Nice to see some kind of variation on the TEFL blacklist model- the change in technology makes the repetition of the same old complaints slightly less tedious for a while. I predict it will all end in tears. You can follow its attempt to get added to Best TEFL Soap Opera Part Two here:
http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=9205333585
I write my “15 ways…” articles and teaching ideas in the spirit that even if what I put in there is painfully obvious, sometimes seeing something written down can help clarify an idea that was floating round somewhere at the back of your brain. A case in point is this description of two kinds of teachers who I’ve never consciously thought about, read about, written about or written for but have probably come across while only half realising it:
“There are two kinds of teachers here in Korea that really make me wince. One is the native-speaker who has been here for six or nine months, acknowledges that he was lost for three months but now ‘has it all figured out’
No help, no study, no reading, no questions to other teachers, he just somehow found a way to get through his classes without bosses, parents or students complaining..
He no longer feels uncomfortable in class, so he no longer feels the need to grow, change, develop or learn. Maybe he’s hit on one or two good activities, but I sort of doubt it.
The other kind is the Korean teacher who has studied modern teaching ideas and techniques, who does know what exciting things she could and should be doing in class, but who doesn’t do those things because she is afraid her boss or the other teachers or the parents won’t like them…”
Phil Owen, Korea TESOL President in The Korea Times, Thursday 16 October 2008
And after all the teaching and reading about teaching and writing about teaching and studying about teaching over the last 13 years, reading something that was only half remembered or half conscious is about the best you can hope for most of the time. It’s certainly the best you can hope from Complex Systems in Applied Linguistics, a brand new title from OUP. In summary, it says something like “a complex system is a mathematical concept that is different from just a complicated system and often involves techniques like computer modelling. However, because most of you studied English Lit at uni, we are going to deal with this subject without using a single mathematical formula and instead look at complex systems as some kind of metaphor of language, SLA and teaching. This basically means that we have to stop pretending that these things are easy to predict”
Or as a very short summary “complex systems are complex, but we think they are interesting and you will too (hopefully, because we’ve spent an awful long time researching them!)”
Not sure I ever thought any of those things were easy to predict, and am totally certain that more computer modelling and less metaphor is what has made complex systems interesting and useful, but did prompt a few minutes of musing and a tiny bit of “Oh yer, hadn’t thought about that recently”. Here’s hoping that Language Learner Strategies, which arrived in the same package from OUP, turns out to actually have something new to me in it. I’m on page 25, and it’s looking more hopeful so far.
Getting more or less back on topic, here are some other TEFL related bits and pieces in the same edition of The Korea Times:
“As ETS is a non-profit organisation, we don’t care about an alternative test organizer”
Well if you really don’t mind people doing other people’s tests, ETS, might I suggest you recommend BULATS and IELTS to all your candidates and stick to doing GRE?
And a fundamental misunderstanding of action research:
“This lead to my action research… I applied my research to develop the Pronunciation Rhythm Control Method (PRCM), which has proven to dramatically improve English speaking and listening skills for both students and teachers”
The whole point of Action Research is that it is to develop and adapt methodologies for use in a practical teaching situation, and coming up with a Method with a big M demands entirely another approach- one that the so-fine-you-could-easily-miss-it distinction between ‘has proven’ and ‘has been proven’ suggests this person has not gone through. Doesn’t mean I’m not open to her ideas, though, and I will be seeking out a workshop on PRCM if I can.
*I was going to call this post “The best you can expect in TEFL”, but this message I saw on a T shirt in Seoul today seemed to say it much more poetically…
androgogy- teaching like a girly man
behaviourism- the theory that making your students pretend they have stiff upper lips will make them act and speak like Englishmen, and wearing a crown in class will make them speak Queen’s English
co-hyponym - Getting students to hypnotize each other to help with vocabulary learning
communicative weight- the difficulty of where to look when talking to the obese
feminist pedagogy- (more…)
50% (more…)
I have to fly away from my Yahoo BB internet connection now, and I may be some time. So while I am gone from cyberspace, you all have a chance to read the over 200 articles I’ve written elsewhere- starting with this month’s supply:
15 easy ways to bring change into the classroom
15 ways of dealing with students who pause before they speak
15 ways of dealing with pre-experience Business English and ESP students
15 ways to boost your teaching and lesson planning creativity
15 places to start getting published
15 ways to correct spoken errors
15 ways to bring lucky chances into your classroom and lesson planning
Done already? Well, I’m sure you’ve all been good and read the entire list of articles etc in the September list further down this page already, so the extra homework for the keen this month will be having a look at:
TEFLtastic articles (reorganised a bit to have more links to articles elsewhere on the same topics)
and
TEFLtastic worksheets (ditto)
This is when my studies with the Lonely Planet phrasebook started getting completely out of hand, I think I might have been just short of giggling like a school boy on the train at one point… Not that hysterics is a bad thing for language learning, mind you.
chim pogwanhami issossumyon hanundeyo = I’d like to store my luggage
ilbon ch’ulgu = entrance number 1
kaduk ch’aewojuseyo = please fill the tank
chuch’a hanunde olmaeyo = how much does it cost to park here
kio sut’ik (more…)
Seems that there is an interesting TEFL strike story going on right on my doorstep that I hadn’t even heard about, including loads of juicy controversy. You can see the recent open letter by the leader of the Berlitz strike here, and the article in Metropolis she was replying to here.
Hat tip to the David English House newsletter for teachers, part of the ETJ (English Teachers in Japan) empire of niceness (in endless opposition to the JALT empire of evil). If you are in Japan, don’t miss the upcoming ETJ Expos in October and November.
Candidate number one
Involves me, and Paul Lowe’s threats to sue me for never mentioning him on my blog (!?) or something, still can’t quite work it out. “Bizarro!” as TESall.com put it. I thought, what the hell if I’m going down might as well go down with a fight and show some people power and so started an I Am Spartacus campaign to tell everyone in TEFL what had happened. Messes the story up a bit that it was all bluster and he never did sue me, and that every blog he wrote to saying I shouldn’t be allowed to comment on there because I was guilty of a “hate campaign” (along with UsingEnglish.com, whose apparent crime was publishing my grammar game worksheets) just ignored him. So, not sure this one wins, although it did all take a break after online rumours (still unconfirmed) of a suicide attempt…
Candidate number two
-involves Bruce Veldhuisen’s TEFL International and their one time guarantee of academic standards IATQUO. Or not, as some kind of feud goes on to this day with them each accusing the other of being unprofessional and worse, which kind of makes you wonder about the judgement of the other side for choosing to ever doing business with them, doesn’t it? It’s got the usual recipe of anonymous blogs set up by people who slag others off for doing just that and bringing people’s family into it, but still not sure it quite takes the championship.
Candidate number three
This is more like it. TEFL Watch turns into an anti-TEFL International slag fest, with needless to say Brucey’s side not keeping out of it. Then, in a twist worthy of Dallas (or at least Neighbours), an ex-forum moderator becomes the accuser in chief of the management of the site because he suddenly decides that Bruce V and his crew and being treated unfairly, eventually driving the owner of TEFL Watch to give the whole thing up and start writing about healthy grilling with George Foreman. Nice and juicy, that one, and haven’t even mentioned the allegations of having to flee the country for their personal safety. Could still be the greatest TEFL soap opera of all time, but let’s see how the last candidate plays out-
Candidate number four
Can the anonymous blogger throwing accusations about Sandy MacManus uncover Sandy’s real identity and so stop him being an anonymous blogger throwing accusations about? And how does threatening to make him lose his job in the Middle East help with that? Or has Sandy already uncovered “Michael Flynn“? And what script writer is being paid for melodramatic twists like death threats? And why would Paul Lowe, the chief suspect, go from repeatedly claiming to the police that he has never commented on any blog let alone started one of his own to suddenly tell the police where that blog with the death threat and many of his bizarre comments is?
Votes for one of the four or other candidates below please:
Here is another attempt of mine to cope with my complete lack of language learning motivation, Playstation-generation attention span and need for something new every couple of hours. And the new method is- trying to find as many rude things in the language as I can… Not a method that many schools advocate, but I think they might be missing out on a real motivator with teenage classes!
As with My Lonely Planet Is Full of Eels, all the sentences below come straight out of the Lonely Planet Korean phrasebook but it is no reflection on this rather useful publication that I found the things below amusing and so learnt them easier that way:
han-gugesonun igol ottok’e haeyo? = How do you do this in your country?
hajinun ank’o pogiman halkkeyo = I don’t mind watching, but I’d prefer not to participate (more…)
96. “Sick of our dirty classrooms? Home lessons available for just 50% more!”
97. “And your thought only pizza delivery boys would travel all the way to your house！”
98. “Our 100th international branch right here in your town is in a newer building than our Rome branch, less expensive than our London branch, more flexible than our Frankfurt branch, cleaner than our Naples branch, and with more polite staff than our Paris branch”
99. “We make illegal copies so you don’t have to” (more…)