Author Archives

Teacher and Materials Writer

• Problems with images in ELT materials

  By Pete on May 7, 2017 • ( 15 )

  

  Images in ELT coursebooks are often ambiguous. What might seem a fairly obvious depiction of an act or concept to us may be perceived as something completely different to our learners. In an interesting, small-scale study, Hewings (1991) asked a… Read More ›

• Lesson idea: Tomlinson’s text-driven approach

  By Pete on May 6, 2017 • ( 24 )

  

  In Developing Materials for Language Teaching (2013) Tomlinson introduces a text-driven approach to materials development. He goes into quite a bit of detail regarding text selection, offers a suggested framework for the approach and provides a practical example (pages 99-114)…. Read More ›

• IATEFL 2017: Does feedback work?

  By Pete on April 8, 2017 • ( 6 )

  

  A summary of Loraine Kennedy’s main points from the talk ‘In one ear and out the other: does feedback work?’ You can access the session here (again, won’t embed). Orientation This talk was specifically about in-service feedback for teachers, not… Read More ›

• IATEFL 2017: Developing teacher talk

  By Pete on April 6, 2017 • ( 1 )

  

  I’ve just watched Jamie Keddie’s talk entitled ‘Developing Teacher Talk’. I was excited about this one. I’m a fan of Jamie’s site and I recently watched his TEDx talk On Videotelling. Here’s a link to the talk (can’t embed again)…. Read More ›

• IATEFL 2017: Integrating pronunciation

  By Pete on April 4, 2017 • ( 1 )

  

  I just watched a good talk from Mark McKinnon and Nicola Meldrum called ‘Making pronunciation an integral part of your classroom practice’. Here’s a link (I can’t embed the vid for some reason). I’m a DipTESOL graduate so ‘pron’ is… Read More ›

• Metaphors for teaching materials

  By Pete on April 4, 2017 • ( 6 )

  

  What are coursebooks to you? This question prompted plenty of discussion on our materials development course. We were given various metaphors to choose from – a springboard, a straitjacket, a recipe, a compass, etc. I opted for a crutch, as… Read More ›

• The role of teaching materials – deficiency vs difference

  By Pete on April 3, 2017 • ( 2 )

  

  I took a course on materials development recently. It was really good – plenty of input and ideas I could apply in my current context. Here’s a link to the course if you’re interested. The role of teaching materials (as… Read More ›

• Learn English through football

  By Pete on March 22, 2017 • ( 0 )

  

  Ball ball ball, footie footie footie! I’m a bit obsessed with the beautiful game, and I’ve taught plenty of students who are too! You may have come across Premier Skills English before, the British Council/Premier League site dedicated to teaching… Read More ›

• Teachers – which sea creature are you?

  By Pete on March 11, 2017 • ( 8 )

  

  I wrote a post a while back comparing learners to different birds. Svetlana at ELT-cation requested more, so here I’m comparing teachers with sea creatures. Which one are you? For a quiz version of this post click here. (Note: this… Read More ›

• Random realia and peculiar props

  By Pete on February 28, 2017 • ( 2 )

  

  I think it hit home about five minutes before the lesson: ‘Am I really going to base a 30 minute activity around this bottle of murky water? Surely this can’t work…’ Most of the activities I’ve tried from ‘Teaching Grammar… Read More ›