and late programmes have expanded rapidly to include a total of 54 kindergartens and schools. A Language Immersion Centre was established to coordinate programme management, the creation of learning materials, the training of educators and administrators, research efforts and public relations. Student achievement in the early CLI programme has been studied extensively. Students are achieving curriculum expectations in all subjects. In general, they have learned to speak Estonian well. They perform equally well or better on Russian language tests as the control group students studying only through the medium of Russian. Late CLIL student achievement is currently under study.

What does a teacher need to know/understand/learn before becoming a CLIL teacher rather than a regular content or language teacher? Good CLIL practice goes hand in hand with good practice in education in general. However, as CLIL is initially taxing for both students and teachers, it is particularly important that general good practice in education be applied with particular care. Moreover, there are also some aspects of teaching in CLIL that are in some way unique.

PB

CLIL does not simply involve changing the language of instruction, it also requires a shift in teaching practice. CLIL content teachers, be they, for example, teaching maths, science or geography, are also teachers of language. CLIL language teachers are also teachers of content. They support the acquisition of both the language and the content needed for the subjects being taught through the CLIL language.

What else do CLIL teachers need to keep in mind? Language is an emotional vehicle. Emotions touch the core of who we are. They can help or hinder learning. Working through a second language carries with it a certain stress. The learner in CLIL will face difficulties in finding the right words or likely feel restricted in expressing complicated thoughts and emotions through simple language. Thus, in CLIL, managing the emotional dimension takes on a particular importance. The CLIL teacher works to guide students in harnessing positive emotions and managing destructive ones. In part, this is done by guiding students in better understanding and managing the learning process and their expectations. CLIL students cannot expect to understand every word they read or hear. They need to accept a certain degree of ambiguity. They require support in keeping this in mind. At the same time, the student’s own learning strategies need to be analysed and developed so the students can take greater control of their learning and reduce the ambiguity. Students can also benefit from being provided with and encouraged to use a lexis for speaking about feelings. Moreover, CLIL teachers work to build a secure learning environment where students feel safe in experimenting with language and content. Such a learning environment is free from sarcasm, is constructive in nature, and sufficiently challenging. Above all, as with all students, teachers need to believe that their students will succeed. CLIL is not just for the gifted. Although it may be counter-intuitive for some people, it is important to know that average students are successful in CLIL. They simply require that their learning be properly scaffolded.

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How do CLIL teachers build that scaffolding? Chunking of information into smaller more manageable parcels; using graphic organisers, tables and diagrams; co-constructing and negotiating meaning; providing language support by organising and displaying needed discourse patterns and vocabulary are all ways of scaffolding learning in CLIL. In CLIL, there is an emphasis on active learning and peer cooperative work. As a regular diet of teacher-centred lessons and extensive teacher-talk can be de-motivating and disempowering, they are avoided so as not to rob students of opportunities to explore and apply learning. This is particularly important when one is learning through a second language. CLIL students need to use and apply both language and content in the here and now, if rich teacher input is to translate into rich student intake and output. Thus, CLIL seeks to provide ‘just-in-time’ language so that students can immediately enjoy the payoff of actively working with their peers in applying meaningful content.

How does the ‘just-in-time’ concept apply to language? In Nicaragua, when deaf children were for the first time ever brought together into specially established schools for the hearing impaired, educators tried to teach them lip-reading and speech. In general, those schools failed to teach those skills. Students, wanting to communicate in the here and now, started using various signs and gestures creating what would eventually become a local sign language. They were not prepared to wait to learn language, in this case lip-reading and speech for future use. They wanted to communicate in the here and now and found a way to do just that.

“CLIL is a ‘just-in-time’ approach as opposed to a ‘just-in-case’ approach.” Since in CLIL students would not get very far inventing their own language, teachers identify what the students want to say in the here and now and provide students with the basic discourse patterns and other bits of language required to immediately put content and language to use. CLIL students are not learning a language simply for the sake of language learning and future use, but are putting just-learnt language to immediate use while learning and manipulating content that is relevant to their lives. CLIL is a ‘just-in-time’ approach as opposed to a ‘just-in-case’ approach.

What do teachers need to keep in mind once students become more adept at communicating through the CLIL language? As students progress in CLIL and are able to readily communicate through the second language, it is tempting for content teachers to leave language to the language teachers. This is likely to slow language learning down to a crawl. Only by having all the CLIL teachers expecting and supporting continued language development will students be able to maintain the ongoing development of language. Students need to be kept in what Vygotsky calls the zone of proximal development (ZPD). Building on Vygotsky’s original ZPD definition and on Ohta who redefined the ZPD for language learning, I would say that in CLIL: the ZPD is the distance between the actual developmental level as determined by individual manipulation of content and language knowledge, and the level of potential development achievable through the collaborative manipulation of content and language knowledge

with (an) adult(s) or peer(s). It also includes the distance between the actual management of one’s own learning and the potential level of self-management of learning when working with (an) adult(s) or peer(s). Interaction with peers and adults acts as a form of scaffolding helping to support the construction of meaning for existing words and structures, for the content contained within the words, and for grammatical form. However, it is also a CLIL teacher’s aim to develop in students a capacity to self-instruct, to build or otherwise access their own scaffolding. By interacting with others or even imagining interaction with others, a learner can perceive his/her short-comings in expressing him/herself. Learners, who have several years of schooling, can self-instruct and self-evaluate by searching for terms in dictionaries or databases or by reviewing grammar rules. They can seek out summaries of content topics in the form of précis or charts. Learners can also acquire, apply and hone a variety of other learning skills such as effective ways of studying, problem-solving, goals-setting and managing their own feelings and attitude. Once a certain segment of self-instruction has been completed, the learner can seek opportunities for applying the learning while also seeking support from others in refining this self-acquired knowledge and skill. In short, CLIL’s three-fold focus on language, content and learning skills needs to be maintained throughout the life of the programme.

Is CLIL a passing fad, today's quick-time solution? CLIL-type practice has been around for thousands of years. Already some five thousand years ago, the Akkadians, who had conquered the Sumerians, used Sumerian as a language of instruction to learn subjects such as theology, botany and zoology. Despite roots that reach far back in history, CLIL is very much a modern democratic tool. It is respectful of local culture and language. It aims to support the development of a region's first language and the CLIL language. The world is becoming increasingly integrated. Global competition, cooperation and communication are on the rise. Inter-disciplinarity is increasing and technologies are converging. CLIL is an efficient fusion of content and language that helps students to meet the demands of the modern world. It is a solid success story. I believe it is here to stay.

References Ohta, A.S. (2005) Interlanguage pragmatics in the zone of proximal development. Pragmatics in Instructed Language Learning 33 (3), 503-517. Vygotsky, L.S. (1978) Mind in Society: The Development of Higher Psychological Processes. Harvard University Press, Cambridge, MA.

Author Peeter Mehisto has worked with a wide range of stakeholders to develop Estonia's national CLIL programme. He is a winner of several awards in education. Originating from Canada, based in England and Estonia, Peeter is currently researching CLIL programme management and pedagogy. Author, trainer, manager and educator, he has extensive experience in working with teachers and administrators to support the implementation of best practice in CLIL programming. His has worked with educators and administrators in North America, Asia and several European countries. He is the lead author of a new book entitled Uncovering CLIL: Content and Language Integrated Learning in Bilingual and Multilingual Education (Mehisto, Marsh, Frigols, 2008, Macmillan Education).

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Teacher development – a worm’s eye view By Amol Padwad, India

Introduction Teacher development (TD) is an important aspect of educational policies and programmes. It has a crucial bearing on the quality of services and products of any educational enterprise. Ensuring continuous professional development of teachers after entering the teaching profession is a major concern for policy makers, programme designers and educational managements alike. This issue is further complicated by the diverse views of professional development held by different stake-holders. The present article attempts to look at the views of teachers from an Indian context about professional development and to suggest some implications of these views for teacher development theory and practice. First a brief description of the context and the profile of teachers will be given. This will be followed by a discussion of the prevalent (academic) views of teacher development vis-à-vis these teachers’ views on the matter. Finally, some implications for teacher development theory and practice will also be discussed.

Background The worms in the title represent the teachers working in resource-poor areas of central India, teaching English as a second/ third language. These teachers usually have poor language competence, little useful pre-service training or qualification and low self-esteem. Many of them have become teachers not by choice, but by compulsion. Their context is characterized by: • High social (‘prestige’) status of English: Ability to use English effectively is not only a passport to upward and onward social mobility, but also to higher social standing for the user. • Huge, centralised and alienating system: Education at all levels is centrally controlled, involves millions of students and several thousand teachers; an individual student or teacher feels lost in the system; their voices find little scope in the system. (But please see Kadepurkar, 2008 for a refreshing exception to this) • Uniform syllabuses and centrally prescribed textbooks: Since the system is state-sponsored and controlled, there are usually uniform syllabuses and textbooks prescribed for very large number of learners, irrespective of the diversity of their contexts, needs and abilities.

• Examination- and quantity-oriented work: The main (and often the sole) yardstick of ‘success’ is the students’ performance in year-end examinations; teaching-learning is strongly conditioned by the examination patterns and policies; monitoring and measuring of achievement is done quantitatively; qualitative growth is usually ignored. • Culture of ‘teacher as knower, filler of learners’ heads’: the traditional paradigm of education, which sets the teacher in a position of authority and source of knowledge, still holds strong; classrooms are marked by a clear hierarchical division between teachers and students. The irony of the situation is that the teachers have to work under the heavy burden of expectations from students, their parents, the society at large and the educational authorities, while there are neither incentives, nor pressure, nor scope, nor support to develop professionally. Another irony is that a significant number of teachers seem frustrated with the situation, but hardly anyone seems to go beyond blaming the system and reconciling themselves to it. These teachers come with little awareness of ELT theory and practice, since a typical pre-service professional course consists of a one-year general teacher training programme with a small component of teaching English. Once in service, they get very few opportunities for further development. The mandatory inservice training is usually for about ten days every five or six years. There are occasional training programmes focusing on immediate needs, for example, on a newlyintroduced textbook or reforms in evaluation. These training programmes serve only short-term instrumental needs and are usually not designed to make any contribution to long-term developmental goals. The metaphor of ‘worm’ is deliberately chosen, and it is not entirely negative. The comparison of these teachers with worms is intended to suggest that they are numerous but insignificant, faceless members of an enormous system, where they do not seem to possess any individual identity or voice. They do not have any role in or control over policy making, syllabus design, materials production, selection of textbooks, evaluation patterns and methods, or even much of their classroom practices. For all practical purposes their job is restricted to carrying out as faithfully as possible what has been assigned to them ‘from above’ often without knowing what, why or how.

But as already said, not everything is negative about being ‘worms’. Worms are closer to the ‘ground reality’ and if they do not know what happens ‘above’ at the top, they have a first hand knowledge of what happens ‘below’ in the actual field. Ultimately it is these numerous faceless teachers who ‘battle it out’ in the field and are responsible for how a teaching programme is implemented in practice. So these ‘worms’ have the potential of making or breaking an innovation or initiative. It is therefore crucial to try to understand ‘Teacher Development’ from these ‘worms’’ perspective. An understanding of how teachers think of professional development, what their attitude towards and expectations from professional development are, may help in better tuning of the policies and programmes of professional development to the actual needs and interests of teachers. The present article does not claim to suggest ways of achieving such fine-tuning, but only aims to present some vital questions that have come up in course of an on-going longterm experiment in teacher development in a small region of central India.

This is about teacher development The notion of ‘development’ is used in this article in a specific sense, much broader than and different from ‘training’ and ‘education’. It is important to bear in mind that the entire focus in this article is on ‘development’. Both ‘training’ and ‘education’ refer to processes that are short-term, aimed at specific and narrow goals and are usually managed by others. Both serve a rather limited range of purposes and are often tightly associated with more or less clearly defined and achievable (short-term) objectives. Both notions of ‘training’ and ‘education’ seem to assume that teachers are passive recipients of knowledge and skills; both undervalue the role a teacher plays (or does not bother to play) in his/her own development. ‘Development’ on the other hand is a much broader concept, implying a continuously on-going process with no ultimate end-point, that is primarily fed by one’s personal urge and interest in selfdevelopment. Another important difference is that ‘training’ and ‘education’ seem more formal processes, involving outside agencies and inspirations, while ‘development’ is more informal and voluntary and is usually not an outcome of outside compulsions (though the process may be triggered by outside causes). The process of

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development is often less tangible and visible, as against ‘training’ and ‘education’, which frequently have well-defined and measurable goals. Generally ‘training’ and ‘education’ are assumed to be a part of the larger ‘developmental’ process, and are expected to contribute to continuous professional development of teachers. Teacher development theory and practice seems to project ‘development’ as the overarching goal for a teacher. It is expected of a teacher that s/he keeps growing continually both professionally and personally during his/her lifetime. This process of growth takes him/her on the path of becoming increasingly more effective and achieving greater success as a teacher.

The views of practicing teachers Against this backdrop of the theoretical and idealist perspective on development, it is enlightening to consider the views of practising teachers. When one tries to elicit the views of an average teacher on development, one finds that their beliefs and attitudes are quite different. A small group of teachers, who fit the description of the ‘worms’ above, were interviewed during an experiment in teacher development. (More details of the experiment are given below.) When asked about their thinking about and engaging in their own development, these teachers’ typical responses were: “Why develop at all?”, “What’s wrong with what I am doing now?”, “Development? That’s for the intellectuals!”, “We’ll think of developing when there is need!”, “Of course, I am developing! I have attended many training programmes!” The teachers’ reactions, which are quite representative, imply that • many teachers do not seem to see ‘development’ in its broad, continuous sense; • many teachers do not see any concrete need for personal/ professional development; • many teachers lack interest in selfdevelopment and feel themselves incapable and undeserving of it; • many seem quite comfortable with their well-settled routines and feel insecure about trying out anything new, or feel threatened by the demand to develop; • many are reluctant to take even those few opportunities that come their way.

English Teachers’ Clubs Given this situation, it should not be surprising that hardly anyone seems to take the trouble to engage in personal and professional development. However, an innovative experiment of English Teachers’ clubs (ETCs) going on for over four years in some rural places – especially in Bhandara,

Wardha and Amravati districts – in Maharashtra and Hyderabad in Andhra Pradesh (central India) shows that professional development is possible within this pessimistic situation too. ETCs are small groups of 10-20 teachers with low confidence and competence, frustrated with the given situation, similar to those described above, but differing in their interest1 in self-development and their willingness to try it. The first ETC was formed originally by a small group of motivated teachers in and around Bhandara coming together during a crisis triggered by radical syllabus reform.They showed inclination to stick together for continuing self-development even after the crisis was over. Under a pilot project supported by the Hornby Trust, UK and the British Council an attempt was made to shape this group into an ETC and also to launch a couple of more ETCs in Bhandara. Later more ETCs were launched with different degrees of success in a few other places in Maharashtra and also in the neighbouring states of Andhra Pradesh and Chhatisgarh under a slightly larger project supported by the British Council and ELTeCS. The entire project report and its findings are available with the present author and can be sent to anyone who is interested in them. The more successful clubs meet regularly, plan and carry out need-based activities, share ideas, experiences and anxieties, and provide a strong emotional support to each other. These clubs are characterized by collective work, planning, decision-making and funding. The participation in ETCs has led to some concrete gains for its members as detailed further below. These details are based on my close personal observation of the members of at least two ETCs which I am in constant contact with all along. These observations are also corroborated by the regular feedback and interaction with the ETC members in the periodic meetings of these two ETCs and by the reports from other ETCs2. Here are two quotes from the member-teachers’ feedback: “I must very clearly and openly declare that my participation in the workshops, seminars and meetings of ETC proved to be helpful…. [T]he participation in the abovementioned programmes boosted my confidence and courage. I was motivated by the lectures of the experts whom the ETC had invited.” (NJ – a higher secondary teacher, June 2007) “From my personal experience I can say that ETCs offer teachers a space to voice their concerns and make them feel that in facing problems they are not alone. Moreover, it helps them in drawing jobsatisfaction from their routine work offering them personalized ways for learning and development.” (KD – a tertiary level teacher, August, 2007)

The tangible gains from these clubs in the last four years since their inception are: • greater confidence among the member teachers; • higher language competence: the members being able to handle English more effectively both inside and outside classrooms; • a positive attitude to work: as reflected in their willingness to innovate and experiment in their classrooms, their acceptance of the possibility that they could ‘do something’ and a noticeable decrease in their grudge against the system; • more job satisfaction: the memberteachers increasingly enjoying their work and being enthusiastic about their teaching and considerate to their students; • more professionalism: e.g. more time and serious thought being given to planning their work, making efforts to supplement their teaching with more ideas and materials; • greater professional awareness: significant increase in the participation in professional events like seminars and conferences, greater understanding of theoretical concepts/ frameworks and ability to relate at least some of these to their routine work; • a move towards autonomy in development: e.g. the awareness that development is a long-term and less tangible process, member-teachers looking out for more sources of information and knowledge, undertaking voluntary reading and discussion activities, some enrolling on self-study courses; • higher professional standing in their workplaces, with colleagues and authorities increasingly recognizing their improved performance and occasionally giving them greater responsibilities. Apart from these gains, the experience with the ETCs has also raised some issues. In all places where ETCs are working, they typically involve extremely tiny portion of the teaching community, and fail to attract the remaining vast majority. In order to understand why the idea of an ETC does not appeal to most teachers, I have been constantly comparing the beliefs and attitudes of the members and nonmembers of ETCs. Over the past four years I have come to realize that: • Most teachers seem happy with ‘training’ and do not see any need for ‘development’. However, to be fair, there seems no justification in blaming teachers for having such a feeling. • Probably many teachers have only ‘training’ needs and may not want to venture onto the path of ‘development’. This realisation may largely explain why continued >>>

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only a tiny number of teachers joined the ETCs or seem interested in selfdevelopment. It appears that most teachers do not feel and may not have developmental needs. Development seems essentially a smallscale activity, given the small number of interested/ motivated teachers. Besides, smaller groups seem better able to cater to the various kinds of needs and challenges of development. A professional development programme can be effective and sustainable if it is limited only to those teachers who are really interested in self-development. As I said in the section on TD, development is primarily fed by one’s own personal urge and interest in self development. It can’t be forced. Even when teachers are seriously interested in self-development, they need strong emotional support to initiate and sustain their development. Development is a voluntary activity, hence interest/ motivation is a top priority. Development is a highly individualised activity. Whether in small groups or large, there cannot be one common programme and recipe for the development of all the diverse individuals. Hence it is necessary to help teachers to personalise their developmental process, to gradually identify their personal needs, plans and strategies, which again cannot be identified once and for all, but will keep evolving throughout. Development is an individual activity, but it seems to thrive in a group, apparently because of the emotional support a group can generate through caring and sharing.

The theory and practice gap While this is what the actual experience of working on teacher development suggests, the existing TD theory and practice seem to present a different picture. One may particularly single out some broad assumptions that seem implicit in the existing TD theory (and practice) and contrast them with the points above. These implicit assumptions are: • All teachers are interested in and motivated for self-development. • A teacher understands what professional development implies for him/her. • All teachers perceive the need to develop professionally. • Every teacher can and should develop professionally. The ETCs experience implies a reality different from these assumptions. It underlines the need to take a critical look at these and other similar assumptions and to put them to test. Some of these assumptions may look idealistic and good

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on humanitarian grounds, but may not stand the test of reality. For example, if it turns out that most teachers are interested not in the long-term voluntary process of development, but in short-term need-based training, it should not be wrong to question the expectation that engaging in professional development should be a universal goal for all teachers.

• Since development is an individual process, each individual needs to evolve his/ her personal take on development in terms of his/ her needs, interests, goals and plans. TD theory and practice need to include ways to help personalise the developmental process for every participating teacher.

Implications

Notes:

So what are the implications of all this discussion for TD Theory/Practice? It seems that there are some simple but fundamental questions, like the ones below, that TD theory/ practice needs to address. These questions seem extremely important in the particular context in which we have been working, but it needs to be investigated if these or similar issues are relevant for other contexts too. I suspect that they are significant issues for many other contexts as well.

1. The terms ‘interest’ and ‘motivation’ are used interchangeably in this article, though they may not be synonymous, since I believe that these two are inseparable. The basic point of the argument is they are a sine qua non for anyone to engage in and sustain personal and professional development.

• Is it true that only a few teachers are interested in professional selfdevelopment? • Why do only a few teachers want to develop? Why isn’t everyone interested in self-development? • Is there anything like an ‘aptitude’ or ‘innate urge’3 for development, which is responsible for some teachers going for self-development, and others staying away from developmental process? • Is it justified to expect/ assume that every teacher should strive for professional development? • How can one find out who wants to develop? • How can the interest in self-development be created in those who do not want to develop? • Why waste money, time and efforts on those who don’t want to develop, if there is no need, nor benefit nor interest? These questions lead to the following points of implication for TD theory and practice: • It will be useful for a TD programme to find out if the participants are interested in development. If they are, the programme is likely to be more effective. If they are not, it will be advisable to pay attention to developing interest first, before embarking upon the actual TD programme. • Emotional support is crucial in initiating and sustaining development. So it is necessary to try to build in emotional support in TD activities and programmes. • Since emotional support is difficult to come by in a highly formal setting and in large groups, a TD programme needs to devise and/or support various forms of informal and small-scale networking.

2. There are two studies focusing on the ETC experiment so far: one by K. K. Dixit on ‘facilitator development’ for the ETCs as the M. Ed. dissertation at the College of St. Marks and St. John, Plymouth, and the other by Sanghita Sen on the role of ETCs in professional development as M. A. dissertation to the Institute of Education, London (both 2007). These studies also give some details about the impact of ETCs. 3. The terms ‘aptitude’ and ‘innate urge’ are used, for want of better alternatives, as very vague expressions of the notion of some innate quality or faculty that is responsible for a person’s taking interest in a particular thing. The basic point of the argument is that there is a likelihood of the existence of such ‘aptitude’ for development in some and not in others, and TD theory and practice needs to take this into consideration, at least to investigate if this is really so.

Reference Kadepurkar, H (2008) ‘When teachers write coursebooks’ in the Teacher Trainer, this issue page 10.

Author Amol Padwad is currently Head, Department of English, J.M. Patel College, Bhandara (India) and has 24 years of teaching experience at different levels. He also works as teacher trainer and ELT consultant. He has published several articles, reviews and translations and successfully managed some innovative national and regional ELT projects. His areas of interest are teacher development, ESL/EFL, translation studies, Marathi Grammar, bird watching and science popularization. Email: [email protected]

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Late age language learning By Anita Pincas, UK Ellen Bialystok of York University, Canada, has been widely quoted as suggesting that speaking two languages slows the brain’s decline with age, on the basis of a study that compared various cognitive test results for monolinguals and bilinguals (Bialystok, et al (2004). Dr Paul Iverson of University College London Centre for Human Communication likewise achieved some publicity when he maintained that later life difficulties in hearing and understanding a second language are not an inevitable effect of ageing. Through training, the adult brain can be retrained to cope with the sound system of second languages. We can essentially change the 'perceptual warping' produced by the habits of the mother tongue so as to acquire a new set of phonetics (Iverson et al 2005). Dr. Gitit Kavé, a clinical neuro-psychologist from Tel Aviv University, has been quoted in numerous popular science journals for her recent finding that senior citizens who speak more languages do better in cognitive tests. The results for groups of bilingual, trilingual, and multilingual individuals between 75 and 95 showed that the number of languages spoken correctly predicts good cognitive test scores beyond the effect of other factors such as age, gender, place of birth, age at immigration, or education. Those who reported being most fluent in a language other than their mother tongue scored higher on average than those who said their mother tongue was their best language. She has been quoted as saying that “knowing and speaking many languages may protect the brain against the effects of aging, although the cause is not known” (Kavé et al 2008). Why should such ideas arouse interest? Because the Critical Period Hypothesis (Singleton & Ryan, 2004) is still a matter of argument among language acquisition researchers, and is certainly still a commonplace belief for the public at large. And also because in recent years we have all been made aware of our increasing longevity, with the consequent interest in discovering more about what the effects of ageing on the healthy brain really are. For a very long time, it has been an accepted fact that retirement should take place at age 60 or 65, and that there is little point in attempting to learn very much after that age because memory declines so severely that only exceptional people could achieve any success. Now, however, these views are being overturned all around us, with overwhelming evidence from such sources as the University of the Third Age, and adult education colleges across the world (especially in Europe and the USA) that not only do older people want to continue learning, but are extremely good at it. In many UK Adult and Community Education colleges they mingle in the same classes with younger students and show consistently satisfactory outcomes {Jamieson 2007). Most recently in my own college, the Institute of Education of London University, where we teach only post-graduate courses, between 710% of students are over 50, some over 70. We conducted a small survey of these older students and found that they were very

confident about their learning abilities. Another recent UK survey found that 15% of all undergraduate students are over 50. One of my doctoral students, Rosemary Westwell (Westwell 2006) recently completed a thesis examining her success in learning Spanish while in her mid-fifties. These and similar findings elsewhere have renewed interest in discovering whether there is genuinely a third age sector at the far end of the lifecourse. Of course, adult learning has been recognised for decades, but older adult learning has not. I now run a one term master’s course in older learning*, as well as a special research group around this topic at the Institute of Education of London University. There has been very little research into how older people approach and succeed in language learning, but at least two recent reports have been of particular interest. One presents a detailed analysis of the evidence for and against the Critical Period Hypothesis (CPH) (Nikolov 2006) and indicates that age-related decline is subject to compensatory mechanisms. Given that older people can learn an L2 by using declarative rather than procedural memory, for example in vocabulary acquisition and grammar, their competence is not susceptible to the CPH, and many show extremely good L2 retention. An investigation of the strategies used by good older language learners (Ohly, K 2007), demonstrated that they rely on metacognitive strategies to control, plan and evaluate their language learning, on cognitive strategies to memorize, make inferences and guess, and on social/affective strategies to control the more emotional aspects e.g. self-encouragement or seeking clarification by native speakers, as well as also on sound communicative strategies. In other words, they seemed to be good at learning generally and then at applying their skills to FL tasks in particular. So it seems to be no coincidence that many language schools now offer “Club 50+” courses and that foreign language study is cited by NIACE among the most commonly chosen subjects of the older (55+) learner in the UK. And why not?

References: *Issues in Educating and Training Mature Adults (50+)

http://ioewebserver.ioe.ac.uk/ioe/cms/get.aspcid =882&882_1=830&var1=3&var2=MAMODIET MA Aldridge, F. and A. Tuckett (2007) What Older People Learn: The Whys and Wherefores of Older People Learning. Leicester: National Institute of Adult Continuing Education (NIACE). http://www.niace.org.uk/publications/W/WOPL. asp. Bialystok, E., et al (2004) “Bilingualism, Aging, and Cognitive Control” Psychology and Aging Vol 19 p.290 -303] Iverson P. et al (June 15-17 2005) "Plasticity in Speech Perception” Workshop, Centre for Human Communication University College London, http://www.phon.ucl.ac.uk/psp/index.html Jamieson, A., (2007) Higher Education Study in Later Life: What is the point? Ageing & Society, 27(3) May-June, 363-384. Kavé, G. et al (2008) “Multilingualism and cognitive state in the oldest old” Psychology and Aging Vol 23(1) 70-78 Nikolov M. et al (2006), “Recent Research On Age, Second Language Acquisition, And Early Foreign Language Learning” Annual Review of Applied Linguistics Vol 26, p. 234-260 Ohly, K (2007) “Older learners of German and their use of language learning strategies” in Gabrielatos, C. et al Eds Papers from the Lancaster University Postgraduate Conference in Linguistics and Language Teaching (LAEL PG) Volume 1, http://www.ling.lancs.ac.uk/pgconference/v01.h tm Singleton, D., & Ryan, L. (2004) Language acquisition: The age factor (2nd edition). Clevedon, Avon: Multilingual Matters. Westwell, R., 2006 “The Development of Language Acquisition in a Mature Learner” PhD Institute of Education, London University.

Author Anita Pincas is Senior Lecturer in the Department of Continuing and Professional Education, Institute of Education, University of London. Her scholarly interests, research and publications are in critical pedagogy as relevant to school and higher education, applied linguistics, and eteaching and e-learning. She was among the first to offer an MA TESOL by internet (1993), and still runs the pioneering Online Education and Training distance training course for language teachers and others. http://www.ioe.ac.uk/english/OET.htm

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Article Watch Below are brief summaries of relevant articles from other journals. ELT Journal. 2008. http://eltj.oupjournals.org Vol. 62/1: pp. 3-10. ‘Critical incidents in ELT initial teacher training’. Thomas S.C. Farrell. Eighteen trainee teachers on an English language teacher education course in Singapore reflected on critical incidents that occurred while teaching. Results indicated that, while analyzing critical incidents can be useful for trainees, language teacher educators should realise that classification of such incidents into neat categories may be problematic. When giving a critical incident assignment, care should be taken, especially in the handling of ‘lows’ in teaching. Vol. 62/1: pp. 37-46. ‘Integrating feedback and reflection in teacher preparation’. Caroline Brand. Outcomes of recent research into short, intensive TESOL certificate courses suggest that feedback is a contentious and problematic component. The author proposes a new approach to the postteaching-practice meeting where feedback and reflection are integrated in the form of reflective conversations. A number of features are suggested to address the problems identified in research – e.g., the presence of language learners and a nonevaluating facilitator in the meeting. Vol. 62/2: pp. 139-47. ‘Teacher research for professional development’. Derin Atay. A study conducted at the English preparatory school of a state university in Istanbul, Turkey, aimed to discuss the research experiences of Turkish EFL teachers in a 6 week research-oriented INSET programme. Sixty-two teachers took part in the programme which comprised modules on theoretical knowledge of ELT (2 weeks), issues for investigation (2 weeks), and investigating the classroom and doing research (2 weeks). Topics came from the teachers. Data was gathered from teachers’ nrratives and journals. It seems that the teachers developed their research skills, became more aware of the teaching/learning process, felt fresher about their work and collaborated with colleagues. Despite several problems with the experiment, the author feels that the focus on teachers actually doing their own research within an INSET programme leads to good professional development. English Teaching Professional. Issue 56, pp. 54-55. May 2008. www.etprofessional.com ‘Improving through integrated workshops’. Emilce Vela was asked by her school supervisor to run a four-year series of

workshops in a teacher development project for primary teachers in Argentina. She had been working as an English teacher for about 10 years but had never been a coordinator/mentor/in-service teacher trainer before. In this article she describes how she went about preparing the project. Interesting reading for would-be or starter trainers. Language Issues (The journal of NATECLA), vol. 19/1, pp. 4-13. Winter 2008. ISBN 02635833. ‘Theory, practice and professional identity’. Eva Illes. The author questions presentation of theory and practice as opposing concepts as this causes a distrust of theory on the part of teachers, assumes a hierarchical relationship between theoreticians and teachers, creates a tendency to pendulum swings in classroom practice (in, e.g., the teaching of grammar), and reinforces the status of English native speaker teachers. Instead, the writer supports an interactive model where theoreticians connect to practice and teachers do classroom research and articulate what they come to know. The implications for ESOL of adopting an interactive model are discussed.

Rinvolucri; ‘ELF: a response to Jennifer Jenkins and Mario Rinvolucri’, Nick Shepherd (MET’s language editor). These pages present three short extracts from Jenkins’ original article of 2004, a counter article by Rinvolucri, and a piece by Shepherd in which he (1) tries to find some middle ground between the combatants and (2) looks at the question more from the learner’s point of view.

Language Teaching Research. 2008. ISSN 1362-1688. http://ltr.sagepubl.com

RELC Journal. Vol 39/1: pp. 25-50. April. 2008. http://RELC.sagepub.com .

Vol. 12/1: pp. 105-24. ‘Trainee teachers’ understanding of content/language connections’. Rita Elaine Silver. This paper explores the developing understandings of language and academic content connections of pre-service teacher-trainees preparing to teach in Singapore’s bilingual education system. In parallel, it explores the author’s own developing understanding of the teacher-trainees’ perspectives. It is thus an example of ‘exploratory practice’ (EP), being about both teacher and trainer development.

‘A functional analysis of teachers’ instructions’. Richard Watson Todd, Intisarn Chai-yasuk & Nuantip Tantisawetrat. This article attempts to describe the functional structure of teacher instructions. The authors examine nine sets of transcribed instructions from four lessons taught on an EAP course at a Thai university. On the basis of an analysis of the transcripts a potential structure of directing-transactions is suggested.

Vol. 12/2: pp. 161-82. ‘Looking beyond the teachers’ classroom behaviour: novice and experienced ESL teachers’ pedagogical knowledge’. Elizabeth Gatbouton. A study was set up to discover what pedagogical knowledge novice ESL teachers have internalized after having completed a teacher training programme and how this knowledge compares to that of more experienced teachers. The knowledge was examined specifically in relation to language management, procedural issues and handling student reactions and attitudes. Implications for teacher training are discussed. Modern English Teacher. April. 2008. www.onlinemet.com ‘About Language’, pp. 15-20. Three contributions: ‘ELF at the gate’, Jennifer Jenkins; ‘What sort of standard does ELF need to reach?’, Mario

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Teachers and Teaching: theory and practice. http://www.tandf.co.uk/journals/listings/t.asp Routledge. ISSN 1354-0602. The journal of the International Study Association for Teachers and Teaching. Vol. 13/6: pp 587-99. Dec., 2007. ‘The advantages and disadvantages of using ICT as a mediating artefact in classrooms compared to alternative tools’. May Britt Postholm. The aim of this interesting article is to describe and show the conditions that have to be satisfied if ICT is to have an advantage over alternative tools in a classroom. The main focus is on the importance of the context of the learning activities, in which the teacher plays an important part.

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Publications Received The purpose of these notices about recent publications in ELT and related fields is to broadly indicate topic and to point out likely points of interest to mentors, teacher trainers and teacher educators. Print size is noted only if unusual. Dimensions are indicated only if exceptionally small or large. E.g., 148pp+ means “148pp plus an informative roman numbered preface, etc”. All books are paperback unless otherwise stated. Dealing with Difficulties: solutions, strategies and suggestions for successful teaching. L. Prodromou & L. Clandfield (2007) Delta Publishing. ISBN 978-1-90508500-2. 128pp; nearly A4. This is a teacher’s resource book mostly of recipe-like procedures organized in a three-level hierarchy. For example, section 1 (Large classes and classroom management) comprises eight sub-sections (e.g., Managing big numbers, Engaging students with the material, Moving students around & Drilling). The sub-section on managing big numbers comprises seven distinctly titled procedures. All in all, more than 150 procedures are presented. Sections 2-6 are: Discipline problems, Mixed-level classes, Homework, Teaching exam classes & Professional development (3pp). Each section has an informative introduction. In addition, there are a few relatively discursive sections headed ‘Tips and techniques’ (ca. 2 pp. each). For example, on pp. 42-43 there is a section entitled ‘Diffusing discipline’ which presents short tips and options under six headings (e.g., A rewarding system [sic] & Sanctions). In the final third of the book, many of the procedures seem relevant to dealing with difficulties only in the sense that you can forestall some kinds of problem by being an interesting teacher with a large and varied store of teaching moves. Written for TESOL teachers, this book is very recommendable, although experienced teachers may find a considerable proportion of the procedures very familiar – the following, for instance. Present students with the jumbled up letters of a long word from which students try to make as many other words as they can. No index; one page of recommended further reading.

The following four titles mainly concern pre-secondary education: Teaching Young Language Learners. A. Pinter (2006) Oxford University Press. ISBN 0-19-442207-0. 180pp+. This book is in the publisher’s long-running series of ‘handbooks’ for ESOL teachers (and, to a degree, foreign language teachers generally). Teacher trainers are also mentioned as potential readers. This a background- rather than a resource-book or a book of bit-sized tips. Basic, theorygrounded information is presented about a wide range of core issues under the following chapter headings: Learning and development, Learning the first language at home and at school, Learning a second/third language at home and at school, Policy: primary ELT programmes, Teaching listening and speaking, Teaching reading and writing, Teaching vocabulary and grammar, Learning to learn, Materials evaluation and materials design, Assessment, Research in the primary English classroom. Each section ends with suggestions for further reading. At the end of the book is an appendix of action research tasks and a glossary. Unlike most of the titles in this issue’s set of book notices, this one has a proper index and bibliography. It is recommendable particularly for pre-service and novice primary teachers. Experienced trainers are unlikely to find a great deal in it that is new, and in at least one respect the author’s views seem outdated. Namely, in recent years considerable doubt has been cast on the factuality of Chomsky’s Universal Grammar (see, e.g., M. Tomasello. 2003. Constructing a Language. Harvard University Press). Time for a Story. J. Rűdiger-Harper (2005) Chadburn Publishing. ISBN 3-033-00366-4; ca. 100pp. A4. This book, by a very experienced EFL teacher based in Switzerland, includes eight original stories for use at primary level (ca. 8-14 years of age). The stories, which are in large font (to make reading easier), range from about three to eight pages in length. Every fifth line is numbered. For each one, there are plentiful questions and tasks for pre-, during-, and after-listening. Each of the

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eight units exemplifies a different approach to using the stories; e.g., sometimes pupils hear the story (from the teacher) before they read it themselves; sometimes they read it without first hearing it. The author’s aim has been “primarily to engage students in the use of language at a level where comprehension and meaning is paramount” (from Preface and Teaching Notes). This book supplies something important that few coursebooks provide. There is an inserted, stapled A4 supplement of English-German wordlists for the stories, but the book itself is not bound to any particular national setting. 100 Ideas for Primary Assemblies. F. Sedgwick. (2006) Continuum. ISBN 08264-9101-4. ca. 13x19.5cm. 148pp+. The author, a former UK headteacher, presents his varied ideas for enlivening school assemblies in the following sections: Autumn/Winter (e.g., China, A mathematics assembly, Snowy weather, A Sikh story for November or December, Why is a good story like an onion?), Spring (e.g., Skills, Anger, The runaway son), Summer (e.g., 4th July, Exercise, Robin Hood, Bigotry, Dr Barnardo’s) and, with just five ideas, Dealing with special days (e.g., A death in the school). Highly UK-centred, but nevertheless a likely source of inspiration for anyone who leads assemblies.

continued >>>

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101 Essential Lists for the Early Years. P. Tassoni. (2006) Continuum. ISBN 0-82648863-3. ca. 13x19.5cm. 115pp+. An “early years trainer”, the author offers her lists in the following sections: Starting out (e.g., Your essential kit; Websites, books and magazines), Layout and organization (e.g., Managing snacks and toilets, The dough table), Planning (e.g., Different types of planning), Ideas for activities (e.g., Encouraging pre-reading skills, Favourite books, Favourite nursery rhymes), Working with children (e.g., Dealing with tantrums, Helping children to concentrate), Observation and assessment (e.g., A quick tour of observation methods, Sharing information with parents), Parents (e.g., Showing new parents around, Moans and complaints), Special needs and inclusion (e.g., Early identification, Watching out for hearing loss, Support, websites and

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resources), Staying safe (e.g., Signs of child abuse, Dealing with threadworms, Your own back care), Coping with management and inspection (e.g., Working with assistants and volunteers, Preparing for inspection), and Moving on (e.g., Making the most of training, Where to look for a job). The lists vary in length, with few being longer than one page. For example, List 58 (keeping in contact with parents), has a two line introduction and then seven reminders, e.g., “Webcams – these are really controversial, but some parents like being able to see their child at any point”. This could be a real eye-opener for preservice teachers, ones thinking of working in the UK in particular.

ERRATUM In the bibliography section in the last issue, the bibliographical data was incorrect for one book. It should have read: Wright, T. and R. Bolitho (2007) Trainer Development. www.lulu.com The book is available on Amazon. [http://www.amazon.co.uk/TrainerDevelopment-TonyWright/dp/1847532322/ref=sr_1_1?ie =UTF8&s=books&qid=1215606497&sr =8-1], other online book dealers and through all normal booksellers. ISBN: 978-1847532329

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Postgraduate degrees in Applied Linguistics by distance or on campus macquarie UNIVERSITY

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The Department of Linguistics is home to six research centres and groups and has more than 850 current postgraduate students in over 30 countries. I Rigorous and challenging programs I Applied Linguistics, TESOL, Literacy, Language Program Management and Teaching English for Specific Purposes strands

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Special Features of the programme: I Flexible, modular structure allowing part (up to four-years) or full-time study I Transferable credits may be accrued as follows: 60 credits – Certificate TESOL 120 credits – Diploma TESOL 180 credits– MA TESOL All modules are based on the principle of linking theory to the ESOL classroom and professional development e.g. active participation in classroom observation. Programme offers core modules plus a range of options allowing specialisation. A non-assessed Graduate Study Skills course provides help and advice related to both study and professional development.

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MA in Teaching English to Young Learners (by Distance)

The Centre for English Language Teaching, Department of Educational Studies, University of York, is the only centre in the UK to run this highly specialised MA in TEYL. The MA in TEYL is a two-year programme comprising eight multimedia self-study modules, plus participation in an annual Preparatory Course which can be followed face-to-face or online. The face-to-face Preparatory Course will be delivered at three different times of year: during July in York, during November/December in Singapore, MAininCanada Teaching to The online Preparatory Course in and in Spring 2009 (to beEnglish confirmed). February each year is available for those unable Young Learners (by Distance)to attend any of the face-to-face Preparatory courses. Assessment is by eight module assignments, some of which require the carrying out of small-scale classroom-based research projects. Emphasis is on the linking of theory and practice, making extensive use of material from authentic classes. Students can choose to focus on one of the following age groups: 6-11 years, 11-16 years, or 6-16 years. Visit our web site: www.york.ac.uk/celt/teyl/ma_teyl.htm For further information contact the MA Programme Administrator (ref TTJ07/08) CELT, Vanbrugh College, University of York, York YO10 5DD, UK Email: [email protected] / Telephone: ++44 1904 433688 / Fax: ++44 1904 432481

Norwich Institute for Language Education NILE offers a range of professional development courses for teachers and trainers of English. Please see the website for full details—www.nile-elt.com

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All of NILE’s Teachers’ courses are eligible for Comenius funding Norwich Institute for Language Education , 82 Upper St Giles Street , Norwich, NR2 1LT Tel/Fax: +44(0)1603 664473/664493 email: [email protected] www.nile-elt.com

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