Author Archives

Teacher and Materials Writer

• Research in brief: Harnessing the translanguaging corriente

  By Pete on December 18, 2025 • ( 0 )

  

  Article: The translanguaging pedagogies continuum (Ossa Parra and Proctor, 2022) Link here Summary: Research into best practice for teaching multilingual learners (in the US and elsewhere) has focused on English-only instructional settings, and systemic monolingual contexts. This runs contrary to… Read More ›

• Another year in review

  By Pete on December 15, 2025 • ( 2 )

  

  An interesting one – lots of change! Leaving Malaysia My two-year contract at St. Joseph’s International School ended in July. During those two years, our EAL team achieved a lot. Establishing an EAL department in the high school, building multi-tiered… Read More ›

• EAL lessons: Robbie (Isaac Asimov)

  By Pete on November 14, 2025 • ( 2 )

  

  Here’s an example of the EAL content I’m putting together these days. Last year, I was teaching a group of A1-A2 level multilinguals (Year 8, aged 13) in a support group. We were looking to introduce them to authentic literature…. Read More ›

• Research in Brief: Input Enhancement and L2 Grammatical Development

  By Pete on October 29, 2025 • ( 0 )

  

  The research:  Leow, R. P. (2008). Input enhancement and L2 grammatical development: What the research reveals.  (Open access, see here) Type of research A meta-analysis of research into the effectiveness of different input enhancement techniques. The range of studies were… Read More ›

• Performativity in education

  By Pete on October 23, 2025 • ( 1 )

  

  I tend to post my short-thoughts on LinkedIn rather than on this blog. This one is an example from around 8 months ago – but I decided to post here too just for easy reference. I originally came across Ball’s… Read More ›

• Research in brief: Language ideologies and pedagogical tensions

  By Pete on October 17, 2025 • ( 2 )

  

  An interesting (small scale) study on home language use in the EAL classroom from Neokleous and Natlandsmyr (2025) – Link here. Plenty of interesting findings within those themes: Theme 1 Theme 2 Relating this to my context The findings seemed… Read More ›

• Further IGCSE ESL musings

  By Pete on October 14, 2025 • ( 0 )

  

  A few months ago, I wrote a post on the value of the IGCSE ESL course. I’ve had a few other thoughts since, which I’ve shared on other platforms. I just wanted to file those thoughts somewhere under ‘random Pete… Read More ›

• Materials writing conversations #20: The title

  By Pete on September 7, 2025 • ( 0 )

  

  Project manager (PM): So, this new product is the big one! General English resources have never been so pointless, which is why TITLES MATTER.  (Everyone unmutes their mics to shout ‘hear, hear’ and bang stuff down loudly and repeatedly) PM:… Read More ›

• IGCSE LinkedInLit (Volume 2)

  By Pete on July 29, 2025 • ( 0 )

  

  Here are more of my #LinkedInLit posts about IGCSE English as a Second Language. You can read the first volume here. The cultural trip ‘This cultural trip to England is an excellent opportunity for #IGCSE #ESL students,’ said Mr Wells… Read More ›

• Does IGCSE ESL miss the mark?

  By Pete on July 24, 2025 • ( 1 )

  

  I like teaching IGCSE ESL although I’m not sure it’s always suitable for my learners. Here are a few thoughts I have on it, both good and bad. Note, I’m writing about the Cambridge course here, as it’s the one… Read More ›