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 ›
materials writing
Materials writing conversations #20: The title
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 ›
Materials writing conversations #19: vague briefs
Host (Des): Welcome back to ELT Publishing Family Fortunes. Before the break, we asked each publishing team to name ‘Something that publishers are deliberately vague about in project briefs’. Donald gained control of the board for Big Four ELT with… Read More ›
Materials writing conversations #18: The Test Specification
This is completely imaginary blah blah blah. Hi Pete, Thanks for agreeing to write the official practice exams for the Test Of English Within Academic, Research, and Technical Settings (TOEWARTS), 2025 specification. As you know, endorsed exam practice resources like… Read More ›
Materials writing conversations #17: The front cover
Dear Pete, As author of the book English for Ticking Boxes, we’d appreciate your input regarding the image choice for the front cover. You’ll be familiar with our earlier range of front cover images for books such as… English for… Read More ›
Pitching ideas to publishers
You want to approach a publisher with an idea for an ELT resource. How do you write a proposal/plan/pitch? Some publishers have proposal forms. Myself and my co-author pitched a book to a publisher last year using an in-house proposal… Read More ›
Year in review
Where to start? January obvs… ‘The big one’ At the start of the year I was deep into a project with Pearson International, writing the 2nd Edition of their IGCSE English as a Second Language coursebook. I’ve written about the… Read More ›
11 Great ELT Editors
I’ve worked with some awesome editors as an ELT materials writer. I don’t praise them enough or acknowledge the support they’ve given me. So, here are 11 people who have been AWESOME to work with and that I’d easily recommend… Read More ›
Back to the classroom!
My year as a freelance writer is over. I’m really looking forward to a return to the classroom next month. Here’s what I’ve been up to since last August, and a bit about what’s happening next. Freelancing I finished my… Read More ›
Materials Writing Conversations #16: ‘Undermatter’
Workbook Unit 1, Draft 1 – Feedback Editor: Thanks for the great content. However, there is some undermatter in Unit 1. I know we said to have two grammar practice activities. Can you add one more in which the grammar… Read More ›