English Raven

An apology to English Raven members and blog followers...

Well, you may have noticed that there haven't been many posts for the past 6 weeks or so on the blog, and some English Raven members are no doubt wondering where the World News for Kids articles and new World Adventure Kids project are headed. Still others are wondering what has happened to all the interviews and follow-up articles I promised for this blog...

And yet others have assumed that I have fallen into a voluminous black sack somewhere and can't crawl out. Perhaps others are hoping that's actually true!

The truth is that a new publishing project has landed on my lap and it has deadlines that are extreme. Projects like English Raven certainly don't generate anywhere near the income required to turn down publishing projects like this one, and what additional attention I can spare needs to be thrown into my online TOEFL services, which - in comparison to English Raven - do in fact generate a healthy income.

So my heartfelt apologies to people wondering where all the development in English Raven is going, and a humble plea to be a little patient... My current publishing project will wind up at the end of December this year, and I'll be free to dedicate some energy to English Raven and its hoards of materials and projects from early next year. Nothing is lost, nothing is cancelled. There's just a bit of time out here to generate the sort of income I need in order to pursue the projects I love to do and dream about developing. I'll be back in the early new year in 2010 - with a vengeance!

Apologies again,

~ Jason

:D

The Korean notion of "waeguk-saram" (foreigner)

If you've spent any significant amount of time in South Korea and picked up even the most rudimentary vocabulary of Korean, you've most likely heard the word waeguk-saram more times than you could possibly count.

That's because, in Korea, that's what you are if you aren't Korean: waeguk-saram (or sometimes just waegukin) means "foreigner".

Personally, I've never particularly liked the word "foreigner", as it isn't too far removed from a word that resounds with even more sense of isolation in "alien" (which is, in fact, the word most often used in translation for waeguk-saram in formal/bureacratic Korean). In Australia at least, it has never been a particularly polite or refined way of referring to someone of a different nationality who happens to be visiting your country, and is almost never heard with reference to someone who has actually moved here to live, work, or study. You'll see and hear terms like "international student", "international visitor", and "migrant" much more often than you'll hear a blanket term like "foreigner".

Needless to say, during 10 years of living in Korea, it often made me wince ever so slightly when I had to hear every Park, Lee and Jung refer to me (usually while I was standing right next to them) as "that there foreigner". Remembering that sensation, I'm even more sensitive about ever using the word myself now that I'm back in my own country and surrounded by such a rich array of nationalities.

However, I've always felt that I didn't have quite the full picture when it came to waeguk-saram and Koreans' understanding and use of the term. That was confirmed today when I took my wife and kids to meet a gathering of Korean mums and housewives who had decided to meet up in Melbourne for some lunch and bonding.

My main job was to take care of our son and baby daughter while my wife engaged in some much-needed chinwagging with other Korean ladies - all of whom are relatively recently arrived in Australia as migrants and applicants for permanent residence. I was doing a very good job with this and keeping my nose firmly out of their business until it occurred to me that I was hearing those terms waeguk-saram and waegukin again and again from their conversation. I got curious and listened in a bit, not all that naughtily I might add (it was apparent to everyone there that I speak decent Korean and I was seated right there at a table with them!), to figure out why this - one of my least-favourite Korean terms - was being used so much.

Abruptly, I realised that these ladies - with the exception of my wife, who knows my distaste for the word and was the only one of these particular Korean ladies actually married to a non-Korean - were referring to all and sundry around them in their new home in Australia as waeguk-saram or waegukin: foreigners and foreign-ish things! I was amused and startled at the same time by this, and later explained to my wife why.

1. The term Hoju-saram (Australian) was used very rarely in their conversational dialogue - waeguk-saram was by far the dominant referent.

2. If anyone could/should be referred to as foreigners in this environment (Australia), it would be the Koreans themselves - not the Australians, not the Chinese-Australians, Vietnamese-Australians (etc.) all about them.

3. Even if this is the basic case (that these newish Korean arrivals are the actual "foreigners" in this context), the majority of Australians wouldn't see them that way (given they are here as migrants), and would almost certainly never directly refer to them that way.

  

Bizarre as it might sound, I was listening to "foreigners" referring to natives in their own country (who wouldn't necessarily consider the foreigners as being such nor would ever directly call them that)  as the foreigners. Does that make sense, or have I twisted my own concept into too many figure eights?

It was a revelation to me, because while in Korea I got so used to being labelled a foreigner that I actually began to regularly refer to myself and my friends as being such. You'll even see "foreign teacher" being the popular term of parlance in recruitment and scheduling in Korean schools. Being called a foreigner and being constantly reminded of your foreign condition is all a part of handling the Korean context. But even here in my own country, to these people I'm still the foreigner! While in Korea, sitting around a table with other Australians (or for that matter even other westerners) I just cannot in my wildest dreams imagine anyone referring to the Koreans around us as foreigners!

I'm not relating this experience here to have a quip at Koreans about their concept of "foreigner"- rather, I'm admitting that I guess I didn't really understand just how deep the Korean root feeling of ethnicity (and a deeply ingrained sense of "us" versus "them") runs - and (I confess) I still don't know now! I can say with some confidence that no Korean really uses the term "foreigner" in an attempt to be rude or derogatory; for them it is a simple statement of fact that indicates a separation of Korean from non-Korean, irrespective of location or context. It may sound a little scary or extreme to some (I'll confess, myself included) for there to be such a quick and all-encompassing distinction made in many Koreans' minds, just as it is rather heart-warming to hear the Koreans' instinctive use of uri ("our") when they refer to family members and possessions.

  

Just when you thought you had something figured, eh?

:D

Halloween games and learning materials for kids

It's getting close to that time of the year again - HALLOWEEN! Before I get too busy with various other things, thought I'd better post about the page of Halloween materials and activities I have on English Raven - given everything on it is 100% free for site visitors and it's been a popular destination for teachers over the years.

The page includes flashcards, card games, word searches and puzzles - all highlighting Halloween vocabulary and concepts. Here's a quick preview for you!

   

   

Hope they give you some starters - though remember there is an asbolute plethora of great activity stuff out there on the web for Halloween now (try Googling it!).

  

:D

  

Do "self-selected" membership fees for a teacher resource site actually work? In a word, YES!

I've been somewhat missing in action from this blog over the past couple of weeks. There are a plethora of reasons, not least my wife's recent induction into an AMES language program here in Australia (thank you, Australian government, for footing the bill for 510 hours of language instruction leading to a real work qualification for new permanent residents, offering free child care, and providing a free voluntary tutor that does house visits to boot!). I've also had an explosion in demand over on RISE for TOEFL speaking and writing subscriptions, and I've been struggling to keep up with it all!

So partly to allay the great Alex Case's fears that something must be wrong for me not to post, but mostly to explain another reason I've been too busy to pop in here and write something, let me now give you an update on the intriguing "let members choose how much they pay" experiment I've had going for a month or so now for my main teacher resource site/service: English Raven.

Inspired by Radiohead's move a couple of years back, where they let fans choose their own price to download their whole new album of songs, I decided to scrap a set fee for membership in English Raven and let teachers decide for themselves how much they could/should/would pay for access to all of my materials for an entire calendar year.

Of course, it went a bit beyond that. I had always been concerned that one set membership price could (a) disadvantage or turn away teachers who were only after a couple of specific things or sections of the site materials; and/or (b) slap those teachers who happened to be in a country where the income or exchange rate made purchasing a membership with my site inordinately expensive; and/or (c) get away from the basic idea that money earned through English Raven would basically help the site pay for itself in terms of hosting, space, time investment, etc.

After I made the change to a self-elected fee, word got around pretty quickly, and I've had dozens of emails from blogsters and site owners wondering how it is all going.

  

Early days yet, of course, but here's what I've noticed from all the various numbers:

1. Generally speaking, although almost all teachers pay widely different amounts for a membership, the average is about the same as what I had originally as a pre-set figure.

2. My rate of membership sign-ups has almost doubled. It usually comes close to doubling at this time of the year anyway, but I'm talking "double the number that already doubles" - or something like that!

3. I'm getting a lot more members from parts of the world like Eastern Europe, which tended to be a source of a lot of visitors in the past but not paying members.

4. Site visitation in general has gone completely through the roof. I've had some generous WOM support from some great and influential people lately (namely Larry Ferlazzo and Sandy Kemsley) which needs to be factored in there, but I do believe the "choose your own membership fee" has had a definite impact on general visitation as well.

   

So far, a resounding success. It works. If you let site visitors choose their own fee, you will get a lot more members and most probably make more money than you were making previously.

That's the theory, anyway, and the pattern for my own site at this stage appears to confirm it.

 

Why does it work? Well, I may have already sort of answered that in some ways above, but I may pass it over to some of you readers to ponder and comment on for a while...

AND, could I be so arrogant and bold (and/or naive) as to say this little experiment may pave the way to more teacher resource sites using the same sort of pay-for procedure? Would it be such a bad thing?

  

:-D

 

Using Shaun the Sheep for language development (output rather than input!)

This is one of my son's all-time favourites, and his older cousins (6 and 8) are mad about it, too. Funnily enough, it is something adults can sit around and howl with laughter at as well.

Yes, it's Shaun the Sheep!

 

   

What I love about these kind of kid's programs is that they don't have any dialogue in them. Everything is picked up from the context and actions.

Now, for language learners, some teachers avoid these because of the very fact there is no dialogue in them and there won't be any "comprehensible input" for them to listen to.

What I think they're missing is:

1. These episodes appeal to and really interest kids - they become engaged;

2. Kids decide for themselves how the story ought to be vocalised, and are willing to ask for help if they can't name or describe something;

3. The stories become perfect for any language learning level, because everything is visual and contextual and they can tell or talk about the story using whatever language they have at their disposal;

4. They can be watched over and over again, with richer descriptions applied incrementally (I watched Jamie go from one word scene descriptions to very active "what is happening now" utterances, and then on to rich cause and effect accounts, predictions and then even inferences).

 

I think half the problem with videos/DVDs for teachers is that they automatically worry too much about the "level" of the language input involved. If we make the input visual and contextual, then we have a beautifully rich resource for encouraging language output - especially experimentation with language.

   

By the way, I see absolutely no reason why the Shaun the Sheep episodes wouldn't work with older teens and adults as well. They're absolutely hilarious, and there are many layers of inference possible.

  

:-D

  

Spellbound with "The Wizard" - by Jack Prelutsky

   

I picked this book up for Jamie last weekend, and my - what an absolute beauty! The Wizard is written by children's poet laureate Jack Prelutsky, and illustrated by the amazingly talented Brandon Dorman.

It's the poetic story of a mysterious wizard who lives in a spooky tower at the end of what appears to be your average suburban street. It's beautifully written and had both Jamie and I completely spellbound. The pictures are just superb, and Jamie has been having loads of fun talking about what he can see in each illustration - but also what he can almost see or might see... I've been cajoled into reading it at least three times every night before we go to bed, ever since we brought it home!

There just aren't enough of these kinds of storybooks appearing these days. Publishers have become so 'sanitized' in their selection criteria that it's kind of surprising to see a story about a wizard who (apparently quite callously at first) puts a live frog through a variety of bizarre transformations, and then leans out the window of his tower at the end and peers down at the children playing heedless on the street below (with the final hint that he might put one of his transformation spells on one of them). As we talk about the story and this mysterious Wizard fellow, Jamie has come to discover that the wizard may not actually be all that evil at all - maybe "naughty" if anything, and with a definite cheeky sense of humour.

In any case, I totally recommend this for your children's bookcase collection. It's an absolute cracker!

 

A couple of bonuses as well:

You can see a fantastic preview of the book's contents on the Harper Collins Children's Book Site page

Jack Prelutsky's personal site is an entertaining spot for children, parents and teachers

Read Jack's Integrating Poetry with Other Arts and Classroom Activities (for teachers)

Jack's Tips for Reading with the Very Young (for teachers and parents)

 

On a final aside, one thing I like about publisher sites like the Harper Collins one is the fact that they feature direct high visual links to the author's and illustrator's homepages. ELT publishers rarely if ever do that - they didn't and continue to refuse to do so for me, anyway, (see here) despite my polite requests and pleading. In fact, they won't even update my author page or replace the horrendous picture that's there...

But I digress!

Get yourself a copy of The Wizard and enjoy bringing some spooky and imagination-tugging creativity to your child/ren!

 

:-D

 

English Raven at KOTESOL Conference 2009

Well, I've had my presentation proposals accepted and I'll be heading back to Korea to present a couple of seminars at the Korea TESOL (KOTESOL) International Conference on October 24-25.

I've actually lost count how many KOTESOL ICs I've attended, but this will be the first time in almost four years that I haven't been there as a guest of Pearson Education (and subsequently the first time in quite a while that I'll be presenting on something other than the Boost! Integrated Skills coursebooks!). The price of going as an independent presenter this time is compounded by the fact that I'm jetting into Seoul all the way from Melbourne this time, rather than getting a 30 minute flight up from Kimhae Airport in Busan. It's going to cost a bit between the airfare and the accommodation, but it is an excellent conference and I'll be able to catch up with a lot of old friends.

Here are the abstracts for my two presentations, in case you happen to be at the event and want to come along and say hello!

   

How to Make TOEFL Speaking Involved, Interesting, and INTERACTIVE!

Unfortunately (and curiously), the majority of test-preparation materials on the market for the TOEFL iBT speaking section are rather uninspiring and – in many cases – just downright boring, for both students and teachers! They also tend to target single users preparing for the test on their own, which creates complications for classroom and group-based students preparing for the test together with a single teacher. In this presentation and accompanying workshop, Jason Renshaw will present a unique approach to TOEFL speaking preparation that focuses on three essential criteria. These are that the students should become personally INVOLVED in the tasks; they should find the content and applications INTERESTING; and – most importantly – the activities should promote genuine INTERACTION. In addition, Jason’s approach to classroom-based TOEFL speaking tasks promotes the idea of teachers being facilitators of practice rather than just “checkers”. Finally, the tasks presented also encourage whole-class participation rather than isolated performances.  Whether you are a student preparing for the TOEFL speaking section or a teacher responsible for preparing learners for the test, you’re likely to find some ideas here to inspire you. This will be a very hands-on workshop, so be prepared to participate!

   

   

Creating an Adventure-based Reading Approach for 9-14 year olds

Part of our professional practice as English teachers(and materials writers) is to explore new approaches to teaching and learning. “Adventure-based” Reading is an example of this creative process borne out of classroom experience, designed by Jason Renshaw. It specifically targets first and second language learners aged 9-14 who are ready to move on from standard levelled-reading approaches, and seeks to incorporate priorities such as extensive and voluntary reading, reading fluency, and integrated and content-based reading. It also targets global issues, a values-based curriculum, and the combination of non-fiction elements within an imaginative fiction-style format. Central to the approach is the idea of the reader him/herself becoming the main character in the story and controlling the direction of the plot to experience a genuine adventure! Adventure-based reading also addresses the tricky issues of mixed-ability classrooms and reader motivation. It is flexible enough to be used as a whole-class or independent reading application. In this presentation, Jason will explain how and why this new approach was developed, and give attendees a taste of Adventure-based Reading so they can experience it for themselves.

 

 

Biography

Jason Renshaw is a veteran teacher of English as a second and foreign language, having taught the language for more than 17 years in countries on three different continents. He is a graduate of the University of Melbourne and his Korea-based experience amounts to 10 years teaching in private institutes, culminating in a position as visiting professor in the English Education department at Kyungpook National University. He is the author of the acclaimed BOOST! Longman Integrated Skills Series, and is the founder/webmaster of the well-known teacher resource website www.englishraven.com. He has also developed considerable specialization in materials design and test preparation for TOEFL, TOEIC and IELTS. Currently, Jason lives in Australia and works from his home next to the beach as a freelance ELT materials writer and tutor for his own online school: www.English-iTutor.com.

  

:-D

 

Beyond and before teacher training

Are teacher training and teacher development one and the same? How should they be scheduled? Should attendance be compulsory? Should they be compensated?

  

These are pretty fundamental questions in our profession that aren’t always easy to answer. They keep some teaching supervisors and coordinators awake at night, cause others to be lauded for their success, and relegate others to a despised role as the ineffective head of a teaching team... 

While I might concede that teacher training can contribute to overall teacher development, I’ve found it useful in my own experience as an academic coordinator and “teacher trainer” to differentiate the two - and in fact add a third priority. The following are my own views, experiences and suggestions when it comes to teacher training, program development, and teacher development. They go beyond initial pre-service formal training qualifications (like a CELTA for example) and deal specifically with training and development as it happens in actual school/institutional contexts.

   

   

Teacher Training

  

To me, this is the instruction to teachers most directly relevant to their jobs at a particular school or in a specific program. Through teacher training, teachers learn about the school’s program and methodological perspectives, the content they need to teach, any lesson planning requirements, how to test and assess, and various other administrative tasks that might be considered fundamental to their day-to-day jobs at the school. Generally speaking, the more organised and targeted a school’s program is, the more important effective training becomes.

I also distinguish between pre-service and in-service training.

New teachers at a school will need initial training to understand the school, the program, the levels and the overall job requirements. Unfortunately, there are many TEFL schools around the world that treat initial teacher training as a day’s worth of teacher observation, and from there they are basically forced to develop their understanding about the school and its programs through trial and error.

However, no matter how lengthy or robust initial teacher training is, it needs to be followed up regularly – through in-service training. This is how a school checks ongoing understanding of the program, improves the delivery of it, announces changes to approaches and materials, and explains clearly how they are to be applied. It could also include ongoing tips on ways to handle administrative tasks more effectively.

To some degree, I’ve always seen and applied teacher training through a bit of a top-down model. It’s a way of communicating clearly from the school/employer/manager level to the teaching team. The teachers are employed and expected to perform according to the school’s requirements – it’s their job. Now, before you go diving for the comments section with your fingers over the necessary keys to type out “authoritarian pig-dog!” please bear in mind that I also believe ongoing in-service teacher training in this fashion can only ever be effective if it exists alongside (and in fact feeds from) two other important applications: program development and teacher development. Without those, all you really have is actually an organised “ordering about” program. Some schools are satisfied with leaving it at that; some are even satisfied with something less (expecting things of their teachers and assuming things about the work role, but only ever informing them about it when the teachers “stuff up” in some way). Schools that only feature top-down training can sometimes be not particularly motivating to work with. Schools that don’t even provide that can be positively frustrating.

 

  

Program Development

  

Program development (to me) involves improving the school’s overall curriculum, materials and teaching approaches. Some readers out there might be wondering why this is included in a post about teacher training and teacher development, as program development is often considered a completely separate and complicated priority. In many schools, program development happens behind doors between certain members of management, is delivered from afar from a head office of some sort, or may even include handsomely paid external ‘consultants’.

To me (as an academic coordinator or DoS), program development simply MUST involve the teachers – they are the people who interpret and deliver the school’s program and without them it is an empty shell without much real substance at all. It isn’t all that hard to include teachers in the process of selecting coursebooks, deciding on scheduling and necessary supplementary materials, etc. They can also help identify what sort of training will be needed to deliver the program most effectively. Aside from the fact that (in my experience) teachers tend to be excellent contributors to effective program development, by including them in the process you are giving them a direct say in what they will experience as part of teacher training (see above) – validating that application to a greater extent. If the teachers can contribute to and agree on the program to be delivered, they are more than likely to be more positive about attending the necessary training sessions to better understand and learn how to apply the program.

Note that I said “contribute to” program development. It’s not always a good idea to let the teachers by themselves decide the program from A-Z in some kind of open forum. Aside from teaching experience, the teachers don’t always have the necessary context-locality experience, nor the business know-how to incorporate a program that meets everybody’s needs. It will most often need to involve a series of compromises. In my opinion, it is this ability to listen and compromise that makes or breaks academic coordinators and school owners on the one hand, and teachers on the other. In an inclusive approach to program development, it is rare that both sides will have every single one of their preferences catered to. In worst case scenarios, some school managers just talk with their ears shut, while some teachers just resort to whining and criticising without being willing to make suggestions or back them up with examples or samples. The resulting program development and associated teacher training can become almost farcical. But if program development happens regularly in an open-minded and give-and-take spirit, both sides can have wins (perhaps enough to even make the work feel worthwhile), and some things can be won together. In this divide between teachers and management, we need more bridges – not widening gulfs. In my experience, involving (and I mean really listening to) teachers in program development creates more bridges than gulfs. Even if the teachers didn’t get their own way in all things, the very act of talking to and listening to (and even debating with) them can make a very big difference to effective program delivery and teacher training sessions. The surest way to turn a teaching team surly is to not involve or let them say their piece at all…

 

So we might conclude that inclusive program development can lead to effective and relevant teacher training, and can certainly alleviate some of the potential authoritarianism and “one-way-traffic” feel of it. What, then, of this notion of teacher development?

   

  

Teacher Development

   

You might well argue that if teachers are involved in program development and attending regular teacher training, then they are developing – and “teacher development” is happening almost by default. I don’t quite see it this way.

To me, program development and teacher training are most directly related to teachers’ day-to-day work challenges in a particular school or context. Teacher development, on the other hand (and while closely linked to those processes), should be more expansive and more creative. It should have the teachers’ own concerns and interests at heart, and to that end it may involve exploring things well beyond one particular context or set of coursebooks. Teachers may bring experience of teaching in other contexts or want to develop aspects of their teaching that will be more relevant in contexts beyond the one they currently find themselves in. It could involve almost anything, but to me the golden rule is that it is the teachers themselves who decide everything in a teacher development program.

That might sound too vague to implement in any sort of effective way. In fact, in my own experience, many teachers have found the notion of open teacher development a bit baffling or even intimidating. Dare I say it, in some cases it’s been like watching prisoners subject to gruel and water day in day out being taken out to a smorgasbord lunch. In some cases they dive in and eat ravenously of anything and everything – making a complete (but delighted) mess of it. In most cases they stand back – suddenly not sure what to partake of, and perhaps not quite sure that they are actually allowed to!

A good way to get a teacher development program started is to start simple, for example by having an activity swap-shop session. Teachers have 15-20 minutes to present and demonstrate their favourite teaching activity, taking turns and according to who is willing to get up and give it a shot.

The opportunities to go on from there are almost endless. Teachers can be invited to suggest things they’d like to know more about (anything from a teaching approach to what it’s like to teach adults – if in a YL setting), and then someone from the teaching team can volunteer to host a small session exploring that area. They could take turns conducting fun-style lessons in other foreign languages they happen to know, or even contribute to a Lonely Planet style presentation series about different TEFL contexts around the world (if you have teachers who have taught English in multiple locations).

Teacher development can also be more guided and facilitated (and yet still have teachers’ interests and priorities at heart). For example, they could be asked to get into teams and come up with a completely new and innovative teaching approach, or talk about their favourite student, or even present some new culture tips about the foreign language context they are working in. They could also present some ways they have managed to cut down on the time needed for lesson planning or administration. They could take turns presenting a particular problem they’ve been having with their teaching, with the rest of the team makes suggestions about how to overcome or at least handle it. Perhaps they could be asked to showcase how they use technology in their own teaching development. It could even involve debate, with a particular proposition given to them (like “we should be doing TPR with all learners under 10 for at least 5 minutes at the start of every class”) and then letting them go nuts with it.

The very best in-house teacher development sessions I have seen, however, were the ones where teachers got up and did whatever the heck they liked (so long as it had some sort of link to teaching).

I guess my main point here is that involvement in program development and associated teacher training can certainly help teachers to do their jobs better, and even more happily. But to me, teacher development is very broad, very inclusive, creative, and as much about sharing and exploring as it is listening and learning. It focuses on the fact that teachers are human beings, all human beings are different, and all of them have something different to contribute (or similar things to contribute in different ways!). It gives each of these different people a voice that is entirely their own – and values it. Even when teacher development topics have apparently tenuous links to actual teaching, they can still be enormously entertaining and insightful.

And let’s not forget that it also creates potential benefits for schools.

Aside from the fact that teacher development sessions of this nature can be very enjoyable, entertaining and motivating (having much needed positive impacts on overall teacher morale – and remember: happy teachers = happy students = happy school…?), they can also feed back into program development and teacher training in often positive and sometimes unexpected ways. Culture tips, creative new method or techniques, debate outcomes, technology innovations, tips about effective lesson planning – they can all potentially become ideas on how to improve the school’s program in ways that all (or at least the majority of) teachers can agree on. They can also lead to areas of interest or concern where specific teacher training is actually requested by the teachers. Program development and teacher training alone are not always well equipped to facilitate this sort of lateral thinking and creative innovation, but a good approach to teacher development often is.

 

   

  

Well, up until now we’ve sort of treated teacher training, program development and teacher development as valid necessities. However, whether or not they go ahead and work well depends a lot on some more pragmatic considerations.

   

 

Scheduling

  

Let’s start with scheduling. Too much or too little of anything is rarely the right portion, and the same applies here. Remember that the following recommendations are based only on my own experience and opinion!

Generally speaking, teacher training should involve at least a week of pre-service training and then monthly or bimonthly ongoing in-service application (it depends a lot on the particular context and program, but whatever is decided on, it is important to create a reliable routine). Alternatively, teacher training can follow immediately or close after the program development sessions attended by teachers, if they are the primary source of teacher training priorities.

Program development? Well, depending on the given “session” (whether it is 9 weeks or a spring term), I generally go for two (or three) program development meetings – one at the end of a session to reflect and make necessary changes for the next session, another mid-way through the session to see how things are going with actual implementation, and then again toward the end to complete the cycle and lead into the next session again.

As for teacher development, this needs to be determined and agreed upon by the teaching team themselves. Bear in mind that the more teachers are asked to attend program development or teacher training sessions, the less inclined they may be to give up even more time for teacher development. Ensuring all three can happen in one school usually involves some sensitive attention to overall balance.

In all three applications, I have a 90-minute time limit for a session. Anything more becomes tiring and potentially tedious for the teachers. I always gave at least a week’s notice and set them (when possible) for low-maintenance days where teachers may not need to do a lot of planning for their regular classes. I scheduled them before classes rather than after (most of the schools I worked at had afternoon and early evening shifts); never on weekends, Mondays, or Fridays; and I always harassed the school owner to shout the teachers for lunch straight after the session.

  

  

Attendance and compensation

 

So, should attendance at these different sessions be mandatory or voluntary? Should they be paid? These are not easy questions to answer, because teaching conditions and contracts vary from context to context and school to school. If teachers are paid strictly on an hourly teaching basis, being forced to attend any sort of meeting or development session can feel like a serious rip off to them. There are also difficulties when teachers are part-time and may have other scheduled duties to attend to (family, study or other jobs). The opinions and suggestions I express below are grounded in my experience in a context where teachers were mostly employed on full-time contracts and schools made enormous profits from their programs; hence, they may not be as applicable to contexts where the situation is different.  

For me (in the programs I led where training and development actually worked well), I made attendance at teacher training sessions compulsory, had that written into teaching contracts (with reasonably specific information on how often they would occur and at what times), and always ensured that salaried teachers were doing less classes per month than the contract stipulated (with an allocated monthly allowance of hours for lesson preparation and professional development). Part-time teachers (almost always on hourly wages) were asked and paid to attend, but given consideration if they couldn’t due to other commitments. If teacher training is incorporated into teachers’ overall hours and contracted duties and salaries, and focuses on how they are to do their jobs (better) at the school context level, I think it is fair to make attendance at them compulsory.

Program development, on the other hand and in my opinion, should be a voluntary affair. Not all teachers care that deeply about the program or want to influence it. To them, teaching may be just a job involving going into a classroom and teaching learners and that’s that. Alternatively (and more positively) some schools are so well run and already incorporate a lot of ongoing feedback and suggestions from teachers that they already feel confident with the program and don’t feel any pressing needs to go in and starting banging it around the walls. However, if these teachers do attend program development sessions, I would be willing to pay them a small stipend for their involvement and time. After all, they are contributing to a program which may well create more profit (in various mediums) for the school not only now but in the longer run.

As for teacher development, you’ll probably be unsurprised to hear that I think this should be absolutely voluntary. It’s for the teachers and hopefully by the teachers, so everything from scheduling to attendance should be decided by them. Given it may not always have much direct relevance to the school program or overall success of that particular school, I generally avoid paying teachers for teacher development sessions. I believe in this case the reward should be intrinsically motivated rather than financially compensated. Some things I have tried, however, were paying a small fee to whichever teacher (or teachers) hosted a particular session, and even a monetary award for the teacher host to give out as a special reward to whichever teacher (or teachers) they felt helped their session the most. Some school owners were happier to facilitate this through small gifts or movie tickets or lunch/gift vouchers, as a more “from the heart” gesture for teachers’ voluntary efforts to improve themselves and each other (and the spirit of the teaching group in general) – and these were the “payments” that probably felt most appropriate and maintained the right mood for teacher development programs that I was involved with.

  

  

 

In conclusion...

   

However you look at professional development at an institutional level, whether it is through these interconnected prisms of teacher training, program development and teacher development or through some other lens, making it happen can be a big ask. As an academic coordinator, I faced the particularly challenging situation of being in a context where training was either completely absent or applied like a straitjacket, with willy-nilly scheduling, compulsory attendance and no compensation being the norm. To incorporate program development and teacher development in an organised and considerate way, at times I felt like I needed to be a freight train engine covered in silk (admittedly sometimes the silk fell off and the train started crashing through every wall in sight; at other times I forgot to bring the engine and was left standing there with silk and the distinct appearance of being on my way to an obscure fancy dress party).

However, when these three things actually happen and work effectively, the chances of being in a positive, progressive and motivating professional teaching environment increase exponentially. They are worth struggling for, and should be very high up on any serious coordinator’s list of priorities.

   

  

:-D

   

The best Teacher's Guide ever?

Well, in my opinion - definitely not.

The title for this post was chosen, however, because out of the hundreds of in-house teacher's guides I've written, this was the one that earned me the most compliments and thanks from a variety of people involved in a private institute TEFL program in South Korea. That included teachers (both native and non-native) and school owners/management. Several "foreign" (read native speaker) teachers actually approached me to say it was the "best teacher's guide ever." Indirectly there were also compliments from students and their parents, who forked out vast amounts of money and rushed to get themselves on a special waiting list to attend the program to which this teacher's guide applied.

The source of this positive feedback was a tome of a teacher's guide I developed for a private institute's notorious "winter intensive session", that time during the private institute (or "hagwon") year where for four weeks teachers slave to horrendous schedules (up to 10-11 classes a day), learners attend the school for 2-3 hours every weekday, and the school owners rub their hands with glee at the massive profits rolling in (with 600-odd students paying in excess of US$400, do the math and the money involved is staggering for a mere four-week program).

You can read the entire teacher's guide at the link below:

Download Winter Session Teacher's Guide 2007

 

Looking back over that book, I have mixed and wistful feelings about it all. It was first designed in 2005, in the 3 days preparation time I had at the end of a busy fall session to get something ready for a large school and teaching team of about 30 - half of whom were generally pretty new to teaching (some completely new), and some of whom were even local English-studying university students comprising ring-ins for the school to cater to the number of students and classes. It sought (at the time) to fix a number of problems:

1. A horrendous existing intensive program, with four different teachers per class using completely different books - usually selected and reported at the very last minute - that represented no unified course content whatsoever (nor for that matter collaboration across the different teachers);

2. A huge lack of consistency across teachers and classes, to the point that levels became almost irrelevant and for students it was like a lottery to see what sort of overall language instruction you received;

3. A completely fragmented assessment and reporting system on student progress and achievement;

4. Very low morale from teachers, who had to cope with ridiculous teaching schedules and were still expected to create a syllabus, prepare for the different levels and coursebooks, mark and grade work, give feedback, and prepare and apply their own tests;

5. The expectation from parents (and students) that this intensive course would be equal to an entire regular term of coursework, would feature reams of homework, and would hence be worth the asked for price and daily class commitment in hours. But above all, parents and students wanted consistency - the feeling that they would get the same learning opportunities (read here: service) and fair assessment criteria that would allow them to make comparisons with neighbours and earn certain bragging rights (okay, not all parents were like that - only about 80% or so...), no matter which teachers were allocated and no matter how experienced or peculiar they were.

 

Essentially, what I did was remove all of the coursebooks except a core reading series ("Think Alongs" - edited by Roger Farr and produced by Steck-Vaughn). I then developed all of the supplementary workbooks myself, covering vocabulary, listening, writing and speaking - making them all extensions from the content and themes in each level's core reading coursebook. And to explain it all, I wrote the teacher's guide you can download above.

   

I could attempt here to say that teachers liked this program and teacher's guide because it created an integrated approach and organised all of the levels, schedules and tasks in a way that made for more effective and motivating learning. I guess for some of the teachers those things were factors. To be completely honest, however, teachers confessed to liking it because it did all of their preparation and organisation for them. All they had to do was attend a quick teacher's meeting before the session to collect their TGs, teaching schedules and coursebooks, ask a few questions, then roll up for the next four weeks with minimal preparation or take-home work.

   

Did I like the TG? Yes. As academic coordinator, it got hundreds of different people off my back and created a more organised and positive atmosphere in the school at almost every level for four very busy weeks. It gave the learners an integrated approach to the content and coursework. It created happy workers and happy customers. It also minimised the preparation I needed to do before each new intensive session: this approach was used for the remaining two years I was there, and for all I know in the years afterwards as well (most probably with my name removed from the books and all the credit going to the school or some new manager who added a couple of extra things to it). I was actually able to take those three vacation days between sessions and do something with my family for a change.

But as I mentioned above, I remain wistful (or should I say bemused?). Is that what good EFL programs and teacher's guides are all about? Pulling together teachers who can't/won't do that sort of thing on their own? Doing all the preparation for teachers who are handed ridiculous and unreasonable teaching schedules? Creating a factory-like program of such precision that it ensures almost every student works their butt off for four weeks over their winter vacation period and gets almost exactly the same level and style of teaching?

  

In some teaching contexts - South Korea and intensive sessions an obvious prime candidate - I guess the answer would be "yes, that is what good programs and teacher's guide are all about."

   

Interesting old world, TEFL - and more interesting in hindsight when you can stand back and cast your eye over it all without the shaded glasses on...

   

:-D

 

Stretchy rope, Black Caimans, and an anaconda in a cage... (World Adventure Kids preview!)

 

Luckily, our intrepid adventurers (led by YOU, the Team Captain - and also the reader, by the way...) have chosen to bring along Stretchy Rope on their mission in the Amazon Rainforest.

Thanks to that rope, Think Sharp doesn't get gobbled up by the Black Caimans in the river. But it was close! Their snapping teeth just missed his boot.

But a little further on, the team discovers an anaconda trapped in a cage in the river. Panther Step wants to set the giant snake free, but your other team members don't look so sure...

What are you going to do? You're the reader and the team captain. It's up to YOU where the story goes next!

  

Welcome to World Adventure Kids (WAK! for short).

 

:-D

  

(Oh, and if you want to read that page encounter above in a larger and clearer size, just click on it - that will take you to the larger version of the image!)

  

More Harry Potter lesson materials (this time showcasing an integrated skills approach)

Okay, I've dug up some more Harry Potter oriented lesson materials that were gathering dust in the Raven Vault! Even if they're not quite right for your actual classroom use, I hope at least they can give you some materials writing ideas.

First of all, a series of lesson materials based around the first chapter of the first Harry Potter book (depending on where in the world you live: Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone or Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone). They are quite high level (post-intermediate at least), on account of the input but also because I basically developed these materials to use as examples in a teacher development seminar (hence wanted it to be reasonably challenging for the teachers, too!). I had just taken over DoS responsibilities at a school that insisted on having different teachers for different skill areas (so learners had four different teachers all focusing on something different - reading, grammar, listening/speaking, and writing; and each teacher used a completely different textbook). I wanted to show the school and teachers how we might use a more integrated approach with united topical content, while still allowing for skill-specific focus. I was also getting reading to implement a more process-oriented approach to the writing curriculum and wanted to show the teachers how this worked through real examples as well.

 

READING & VOCABULARY

HP 1 Chapter 1 - The Boy Who Lived (Reading and Vocabulary)

HP 1 Chapter 1 - The Boy Who Lived (Reading and Vocabulary) - Teacher's Version

   

LISTENING

HP 1 Chapter 1 - The Boy Who Lived (Listening)

HP 1 Chapter 1 - The Boy Who Lived (Listening) - Teacher's Version

SPEAKING

HP 1 Chapter 1 - The Boy Who Lived (Speaking)

HP 1 Chapter 1 - The Boy Who Lived (Speaking) - Teacher's Version

   

WRITING

HP 1 Chapter 1 - The Boy Who Lived (Writing)

   

There's also a nice little cover to go with the materials above if you want to put them together and create a unit 'kit':

HP 1 Chapter 1 - The Boy Who Lived (Kit Cover)

  

But that's not all! (Ready for the free steak knives pitch?)

   

I also found some related materials I developed for an advanced group of teenagers using Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix as their main reading material:

   

HP 5 Chapter 1 - Dudley Demented (Review, Summary & Activities)

HP 5 Chapter 1 - Dudley Demented (Word and Expression List)

   

   

All of these materials were exhausting to make, but they worked brilliantly in the classroom (given the massive topical appeal to learners) and I had high hopes of making many more of the same type for all of the books at differing levels of English proficiency. I thought at the time that I was really onto something and I might even get some writing work out of it! That was, until Peter Usborne politely asked in an email me how on earth I'd managed to get permission from the Rowling Empire to feature the actual name Harry Potter on any of my potentially commercial materials... There went that idea!

   

There are some more Harry Potter learning materials elsewhere on this blog, too:

Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets (Media Studies Materials)

   

:-D

Some great TEFL interviews coming to English Raven soon!

I have managed to convince (through all sorts of very creative coercive techniques, like saying "please?") several great people to do interviews for the English Raven blog. Here's a sneak preview for you (with the people here listed in the order their interviews will appear on the blog):

  

1. Andrew Wright, an elder statesman of ELT and the man who collocates with pictures, games and stories/storytelling in our field;

2. Barbara (Hoskins) Sakamoto, my favourite lady on Twitter - but most other people probably know her as one of the talented geniuses behind the Let's Go superstar series for young learners;

3. Dean Stafford, an old colleague and a veteran teacher of young learners in Korea, tells us about his experience and challenges teaching in the public elementary school sector there;

4. Egbert van Keulen, one of the founding partners at the Myngle online language learning sensation, gives us some insights into online language teaching options with Myngle;

5. Les Kirkham, the new Associates' Representative with IATEFL, talks about what IATEFL is doing to become a more global association for teachers (an interview which is the direct result of a certain island owner in Second Life taking mild offense to my post here cheekily proposing that IATEFL might be better named EATEFL...).

 

The first two interviews there have been completed and are now in the editing stage, while the three following that are ongoing and happening as I type (I'm actually pausing at stages during this very posting to cast new questions at all three of them! ~ risks of multi-tasking?).

And the future? Well, a really cool dude in ELT (Lindsay Clandfield) has agreed to do an interview at some stage for the blog (I'm hoping he'll pass on the antidote to his Six Things hypnotic state that has me paranoid about any listing that falls between the numbers 5 and 7).

I'm also rather hopeful of snaffling Ken Wilson, Alex Case, Sean Banville, Larry Ferlazzo, Sherry Terrell, Burcu Akyol, Sara Hannam, Marisa Constantinides (if she agrees not to spank me... too much) Cotter Hue - as the start of a rather lengthy wishlist, anyway (and once I can get them to forgive me for putting their names on the list to start with without asking them first...).

I'm even more open to volunteers! If you're involved in TEFL in some way, don't hesitate to put your hand up for an interview with the Raven (and bear in mind I like interviewing anyone in the TEFL world, irrespective of experience, publications or dubious status as someone Jeremy Harmer or Scott Thornbury would deign to talk directly to in Twitter - "teachers at the chalkface" especially welcome to apply!).

   

:-D

  

  

Re-thinking our classrooms: where they are and where we belong within them...

The picture above was found on Flickr while I was scouting around looking for common license pics. It was one of the moments where you just pause and go "hmmm!" - where a picture seems to encapsulate a lot of the things you've been wondering about lately (and for me in this case it included things like teaching approaches, online learning, blended learning, DOGME ELT, you name it).

The original source is here on Flickr, and it has a nice caption to it. Worth a look and a quick read. Nothing too deep, but a nice escape from the more shallow diversions of our "trade".

:-D

Using Gmail for online teaching and classroom management (plus a sneak peek at Google Wave)

Well, I know that pitching Gmail (or Google Mail as it is known in some parts of the world) is a bit like preaching to the converted when it comes to many readers who visit this blog. But for those who don't have/use Gmail, or do but haven't really thought about its potential uses for online teaching), you might find the following to be of some interest to you.

I've been using Gmail since not long after it first came out, and never wanted or needed to use any other mail provider as a result. The unique Gmail approach to threading mails, in addition to the massive storage allowance, made it perfect for me. I then watched as Google Talk applications were added (allowing me to chat and then even voice chat), and then the Google Docs facility (formerly Writely), allowing online document sharing and collaboration. As these developments progressed, I began to use Gmail a lot with online language learning as well as classroom management and even collaboration with other ELT writers.

Now Gmail has video conferencing embedded in the service as well, and it is surprising clear and reliable - and most importantly, really REALLY easy to install and use.

I won't go on about the various Gmail features - if you really want to know about all of them it would be a good idea to visit the list of features here. In the meantime, I thought I'd demonstrate some of these features using my own Gmail account:

  

   

There are a few other reasons why Gmail has been ideal for online teaching. For one, it's available in almost every country (where email/Internet is available) in a variety of languages and hence easy for learners to access. It's also beautifully easy to understand and use - something I've always found important for language learning in particular.

 

Of course, the talk of the town now is focussed on Google Wave, which looks to be basically Gmail pumped up with almost every web application you can think of plugged into one seamless interface:

  

  

I'm not really sure myself. Google Wave looks tremendously exciting, but also a lot like entering non-dual citizenship exclusively within the Kingdom of Google. There's also an interesting article that claims Google Wave already has powerful competitors like Tokbox, though I'm not personally convinced yet.

For language learning in particular, the sneak-peek strikes me as being over the top, too cluttered and too confusing for my potential learners. Gmail already does everything I basically need for online teaching and keeps it all relatively simple, so I won't feel any immediate urge to upgrade to Google Wave. There's also the fact that most of my potential learners won't have access to or won't understand Google Wave for at least 6 months or so after launch. That means I'll be sticking to Gmail for quite some time yet!

Do you use Gmail for online teaching and/or classroom management? Have you checked out Google Wave yet? What do you think of its potential for online education?

   

:-D

What to do about those Twitter #teachertuesday and #followfriday binges

If you're a tweeter and a teacher (or a Tweacher) and active on Twitter, you're probably used to seeing lists of recommended contacts fly across your Tweetdeck on Tuesdays and Fridays (and possibly before and after those days as the different timezones conspire to make an average Twitter day last about 48 hours). In fact, it can look like your humble Twitter abode is being suddenly overrun by a furious army of friendly, well-meaning ants!

These are part of the cute little  #teachertuesday and #followfriday hashtag applications that allow people to add to an ongoing searchable reference list on Twitter and comprise a way of giving people ideas about who else to follow.

In theory they are a good idea, but (to me) there's little doubt they've gotten out of hand and been overused to the point that they're close to useless. To give you an example, here's what my Tweetdeck looked like at one stage today:

  

 

Now, those are people who have included me in their #teachertuesday referencing. It's a nice gesture (if you're one of the people there, thanks!), and for a while there I was as guilty of it as anyone else - mainly out of a sense of obligation. These recommendations are problematic (and spilling over into "binge" status in my opinion) because:

 

1. When someone recommends you for #teachertuesday or #followfriday, you feel like you should be doing the same back (or else risk feeling a bit like a shmuck);

2. When you start recommending people, you inevitably end up leaving other good contacts out, so you do more of these posts to include as many of your good Twitter buddies as possible (again, or risk feeling like a shmuck);

3. Everybody starts thanking everybody for putting them in their #teachertuesday and #followfriday lists, which clutters up the Twitter intray even more;

4. Essentially #teachertuesday and #followfriday are basically the same thing - a combination of introducing new contacts to people and "mutual grooming", so why do we have two of these days instead of just one? Because it makes a nice schedule across the week with two times to start plugging each other rotten?

 

The end result for me (I don't know about you) is that I very rarely check out or follow anyone that appears on these lists. I mean, look at them - it's a big mess of names with rarely more than a very flimsy context. These 48-hour Tuesdays and Fridays become a time for me when I politely pass over all these posts (which tend to come thick and fast) and search a little harder for something juicy to read. I used to take part in the habit, too (out of politeness - but figuring that everyone else would be skimming over them, too).

Think about it: It's like being at a teacher conference and every couple of hours everyone starts yelling out who all their friends are, en mass, and then thanking each other for doing so, en mass. Reckon there's time for a handshake and smile in that kind of potential imbroglio? Like in anything, en mass quickly becomes just a mess.

   

Well, in the end Shelly Terrell's example put me onto a way to make this sort of thing a little more meaningful and genuine, by only recommending one person at a time with one of these hashtags and giving some information about why she was recommending that person in particular. This gave me some context for potential people to follow, and I do actually follow a lot more people through this sort of recommendation. Names and what they do and why they should be followed get completely lost in mass lists, but Shelly's way was helpful and I started to follow her example. It put the humanity and relevance back into this sort of practice!

Still, we have the problem of clutter - way too much coming across the Tweetdeck during two days of the week, essentially doing the same thing: scratching each other's backs.

 

Well, I can't say I have any majorly brilliant idea on how to handle or fix these behavioural peculiarities in Twitter. Hopefully you'll add some ideas of your own in the comments section below, but for now here's what I think:

  

1. We all agree that #teachertuesday and #followfriday means no obligation (and no resulting shmuckness) to recommend everybody who recommends you, and no obligation to recommend every Tom, Dick and Haarkon (thanks, Ken Wilson!) on your contacts list!

2. We clearly differentiate #teachertuesday and #followfriday in some way. For example, we reserve #teachertuesday for teachers that have really been inspiring us as teachers with their work or advice or whatever (and we keep it to say 3-4? on any given #teachertuesday, and try to avoid re-mentioning the same people we mentioned last week?), and we dedicate #followfriday to recommending people who give us the best stream of resources and links (and hence are really useful for other people to follow as well, but again - with a limit of 3-4 that weren't featured last week?).

I'm not sure how viable or attractive these options are, but they would help to put some more meaning into these days of recommendations, and reduce the overall clutter at the same time.

 

But if you're like me and don't tend to follow anyone new as a result of these mass listings and re-listings, we have to acknowledge that it's a time-wasting and slightly innane activity on our part and find some better way of handling it all!

  

Got any ideas? Do share!

  

:-D

See some of my other blog posts relevant to being a teacher and using Twitter:

Twitter for teachers - why you should start tweeting!

How Twitter can improve your blog visitation!

Twitter: how receptive are you and your tweet-friends?  

   

Becoming an ELT Materials Writer Part 2: Investing in technology

This follows up from an earlier post I wrote about becoming an ELT materials writer (a little belated, I know!), and it explores some of the ways I recommend you think about making some effective investments related to technology.

Some of these points relate to actually obtaining certain technology tools (to help materials writing/designing processes), while others explore different formats for actually delivering and marketing (or sharing, if you prefer the friendly/helpful collegial approach to things!) your ELT content. 

 

There isn't graphic detail there or lists of specific things to buy or try, but hopefully there are some things for you to consider!

   

:-)

 

Using Lefora (cross between a forum and a blog) for teaching

I've been using Lefora, an interesting combination of forum and blog, for a while now as a language teaching and teacher training tool.

The video below shows some of the main features and some examples from my own Lefora forum:

  

It wasn't possible to cover all the features in a five-minute screencast, but I hope that gives you a quick overview of some of the main ones.

Definitely worth trying out - I've found it extremely useful for not only managing large numbers of students online, but different kinds of courses and even teaching tasks and materials.

  

:-)

  

Five reasons why I like disagreeing with Alex Case on TEFLtastic

1. Because Alex from TEFLtastic is REALLY good at disagreeing with a lot of other people on an impressively regular basis when it comes to TEFL matters, and to get to disagree with him (writer of quite possibly the world's best TEFL blog) from time to time feels a like a bit of a privilege.

2. Because it's good for your professional critical thinking. Alex is a seasoned debater, and to spar with him on some issues in our profession (he tends to call it - or at least has at some stage defended calling it - an occupation... there's something fresh to disagree about!) is a very healthy way to challenge your own beliefs and the way you make deductions based on your experience.

3. Because he is actually willing to adjust his views on certain issues, or at least agree to the possibility that he may not always be right in his interpretation of them.

4. Because it seems we only actually disagree on anything major very rarely - according to him, in fact, the tally stands at a grand total of two.

5. Because he can take it. You can disagree with Alex about something (and have him disagree with you) without it needing to become a flame war or an exhibition of monoliths battering moss off one another. In short, disagreeing with Alex Case can be a constructive, enlightening and civil affair that represents to me progressive discussion.

Goodness knows our profession needs more of number 5 with a lot more teachers taking part.

And I indicated five reasons when in fact at first I thought of six. I deliberately reduced it to five as part of my self-help program to stop thinking about things in sets of six, a result of the hypnotic effect from reading Lindsay Clandfield's blog too often.

Hang on, doesn't that last one make the tally into six after all?! "Crikey!" (as the legendary Steve Irwin would say) - looks like I'll have to restart my therapy all over again...

   

Oh, and no doubt Mr. Case will be over here at some point disagreeing with something I've said in a post about disagreeing with him.

:-)

"Forced" to teach English to children? Think all YL coursebooks are crap?

Then this post is especially for you!

I'm a member of BELTfree, Karenne Sylvester's excellent gathering place for freelance ELT professionals. One of the (many) great things Karenne does in this motivating online community is give members a polite kick up the bottom from time to time and draw their attention to posts they are probably more qualified to comment on than some others.

Today, Karenne drew my and Barbara Sakamoto's attention to a post in BELTfree titled "Oh Lord find me a Young Learners Coursebook that isn't Useless!" (can't post a link to it directly here - if you're interested, best join BELTfree yourself!).

In it, the poster basically laments the fact that he has to teach children against his will (mainly because he needs the money for his mortgage, amongst other things), complains that the school asks him to do this when he's clearly not good at it and doesn't want to, and then moves on to have a bit of a wail that all available YL coursebooks are crap, full of crappy content and activities, and don't do enough to control his class and keep them occupied for a full hour. Could someone (anyone) point him to a simple, all-things-taken-care-of coursebook for kids that could make this miserable and grossly unfair assignment more tolerable? 

Barbara, who is one of the authors of Let's Go, responded first and was pretty accommodating to the fellow. Barb's that sort of lady. She doesn't judge, doesn't make presumptions, and does her best to be helpful according to the genre of the request for information or help. Even when it's pretty clear that the person who wrote the post probably needs an almighty kick up the backside.

I don't have Barbara's redeeming qualities, it would seem.

Here is the response I wrote:

Entertaining post, and - like Barb - I can well remember the feeling. My first TEFL job was in Korea, and I was specifically told I would be teaching teenagers. I thought I could handle this, and like you, didn't feel comfortable or inclined at all to teach kids younger than about 12-13. Within hours of arriving in my new job, the awful news that most of my students were aged between 8-12 was only surpassed by another announcement a few weeks later: the school was opening kindergarten classes, was flagrantly changing the terms of my contract, and I would have additional classes of kids aged 3-5 to deal with.

The horror! I wanted (and perhaps tried, not sure - started drinking more mid-week around that time) to run for the hills. I used to think back to that fateful decision to go and teach English in Korea, and every time from out of nowhere I got a vision of some historic US President saying to his wife: "Stuff kicking around the house - I'm bored, darling... Let's go out and see a show for a change!"

In the end I decided to have a crack at it, because deep down I really do like kids. It took 6 months at least to start getting a grip on these YL and VYL classes, and I feel sorry for those parents who were forking out loads of money to have someone as struggling and unqualified as me responsible for their bairns' initial English education.

About two years later, I was something of a specialist with YLs (in that context), and enjoyed teaching them so much that I stuck with it for another 7-8 years!

Right, so in claiming we have something in common, let's move on to the issues you raise about coursebooks for YLs.

First of all, Barb's series - Let's Go - would have to be the absolute best I've ever used with those age groups. It's one of the only major YL series to last the distance, into its 3rd edition now and boasting a track record of 20 highly successful years on the international market. Why? Well, Barb has done her best to pitch some of the series' attributes to you according to the sentiments you expressed in your original post, but to be totally honest, the books were made by seasoned YL professionals who know the "language" of children. Part of that language is chants and songs, yes, something I've never been particularly keen on myself, but kids generally are. Remember we are entering into their world, not dragging ours to them (and that's one of the beauties, because their world has much less innane complexity or ugliness). Let's Go has great little dialogues, very clear language goals, easy to apply interactive materials and stories, just to get started.

But let's go beyond that. I daresay you won't find Let's Go any better than anything else you've used until you can come to terms with a few things:


1. Sorry - the story about not being (and not wanting to be) a YL teacher just doesn't wash with me. If you don't want to teach kids, change schools/jobs. Don't blame it on coursebooks or (worse) the bairns themselves. Schools continue to put guys like you in front of kids classes because you'll continue to accept the role, happier to complain about it than actually do something positive about it (developing your YL teaching skills or else refusing and getting another job). If you think teaching kids is "just a job", you definitely entered the wrong profession. It's a role and a responsibility as well. If that sounds self-righteous or "do gooder" to you, then probably even more reason for you to change jobs.

2. Coursebooks for little kids can only ever be a guiding framework. Kids need to get out of their chairs, do things, find out things, explore and create. If you expect the coursebook to do your work for you and maintain not only the language goals of the course but also keep the kids occupied, motivated and entertained, then you deserve whatever dismal failures you get! You're a teacher - no matter what the age group concerned - and if you think it's all about the right coursebook, then you're probably better described as an instructor.

3. Focussing kids on coursebook pages is only courting disaster. They need other supplementary materials and activities - especially games. Games, games and more games. It's how kids learn, and (after ripping you a new you-know-what earlier on, I want to give you some encouragement!) it's what makes teaching them a whole lot of fun for teachers, too.

4. Observe some good YL teachers. Maybe not at your school - you may need to go to another school or context. There's always somewhere. Watch how the classes work and how the teacher manages it. This is really important not just in terms of finding out what techniques and activities actually work with kids, but also in showing you what a successful YL language class looks like. You'll see a lot of halos and rosy cheeks rather than diabolical leering faces and forked tails poking out the bottom of shorts and skirts. You'll be awed by the progress kids can make and how genuinely fun and affectionate they can be. Once you've seen this sort of class and these sorts of kids, you'll realise it's possible to do and worth striving for.

5. See this as a new challenge for you - not just something to "get through" and tolerate. I'll tell you this much - teachers who become good at teaching kids usually become great teachers for teens and adults, even business people as well. The reverse is not often true, or not as automatic. I've met some "lofty" teachers of adults who pour scorn on YL courses and YL teachers, when I know darned well it's because they wouldn't last 2 minutes in an even moderately rambunctious YL classroom. Teaching English in general is a skill. Teaching English to kids is an art. See this as a chance to enhance all of your other teaching skills (for other age groups) but also a chance to become an artist!

6. Got kids of your own? I get the impression you don't. Well, learning how to teach a foreign language to kids gives you some of the best darned parenting skills you can imagine. If you're going to have kids of your own one day, you're investing in your own future happiness. If you're not going to have your own kids later in life, you've definitely improved your prospects of getting along better with nieces and nephews at Christmas time.

  
Sorry, not all of those suggestions go straight to the heart of your initial enquiry about finding a good YL coursebook. That's because YL teaching is as much about a state of mind and openness of heart as it is anything else (including materials to use in the class).

   
I've got a pretty extensive resource site for teachers of kids: www.englishraven.com. Send me an email and I will set you up with a free membership. Why? I can see from your initial post that you're probably actually a nice guy and you definitely do have a sense of humour. That makes you a potentially great teacher of kids, and I'm happy to help you out.

Five years later, when you prefer teaching kids to adults and business people, hopefully you'll remember people like Barb and I, and offer to buy us a beer when we're in your neck of the woods.

All the best,

~ Jason Renshaw

  

  

Well, perhaps I was a bit too hard on the guy. Then again, perhaps I wasn't. No doubt someone will post a comment here and let me know! I have to admit, if there's one thing guaranteed to get my ire up and make me engage in ranting blog posts like this one, it's teachers who agree to teach kids and then complain about it, blaming everything and anything beyond that all important circle that is themselves.

There are, on the other hand, people out there who are perhaps teaching kids somewhat against their will (I was, when I started out), who nonetheless want to come to grips with their predicament and make the best of it. I hope some of the tips in the post above turn on some lights for you!

:-)

   

Introductory E-Pal writing activities for younger learners (writing to communicate, learning to write, and writing to learn)

Here are some materials I developed for learners in grades 1-3 to give them a very gentle introduction to email-style written communication, and to help them notice and discover things about writing (and language as well - of course!).

Feel free to download the files used as examples in the screencast:

Download Barney_Bear_E-PAL_B-6

Download Marvin_Monkey_E-PAL_M-6

Download Ernie_Einstein_E-PAL_E-3

  

There are plenty more of these kinds of email writing sets in the E-Pal Correspondence for YLs section of English Raven.

 

If you're an English Raven Member, here's where/how to find them in your private entry portal:

 

:-)

  

The Very Hungry Caterpillar re-visited

Apologies in advance to anyone who has already seen this on my blog and would rather skip seeing it again.

The following link will take you to a post made on this blog about 18 months ago, when my then two-and-a-half year-old son Jamie was caught on video reading aloud the Very Hungry Caterpillar (by Eric Carle).

Jamie and the Very Hungry Caterpillar

It's a classic (especially if you're familiar with the story), and was a favourite with people visiting my blog at the time.

Enjoy!

  

:-)

How to make quick speaking and listening placement tests for the Boost! Integrated Skills Series

 

I recently got a very polite email from a gentleman in Korea who is running a school program and is using my Boost! Integrated Skills Series. He wanted to know if I could help him with speaking and listening placement tests for the series, given there are already excellent placement tests for the reading, writing and grammar strands of the series (available for free download in the teacher resource center of the main Boost! site).

Unfortunately, the folks at Pearson Asia ELT have never gotten back to me about making placement tests for the speaking and writing strands (a-hem, despite numerous reminders!), quite possibly because there hasn't been any real demand for them from the marketplace. The impetus for professional reading and writing placement tests for the series actually came about when schools in the United States started using these strands (not just for ESL students but for remedial work with native speakers, believe it or not! ~ appears to be one of the first instances where a textbook series made for EFL contexts was adopted for an ESL context and for remedial purposes, as opposed to vice-versa), and they demanded appropriately accurate and professional placement tests. Given that Boost! Speaking and Listening haven't been adopted (yet) in the United States, it probably accounts for why I haven't been asked to produce placement tests for these particular strands.

But I do have some alternative suggestions for creating quick placement tests for speaking and listening based on existing reading and writing materials. I'm writing about them here on the blog in the hope it gets found by other Boost! series users looking for similar ideas. Even if you're not using Boost!, you may get some useful ideas out of this for creating quick speaking and listening placement tests for other series you are using.

(If you figure this post is just a shameless plug for my coursebook series, I would like to tell you (1) you're probably partially right, and (2) no-one's forcing you to read this post - "it's my blog and I'll post what I want to, post what I want to" - nothing for you to see here, move along, please...)

  

Making a (Boost!) Speaking Placement Test

First of all, let me point out that speaking placement tests are notoriously hard to make well, and are rarely reliable given teachers have very little time to check each student 1-1 without rushing or avoiding distractions from other students in busy school settings.

One very quick way you could produce a placement test, however, is by using one or more of the Boost! review units from the main speaking coursebook, which are designed to check things like pronunciation, ability to contribute to an ongoing dialogue, and ability to create short speeches of a more topical nature. These could be taken from levels 2 and 3 (as it is a 4-level series, and for placement content I always aim for the middle levels and see how well the learners appear to be able to handle them). Very simple to generate, and a pretty good indication of general ability across the four levels, but - as I mentioned earlier - it's going to be time-consuming to apply to a lot of students 1-1.

An alternative suggestion, and one I've used often in the past, is to use the student's written work as the basic material for the speaking placement test. The placement test for Boost! Writing is quite reliable and manageable to apply with any number of students. This indication of writing level (across a range of levels 1-4) will be a useful starting point, because it reflects the student's productive ability. Let's say the writing test indicates level 2. We can then chat about the same material in the writing test with the student and get some idea about how much above or below their indicated writing ability their speaking capacity appears to be. This is a simple matter of asking the students to read some of their own text out loud, asking them to talk for 1-2 minutes in response to the main essay topic (allowing them to recall but not look directly at what they wrote on paper earlier), then following up with some general questions that check the topic in more detail and expand it in new directions more personal to the student. Some students will be more fluent in expressing their ideas than their writing indicates, while others will not (and some may be right at about the same level).

Some test writers and assessment experts out there will no doubt be cringing at this advice, but I've used this method and it's been very reliable. In addition, it has been very easy to apply with a minimum of fussing around - which makes it feasible in busy settings with a lot of students to place.

  

Making a (Boost!) Listening Placement Test

The advice for the listening test is fairly similar to the advice given above about speaking. The first simple idea is to use a range of review units from levels 2-3 of the main Boost! Listening coursebook (remember there are 6 complete review units in each book, so there's plenty to choose from and it's not like you're going to end up pre-using too much of your review materials), or even the supplementary listening materials in the free teacher resource section (there's a worksheet and range of sound files for every coursebook unit). These review materials are particularly useful because they incorporate a variety of the skill foci used in not just the previous unit but all of the previous units in that particular book. They also feature sound, word and phrase level comprehension in addition to the main skill comprehension questions. Again, it's a simple matter of checking how well the learners handle this mid-level material to help you decide whether they are below, above or pretty much at the level represented by the review or supplementary materials.

Alternatively (though I must say I prefer the former option in this case, because of the sheer volume of extra review material and listening files available for applications like these), you could use the learner's reading placement test (for the Boost! Reading strand) - a good reliable measure of the student's level - as a starting point, and then use a couple of the supplementary listening materials to check how closely their listening level appears to correlate with the indicated reading level.   

  

Admittedly, these are not perfect solutions for determining speaking and listening levels of students coming into your program (though bear in mind, are there actually any really perfect solutions when it comes to testing in general?), but they are practical, hit reasonably close to the mark, and can be applied without too much extra time for preparation and application.

 

:-)

  

Why I click on the ads on free teacher resource sites and blogs!

Many (if not most) free teaching resource websites (including blogs) feature ads on them, in the hope it will generate a little income for the hard-working person who designed, wrote and uploaded all this material.

Unfortunately, in the case of teaching resource websites, in most instances it generates so little income that it is almost negligible.

The following video explains why I click on 2-3 of the ads (as a habit) whenever I visit sites or blogs made by teachers who are sharing their materials and wisdom!

 

  

:-)

   

The best and worst of 10 years dealing with Korean language institute owners (Part I)

I returned home to Australia in March of this year, following a very eventful 10 years teaching English to a variety of age groups in South Korea. Most of that time was spent in academic coordinator roles at three different private institutes.

Alex Case from TEFLtastic recently challenged me to write about my Korea-based experiences, and I thought I'd kick things off by summarizing some of the best and worst experiences I had there, specifically with regard to the Korean language institute owners (usually referred to as "directors" in that context) I had to deal with over that time. This post is dedicated to some of the "bests" I personally saw and experienced during my time in Korea.

  

THE 'BEST' LIST

- Director 1 let me use his car whenever I wanted after school hours and during school breaks.

- Director 1 and his wife (the principal) gave me time off only four months into my first contract to return home to Australia to attend my sister's wedding. They bought a beautiful custom-made Korean hanbok to give to her as a gift, and the director offered to drive me to the airport to catch my flight to Seoul, from whence I would fly to Australia. He had too much to drink and overslept, and I ended up having to take a taxi in haste to catch my domestic flight from Busan to Seoul. As I sat on the international flight on the tarmac in Seoul, a few minutes from take off (roundly cursing my unreliable director), a flight attendant approached me with a package. It was the hanbok and a box of Korean baek-seju wine. The director, mortified at oversleeping, had rushed to the airport, caught the flight after mine to Seoul, and had managed to convince the flight staff to bring the present parcel to me just moments before I was due to take off. Amazing.

- Director 1 and his wife took all the teachers (all 20 of us) on a three day trip to Jeju Island, all expenses paid, as an expression of thanks for our help in achieving a school enrollment of more than 1,000 students.

- When it was clear we needed more targeted textbook resources for our younger learner students, Director 1 and wife gave me a paid month off to write the materials for the school.

- Director 1 introduced me to the lady who would later become my wife.

- Director 1 became concerned when I spent too much time late at night developing materials and programs for the school - he'd call me to tell me to either get some sleep or else join him for a drink up.

- Director 1 remained a very good friend in the years after I left his school to work at another one, and supported my role as a Korea TESOL Chapter president by sponsoring, covering the cost of our chapter website and paying the membership fee for any of this teachers who wanted to join the association.

- Director 2 gave me private housing with two bedrooms in a beautiful part of the city (at the time hardly any teachers managed to get single housing), and later gave me a computer for the house (first thing I did with it was build the methodology section of English Raven!) and paid for all my Internet bills.

- Director 2 bought me a brand new bicycle after watching my first teacher development seminar (he was that ecstatic to see actual teacher development happening at his school).

- Director 2 organised all the wedding invitations when I got married, and sat at the family table at the reception, acting as a translator between my and my Korean wife's parents.

- Director 2 forked out a heap of money to let me develop an immersion-style kindergarten program and setting, with few questions asked and minimal intervention in how the program was designed and run.

- Director 2 was often a very good listener, and a great motivator and supporter of positive change (even when there was no direct profit involved).

- Director 3 actually gave me a share of the profits from the textbooks I made for the school.

- Director 3 actually paid me generously for the special online program I developed for her school.

- Director 3 paid US$500 towards the cost of my flight ticket to go to IATEFL in Cardiff in 2005 (plus allowed me a week off to attend).

- Director 3 offered to pay for TESOL methodology books for the school, and for any of her teachers who decided to embark on MA TESOL courses (at one stage we had 4 of our teachers doing MA TESOL degrees - at the time unheard of in private institute settings).

- Director 3 made allowances in my teaching schedule for both MA TESOL study and also coursebook writing when I won the Boost! contract with Pearson Longman.

- Director 3 regularly paid generous bonuses to her teachers after intensive sessions or at times when the school was doing particulary well in some way.

- Director 3 generously sponsored Korea TESOL's YLT-SIG, by paying for and organising printing of conference booklets, and in one instance organising a bus to take all of her teachers to the other end of the peninsula to attend a YLT-SIG teacher development event.

- Director 3 insisted that all staff meetings involving foreign teachers be conducted entirely in English, and herself attended all teacher development seminars as an active participant.

- Director 3 organised the best darned hwe-shiks (staff dinners/parties) imaginable.

- Director 3 was genuinely warm-hearted and open in 95% of my (and all the other teachers') dealings with her.

  

Now, before you read this and think "hey, obviously all that negative stuff I've read about Korean directors isn't true!" or even think about packing your bags and heading off to TEFL paradise, remember that there are two equal sides to this coin. This list showcases a lot of generosity and dedication to TEFL professionalism on the part of these directors, but often it was a result of teacher actions/guidance in the first place, and very often it was offset by some other kinds of behaviour that weren't quite as noble, generous, or considerate.

In a later post (Part II) I'll be listing some of the more prominent "worsts", and they feature the very same three directors portrayed here. For now, however, these are the "gems" - so to speak!

  

:-)

Where are all the dungeon masters in English language teaching?

  

Take a look at the picture above... Does it look all that different from an inclusive, conversation-based English language class? Admittedly, the guy holding the book upside down there doesn't do the ideas to follow any favours (and I think I've just spotted Gavin Dudeney sitting behind the group!), but let's ignore those minor distractions for the time being.

Those people are playing Dungeons and Dragons - a game I'm sure you've heard of at some stage (and if you haven't, there's got to be at least a chance you've heard of various famous computer-based successors to D&D like World of Warcraft).

Of course, these are fantasy-based roleplaying games. You may be wondering what the point is in bringing the idea of fantasy games to the topic of English Language teaching, or even aghast with a possible misunderstanding at the title of this post (recalling whip-wielding public school teachers from them bad old days or something).

I recently caught up with an old teacher of mine from high school who was a massive roleplaying games fan and who helped a lot of his students get into these games and learn from them. He was telling me how fantasy roleplaying games still resulted in better creative and critical thinking skills in students, did more for voluntary and extensive reading than anything else he'd yet encountered, and - this one is important - motivated previously unmotivated students to read, write and talk more.

Let's skip most of the dragons, demons, lightning-wielding wizard stuff for a moment and think more about what imaginative roleplaying games could bring to English Language Teaching. I recently referred to a post about immersion roleplaying ideas on this blog, and looking at my own World Adventure Kids concept, you'll see where I came from and where I'm heading with all this.

If we adapt the setting side of the roleplaying game concept (to make it more real-world in orientation, even if within a fictional or imaginative plot), make the teacher a Game Master (sounds nicer than Dungeon Master, doesn't it?), and remove the technical nature of most of the rules, we end up with an enormously powerful tool to engage and involve students in a communicative activity that absorbs all the major language skills fluidly and naturally. Undoubtedly one of the biggest challenges for almost all teachers of English is keeping the learners interested, and ELT Roleplaying could be a real talisman in that respect.

Most language teachers already do some sort of roleplaying activities in their classes (as well as interactive games), so this idea shouldn't feel entirely foreign to them. Teachers already active in Second Life will be even closer to a realisation that ELT Roleplaying has a lot of potential, and as a broader concept could be drawn on as a tool to facilitate genuine language use and genuine language growth across multiple, integrated skills.

 

So where are all those dungeon masters from the past who have now become teachers of English? I know you're out there somewhere... Why don't we see more roleplaying games used in ELT contexts, and what can we do to promote their growth and use (with appropriate materials and methods) in the classroom?

 

:-)

 

Teaching English: groups versus 1-1 (one-on-one)

I started out teaching English when I was 18 years old, fresh out of high school. With high VCE scores in English and English Literature (and a 99% score for History - still don't know how I pulled that one off), I found it easy to find tutoring gigs with high school students who needed help with their essay writing skills. It was all 1-1 (one-on-one or one-to-one or whatever it's called now), and I really enjoyed it. Later I went on to tutor (again on a 1-1 basis) ESL students from university and business settings, and even tutored a businessman in Swedish.

Once I got into TEFL as a serious occupation, it was pretty much all groups. Again, I really enjoyed it. However, I was sometimes asked to help out kids 1-1 in special circumstances - mostly returnee students who wanted specialised instruction or (in one case) my school owner's daughter. This wasn't as enjoyable. Something was telling me this just wasn't right (or rather, I wasn't right for it).

After years of teaching English to groups, the Korean government finally changed some of its pretty bizarre discriminatory laws regarding spousal working rights, and foreign husbands of Korean nationals were finally allowed to run their own tutoring businesses (prior to this, only foreign wives of Korean men were legally allowed to do this, as they qualified for residence visas when foreign husbands did not). The Korean EFL context has a thriving private tutoring industry going, and I was happy to dip into it to try and earn some valuable extra income to help support a growing family. I also had some vague idea that I would be free and able to provide better-quality instruction given the chance to cater to only one student at a time.

Finally legally entitled to do so, I left the institute I was employed at and started private tutoring. It was definitely lucrative, and being somewhat "renowned" locally as a TOEFL specialist and Pearson Longman author, there was no shortage of willing students (or should I say parents?).

It was also definitely NOT my cup of tea. I still enjoyed certain teaching aspects of it (namely the chance to give one child all of my attention and time), but there was always a voice in the back of my head whispering "this isn't the way it should be - this kid should be interacting with other kids, not me." The few chances to teach adults 1-1 felt much more comfortable, but generally speaking, this tutoring thing wasn't sitting all that well with me.

Within four months I packed up shop and fled to a university job. In front of classes with up to 40 students, I felt much more at ease again. I could facilitate and get the learners working with each other. I was a guide, not the focus. There were still many chances for 1-1 work and discussion with students, but it was much nicer being shared around rather than being the whole focus of an 11-year-old's attention for a full 50 minutes.

I thought perhaps the course of my teaching experience and personal beliefs about language learning (interactivity and communication among peers) had made me much more of a "groups" teacher, but - and this is interesting - I had no such feelings of uneasiness when teaching students 1-1 online. In fact, with online teaching, I much preferred the 1-1 dynamic over groups.

Now back in Australia, I'm looking into ways to do voluntary ESL tutoring and mentoring for adult immigrants. Whether it is groups-based or 1-1 doesn't really concern me - they are both appealing prospects.

I still have a lot of friends in EFL contexts who do a lot of 1-1 tutoring and are really good at it (and make some pretty darned good money out of it, too!). For me personally, the memory makes me shudder with discomfort. Give me groups any day - even really big ones - unless it's online teaching, where I prefer the 1-1 dynamic.

So, using my example, it might be fair to say that teaching groups versus teaching 1-1 is not such a simple distinction to make. It obviously depends a bit on a range of other factors...

What about you? Do you have any particular preferences or experiences you'd like to share when it comes to group-based versus 1-1 teaching? What are the factors that influence your preferences?

:-)

  

  

IATEFL and TESOL or "EATEFL" and "TESOLA"?

  

The two webpage images above come from the world's two major ELT associations: IATEFL and TESOL Inc. As you may be very well aware, the first stands for International Association of Teachers of English as a Foreign Language, while the second stands for Teachers of English to Speakers of Other Languages.

These are the two heavyweights - the big boys on the scene of English Language Teaching in a global sense. They both proudly claim this, too - with IATEFL's main site singing "Linking, developing and supporting English Language Teachers worldwide" and TESOL proudly laying claim to being "A Global Education Association."

So, are they both in fact genuinely global and international in perspective, discussion, development nad action? What's your opinion?

Or would it be more realistic to start calling them EATEFL (European Association of Teachers of English as a Foreign Language) and TESOLA (Teachers of English to Speakers of Other Languages in the Americas) and concentrate on the positive ways they can network and share with other parts of the world where English is being taught - rather than alluding to the idea that they cater to all English teachers in all parts of the world equally?

If they are truly global and international, let's hear about it, and help spread the word so more teachers outside their traditional spheres of influence can benefit from them, too!

:-)

Asia TEFL conference goes to Vietnam for 2010

 

Asia TEFL has been spreading its wings since about 2003, and now has more than 12,000 members (which would have to make it one of the biggest ELT associations in the world - as befits the region in the world with the largest number of EFL students, I guess).

There are three things I quite like about this organisation:

1. Membership is free and gives you access to free journals and a special Newsnet Magazine.

2. The move their conferences around the Asian region every year (China 2005, Japan 2006, Malaysia 2007, Indonesia 2008, Thailand 2009), making them truly representative of the region they profess to cover (unlike so-called International associations like IATEFL and TESOL, which always only ever hold their events in Britain or the United States resectively). They also get some very big names to their events!

3. They offer up to 30 travel grants of US$300 to presenters coming to their conferences. So not only is their membership free, they really do make an effort to help out the people who decide to participate as presenters at the events.

 

My only concern or criticism is that the organisation is extremely academic and policy-driven, which can often make "your average teacher" feel somewhat excluded. I hope as an organisation they can learn to cater to the practical and pragmatic considerations of teachers in the region, and avoid the risk of becoming like a bit of a "gentleman's club" - only welcoming people with certain faculty positions or lofty pieces of paper in their resumes.

  

Then again, teachers can do something about this as well, by getting involved and bringing the practical and pragmatic presentations I mentioned to the Asia TEFL events. Sometimes we're only "excluded" if we allow ourselves to be!

  

The next conference will be held in Hanoi, Vietnam (August 6-8, 2010). The call for presentations is now open, so if you're Asia-based, consider becoming an Asia TEFL members and presenting at (or attending) their next major conference!

   

:-)

 

Simple answers to 10 common questions about Teaching English as a Foreign Language

The truth hurts sometimes. However, sometimes confronting the truth helps you accept and understand certain things with more clarity. From there, it is pretty much up to you...

Here's my take on 10 common questions asked within or about the TEFL industry. Far from demotivating me with a sense of "Why bother? What's the use?", my acceptance of some of these home truthes is actually a driving force in my own personal motivation to stand up to, change, or (at the very least) learn to live harmoniously in coexistence with some of them.

  

Q1. Why are so many people around the world learning English?

Incorrect answer:

Because they want to be global citizens and connect/communicate with other people around the world.

Correct answer:

Because they have to. It's mandatory in their schooling or as part of their job prospects.

   

Q2. Why is motivation such a major issue in English language learning classes?

Incorrect answer:

Because English is difficult and takes a long time to learn.

Correct answer:

Because most learners don't actually want to learn English, and wouldn't if they had a realistic choice.

 

Q3. Why does so much English language instruction take place in cramped, unadorned rooms with few (if any) windows?

Incorrect answer:

It helps the learners focus more on the language and learning.

Correct answer:

This is all that some contexts can afford to efficiently provide, and in other contexts it's because it's all they can afford according to a business plan designed to make massive profits.

  

Q4. Why are coursebooks so important in English language programs?

Incorrect answer:

They are the most effective way to guide and facilitate language development.

Correct answer:

(1) Most school administrators have no real idea how to teach English effectively; (2) most of these schools hire inexperienced or barely qualified teachers who also have no idea how to teach English effectively; and (3) schools want to make money and pre-made glossy coursebooks make them look far more professional and effective than they actually are.

  

Q5. Why do tests play such a major role in English as a Foreign Language study?

Incorrect answer:

They help students measure their own growth in the language and set new learning goals for themselves.

Correct answer:

English is a qualification first and foremost (for the vast majority of students), and given the sheer number of students, there needs to be a simple way to measure who is better than whom (and hence more "qualified").

 

Q6. Why do most English language tests focus exclusively on reading, listening and grammar skills?

Incorrect answer:

Because it is impossible to test speaking and writing fairly and effectively.

Correct answer:

There are too many people to test, and these passive skills are the easiest to measure quickly, reliably, and profitably across massive numbers of applicants.

  

Q7. Why do so many "non-profit" English testing organisations charge so much for their tests?

Incorrect answer:

Because of the incredible costs associated with making and delivering tests.

Correct answer:

Because "non profit English testing organisation" is a complete misnomer.

   

Q8. Why is it so expensive to learn English?

Incorrect answer:

It requires a lot of resources and highly trained professional teachers.

Correct answer:

English language learning is a major business, and business is about supply, demand, and making tonnes of money.

  

Q9. Why don't many teachers do more to develop their skills and professionalism?

Incorrect answer(s):

They are too busy and/or aren't aware of the opportunities available to them.

Correct answer:

They don't want to or couldn't really be bothered.

  

Q10. Why don't major publishers develop better and more eclectic teaching materials?

Incorrect answer:

Because they have high overheads and can only afford to cater to the needs of the immediate market.

Correct answer(s):

(1) Their organisational development has hypnotised them into a belief that they are producing better and more eclectic materials; and (2) because they are infinitely less profitable; and/or (3) they don't need to. 

   

Bonus questions: Is there any hope at all for TEFL? Is it destined to keep spiralling downward inside a bottle plastered with labels of success? If there is hope, where will it come from?

   

I'll let you help me answer that one!

  

   

Got an answer to the final bonus questions above? Do you have any alternative answers to any of these common EFL questions? Got other questions you'd like to add to the list?

Go for your life!

  

:-)

  

 

The place to go for all the latest and best blog posts about English language teaching

There are so many English teachers blogging out there these days (and there are so many facets to ELT) that it can be pretty hard to know which ones to follow, or which ones you're missing out on. I have a few personal favourites that I visit quite regularly (like Alex Case's TEFLtastic, Lindsay Clandfield's Six Things, Larry Ferlazzo's Websites of the Day, Burcu Akyol's Blog, Shelly Terrell's Teacher Reboot Camp, and Karenne's Kalinago English), but I also like to visit new ones and - most importantly - just go to the actual posts that are likely to be of some personal interest to me.

So eventually I found OneStopBlogs, an offshoot of the popular OneStopEnglish service from Macmillan, and all my wishes were granted! Basically, most of the ELT blogs worth reading register themselves here, and all the posts for all of those blogs are accessible from one central place.

In addition to a handy top stories page, OneStopBlogs has an ongoing and regularly updated listing of all blog posts. Very easy to use, very informative - a great way to get just enough information about each and every post to help you choose quickly and easily what's worth reading in more detail. I glance through this while the kettle's boiling, then sit down with a nice cup of strong coffee (maybe a chocolate biscuit or two, if my wife allows it...) to read the full posts I'm interested in.

I'm also a bit of a fan of their Blog Site Stats page, where you can see their ranking of the Top 50 English language teaching blogs (very happy to note that I've gone from 19th place to 8th as I type this - or is it because I'm typing this?? Exactly what sort of tracking tech are those guys using over there?), a ranking of blogs based on Readability (happy to see I'm just over the cusp into Thomas Pychon range while Mr. Case is in the Scientific Journals category - that's what you get for using too much sarcastic language, Alex), and even lists based on Most Active, Wordiest and Friendliest blogs.

   

Anyway, it's a fantastic resource for following ELT bloggers in terms of finding the current posts that you're most likely to want to read - all in one place. Thoroughly recommend it.

   

:-)

  

   

Remembering a revolution in online speaking for language learners

In late December, 2005, I was sitting on the couch with a laptop at my parent's house in Australia, at the end of a short break and due to return to Changwon, Korea, where I was academic coordinator of a fairly major language school. When I returned, I would plunge into the popular "Intensive Winter Session" (10 classes a day for four weeks), and as usual, part of my vacation time had to go towards planning the spring term that would follow.

On that sunny morning, I was looking around the Internet for applications that would allow me to bring online speaking into our school's curriculum. Online applications for education by that time were very common, and Korea in particular was saturated with all sorts of glittery automated listening and grammar programs. But, flush with a fresh infatuation with this new concept of "Web 2.0", I wasn't interested in automated stuff, nor programs that just did more one-sided practice with essentially passive skills. I wanted the Internet to provide me with ways to connect students and teachers across time and space, and to allow the productive skills of speaking and writing to really flourish.

I also thought this could be the makings of a savvy business move for our school. In Korea, you will hear that all the parents really care about is test scores. Well, there is a lot of truth in that, but I think they also crave something very basic and inherent to anyone who enrolls their kids in a pay-for education program: evidence. I had already been proven right on this count by putting more effort into our school's writing program, asking for more compositions to be completed at home (rather than during class time) and adorning the walls of the school's main foyer with new samples of students' written work every week. Writing, and the act of completing it, was very important evidence to parents that the kids could use English in an independent and productive fashion. Many Koreans also have this in-built assumption that they and their kids are completely hopeless at speaking English, irrespective of how much time they have spent studying it. An online speaking program could be another, even more powerful, provision of evidence to parents and learners that said: hey, you can use English communicatively... believe it!

At that time, I couldn't find anything that could help me with speaking applications. They were either live-only or required complicated programming skills with software downloads for all potential users (by that time I was only ever interested in browser-based applications that wouldn't create unnecessary hassles for the learners and their parents), and in almost all cases they were prohibitively expensive.

Four months later, in spring 2006, I stumbled across Odeo, which was essentially a podcasting site at the time. However, and much to my delight, not only was Odeo fully browser-based, it had an application that allowed users to send direct audio messages to each other through a simple pop-up screen. Even better, it allowed users to share this recorder with anyone - Odeo member or not - online and accept recorded audio comments from them. And in an unexpected bonus, Odeo also featured a little application called Hellodeo - the first fully browser-based application I had seen that allowed you to record video directly from your webcam and obtain an html code that allowed you to embed the video directly into your own webpages. No software downloads, no complicated sign-up procedures... suddenly I was in business. Odeo's set up allowed me to set up a program, integrated with my own main website, that would facilitate online recording and sending of messages from learners to their teachers, and there was a nifty video application which would be great for creating task pages.

I experimented for a bit, and then by September 2006 I was ready to lauch a complete online speaking supplementary program for the hundreds of learners we had across ten levels in our program:

   

The pages and applications featured in that screencast can still be viewed here, with all the level pages still live. It's actually quite interesting to flit through the different levels and see what the learners at different ages were capable of producing, online, through speaking.

As far as I was aware at the time, this was one of the first major school-wide online speaking programs designed for an institute using very basic web skills and embedded web 2.0 applications from external sites. Certainly in our own school and even 'local private institute market' it caused something of a revolution. Teachers needed specific training, regular class scheduling and workloads for teachers had to be reworked to accommodate the extra work required (as teachers recorded and sent feedback to the learners), and learners themselves needed guidelines and help documents.

What continues to surprise me is that, in a country as wired and tech-savvy as South Korea, none of our competition - not even the super famous private institutes in Seoul - had come close to producing anything like this, and didn't really even start to until about 18 months later (even then, they didn't work on or produce these in-house, almost always going with expensive third-party developers and suppliers.

There were other surprises to come, too - some good, some bad.

On the good side, the introduction of this online speaking system may have actually saved the school in question from sinking. TOEFL iBT fever had just hit Korea: not only was there this brand new speaking thing to deal with on the test, but it required online application. At that time, schools that could cater to TOEFL preparation (and now Internet-based TOEFL in particular), became the instant market leaders. In addition to that, the owner of the school, sick to death of the inordinate franchise licensing fees she had to pay to the Ewha ALS chain, had decided to drop the chain brand name and continue the business under a new, private, non-national business name. Koreans are massively addicted to brand names, especially big flashy ones that could claim Seoul (where all the richest and 'brightest' students were) as their head office base. We were now due to become a "ma and pa on the corner" school with no links to any such brand name, and there was every expectation our enrollment could shrivel by half or even two-thirds as a result of a simple name change.

We introduced a big online speaking program to supplement our course at exactly the same time TOEFL iBT speaking fever hit and our school dropped its all-important national brand name link. The learners, for the most part, loved the online speaking applications and really embraced them. The parents went nuts over the online speaking program. The important "evidence" I alluded to above was abundantly clear to them through this program. They thought it was the best thing since sliced cheese. Far from copping a hit, our enrollment actually went up - and up!

Then there was the bad...

The makers of Odeo were two blokes named Evan Williams and Biz Stone. Given we were using this service with paying students and profiting from it (indirectly at this point), I contacted Evan and asked for information about a customized pay-for version, or at least official permission to keep using the Odeo applications under these auspices.

Evan, a very friendly and approachable person, got back to me and explained that no pay-for or customized versions were ready or required, and in fact his direct message to me on October 3, 2006 was:

"Hi, Jason. No problem. Would love to have you use the service, as is, for any and all uses."

 

Little did I know, at that very time Evan and Biz Stone were playing around with another novel little application they called twttr. In fact, they became so interested in it that they abandoned development and most essential maintenance of Odeo in early November, 2006. The Odeo service went into limbo - dead as a doornail (no recordings possible and not even access to previously recorded messages), and left us and our students stranded with no recourse.

Evan, with his new company Obvious Corp, eventually sold off the derelict Odeo carcass to Sonic Mountain, and concentrated on twttr - eventually putting some vowels back into the word to come up with Twitter, and (as they say) the rest is history. (I mean, what were those fools thinking - abandoning a free podcasting site called Odeo in preference of something that sounds like a bunch of annoying birds perched on your fence early in the morning??? They must be daft!) 

I did find an alternative application very quickly for our online speaking programs and avert potential disaster for us as a business, but this was to be a first and very important lesson for me. If you use web 2.0 applications that are free, and put them into a highly organised and structured private school curriculum with hundreds of users who are paying you fees, you are fair game when those applications go pop on you.

   

There were other problems for online speaking further down the line, too, but I'll leave them for now... Another post, another day. For now, this post reflects on what really did feel like a revolution in our curriculum at the time.

Does it feel strange to you that events and developments for web applications back in 2006 (all of three years ago as I type this) now sound like ancient history?

:-)

  

Access all the English Raven materials - choose your own membership fee!

Well, I am not to the ELT world what Radiohead is to the music industry (though I share a fondness In Rainbows), but I have decided to let teachers decide for themselves how much they would like to pay in order to become English Raven members and access all the materials on the site for 1 calendar year.

The video below explains the whys, hows, etc.:

   

  

Let's see what happens, then. I certainly feel a lot more comfortable about paid memberships now, though!

  

:-)

  

"Little Readers" for kids aged 4-7: The Beach

I've been developing a set of simple readers (called "Little Readers") for my son Jamie which should also be relevant to teachers who want to teach basic reading skills to students aged 4-7. The first of these (The Beach) is now available as an online storybook (feel free to embed the version below, or access the master version at http://screenr.com/8x8):

   

   

For best visual effects and delivery, I recommend hitting the zoom icon to the right of the volume setting there. It will give you a high definition full screen version which is perfect for using at home or in a classroom with younger readers.

I'm not exactly a master story-teller, but I've made an effort in the recording and pacing here to make sure learners have time to repeat each line of the story after the narrator (and also in the Sentence Review section at the end).

You can also use the picture grid at the end to get the learners to re-tell the story to the best of their ability just by using the story images in sequence (without text).

I have print versions of these Little Readers ready as well, but still a little unsure about the best way to format and distribute them online. I intend to make these online versions free for all to utilize!

Oh, and my son Jamie has been instrumental in these Little Reader storybooks. He often tells me what to include in them! I really should be acknowledging him as a co-author, shouldn't I?

:-)

Interesting article about "the new literacy" and how today's young writers are benefitting from things like social media

I recently read this interesting article from Clive Thompson about "The New Literacy", drawing on research findings from Andrea Lunsford at Stanford University.

I like the fact that this article explores what appear to be some serious benefits of modern social networking and its effects on today's young writers, rather than wailing on about how the Internet and social media are destroying writing ability in young people. Lunsford goes as far as saying that she thinks "we're in the midst of a literacy revolution the likes of which we haven't seen since Greek civilization" and that technology is reviving (rather than killing) our ability to write.

 

A few findings from the study that really opened my eyes:

- 38% of writing done by university students done outside the classroom

- Young online writers better at assessing audience and adapting tone and technique to get their points across

   

It's an interesting read, and worth looking at if you're the sort that worries about the writing skills of young people in the age of technology and social media.

 

:-)

Funny YouTube video about the Grammar Translation Method

This is a rather bent but amusing video about the Grammar Translation Method. I came across it a while ago and recently stumbled on it again and wanted to share it here on the blog. The allusion to GTM being a "classical" method is really worked on here, and the scenes showing injuries and a student suffering the effects of dimentia are hilarious. The scene at the end with an ancient statue-like teacher droning on (and dying from old age the next day) is pretty funny, too.

 

  

Actually, this video would be funnier if GTM wasn't still so prevalent around the world in language teaching even today...

 

The same producers of this video made others (in the same spirit) in a little series including The Silent Way and Desuggestopedia. There is also an introduction to the series, which I found mildly disturbing, as I'm pretty sure the black and white footage of kids beating up on and torturing an inflated doll is taken from that study that showed how kids develop violent behavioural characteristics by imitating adults.  

   

Anyway, I think these videos about three very well-known methods would make a humourous inclusion in teacher training courses. As I said, a bit whacky, but they do make fun of some of the methods' less endearing characteristics.

 

:-)

   

TOEFL speaking tips and practice materials online

I recently added a new TOEFL speaking mentor service to my online teaching site at English-iTutor.com (my own little online school for teaching over the Internet!).

This is a nifty application that gives subscribers access to a full TOEFL speaking test made to ETS standards and my special video tips and notes for the best ways to understand and approach each kind of question in the speaking section. Users also get access to a special Voxopop recording facility where they can practice recording their responses online and share/compare their speaking efforts with other people who are preparing for the test.

 

 

  

My tips for the TOEFL speaking section have proven to be surprisingly effective (see what users have been saying about them in relation to their score improvements here).

There are also a variety of free materials and practice tips both on my English iTutor site and in the very active forum I set up for test takers. Whether you are a student preparing for the test or a teacher responsible for helping such students, there's likely to be something there of value to you related to TOEFL iBT speaking preparation and practice.

  

:-)

Teaching English before and after parenthood

I've been meaning to post on this topic for a while, because it has begun to intrigue me!

I, like many people out there, began teaching English well before I was married and had a family of my own. Parenthood brings a whole host of changes to one's lifestyle and outlook on life on multiple fronts- of course - but I've also found it interesting to compare what I was like as a teacher and how I felt about teaching and students before I had kids of my own to the situation afterwards. Most of my experience in teaching has been with younger learners and teenagers, and parenthood undoubtedly has an impact on you when you are teaching these age groups. But it's interesting the way parenthood changes your attitude to students who happen to be adults as well.

These sorts of changes definitely vary from person to person, but here's what I managed to observe about myself and the impact parenthood had on my teaching.

   

Teaching Young Learners

Having my own family meant I had a little less energy in the classroom, and I certainly had less time to pour into materials and activity design for these age groups. I still loved the kids, but it sort of changed - having my own kids made me think a bit more about the fact that these kids had parents and homes of their own. It gave me a greater appreciation of the notion that I should teach these kids the way I'd want someone to teach my own kids.

Parenthood also gave me a very effective lesson on the importance of patience. EFL in particular has a here-and-now "accelerated" feel to it when you follow the syllabus and look for successful learning in each lesson. Watching your own kids grow and develop makes you appreciate things like time, play, the "silent period" and variation in language acquisition, and the fact that "pushing" usually makes kids more distant than more rapid in their language gains.

As a parent, I also found it easier to talk with the kids' parents, and generally found them more receptive to my advice. Interestingly, I was also a little more demanding of parents. I wanted them to get off their backsides and make an effort to help and inspire their own kids - take some responsibility for education in the home - not just load the kids off to private schools and have strangers take responsibility for almost everything. The good old "I'm too busy to help my kids with their English" just didn't quite wash with me anymore!

  

Teaching Teenagers

This was generally similar to many of the changes that happened for teaching younger learners, though my own children were still too young to compare directly with the teenagers I was teaching. Probably the biggest change I noticed here was the way the teens actually regarded the teacher. Once I had kids, I found that my teenager students liked to hear about them and my family life more - and there was actually more respect from them. I think there was also more trust, as they began to see a caring family person and not just a teacher.

  

Teaching Adults

The university students I taught followed the same trend as the teenagers mentioned above, but possibly with more interest. I guess as young people they were on the verge of getting married and starting their own families much sooner than the teens, and were infinitely more interested in it all. Given I was in an EFL context and had married a local and had children, these students were generally more inclined to accept me as an insider and not "a stranger from a strange land" (marrying and settling locally in EFL contexts is another kettle of fish, though, when it comes to effects on your teaching).

The most poignant change I noticed, however, was with my business English students. At around the same age, with similarly aged families, similar life and career pressures, similar lack of time - these company employees started becoming much more like colleagues and close friends. There was just so much of mutual interest and concern for us to talk about! Language learning flowed beautifully as we counselled each other cheekily about spouses, kids, finances and recreation. Again, I was in an EFL context, and there was a lot of interest about the best ways to help their own kids with their English. It was fascinating to have a portion of our lessons dedicated to finding out how they could develop English within their young families. For my business English classes, parenthood did a lot of good!

  

There are probably a whole host of other changes that I haven't managed to touch on here, but there's what I managed to come up with off the top of my head.

How about you? Did parenthood change you in many ways as a teacher?

:-)

Some great reading on "Six Things - a collection of miscellany from the world of ELT"

   

Lindsay Clandfield's Six Things blog has been giving me some great reads of late, and I think it would have to be one of the better ELT blogs around the traps these days. Lindsay's posts are always entertaining, thought-provoking, and well-written.

Here are some of my favourite posts from that blog so far:

Six highly provocative quotes in ELT

Six rumours and conspiracy theories in ELT

Adrian Tennant’s Six Acts of Sheep in ELT

 

There are many more great posts there, and clearly many more to come, so if EFL/ESL/ELT is your thing, I think this is a blog worth following.

:-) 

 

Twitter: how receptive are you and your tweet-friends?

Apologies in advance to any readers who get instantly annoyed by the idea of percentages or statistics being used to draw conclusions about communicative philosophy.

I've been ever so slightly fascinated with "following" versus "followed by" tallies for individual tweeters on Twitter. Excusing for a moment the inevitable impact of spammer sorts who follow purely to chase followers of their own, it's interesting to consider people's tweets against the backdrop of a comparison of their following/follower tallies. Let's take a look at yours truly, and one of my favourite Twitter friends Marisa Constantinides.   

 

  

Now I think what a lot of people on Twitter do is look instantly at the followers count, and figure that the higher that count is, the more worth following they are. Based on that simple criteria, my count (at this stage) of 590 might make me look more "popular" or "follow-worthy" than Marisa's count of 313. I think some people also figure that people with larger discrepancies between "following" versus "followers" tallies is some kind of indication of status within the Twitterverse - if there are a lot more people following you than you yourself follow, your place in the Twitter pantheon of Twits is respectably high-up.

But is that why you are on Twitter? To find out who most others follow so you can be a worthy follower, too? 

Take a closer look at the tone and nature of the tweets from people with the aforementioned "high-up" status in the Twitterverse. Something I've noticed is that some of these people begin to tweet as if they are sitting on a throne with many loyal followers hanging on their every word. They tweet but don't listen, and rarely if ever actually interact. Other tweeters out there should be seen on a followers tally but not heard, unless they are of a similar lordly twitly rank, and then they can both delight their collective retinues of followers by tweeting to each other and letting everyone listen to them.

Okay, that's exactly why a lot of people use Twitter in the first place, and beyond that, the observation is probably not fair in a lot of ways (the use of "some" was important there!). People who tweet a lot of useful information and observations may gather large numbers of followers and it would be a terrible injustice to start labelling them as arrogant Twitter Gods just because they don't follow as many people as they themselves are followed by. And once the tallies go above 500 or so, I think it becomes potentially a little silly to start reading too much into the tally discrepancies: "Oh that Bob is so up himself - he has 1500 followers but he's only listening to 1200 of them..."

However - humor me for a moment - let's look at Marisa's and my stats according to this analysis of "followers" versus "following"...

If we divide the number of people we follow with the number of people who follow us, and convert it into a percentage, we get an interesting little stat.

Jason -> 482 (following) / 590 (followers) = 82%

Marisa -> 305 (following) / 313 (followers) = 97%

   

Marisa clearly has a more distinct balance than I do. She "listens" to as many people she speaks to on Twitter (this is just reading the tallies, of course, and does not factor in what is said, when, why and whom to). She also has more "manageable" tallies - well under 500 for both counts. Just looking at the stats there, could we be forgiven for thinking Marisa is more likely to be a person on Twitter we can genuinely connect and interact with?

I guess it depends a lot on why you join Twitter and what you want to do with it. If you're on there to listen to other people, and get instant access to tweets from people you feel you can look up to, then the follower tallies would perhaps be irrelevant to you. However, if you're on there to meet like-minded people, share thoughts and resources and experiences (and generally interact with other people), you might want to consider the follower tallies before you choose whom to follow. If you've chosen to follow someone with a large number of followers but a relatively small number of people they themselves follow, don't be disappointed if they don't want to chat with or get to know you and it seems you're there to listen to them - not vice versa.

And don't for a second allow yourself to be intimidated by your own followers tally compared to others'. Twitter becomes a real pain when it starts to feel like a popularity contest.

   

:-)

 

Beneath Stars' Northern Dome...

One of the great things about blog-writing is that you get the occasional chance to be unashamedly selfish. Another positive is that you get a chance to write things down before they drift out of your memory forever. This post takes advantage of both of those aspects. Warning: if you're not much into reading poetry written by half-tanked university students, you might like to skip over this one...

A little over 14 years ago, I was a student up very late one night in my warm cozy ground-floor dorm room in Värmlandsstudenthem (Värmland province's student dormitory) on Torsgatan (Thor's Street) in Uppsala, Sweden. On the desk in front of me were various tomes from Uppsala University's amazing "kingly" library covering topics from Old Icelandic to runic inscriptions, Scandinavian place and personal name etymology, and even Anglo-Saxon verse, along with an impressive assortment of dictionaries (Old-Icelandic to Swedish, Swedish to Swedish, Swedish to English, etc.). Outside, the night was crisp, still and sharp as a blade, with the snow-blanketed old buildings awash with the bright glow of a late-winter moon. I was 22 years old.

I was slightly fuzzy from the effects of a moderate drink-up with some dorm friends down at one of the local student pubs, but I had homework to get done before the following morning's Old Icelandic class. Somehow, drinking some ale before reading poetry from vikings seemed somewhat appropriate...

I was struggling to get my head around the various verse forms and rules of Old Icelandic poetry - especially the dróttkvætt (or skaldic "lordly" metre). With all the complex rules of this verse form (which is extremely elaborate and demanding), my head was in a spin, and I abruptly decided the best way to get a feel for it all was to write my own poem in English applying the dróttkvætt verse rules.

Still half-cut, about 30 minutes later I found the following poem scrawled on a piece of notebook paper in front of me:

  

Beneath stars’ northern dome

night breathes on, steely bright.

That silver soul sails, roams –

a sword of lordly white.

Feel the old oak aching

and ageing – those sages

sing with songs of making:

soft sighs from dry pages.

 

Mountains now moan along,

mourning (morning) stone slowly born

in the whirling wheel’s song –

warning of time long gone.

Deep the rocky root dips,

dreams in seams (seems) under ground –

into sealed silence… slips!

sleeping and weeping wound.

   

Though weightless (waitless) is water,

and willing to laugh still;

merry without mortar,

mirth-swilling winding will.

Happy, hopeful ever,

high hills to sea (see) sighing –

this cleaving weaving clever

queen serenely dying.

 

It lingers now, and leaps and laps

light from an old bright-hewn gown;

glimmering and gleaming it traps

the glints from a long-drowning crown.   

  

The first three verses there pretty much obey all the central rules of dróttkvætt: 8 lines per verse, 6 syllables per line with three 'lifts' in each, alliteration, consonant rhyme (skothending - for example Beneath stars’ northern dome and Though weightless is water) in odd lines and internal rhyme in even lines (for example, mourning stone slowly born and dreams in seams under ground), though I did away with trochees in favour of creating alternating end-rhyme to appeal more to the modern English-speaking ear. The final verse is basically in hrynhenda verse (the same as dróttkvætt except with 8 syllables per line).

In addition to pulling off not one but three full verses in dróttkvætt, I was even more surprised to see that I'd actually written something that might mean something. I'm still not exactly sure what, but I think the verses capture the moment and the feelings from that exact moment in Uppsala - a crisp late-winter night on the cusp of spring under a bright moon and contemplating the passing of time over ancient poetic verse with piles of old books on the desk in front of me. It's almost as if the strict conditions of the verse took up all my concentration, and then raw thoughts and feelings direct from the deeper subconscious poured out onto the page - guided into form not by me but by dróttkvætt itself...

In any case, it's the first and possibly only piece of writing I've done that might qualify as half-baked poetry (or else the first proof that poetry wasn't really for me after all!). The original piece of note paper has long since vanished, and it has become increasingly difficult to recall the poem in full. Thought I should write it down here before it "serenely dies" and I lose all the "glints from a long-drowning crown"...

:-)

  

What I like about Ken Wilson's blog...

Ken Wilson recently started a blog. Ken is pretty well-known for his work with music and drama in English Language Teaching and (more recently) some pretty darn fine coursebook series like Smart Choice from OUP. You can see his new blog here.

   

Ken is pretty active on Twitter, and I recall him mentioning there that he was slightly worried about starting a blog because it was going to be basically about him and his life. Myself and a host of other Tweeters assured him that was a better reason than most for starting a blog, and away with it he went.

Okay, so what? I hear you mutter. Why am I dedicating a whole post on my own blog telling you about Ken Wilson's new blog? 

Well, for a start, Ken is a fascinating and lively person with a positively uplifting attitude to not only ELT but life in general. He is entertaining in that "drama-guy" way I recall from my own Year 12 days when the local drama teacher took over our VCE English Literature class and transformed it from a sleepy, dusty, lifeless class to one full of energy and all sorts of rich revelations.

However, it's not just that. I really like the way Ken is dedicating his blog to a rich account of his many experiences within the ELT field. Reading his post about how it all started for him, I got a rich insight into what ELT was like in 1968 (four years before I was even born), which reminded me of what I love about chats with Andrew Wright - another veteran from the early days of modern ELT (great interview with Andrew coming to this blog soon, by the way!).

These sorts of personal accounts of the 60s, 70s and 80s and what ELT was like in those times fascinate me endlessly. Call it a personal fondness for history or the feeling that in order to know better where we are and where we might end up going, we need to not only know but feel where and how things have been before. Young EFL teachers these days tend to get a very sanitized and (I daresay) very generalized account of what happened in our field in the past, generally through short paragraphs in methodology books quickly describing "designer methods of the 70s" or something like that. While I understand the space and genre limitations of these books, I can't help feeling that the decades leading up to now have been grossly summarized. Worse than that, they are portrayed in a way that is almost as black and white as the text that summarizes it.

That's where blogs like Ken's really help to fill out the picture more and add things like color and movement. In our field, we're lucky enough to have many veterans like Ken who are still very much alive and very happy to talk to new generations of English teachers (and some who even manage to keep up with or even ahead of the current generation!). I wish more of them would write blogs in the style Ken has - unrestrained, full of characters, settings, descriptions, and a very personal take on it all. It does his experience and the times he was a child of a lot more justice than he probably realizes, and inspires new generations of teachers in ways he probably never thought possible.

   

Plus it's just cool to see what these people looked like when they actually had hair!

:-)

 

 

Jamie and how to spell "Pocoyo" & "bookshop"

My four-year-old son Jamie is experimenting his way through an interesting phase in his reading development. He already knows the alphabet and is starting to try and connect individual letters to words he knows.

It generally works pretty well for him with the books he knows, because the words he is spelling out correspond to the words he can say completely and knows from active memory of the stories. It can lead to some pretty amusing results when what he is spelling out doesn't exactly correspond to the word he thinks results from these letters.

There are two main bookshops in our local shopping center: Borders and Angus & Robertson. Jamie knows them simply as "the red bookshop" and "the green bookshop" respectively (based on the colours of their storefronts and banners).

While eating lunch together last week in front of the Angus & Robertson bookstore, Jamie decided to spell out the cover of his latest Pocoyo DVD, and then the Angus & Robertson sign. Here's what he decided the letters amounted to:

 

It's fabulous watching the little guy experiment and make his own connections! And as you can see from the video, it can be pretty funny, too.

I'm currently expanding Jamie's awareness of the alphabet by concentrating on the actual sounds the letters make and helping him to connect them to initial sound values for a variety of words (through a series of simple picture-based posters, which I will upload here on the blog at some stage). Our nightly reading time has also resulted in him building up a large number of basic sight-words, so he's in an interesting transitional stage in his reading development at the moment!

  

Oh, and parent's pride... If you didn't get enough of the little guy in the video above, here's a recent snap of him (and below that his 8-month-old younger sister Hannah) during a family picnic down on the waterfront near our home in Barwon Heads:

   

What can I say? Thank goodness they both take after their mother!

   

:-)

 

  

Access great books and articles from Dr. Stephen Krashen!

Anyone who teaches languages has most likely heard of him, and those who haven't really ought to have, or - better - should make a start now on reading his stuff. I'm talking about the man who brought us the theories of comprehensible input, acquisition-learning hypothesis, the Natural Approach, the silent period, i+1, monitor theory, affective filter and free and voluntary reading (not sure if he "fathered" those last ones, but he certainly brought them into the collective conscience of English language educators). He's also been a strident advocate of bilingual education for a very long time - and continues to battle the critics on this and a small host of other issues.

Yes, I'm talking about Stephen Krashen, of course!

Well, Stephen has been pouring his experience, expertise and research findings onto his own website (Books and Articles by Stephen D Krashen) for quite some time now. It's a brilliant resource, and one really worth exploring.

        

 

         

One of the things I really like about Stephen is his willingness and genuine interest in engaging with language educators, whether they be grizzled veteran research writers ready for another round of sparring, or teachers new and fresh to the profession. He's one of those generous experts who will reply to your email, and is always ready to share knowledge.

Here's some trivia about Stephen you may not know (and I'm relying here on the word from a US colleague who saw Stephen speak and appeared to know a lot about his background, so let's hope this isn't hogwash!). Apparently in his younger days he was a professional body-builder!

The same colleague also told me about a Krashen seminar he attended, and Stephen was introducing the idea of affective filter. He abruptly changed track and announced that the entire front row was going to learn some basic German and get up in front of the entire audience and perform it... NOW! As the row of people referred to immediately began to recoil and squirm in alarm, Stephen turned to the rest of the audience and said "That, folks, is what I mean by the concept of affective filter."

Would have liked to have seen that one!

               

:-)

                 

How Twitter can improve your blog visitation!

If you're the sort who worries about how much visitation your blog is getting, aside from the very good advice to make sure you post regularly and make your content interesting and unique, you might find that a good network of contacts on Twitter can make a big difference!

Have a look at my blog's visitation numbers over the past 2 months:

         

 

 

Admittedly, I'd left my blog in limbo for quite some time and wasn't posting a lot, but take a look at the increase in traffic from mid-late July... This corresponds to when I started to use Twitter more regularly and make more of an effort to widen my personal network of contacts.

Whenever you have a new post ready for your blog, you post a quick link to it in Twitter. If you have the right network of contacts interested in the same or similar issues you are, you are automatically going to get some good traffic come through very quickly. Also, if they deem your blog content to be good and relevant, your Twitter friends will "re-tweet" it to their own extended networks - resulting in yet more traffic.

The two activities actually complement each other very well - as Twitter is more about quick messages and references, while the blog allows you to really explore things in much more depth. The quick notification on Twitter makes a handy heads-up, but also allows your network of contacts decide whether the content of a particular post will whet their interest (and that of their own network of followers).

I've noticed one other beneficial side-effect as well... Since I started posting links to new blog entries on Twitter, my blog's Google PageRank has gone from 2 to 4 in a matter of weeks.

        

This all may be self-evident to some people reading this, but in case you haven't considered it yet, you might like to explore ways you can make your blog and Twitter activity complement each other more!

          

:-)

                

        

ELT authors and the money they earn

I've been following an interesting discussion over on the IATEFL YLT-SIG discussion list about authors and money. This discussion has been all the more interesting because of contributions from some very well-known ELT authors like Stephen Krashen and Andrew Wright.

The general consensus that authors of resource books in ELT make fairly meagre income from royalties (compared to say coursebook authors, who inevitably sell many MANY more copies of their work) concerns me. While it is all well and good to claim it is all about the passion for spreading knowledge and not strictly about money, we do have to remember that these people are experts in their field and contribute in a major way to the ongoing development of language learning and teaching thinking - and they have bills to pay and families to feed like anyone else.

My general opinion is that publishers don't do nearly enough to support these writers financially. Resource and methodology books add a lot of prestige to major publishers' reputations, and there is definitely a flow-on effect to sales of the more lucrative products like coursebooks, CD-roms, etc. Consider, for example, the big TEFL and TESOL conferences, where the "VIP" methodology and resource authors take pride of place in publishers' jockeying for attention and the drive to place as many bottoms on as many seats as possible. These writers are the draw at events like these, and it is also at these events that the publishers flog whole wagon loads of other products, and find new and ingenious ways to burn their company logo into the backs of as many eyeballs as possible. 

These ELT writers are definitely not paid for their time at or contribution to these major events (they will get their travel reimbursed and accommodation and meals paid for - but not the time they give up to travel to and participate in the events). Even I, as a mere "coursebook writer", have experienced some of these gruelling publisher tours. They are exhausting and take a big slice out of the time you need to dedicate to your regular jobs - the ones that tend to actually pay the bills. The more important ELT writers out there are called on to attend many more events, and to say this helps them sell their own books and earn more money is a bit disingenious, in my opinion. Even if an event has 500 teachers attend, and every one of them buys one of these author's resource books, it's only 500 books sold - and pales in comparison to the tens of thousands of coursebook sales that are promoted through such events.

To be fair, we need to remember that major ELT publications help a writer's prospects in a variety of ways. It helps them get university appointments or lucrative teacher training contracts. Some are even paid to associate themselves with major school chains. There are certainly many possible streams of income that flow out of being a major ELT writer or researcher. For the ELT resource book writer who laments that he or she can make more money in one day or week by doing paid teacher training seminars than a year's worth of royalties brings in, he/she ought well to remember that the whole opportunity to do that teacher training work came mostly from the validation provided by their well-known ELT resource book. And the more of these books an author has out on the market and the more major events they attend, the better their asking price becomes for industry-associated training programs or salary as part of a stint at a major school or university. In this case, major ELT works in writing do not comprise major sources of income in and of themselves - they basically open a whole range of doors to some very lucrative income in other areas of the industry.

That said, I'd like to tie this up by returning to the issue of publishers and how they look after their writers, major and minor. I think for authors whose written work and public appearances contribute significantly to a publisher's brand image, these publishers ought to go beyond mere royalties (and drop the "you're helping yourself sell more books by presenting at such and such an event" line) and actually reward the writers financially for their part in increasing the publisher's brand building and, by extension, all the profits they make in all the far more lucrative sales lines in their catalogue.

Good ELT writers will continue to make resource books and attend major events because they enjoy spreading and sharing knowledge and touching base with real teachers in a variety of contexts. But just because they're not doing it strictly for the money doesn't mean these publishers should continue to milk them for it.

                    

:-)

                             

               

TESOL teachers returning home to Australia - what has your experience been like?

I returned to Australia (Melbourne region) in March this year after almost 10 years teaching English as a foreign/second language in Korea. This experience included kindergarten, elementary (primary) school, secondary school, university (one of Korea's most prestigious) and business English instruction at one of Korea's major heavy industries companies. I also produced a major 20-book coursebook series for the world's biggest educational publisher, and participated in professional and coordination activities with organisations like Korea TESOL, TESOL International, and IATEFL.

Given my experience and qualifications, I was rather hopeful of landing a teaching job upon my return to Australia, and there were certainly plenty advertised. However, despite warm acknowledgements about the qualifications and experience, only a few have resulted in my being short-listed, and fewer still have come to an actual interview.

This doesn't particularly alarm me personally, given I have all sorts of other ELT opportunities and offers coming in (from publishing to online teaching and exam preparation), but it did make me start to wonder. I did some asking around, and heard some rather dark comments that TESOL institutions (particularly the university-affliliated ones) in Australia aren't actually all that keen on returning TESOL professionals. The position advertising is done according to policy rather than intent, as the positions have already been essentially allocated from within. Overseas experience is ignored and localized pieces of paper are preferred along with entry-level appointments and then a sort of wrangling climb in promotions from within the industry.

So the comments go, anyway.

Rather than succumb to the temptation of "sour grapes" (and as I said, it's not a major problem for me personally - I'm lucky enough to have other options), I thought I'd open this topic up and invite wider commentary. Have you returned to Australia from a stint of TESOL (or other forms of ELT) abroad and sought a teaching position? What has your experience been like? Is overseas teaching experience respected and sought after, or is it basically a localized industry full of nepotism?

Of course, this may relate to other issues as well... for example the value of teaching experience in Korea in particular when it comes to returning back to your native country. I know some Brits who did a lot of teaching in Korea and had all sorts of problems breaking into the TEFL industry back home in the UK - they mostly had to settle for other jobs (one very talented EFL teacher found himself working on trains!). Teaching colleagues returning to Canada and the US have reported similar difficulties.

And let's skip the "qualifications" issue, if possible, and assume people have the necessary qualifications on paper - what are their real prospects in TESOL industries when they return home after teaching English abroad?

              

:-)

                

          

Making your own songs for kids

Early on in my time as an English as a Foreign Language teacher, I was responsible for teaching Korean children as young as 4 years old. At first, the kindergarten classes in particular were very daunting - not least because the kids appeared to love songs and it was sort of expected that all the teachers would (at some stage) be willing to start singing and dancing about the place.

Let's get something straight here: I cannot sing well. Sometimes I think I can (in those rare moments in a karaoke room at the end of the school term when all the teachers get together and generally act like complete idiots), but it would be fair to say that my singing ability could be compared to ex-president Bush's capacity to string three coherent words together at a tongue-tie competition held especially in his honour before he started getting dragged off to AA meetings.

Anyway, insofar as singing might be construed very loosely as the capacity to open one's mouth and emit some sort of sound, I could sing - if not well. I tried my best to sing the standard songs presented in the kids' books, and began to rely on the kids' ability to drown me out. Generally speaking, teachers who sing like disoriented banshees can still get away with the act when it comes to kindergarteners - who either can't tell the difference or just don't care.

From there, however, the main problem for me was that the songs were incredibly contrived and boring, always set to the same 6-7 universal tunes. Bear in mind that I had no idea who Carolyn Graham was at that time, so I was deprived of the chance to learn how to use amazing things like Jazz Chants. I also knew nothing about her assurance that anyone who has a heart can sing (see the end of the post I've just linked you to).

So, despite my own shortcomings as a singer, I decided to try something different and come up with my own songs. I chose catchy Australian folk songs that had been drilled into my memory as a child, and put new words to them that would be more appropriate for the context my learners were in.

Here is a good example - and a real treat if you happen to be a Rolf Harris fan:

                                             

Click Go The Shears - Rolf Harris

                

In Rolf's lively version above, he's kind enough to provide some much-needed translation of some of the more obscure Australianisms featured in the lyrics. However, for the sake of clarity, here are the lyrics to the main chorus of the song "Click go the shears":

       

Click go the shears, boys, click click click!

Wide is his blow and his hands move quick.

The ringer looks around and is beaten by a blow,

And he curses the old snagger with the blue-bellied joe.

                

Understand any of that? Don't worry if you don't - in world terms you wouldn't be the Lone Ranger (as we like to say Down Under to indicate you're not alone in doing or feeling something). My kindergarten students certainly wouldn't have understood it, and the original lyrics might have been good for a lesson on the obscure nature of the Australian dialect for my advanced classes had there not been a strict blanket ban in that school on using and teaching anything other standard NORTH AMERICAN English, if you please...

In any case, my idea was to take this lively tune and change the lyrics to be more useful and memorable for my kindergarten students. Here are the lyrics I came up with for the same tune above:

      

Snip go the scissors, snip snip snip!

Cutting the paper - clip clip clip!

We are very clever, and we are very good,

'Coz we are cutting pa---per the way we should!

                 

The inspiration for these lyrics came from the fact that we often did a lot of cutting out in class. I wanted a song for them to hum and then sing along to while they were doing this act. I guess the tune and words became quite special to them, as later I often heard them singing it when going between classrooms or lining up and waiting to go home at the end of the day.

I ended up making quite a few of these little ditties, and actually began to enjoy not only making them, but teaching them to the kids and singing with them in and out of class. It becomes surprisingly easy to make your own songs this way when you use catchy tunes you remember from your own childhood, and substitute in lyrics that can fit the learners' daily situations or communication needs.

I did, however, have to restrain myself from creating a special song as a dedication to a particularly useless co-teacher who never came even remotely close to bonding with or controlling her VYL (Very Young Learner) classes. As she joked (at least, I really hoped she was joking) one day about taking some rope into class to bind the students to their chairs to stop them from leaping about and - you know, being kids - I very nearly suggested an adaptation of yet another Rolf Harris classic, which I might have called Tie Your Kindergartener Down, Sport... Of course, in the end I had better taste than to do something like that.

          

How about other people out there? Have you ever made your own songs for young children to use in class?

              

:-)

               

  

My Twitter Mosaic

I know this is old news to many, but I found it a pretty cool toy - the good old Twitter Friends Mosaic. You can see mine below (can you spot yourself in there?):

            

Get your twitter mosaic here.

              

                               

I wonder what these end up looking like for people with really VAST friend/follower tallies!

  

:-)
    

   

What's in a name? Where "English Raven" came from...

One thing I get asked from time to time is "Why English Raven?"

Well, it will (hopefully) be reassuring to know that the name didn't come from a desire to sound like an Edgar Allan Poe poem reader, nor as some sort of cool and tough-sounding computer game character. And for those who have contacted me to say the concept of a raven is too dark and sinister looking/sounding (especially for a resource site dedicated to teachers of young people), I can honestly say being "dark" wasn't the motivation either!

Basically, my surname - Renshaw - comes from an Old English name hraefnsceagu, or "Raven Shaw" - or in the clearest modern English rendering "Raven Wood." Raven is the most prominent element in my family name - simple as that!

Back in 2001, when I was pondering a name for my first website, I wanted something that reflected my identity and yet would be original and memorable. "Renshaw English" just didn't quite make the cut. Too stuffy and too boring, I thought.

I focused in on the raven element, and suddenly thought of the idea of raving - or raven'. As in, "he's raven' on about something." That captured my sense of humour a little, but I didn't want to be known for just gossiping on passionately about something.

Then I started to get a little more poetic. As a student of the modern and ancient scandinavian languages (I spent time at Uppsala University in Sweden studying Old Icelandic, Old Swedish, and Runic), I was pretty familiar with Norse mythology and I was always intrigued by the notion of Odin's two ravens: Huginn and Muninn.

These two ravens (according to the mythodology) travelled the world gathering news and information to bring back to Odin. More tellingly, their names meant Thought (Huginn) and Memory (Muninn).

This was the clincher to me! The idea of a website (and accompanying blog) that allowed me to think and document memories of experiences and work I had done sounded just right. It fit my name, fit the idea of talking passionately (if a little too much or incoherently at times), and represented the Old Norse concepts of thought and memory perfectly!

And that, my friends, is where the name English Raven came from. Simpler and yet more mysterious than you might have at first guessed...

           

What about you? What's the name of your website or blog? Does the name (or naming process) have an interesting development or twist?

         

:-)

          

"Where the Wild Things Are" comes to film!

My son absolutely adores the picture book Where the Wild Things Are (by Maurice Sendak). It is an absolute classic, written way back in 1963.

Well, the exciting news is that an ABSOLUTELY FANTASTIC movie adaptation of the storybook is currently in post-production and is due out in October this year. Here's a preview for you!

    

         

This looks absolutely sensational and - given the role of Maurice Sendak in the movie-making process - looks to be pretty true to the original story and look/feel (there were scenes from the film clip above that made me think immediately of certain pages in the book).

Despite being banned in many places in the 60s, this book/movie/story is one of the sure things to help kids get over their fear of monsters and see the potential for beauty in things that may not look all that pretty to start out with. It is also a masterpiece of raw imaginative power.

Don't miss the movie - and if you don't have the book yet, get it!

             

:-)