Essentials for Successful

English Language
Teaching
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 Essentials for
Successful
English Language
Teaching

Thomas S. C. Farrell and

George M. Jacobs
Continuum International Publishing Group
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© Thomas S. C. Farrell and George M. Jacobs 2010

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as the Authors of this work.

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or

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 Contents

Acknowledgments vi
About the Authors vii
Preface ix

1 Essentials for Successful English Language Teaching 1

2 Encourage Learner Autonomy 15

3 Emphasize the Social Nature of Learning 29

4 Develop Curricular Integration 42

5 Focus on Meaning 57

6 Celebrate Diversity 70

7 Expand Thinking Skills 83

8 Utilize Alternative Assessment Methods 97

9 Promote English Language Teachers as Co-learners 111

10 English Language Education: The Essentials 122

References 130
Index 137
 Acknowledgments

By writing this book we acknowledge that we are standing on the shoulders

of giants and we are really only fine tuning what the giants of our field have
already postulated. In particular we are grateful for the mentorship of
Professor Jack Richards who encouraged us to write a paper on this topic
earlier (Jacobs & Farrell, 2003) and his overall contribution to the under-
standing of communicative language teaching (with Ted Rogers). In addition,
we would like to acknowledge the contributions of all the professionals and
students we both have met during our careers that made writing this book
possible, as well as the patience both our families have shown us.
About the Authors

Thomas S. C. Farrell is Professor of Applied Linguistics at Brock University,

Canada. His professional interests include Reflective Practice, and Language
Teacher Education and Development. He is the series editor for the Language
Teacher Research series (Asia, Americas, Africa, Australia/New Zealand,
Europe, and the Middle East) for TESOL, USA. His recent books are Succeed-
ing with English language learners: A guide for beginning teachers (2006, Corwin
Press, Sage Publications); What successful literacy teachers do: 70 research-based
strategies for teachers, reading coaches, and instructional planners (2007,
co-authored with Neal Glasgow, Corwin Press, Sage Publications); Reflective
language teaching: From research to practice (2007, Continuum Press); and
Teaching reading to English language learners: A reflective guide (2008, Corwin
Press, Sage Publications).

George M. Jacobs is a consultant with JF New Paradigm Education in

Singapore. His interests include cooperative learning and global issues. He is
on the executive board of the International Association for the Study of
Cooperation in Education (http://www.iasce.net) and co-edits the newsletter
of the TESOLers for Social Responsibility caucus of Teachers of English to
Speakers of Other Languages (http://www.tesolers4sr.org).
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 Preface

Education is meant to open magical doors to students, offer exciting, fulfilling

careers for teachers, and help create a world in which people work together for
the common good. The possibilities are great. Students have so much to learn
and so many ways to learn it. Similarly, we teachers have so much to learn
about what we teach and the fascinatingly complex paths to facilitating student
learning. Essentials for Successful English Language Teaching is about how
we teach second language (mostly English as a Second Language (ESL) and
English as a Foreign Language (EFL)) and how our second language students
learn. “There’s nothing as practical as a good theory” (Kurt Lewin, 1951, p. 169)
probably best sums up how we arranged the contents of this book (see also
Chapter 10) as we think it is a practical approach to teaching second language
yet, all the activities are backed up solidly with clearly explained theories about
where they came from.
Essentials for Successful English Language Teaching is about helping
second language teachers maintain and rediscover the reasons that led them to
take up teaching, reasons such as sharing their love of learning, making the
world a better place, and working together with students and colleagues toward
common goals. We strongly believe that the ideas in this book can create excite-
ment, joy, and satisfaction among second language teachers and their students.
What we maintain is that the ideas we’ve gathered and attempt to illuminate in
this book bring with them the hope of many days in which an inner smile tells
us teachers that, yes, we made the right choice when we chose this profession.
Essentials for Successful English Language Teaching takes a ‘big picture’
view of second language learning and teaching. The eight essentials presented
in this book are interwoven with each other, so that they are best implemented
as a whole, rather than one at a time. Each supports the other; each is best
understood as a big picture, rather than as individual puzzle pieces. Chapter 1
outlines in detail what the book is about and what is included in each chapter.

How to use this book

This book consists of ten chapters, eight of which detail all essentials plus the
introduction and final chapters that offer final reflections on the use of the
x Preface

essentials. The eight chapters that look in detail at each of these eight essentials
start from Chapter 2 and end at Chapter 9. The parts of each of these eight
essentials in these chapters include the following:

z A brief story in each chapter that places the chapter’s theme in a real-life context
z A short explanation of the basics of the chapter’s theme. This also includes the
theoretical foundations of the concept – theories and theoreticians whose works
are often cited
z Classroom implications – the activities and learning environment that are congru-
ent with the chapter theme. This is the main section in each chapter.
z Roles of teachers
z Roles of students
z Conclusion
z Reflections of each chapter that include questions and tasks

Writing this book has brought us (the two authors) a better understanding of
why these eight essentials in second language education are, indeed, essential,
and this has given us a great sense of urgency about seeing them implemented
within the communicative language teaching approach to second language
education. We hope that you our readers will carefully consider the ideas
we present and that you will then form your own opinions and take your
own paths, along with colleagues, students, and other voyagers, on the wide,
wondrous, and sometimes wild journey that is second language education.
 Essentials for Successful
English Language Teaching 1
Chapter Outline
Introduction 1
Communicative language teaching 3
Understanding communicative language teaching 5
Implementing communicative language teaching 7
Learner autonomy 8
The social nature of learning 9
Curricular integration 9
Focus on meaning 9
Diversity 10
Thinking skills 10
Alternative assessment 10
Teachers as co-learners 11
Eight essentials for successful English language
teaching 11
Teaching English as a second/foreign language 12
Conclusion 13

Introduction
Since the 1970s communicative language teaching has been one of the most
popular teaching methodologies around the world in second language educa-
tion. Before that, the more traditional teaching methods (e.g., Audio-Lingual
Method; Grammar-Translation Method) that were employed focused more on
2 Essentials for Successful English Language Teaching

producing accurate, grammatically correct target language. Communicative

Language Teaching (CLT) however began to change the emphasis to where
learners produce the language with a focus on fluency and where errors are
seen as being a part of development. In traditional classes, teachers were seen
as the knowledge providers and sole controllers of the class. In the approach
English language teachers share this control and “facilitate” learning rather
than dispense knowledge. So CLT represents a major change and is considered
one of the main approaches to second language education today (Richards,
2005). Jacobs and Farrell (2001, 2003) label this major change in teaching and
learning a second language a paradigm shift because in order to successfully
implement the CLT approach we must shift our thinking about teachers,
students, learning, and teaching a second language. The idea of the shift in
focus is illustrated by the story of the “Cricket and the Coin.”
One pleasant summer day at lunch time two colleagues, A and B, were
walking along a busy street in Atlanta when A turned to B and said, “Do you
hear that cricket across the street?” to which B replied, “How could I possibly
hear a cricket with all this traffic.” Her colleague confidently said, “Let’s cross
the street and I’ll show you.” They carefully made their way through the traffic
to a flower box on the other side where, sure enough, there was a cricket. B was
astounded. “How could you hear a little cricket amid all this noise? You must
have super-human hearing!” “The key,” A explained, “is not how well we hear
but what we listen for.” To illustrate, she took a coin from her purse, threw it in
the air, and let it drop on the sidewalk. Soon, the sound of braking vehicles
filled the air, as cars came to a halt. Drivers and pedestrians turned to look for
the rattling coin. As A reached to retrieve her coin, B smiled and said, “Now,
I see what you mean; it’s all a matter of focus.”
This chapter outlines and describes eight essentials of second language
education that fit with the CLT paradigm shift. The subsequent eight chapters
of this book then focus on one of the eight essentials and the final
chapter concludes the discussion. These eight essentials are: encourage Learner
Autonomy, emphasize the Social Nature of Learning, develop Curricular
Integration, Focus on Meaning, celebrate Diversity, expand Thinking Skills,
utilize Alternative Assessment methods, and promote English language
Teachers as Co-learners. We argue that in second language education, although
the CLT paradigm shift was initiated many years ago, it really has been only
partially implemented. Two reasons for this partial implementation are: (1) by
trying to understand each essential separately, second language educators have
weakened their understanding by missing the larger picture; and (2) by trying
 Essentials for Successful Language Teaching 3
to implement each essential separately, second language educators have made
the difficult task of shift or change even more challenging. We now give a brief
orientation to CLT and how we should really understand and implement it as
a real paradigm shift.

Communicative language teaching

CLT can be seen as a set of “principles about the goals of language teaching,
how learners learn a language, the kinds of classroom activities that best
facilitate learning, and the roles of teachers and learners in the class-room”
(Richards, 2005, p. 1). CLT has been the “in” approach to second language
education since its beginning in the early 1970s, and has now become the
driving force that affects the planning, implementation, and evaluation of
English Language Teaching (ELT) throughout the world (Richards & Rodgers,
2001). That said, not many English language teachers or second language
educators are in agreement or even clear in their own minds as to what exactly
CLT is, and there exist as many diverse interpretations as there are language
teachers and second language educators. This wide variation in implementa-
tion of CLT is not, as we discuss in the chapter on celebrating Diversity,
necessarily a bad thing. Rather, it is a natural product of the range of contexts
in which second language learning takes place and the range of experiences
that students, teachers, and other stakeholders bring with them.
In its early inception CLT was seen as an approach to teaching English as a
second or foreign language for the purposes of enabling second language learn-
ers to be able to use language functionally, meaningfully and appropriately,
instead of the previous emphasis on correctness (e.g., Finocchiaro & Brumfit,
1983). However, over the years ESL and EFL teachers have interpreted a CLT
approach to language teaching in many different ways with many thinking that
the teacher just forms groups in their classes and let the students practice speak-
ing the second language. The end result that teachers using this approach were
seeking was that their students become competent in speaking that second
language. Richards (2005) calls this phase 1 of the CLT movement and he says
it continued until the late 1960s. In phase 1 the previous traditional approaches
that gave priority to grammatical competence as a foundation for language
proficiency gave way to functional and skill-based teaching that had a “fluency
over accuracy” pedagogical purpose. The next phase of CLT according to
Richards (2005) was the classic CLT period from the 1970s to the 1990s.
4 Essentials for Successful English Language Teaching

In this phase, the place of grammar in instruction was questioned because it

seemed to result only in grammatical competence that produced grammati-
cally correct sentences under controlled conditions but did not, according to
many, improve oral production or aid the communicative use of language.
So what was really called for at that time was communicative competence
where students could actually communicate orally in the second language;
for example, Hymes (1972) suggested that Chomsky’s ideal native speaker with
linguistic competence include the sociolinguistic component of communica-
tive competence of knowledge of and ability for language use with respect to
four factors: “possibility, feasibility, appropriateness and accepted usage” (p. 19).
More recently, Richards (2005, p. 1) suggests that communicative competence
includes the following aspects of language knowledge:

z knowing how to use language for a range of different purposes and functions
z knowing how to vary our use of language according to the setting and the partici-
pants (e.g. knowing when to use formal and informal speech or when to use lan-
guage appropriately for written as opposed to spoken communication)
z knowing how to produce and understand different types of texts (e.g. narratives,
reports, interviews, conversations)
z knowing how to maintain communication despite having limitations in one’s lan-
guage knowledge (e.g. through using different kinds of communication strategies).

Since the 1990s CLT has continued to evolve by drawing from different educa-
tional paradigms and diverse sources with the result that as Richards (2005,
p. 24) maintains, there is still “no single or agreed upon set of practices that
characterize current communicative language teaching.” Rather, he suggests
that communicative language teaching these days refers to “a set of generally
agreed upon principles that can be applied in different ways, depending on the
teaching context, the age of the learners, their level, their learning goals.” In
addition, Brown (2000) has maintained that CLT should include the following:

z Classroom goals are focused on all the components of communicative competence

and not restricted to grammatical or linguistic competence.
z Language techniques are designed to engage learners in the pragmatic, authentic,
functional use of language for meaningful purposes.
z Fluency and accuracy are seen as complementary principles underlying communica-
tive techniques.
z In the communicative classroom, students ultimately have to use the language,
productively and receptively, in unrehearsed contexts. (p. 266)
 Essentials for Successful Language Teaching 5
Richards (2005) maintains that if we ask ESL/EFL teachers today who say
they follow the CLT approach what exactly they do, or what they mean by
“communicative,” their explanations will vary widely, from an absence of
grammar in a conversation course, to a focus on open-ended discussion
activities. In our view, the key problem lies in the fact that not enough teachers
are implementing CLT and some of those who do implement it have done so
too infrequently, too often returning to the traditional paradigm. Later in this
chapter, we examine reasons for this.

Understanding communicative
language teaching
In second language education, the CLT paradigm shift over the past 40 years,
which Long (1997) likens to a revolution, flows from the positivism to post-
positivism shift in science (see also Chapter 10) and involves a move away
from the tenets of behaviorist psychology and structural linguistics and toward
cognitive, and later, socio-cognitive psychology and more contextualized,
meaning-based views of language. Key components on this shift concern:

1. Focusing greater attention on the role of learners rather than the external
stimuli learners are receiving from their environment. Thus, the center of atten-
tion shifts from the teacher to the student. This shift is generally known as the
move from teacher-centered instruction to learner-centered or learning-
centered instruction.
2. Focusing greater attention on the learning process rather than on the products
that learners produce. This shift is known as a move from product-oriented
instruction to process-oriented instruction.
3. Focusing greater attention on the Social Nature of Learning rather than on
students as separate, decontextualized individuals.
4. Focusing greater attention on Diversity among learners and viewing these
differences not as impediments to learning but as resources to be recognized,
catered to, and appreciated. This shift is known as the study of individual
differences.
5. In research and theory-building, focusing greater attention on the views of
those internal to the classroom rather than solely valuing the views of those
who come from outside to study classrooms, investigate and evaluate what
goes on there, and engage in theorizing about it. This shift is associated with
such innovations as qualitative research, which highlights the subjective and
affective, the participants’ insider views, and the uniqueness of each context.
6 Essentials for Successful English Language Teaching

6. Along with this emphasis on context comes the idea of connecting the school
with the world beyond as a means of promoting holistic learning.
7. Helping students understand the purpose of learning and developing their own
purposes.
8. A whole-to-part orientation instead of a part-to-whole approach. This involves
such approaches as beginning with meaningful whole texts and then helping
students understand the various features that enable the texts to function, e.g.,
the choice of words and the text’s organizational structure.
9. An emphasis on the importance of meaning rather than drills and other forms
of rote learning.
10. A view of learning as a life-long process rather than something done to prepare
for an exam.

As mentioned earlier, the CLT paradigm shift in second language education

is part of a larger shift that affected many other fields (See Voght, 2000 for a
discussion of parallels between paradigm shifts in foreign language education
at U.S. universities and paradigm shifts in education programs in business and
other professions). Oprandy (1999) links trends in second language education
with those in the field of city planning. He likens behaviorism’s top-down,
one-size-fits-all approach to education to a similar trend in city planning in
which outside experts designed for uniformity and attempted to do away with
Diversity. In response, a new paradigm arose in city planning, a bottom-up one
that sought to zone for Diversity. Describing the current paradigm in second
language education, Oprandy writes:

The communicative approach requires a complexity in terms of planning and a

tolerance for messiness and ambiguity as teachers analyze students’ needs and
design meaningful tasks to meet those needs. The pat solutions and deductive
stances of audiolingual materials and pedagogy, like the grammar-translation
texts and syllabi preceding them, are no longer seen as sensitive to students’
needs and interests. Nor are they viewed as respectful of students’ intelligence to
figure things out inductively through engaging problem-solving and communica-
tive tasks. (p. 44)

Another parallel that Oprandy draws between new ideas in city planning and
new ideas in second language education have to do with the role of the
subjective. In city planning, attention began to focus on people’s need for a
sense of security and belonging in people-centered cities. These concerns, as
Oprandy suggests, are matched in second language education by the desire to
 Essentials for Successful Language Teaching 7
facilitate an atmosphere in which students are willing to take risks, to admit
mistakes, and to help one another.

Implementing communicative
language teaching
The CLT paradigm shift in second language education outlined above has
led to many suggested changes in how English as a second/foreign language
teaching is conducted and conceived (Richards & Rodgers, 2001). Our objec-
tive in writing this book is to argue that the CLT paradigm shift has not been
implemented as widely or as successfully as it might have been because English
language educators and other stakeholders have tried to understand and
implement the shift in a piecemeal rather than a holistic manner. Thus, we
suggest that English as a second/foreign language educators consider eight
major changes associated with this shift because of the impact they already
have had on the language education field and for the potential impact they
could have if they were used in a more integrated fashion.
We selected these eight because we see them as essential, still in progress,
and interlinked with one another. By helping to promote the understanding
and use of these eight elements, we hope this book will provide teachers with
a handy, user-friendly resource. Certainly, other related elements of good
learning and teaching also deserve attention.
First, we briefly explain each essential (we later devote a whole chapter
to each essential), explore links between the essential and the larger
paradigm shift and look at various second language classroom implications
and then we devote an individual chapter to each essential. These eight essen-
tials are:

1. Encourage Learner Autonomy

2. Emphasize Social Nature of Learning
3. Develop Curricular Integration
4. Focus on Meaning
5. Celebrate Diversity
6. Expand Thinking Skills
7. Utilize Alternative Assessment Methods
8. Promote English Language Teachers as Co-learners.
8 Essentials for Successful English Language Teaching

Learner Autonomy

Diversity The Social Nature of Learning

Thinking Skills Curricular Integration

Alternative Assessment
Focus on Meaning

Teachers as Co-learners

Figure 1.1 Eight essentials for successful second language teaching

Figure 1.1 provides an illustration of the interdependence of these eight

essentials of the paradigm shift in second language education. The circular
nature of the figure emphasizes that all the changes are parts of a whole and
that the successful implementation of one is dependent on the successful
implementation of others.
This book focuses on these eight essentials in second language education,
the links between the eight, and, most importantly, how these essentials are
being used and can be implemented. We hope this book contributes in some
small way to encouraging fuller development of these and related essentials.
The eight essentials are briefly explained as follows.

Learner autonomy
Within a CLT approach to second language education we focus more on the
role of learners rather than the external stimuli learners receive from their
environment, such as from teachers and materials. In other words, the center of
attention in learning English as a second/foreign language has shifted from
the teacher and materials (the external) to the student (the internal). This shift
is generally known as the move from teacher-centered instruction to learner
(or student)-centered instruction. Learner Autonomy is a key concept here:
learners have an important share of the responsibility for and control over their
own learning. Chapter 2 outlines this first essential in CLT in more detail.
 Essentials for Successful Language Teaching 9
The social nature of learning
As the name suggests, to be social in learning we mean some form of inter-
action and cooperation is necessary within a CLT approach to second
language education. We focus greater attention on the Social Nature of
Learning English as a second/foreign language rather than on students as
separate, decontextualized individuals. To understand and promote learning,
we look not only at individuals but also at the people who make up their world
and the connections between them. These people include not only teachers
but also peers and others such as administrators and people in the outside
community. Cooperation is valued over competition without excluding the
latter completely. When students collaborate they all play leadership roles.
Chapter 3 outlines this essential in CLT in more detail.

Curricular integration
Curricular Integration refers to a second language pedagogical approach which
fuses knowledge from different disciplines to create more meaningful contexts
for overall learning. The traditional fragmentation of content by disciplines
assumes that students will recognize the links between the disciplines on their
own, but this can be difficult for second language students whose main focus
may be the language rather than the content. However, with a CLT approach to
teaching and learning English as a second/foreign language the integrated
approach purposefully and systematically guides second language students
toward discovering these connections and processes; connections and proc-
esses that help ESL/EFL students better understand themselves and the world
around them. In the highest form, this student-centered approach uses real-life
issues and varied resources to bring students as close to the “real thing” as
possible. Furthermore, integration can also include integrating the various
language skills, as well as integrating the academic with the social and
emotional. Chapter 4 outlines this essential in CLT in more detail.

Focus on meaning
For this essential we focus on learning English as a second/foreign language
for purposes other than just passing an exam. Education is not just preparation
for life; it is also participation in life. Students understand the purposes of
learning and develop their own purposes for learning regardless of the
subject. Within learning English as a second/foreign language we suggest that
10 Essentials for Successful English Language Teaching

understanding also involves our students’ comprehension of what they are

learning rather than learning by rote learning methods such as drills so that
they can be educated as complete human beings. Chapter 5 explains this essen-
tial in a CLT approach to second language education in more detail.

Diversity
First of all, we celebrate Diversity among our second language learners and we
see this diversity as a plus in our English as a second/foreign language classes.
We focus on discerning, taking into account, and appreciating differences
among our second language learners within a CLT approach to language
education; thus we consider all second language (indeed all students) to be
unique. This uniqueness includes differences not only in first language back-
grounds, but also in intelligence profile, personality, and such other background
factors as race, ethnicity, social class, religion, sex, and sexual preference. We
suggest in this CLT concept that no standard, one-size-fits-all way of teaching
a second language exists, and that differences of opinion and perspective offer
opportunities for learning rather than being cause for winner-take-all conflict.
Chapter 6 outlines this essential in CLT in more detail.

Thinking skills
For this CLT essential we focus on how students learn by a process of expand-
ing their Thinking Skills rather than looking only at what they produce. This
emphasis on process rather than just on end-product encourages second lan-
guage students and teachers to promote reflection on one’s thinking, to encour-
age deeper critical thinking, and more varied ways of solving problems, and to
gain sense of greater questioning of how things are done. With an appreciation
of the complexity, uncertainty, nonlinearity, and instability of knowledge in
learning a second language, students not only come to see change as a constant
but also that learning a second language (and learning in general) is a life-long
process; indeed, we suggest that disruption and surprise are to be welcomed
while learning. Chapter 7 outlines this essential in CLT in more detail.

Alternative assessment
We should point out immediately that when we say alternative we are not
“throwing out the baby with the bathwater” because we still see the place of
more traditional testing; it is just that now we want to suggest that English as a
 Essentials for Successful Language Teaching 11
second/foreign language teachers and administrators take into account that
not all our second language learners may respond to such testing in a manner
that compliments their different cultural backgrounds and that we have alter-
native means of assessment that may be more suitable. So within a CLT
approach to second language education we recognize that while standardized,
objective-item tests do provide relevant information, sole reliance on such
measures blinds us to a great deal of what is important in education. We sug-
gest that more Alternative Assessments connect closely with real world pur-
poses. Furthermore, this type of assessment is done not mainly by outsiders
but more importantly by those actually in the classroom (peers) who grasp the
particular context in all its complexity. Thus Alternative Assessment includes
students assessing themselves, peers, and the “how” and “what” of their English
as a second/foreign language learning. Additionally, Alternative Assessment
focuses on what second language students can do rather than on what they
cannot do. Chapter 8 outlines this essential in more detail.

Teachers as co-learners
The final concept within the eight essentials for successful implementation of
CLT focuses on language teachers not principally as possessors of knowledge
that is to be passed on to students; instead, teachers learn along with second
language students because knowledge is dynamic and learning is a life-long
process. Teachers learn with their students, and they learn along with their fel-
low teachers. Based on this learning, teachers join students in playing a greater
role in such matters as materials design and institutional governance. Chapter
9 outlines this concept in more detail.

Eight essentials for successful English

language teaching
Figure 1.1, shown earlier, suggests that the eight essential changes (outlined
and discussed in more detail in subsequent chapters) are related and connected
to one another. For example, the Social Nature of Learning connects with
Learner Autonomy because by working in groups second language students
become less dependent on teachers and more interdependent with each other.
Curriculum Integration is facilitated by student–student interaction because
second language students can pool their energies and knowledge to take on
12 Essentials for Successful English Language Teaching

cross-curricular projects. The Social Nature of Learning element fits with an

emphasis on meaning, as groups provide an excellent forum for students to
engage in meaningful communication in their second language. The Diversity
element provides mutual support for the Social Nature of Learning when
students form heterogeneous groups and use collaborative skills to bring out
and value the ideas and experiences of all the group members.
The Social Nature of Learning also provides an excellent venue for the use
of the Thinking Skills element, as second language students attempt to explain
concepts and procedures to their groupmates, as groupmates give each other
feedback, and as they debate the proper course of action. The Alternative
Assessment element synergizes with the Social Nature of Learning in several
ways. For instance, cooperative learning provides scope for peer assessment,
and an emphasis on the development of collaborative skills calls for different
methods to assess these skills. Finally, the elements of Teachers as Co-learners
go together with the Social Nature of Learning for at least two reasons. First,
teachers often work with colleagues to learn more about education, e.g., by
conducting action research and otherwise discussing their classes. By collabo-
rating with fellow teachers, teachers model collaboration for their students and
convince themselves of its benefits. Second, because cooperative learning
means that teachers talk less, it allows teachers to get off the stage some of the
time and spend more time facilitating student learning as well as their own
learning. One of the techniques for this facilitation is to take part along with
students, thus encouraging teachers to learn more.

Teaching English as a second/foreign

language
“Communicative Language Teaching” is probably the answer given most
frequently when English as a second/foreign language teachers are asked
what approach they use to teach in their own classes, what they think is
most successful and indeed, what the most popular approach is used by
most teachers today. Although we all assume that we have the same under-
standing about what successful English as a second/foreign language
instruction and CLT means and that we all implement CLT in the same way,
the reality is far from a unified understanding or implementation in most
second language classrooms. In fact, what we have noticed is that there
seems to be a great deal of variation between countries, institutions within
 Essentials for Successful Language Teaching 13
the same country, and even classrooms within the same institution when
it comes to definitions of successful language instruction, and that the
so-called paradigm shift in second language instruction toward CLT seems
to be gradual, evolutionary, and piecemeal. There seem to be several reasons
for this slow evolution within second language education.
One reason may be that changing beliefs and behaviors takes time in
education and elsewhere (Fullan, 2008). Lack of change may also be a result
of the difficulty of translating theory into practical application. That is, new
ideas need a great deal of work by practicing teachers for these ideas to be
translated into everyday teaching routines. Furthermore, one teacher work-
ing alone has much less change power than do groups of educators, including
administrators and school district staff working together. Another possible
explanation stems from a lack of understanding of what CLT is and the result-
ing fact that it has often been presented in a piecemeal fashion, rather than
as a whole. In other words, many ESL/EFL teachers may have just started
practicing immediately those parts of the CLT approach that they learned
and that seemed most congenially implemented given the constraints faced
by an individual teacher without understanding what exactly the CLT
approach means. So the point of this book has been to reignite the CLT fires
and to argue that in order to implement CLT as a successful approach to
English as a second/foreign language education, we must realize that it should
take a holistic perspective which has two main implications.

1. First, the changes are ALL related.

2. Second, when we attempt to implement these changes, if we do so in a piecemeal
fashion, selecting changes as if they were items on an a la carte menu, we lessen
the chances of success.

Thus, these innovations all fit together, like the pieces in a pattern cut to make
a jigsaw puzzle. Each piece supports the others, and each builds on the others
as outlined in Figure 1.1 above.

Conclusion
In this chapter (and throughout this book) we have urged our fellow second
language educators to take a big picture approach to the changes in our
approach to understanding and implementing CLT. We have argued that
many of these essential changes stem from a previous underlying paradigm
14 Essentials for Successful English Language Teaching

shift toward CLT that continues today. By examining this shift and looking
for connections between various changes in our field, these changes can be
better understood. Most importantly, by attempting to implement change in a
holistic way, the chances of success greatly increase. This point has been
made countless times in works on systems theory by Senge (2000), Wheatley
(2006), and others. However, it is much easier to state in theory than to
implement in practice. Perhaps the best-known and most painful example of
the failure to implement holistic change in second language education is that
in many cases while teaching methodology has become more communicative,
testing remains within the traditional paradigm, consisting of discrete items,
lower-order thinking, and a focus on form rather than meaning (Brown, 2000).
This creates a backwash effect that tends to pull teaching back toward the
traditional paradigm, even when teachers and others are striving to go toward
the new paradigm.
Second language education plays an ever more important role as globali-
zation, for better or worse, marches forward. Perhaps this is where the eighth
change we discussed, Teachers as Co-learners (see Chapter 9), plays the
crucial role. Many people are drawn to work in second language education
because they enjoy learning languages and want to share this joy with others.
All the changes that have taken place in our field challenge us to continue
learning about our profession and to share what we learn with others, includ-
ing our colleagues, so that we can continue to help our field develop. We hope
you enjoy reading the next eight chapters that detail the eight essential and
interconnected changes that are necessary for successful English as a second/
foreign language instruction.
 Encourage Learner Autonomy 2
Chapter Outline
Vignette 15
Learner autonomy 17
Classroom implications 19
Student-selected reading 21
Self-assessment 22
Student course evaluations 22
Bring Your Own Piece (BYOP) Jigsaw 23
TV soaps 24
Practicing vigilance 25
Role of teachers 26
Role of students 26
Conclusion 27
Reflections 27

Vignette
John Jones, an ESL teacher in the USA just graduated with an MA TESL
(Master of Arts, teaching English as a second language) and is eager to
implement all that he had learned in his graduate TESL program. One of
the most interesting aspects of this program according to John was the
focus throughout on the learner, or “as opposed to having the teacher
decide everything in class,” as he stated, and the encouragement of
Learner Autonomy “where they can move from learning the second
language to using the second language to learn.” To John this was liberating
16 Essentials for Successful English Language Teaching

because he reflected that he had studied a second language (Spanish) in

an environment where the teacher decided everything and never let the
students practice speaking the language or write on their own without strict
controls on how to speak and write. In addition, at the end of his Spanish
as a Second Language learning program he really did not feel that he had
developed real autonomy in his language learning because he had been
so dependent on the teacher for direction. However, from what he had just
learned in his MA TESL program John discovered that it may indeed be
possible to allow and invite students into the learning process. So, in his
ESL language classes he has instituted a policy of checking his students’
first language background and culture so that he can learn and thus
know more about each student. Next, he designs his lessons while taking
this background knowledge into account as he tries to include his students’
interests and ideas. In order to get this information he interviews each
student and also includes questions about how and what they would like to
study in terms of the topics they would be interested in talking and writing
about. His students seem to like these interviews because they realize that
John is taking an interest in each of them and that their ideas about the
learning process really matter. He also encourages his students to look at
themselves as learners and to discover which learning style suits them
best and which learning strategies they can best manipulate while learning
the second language. In order to steer his students toward eventual auton-
omy in their learning of the second language John now includes pair-work
and group-work activities where the students can practice the language
together and not worry about making mistakes. In addition, John has
encouraged his students to read daily newspapers and watch television as
they are all learning English as a second language and these exercises
will further strengthen their language learning with the inevitable result of
becoming autonomous language learners. John also checks regularly
throughout the semester that the students are enjoying their learning.

Our students learn a second language usually because they want to be able to
communicate with others who use that language in their daily lives. So the idea
of proposing that our students should eventually become autonomous in their
learning is essential if we are to follow the CLT approach as outlined in the
previous chapter because Learner Autonomy as it is discussed in this chapter
emphasizes the role of the learner rather than the role of the teacher. In order
 Encourage Learner Autonomy 17
to emphasize the role of the learner in our classes we first need to know some-
thing about who is in our class, the learners, and this is evident in John’s
approach to teaching (above) as he designs his lessons with knowledge of who
his learners are (the students’ backgrounds, learning styles, learning strategies,
etc.) while also encouraging his students to focus on their own learning
responsibilities outside the classroom by reading daily newspapers in English,
watching television shows in English and thus encouraging Learner Autonomy.
This chapter on the essential of Learner Autonomy within a CLT approach to
second language education is the first of the eight essentials we talk about for
second language learners, teachers, and administrators. We place it first because
we feel it sets the tone for the whole book in that we see second language
education as existing on a continuum where learners start as beginner second
language learners being very much dependent on the teacher for help and
guidance, but ultimately we want them to proceed to the other end of the
continuum where they become independent of the teacher as they develop into
autonomous learners. The following sections in this chapter explain what we
mean by Learner Autonomy and then map out how it can be implemented in
second language classrooms.

Learner autonomy
Modern theories of learning emphasize the key role that learners play in the
success of education. This might seem obvious, but previously, teachers and
materials were given pride of place. However, the focus now is on the learner
and the learning process and processes (learning styles and learning strategies
of each student) rather than the previous teacher-centered approach where
endless drilling was said to produce some sort of rudimentary success in using
the second language with the use of prescribed lessons and teacher-proof
materials delivered by dubiously qualified “language teachers.”
In this chapter we link Learner Autonomy to Csikszentmihalyi’s (1990)
work on flow, and Vygotsky’s (1978) concept of self-regulation. For example,
we agree with Csikszentmihalyi’s conclusions that flow occurs when people do
what they see as meaningful work, are intrinsically motivated, and have or are
developing skill in the activities they are doing. In line with the work of the
theorists above, the classroom can be taken as a site for democratic practices
and this provides another rationale for learner-centered education. A key
18 Essentials for Successful English Language Teaching

concept here is that of the hidden curriculum (the knowledge, values, and
beliefs that schools present to students and others), not by what is explicitly
being taught, but by the process in which the actual instruction takes place
(Loporchio, 2006). The point being that if schools and society talk about
democracy but classroom practices do not reflect this because they are overly
autocratic, students may be less likely to know how to function in a democratic
learner-centered setting or even how to insist on this method if they recognize
that they are being denied this right.
To be autonomous, then, means that our second language learners need to
be able to have some choice as to the what and the how of the curriculum we
are teaching them and, at the same time, they should feel responsible for
their own learning and for the learning of those with whom they interact. In
second language education Learner Autonomy involves second language
learners gaining awareness of their own ways of learning such as learning
styles and learning strategies, so that they can utilize their strengths and
work on their weaknesses (Benson, 2007; Nowlan, 2008). The latter focus on
learner strategies is important in second language education because research
has indicated that our students can actually learn how to successfully manip-
ulate their own strategy use. However, the former focus on learning styles is
more difficult to manipulate because it is within the nature of the learner
himself or herself; in other words, learning style is the given. When we speak
about autonomy, we should realize that intrinsic motivation also plays a cen-
tral and important role because Learner Autonomy means that the teacher
no longer shoulders the entire burden of running the classroom, with stu-
dents taking on more rights and responsibilities for their own learning in a
learner-centered approach to second language learning. In summary, when
we talk about Learner Autonomy within a CLT approach we recognize that
we should

z understand our second language learners’ backgrounds, beliefs, needs, and

interests
z take all these into account when designing and implementing the curriculum
z help our students recognize, understand, and manipulate their strengths and weak-
nesses, as well as the learning process itself
z offer our students as many choices as possible in and control over their own
learning
z encourage enjoyment of the learning process
z attain Learner Autonomy so that they can continue learning long after they leave
our classrooms.
 Encourage Learner Autonomy 19
The following section outlines how second language teachers can
implement Learner Autonomy in their classrooms within an overall CLT
approach to second language education.

Classroom implications
Learner Autonomy is sometimes misunderstood as referring only to learners
being able to work alone. However, by first learning how to collaborate with
their peers, learners can slowly discover how to move away from dependence
on the teacher to independence with the ultimate realization of working alone
on their learning. So, when we think of Learner Autonomy in general and
learner-centeredness in particular we see second language classrooms where
students are interacting a lot, not only with the teacher but also with each
other. For example, the use of small groups, including pairs, represents one
means of enhancing Learner Autonomy (Pagel, 2002; Please see the chapter on
the element of the Social Nature of Learning for more on this).
Group activities help second language students harness that power and by
doing so they build their pool of learning resources because they can receive
assistance from peers, and not just from the teacher. For example, many
classrooms use the TTT (Team Then Teacher) guideline. In other words, when
students have a question, they first ask their groupmates. Only if none of them
are able to help do students consult the teacher. Taking TTT a step further is
3 + 1 B4 T, i.e., if students’ 3 groupmates cannot help, they then ask 1 more
group before turning to the teacher.
A frequent difficulty when we encourage students to look to themselves
and peers as resources is that students feel that only the teacher can help, that
classmates know as little as they do, that students helping students is “the blind
leading the blind.” To put it another way, if Student A knows 0 and Student B
knows 0, 0 + 0 might well equal –1, as students leave each other more confused
and off course. Ways to make sure students do not lead each other astray in such
arrangements include setting up groups that are heterogeneous as to language
proficiency so that more proficient peers can help their less proficient group-
mates, using tasks that are doable for students, highlighting instances when
students do well and help each other, and creating information gaps so that
students need to learn from each other.
Another means of implementing Learner Autonomy in second language
education is the use of an extensive reading program to augment regular
20 Essentials for Successful English Language Teaching

reading instruction (Kweon & Kim, 2008). Here, second language students are
allowed to choose their own reading materials that match their interests (rather
than the teacher’s interests or the interests of the curriculum developers, as is
the case in many classrooms) and their proficiency levels. The students also
have the choice of changing their minds once they have started such reading
because if students begin a book or a magazine and it does not seem the right
one for them, they can switch to some other reading material that may hold
more interest. The hope is that extensive reading will assist second language
students to become autonomous learners and to develop an appreciation
for the enjoyment and knowledge to be gained via reading in their second
language (as well as their first). Thus encouraging them to make reading
a life-long habit.
Self-assessment provides another general way for second language students
to develop their sense of autonomous learning (Rivers, 2001). The idea here is
for second language learners to develop their own internal criteria for the
quality of their work, rather than being dependent on external evaluation, or
evaluators (often the teacher), as the sole judge of their strengths and weak-
nesses. Developing these internal criteria enables learners to make informed
decisions about how to move their learning forward. With self-assessment,
second language students no longer have to wait for the teacher to tell them
how well they are doing and what they need to do next, an essential aspect of
developing Learner Autonomy. Yes, the teacher remains generally the more
knowledgeable and experienced person in the classroom, but the goal is for
students to move toward and perhaps even beyond, the teacher’s level of com-
petence. Placing value on learners’ knowledge helps them feel more
capable of playing a larger role in their own learning (for more details see
Chapter 7 on Alternative Assessments) or as one second language teacher
summed it all up so eloquently:
I found this (the old paradigm) to be very true of my teaching style (at least early
on) that was probably shaped by the teaching style that I was taught under, that
being the Old Teaching paradigm. I believe that my style (and teaching as a whole)
is moving toward the New Paradigm of teaching. I initially thought it was my job
to take the knowledge that I had and fill my student’s heads. I found teaching to
be uneventful, passive, impersonal, and boring. Now my teaching has evolved
into a partnership between students where we work together to construct knowl-
edge. Knowledge sharing is a 2 way street. I have found that it takes more time
to be a better teacher but that the payoff is much larger. It has become more
enjoyable to see students develop their own unique selves and personal
competencies.
 Encourage Learner Autonomy 21
More specifically, language teachers can encourage Learner Autonomy by
implementing the following activities that can be adjusted to each particular
student’s and teacher’s needs and context.

Student-selected reading
As already mentioned in the discussion on extensive reading above this type
of activity hopes to develop a life-long reading habit for our second language
students, a life-long reading habit that can be a vital element in life-long
learning. The two main ways that educators can encourage a life-long read-
ing habit are: being readers themselves and letting their students know about
this fact by reading in class with them, and providing time for their students
to read on their own in the same class; this can provide the role model moti-
vation for our second language students to continue with this habit outside
of class. When we say “read on their own,” we also mean that they can read
anything they like, and this can include fiction and even comic books, but it
can also include non-fiction and can be related to any subject area if the
teacher wants to focus on a particular subject. The point here is that reading
extensively means that students come to learn the joy of reading that they
may not have experienced when reading textbooks in their various courses
in school. So if for example, they want to read Stephen King’s work, we allow
them to read it as extensive reading focuses on the act (and joy) of reading.
Programs that promote independent reading enjoy colorful names such as
SURF (Silent Independent Reading for Fun), DEAR (Drop Everything and
Read), and DIRT (Daily Independent Reading and Thinking).
Teachers can play an encouraging role for their students by facilitating their
extensive reading since just because we give them say 20 minutes in a class to
read does not mean that they will suddenly read with sustained concentration
for that period of time if they have not done this before. So teachers should tell
their students that one main activity at the end of the period of extensive
reading is discussions of what they have read during the semester. To be able
to participate in these class discussions students will have to be able to tell
their peers about what they have read. Consequently, Farrell (2008) suggests
that second language students should keep a reading log of some sort about
the material they are reading so that they can draw on that information when
discussing aspects of the book they have read. Then each class member can be
asked to work individually or in pairs or groups to complete any of the follow-
ing activities:
22 Essentials for Successful English Language Teaching

z Write a reaction letter to the author of the book and ask questions about the book
and give comments – what you liked and did not like.
z Make a movie. “The Movie Version” (Farrell, 2008) is an activity where students cast
actors and draw a poster for a movie based on a book they have read. “The Movie
Version” as one alternative to the “boring book report.”
z Students can also make a poster for the “movie-of-the book” and/or redesign and
make a new book cover. Rather than a movie, students could also consider making
a radio play from the story.

Self-assessment
As mentioned above in the general discussion on classroom implementation,
in order for second language students to take more control of their own
education, they need to not only decide on their learning goals, but they also
need to know where they are at in relation to those self-selected goals. In other
words, they should know how to monitor their own strengths and weaknesses.
To do this and encourage Learner Autonomy, self-assessment should comple-
ment assessment by teachers and peers as a key part of how student progress is
monitored. Examples of self-assessment include the following:
Checklists: Before students hand in any assignment they review their work
using a checklist of desired characteristics. This checklist can be developed
jointly by teachers and students prior to students beginning the assignment
although a student-designed checklist would be best as it can tell the teacher
what aspects of learning the student thinks important.
Group work: When working in a group, time can be spent on each student
reflecting on and sharing about their contributions to the group and in
discussing how each of them can be a better group participants. This reflection
and discussion can be facilitated by an initial discussion that the whole class
participates in, considering the collaboration skills and how each one can lead
the group, i.e., distributed leadership, by promoting the group’s success in
whichever way they can.

Student course evaluations

Nowadays, especially at the tertiary level, student input about the quality of
teachers and courses can have a powerful impact, especially on the careers of
their teachers. While the role that these student evaluations should play is
debatable, it seems clear that giving students a role in evaluation of the people
with whom and the programs in which they learn offers a means of increasing
 Encourage Learner Autonomy 23
students’ control over their own learning. However, too often student evalua-
tions tend to be summative – done at the end of a course, rather than formative
– done during a course. So we suggest that teachers conduct student evalua-
tions at different parts of the course because by seeking student input at
various stages in a course, the teacher can show that what second language
students say at these various points in the course can impact their entire
learning environment. In fact, we could seek student input at the end of each
lesson by asking our students four simple questions:

1. What was this class about?

2. What was easy for you to learn?
3. What was difficult for you to learn?
4. What changes would you suggest (if any)?

Even if we do not agree with the student suggestions and do not implement
changes that our second language students suggest, the process itself provides
an opportunity to dialogue with our students about why we teach the way we
do. We maintain that this dialogue, apart from giving our students more prac-
tical knowledge and practice in using the second language they are learning at
that time, also shows that we are listening to them.

Bring Your Own Piece (BYOP) jigsaw

In the standard Jigsaw technique, students begin in “Home Teams” of four
members each. The teacher gives each team member a different piece of
reading material on a related topic (students can choose these topics or
leave it to the teacher). Students then leave their “Home Teams” and form
small “Expert Teams” with their classmates who have the same piece of
reading. They study their assigned piece in preparation for teaching it to
their “Home Team” members. In BYOP Jigsaw, students find their own
pieces. For instance, if the class reading is on the medical topic of AIDS,
then one member of each “Home Team” might be charged with learning
about its causes, another with the history of the illness, another with its
treatment, and the fourth with learning all about its prevention. So before
going to their “Expert Team,” each student does some research on the topic.
They then combine that with the research done by their fellow experts in
order to prepare to join their “Home Team” members for discussion.
BYOP Jigsaw is an example of the use of student-generated materials
(Lee, Mcloughlin, & Chan, 2008). Such materials include those that students
24 Essentials for Successful English Language Teaching

have made themselves, such as stories they have written, oral or written
recounts of experiences they have had, as well as materials students have found
and brought to class, including lyrics of songs that they enjoy. Increasing access
to the internet has greatly facilitated locating such materials. Indeed, electronic
tools have also provided new opportunities for students to make their own
materials, such as their own slide shows.
However, student-generated can mean more than just that the materials are
written by those students or found by them. In keeping with our emphasis on
student-centeredness, student-generated should also mean that the content
flows from students’ interests and needs. If students are writing texts with
which they have no felt connection or they are finding texts on topics which
have no appeal to them, have we really moved forward? This point is
illustrated in the experience of an ESL teacher in China (Malcolm, 1996). The
teacher had been teaching a Writing class that focused on different types
of letters, such as letters to make appointments or to report information. The
students had studied all this before and were just going through the motions,
writing unconvincing letters full of careless errors. The teacher knew that
something had to be done before everyone – students and teacher – collapsed
from boredom. Here’s what the teacher did. He read a short story to the class,
and invited the class to create their own book of stories. Students enjoyed the
story, and enthusiastically began writing their own, going through the writing
process, caring about the quality of what they were writing. The question in
students’ minds changed from “What do I have to do for English?” to “What
can English do for me?”
The story judged by the class to be the best was by a student who previously
had been among the worst writers in the class. When the course ended, this
student gave the teacher a letter of thanks (abridged below):

Previously, my writing teachers gave me low marks. I doubted my ability. I reck-

oned myself as not a manager of the language. Hence, wherever I wrote, I paid
little attention to it, just carried it on as a task. But you encouraged me. Self-con-
fidence was part of my character again. So, when you asked us to write a short
story, I decided to write my real experience, and it was a success, because I had
become a manager of language. I am encouraged more than I can say. (p. 33)

TV soaps
Media is a very important ally for second language learners as teachers of
language students must prepare the students for real or authentic listening
 Encourage Learner Autonomy 25
situations with language that is, as Field (2002, p. 244) says, “the type of
foreign language listening that occurs in a real-life encounter or in response
to authentic material,” which, he says, “is very different” from that of a text that
has been graded for a language learner. TV soaps provide such examples of
authentic language that is real and has not been graded for any particular level.
Teachers can adjust input to whatever level they want to teach; all that the
teacher has to do is to make certain to activate the students’ world knowledge
of the soap schemata before starting this activity. Farrell (2006) has designed
the following six-stage approach to using TV soaps to encourage Learner
Autonomy that teacher can adapt to their own learners’ needs:

TV Soaps

• Stage 1: Fun
The students are asked to watch a particular TV soap and have fun. No response
is required.

• Stage 2: Names and Faces

Students are next asked to listen only for the names of the characters on the
show. They should write these and try to draw a picture of each person.

• Stage 3: Relationships
Students now have to establish the relationships between these individuals.

• Stage 4: Personalities
At this stage, the students should be taught the necessary vocabulary to describe
personalities in order to write a personality description of all the characters they
have identified and, also, to write about which characters they like and/or dislike.

• Stage 5: Summary
By this time, the students should be ready to watch for story content. They will be
asked to write a summary of that day or week’s show.

• Stage 6: Fun (Again)

The cycle comes full circle and fun returns to watching TV soaps in English.

The use of TV soaps is an excellent way to promote Learner Autonomy because

it can show that TV programs in English can be accessible to students of all
levels of proficiency, and that English language learning can even be fun.

Practicing vigilance
The story by Ian Malcom (Malcom, 1996) of the experience of an ESL teacher
in China illustrated in the section “Bring Your Own Piece (BYOP) jigsaw”
26 Essentials for Successful English Language Teaching

above shows how the students can come alive when given an opportunity to
exercise control.

Role of teachers
When students have more explicit control over their own learning, as a true
CLT approach to second language learning suggests, teachers need to be more
flexible in allowing this and thus become true facilitators of learning. No
longer can everything be planned to the minute in each of our classes; no
longer can we (or should we) know that we’ll be on Unit 4 by the fifth week of
the term, no longer can we always dust off and reuse the same trusty lesson
we’ve been using for who remembers how long. This situation adds spontane-
ity to teaching, but it now requires us teachers to stay on our teaching toes.
But this is a good thing because now we can look for learning opportunities
and teachable moments that we would not normally be open to in planned
lessons because we would be focused on following the plan. Fortunately, now
our second language students are available to help us with some of the prepa-
ration work that was formerly only the teachers’ sole responsibility. This also
shows our students that they have certain responsibilities and roles when
attempting to become autonomous learners.

Role of students
Sometimes the slaves become enamored of their chains and are reluctant
to accept freedom. Having teachers make all the decisions can become the
accepted and expected practice. So, if the students are given more scope for
self-determination, they may reject it and criticize the teachers who offer it.
The opposite extreme occurs when students warmly welcome that freedom
but use it for purposes other than learning. A frequent example is when
students use time allotted for group discussion to talk about everything under
the sun except what their groups’ focus was supposed to be. We maintain
however that when we give our students the freedom to discover their own
learning possibilities they will lift their perceived chains of learning past and
rise to these freedoms by making wise learning choices for themselves.
For example, second language students may want to take part in choosing
the media (see also above) in which they learn, such as learning via online
or print resources, and the way in which they present their idea, e.g., doing
 Encourage Learner Autonomy 27
presentations that involve songs, simulations, video, or animation. In this way,
students are exposed to a broader range of possibilities when they hear about
or see what their classmates are doing or have done.

Conclusion
This chapter outlined the concept of Learner Autonomy where second lan-
guage students begin from a dependent position learning the second language
from the teacher to independence in using the second language autonomously,
or from a near total dependency on the second language teacher in the begin-
ning of the learning process to near independence as they learn how to direct
their own education. Second language students can become autonomous
learners by acknowledging their preferred learning style and by monitoring
their use of and exploiting their use of appropriate learning strategies. In other
words, they focus on their strengths and limit their weaknesses. Of course con-
troversies remain in this Learner Autonomy essential of the CLT paradigm
such as to what extent and at what point should second language teachers
intervene when students are, in our opinion, making incorrect decisions? And
how much control should students have over curriculum decisions? After all,
teachers are supposed to be the second language education experts and our
students come to us for direction, and we are the ones with the teaching
qualifications. It is good to recognize these issues while at the same time real-
izing that the ultimate aim of our second language students is to become pro-
ficient in the second language so that they can become fully autonomous and
successful members of our.

Reflections
z What does Learner Autonomy mean to you?
z What does learner-centeredness mean to you?
z What are the differences between Learner Autonomy and learner-centeredness?
z Are you a learner-centered teacher? How do you know?
z How can teachers encourage students to learn for themselves?
z Do you think teachers should always choose learning materials for their students to
study? If yes, why? If no, why not?
z What is a situation in which you could encourage your students to bring in their
own materials? How can computers and the internet help students find and share
materials?
28 Essentials for Successful English Language Teaching

z Reread the vignette at the beginning of this chapter. Do you think John is a typical
language teacher or not? Explain your answer.
z Did you ever have similar reflections as John? Explain.
z What does John mean by “teach and then get out of the way”?
z Do you have a similar maxim?
z If not, what maxim or maxims would you use to explain how you interpret Learner
Autonomy?
 Emphasize the Social Nature
of Learning 3
Chapter Outline
Vignette 29
The social nature of learning 31
Classroom implications 33
Group work 33
Project work 36
Grading group/project work 37
Practicing vigilance 38
Role of teachers 39
Role of students 39
Conclusion 40
Reflection 41

Vignette
A new academic year has commenced in David Rodriquez’s university
ESL class. David is only in his second year of language teaching, but he is
a firm believer in the use of group activities, based on his own experiences
as a learner and on the research and theory he read while studying for his
MA TESL. Unfortunately, things aren’t going as well as he had hoped. On
the first day of class, David assigned students to work in groups so as to
get a mix in each group based on proficiency in English and age level, as
many non-traditional (older) students were taking the course. Some of the
groups don’t seem to be clicking so well; not much discussion takes place
30 Essentials for Successful English Language Teaching

in these groups, their work doesn’t seem to show any of the “two heads
are better than one” magic promised in the research, and students have
come up to David after class to complain about some of their groupmates
and have asked to switch to a group with classmates they were already
friends with. But David has faith that cooperative learning activities can
work because they worked when he was a college student and they had
worked pretty well with his ESL students last year. So, David went to the
library and also talked with his more experienced colleague Melodee
Metzger. Based on what he learned from his reading and from Melodee,
David plans to try two things to make group work more successful in his
class. First, he has decided to do some teambuilding activities in which
students tell their partners about themselves. Second, when he sets up
group tasks, he’s going to pay more attention to creating tasks in which
students really need their groupmates’ help and input in order to complete
the task successfully. For example, students will do the cooperative
learning technique Write-Pair-Switch in which they first work alone to Write,
then Pair with a partner and tell the partner what they wrote and why they
wrote it, and finally Switch partners and tell their new partner what their
first partner had written and the thinking behind their writing.

As discussed in the previous chapter on Learner Autonomy, this next essential

element within the CLT approach to second language education emphasizes
the Social Nature of Learning. As with Learner Autonomy, the Social Nature of
Learning also places our second language students at the center of attention,
offering them one means of taking on more rights and responsibilities in their
own language learning. Furthermore, in the way that David Rodriquez has
decided to implement groupwork activities in the opening vignette to this
chapter, process, rather than product, is emphasized, as second language stu-
dents do not just tell or show each other their answers; rather they explain to
one another how they arrived at the answers (Slavin, 1995). Additionally, the
Social Nature of Learning acknowledges the place of affect in second language
education, highlighting the importance of positive interdependence among
peers, i.e., the feeling among the members of a peer group that the group sinks
or swims together, that the group is only as strong as its weakest member
(Johnson & Johnson, 2009). Positive interdependence helps second language
students feel support and belonging, at the same time that they are motivated
to try hard to assist the group in reaching its goals. Three particular ways that
 Emphasize the Social Nature of Learning 31
second language teachers can implement this view of learning as being a social
entity are,

1. To encourage second language students to learn from one another rather than
solely from the teacher and the materials, such as the textbook.
2. To encourage second language students to learn from the communities in which
they live and interact on a daily basis and, further, from the world beyond.
3. To encourage second language students and everyone at their educational institu-
tion to make a cooperative, rather than a competitive or individualist, stance their
first option in terms of their perspective toward their fellow second language
students, their teachers, and with whomever else they have contact.

Thus, this chapter outlines and discusses the Social Nature of Learning as it
applies to an overall approach to CLT within second language education and
suggests that second language teachers can actively implement more student–
student collaboration in their classes so that the students can further develop
their second language skills and abilities.

The social nature of learning

One of the basic tenets of the social nature of all learning is that we can learn
from each other rather than trying to learn by ourselves. This idea can be
carried over into our second language classrooms when we realize that our
students can also learn from and with their peers. Whereas in the traditional
approach or paradigm, the rules often were, “Eyes on your own paper,” and
“No talking to your neighbor,” the goal in the Social Nature of Learning
essential is to encourage our students to share with their peers and their
teachers. Indeed, research suggests that second language students learn from
and teach others all the time, especially when they are not in formal teaching
settings (Breen, 2001), and more specifically within a CLT approach, as
Richards and Rodgers (2001) have noted, it is actually expected that second
language students will interact with their classmates in speech and writing
during class activities as well as outside of class. In order for this to happen
though, both second language teachers and their students need to be aware of
cooperative learning skills.
Cooperative learning (also known as collaborative learning) is one of the
most researched methods in all of education, with thousands of studies having
32 Essentials for Successful English Language Teaching

been done involving a wide range of students, as to age, ethnicity, and nationality,
and a wide range of subject areas, including second language. These studies
suggest that cooperative learning can lead to gains of cognitive and affective
variables. What should be emphasized is that it is seldom useful for teachers
to just ask students to form groups and work together. Instead, preparation
must take place. The literature on cooperative learning offers principles and
techniques to aid in this preparation.
Many students need some preparation for group activities as they may not
be accustomed to working with classmates on academic tasks. Instead, they
may have mostly experienced teacher-fronted instruction. To prepare students
to cooperate, second language teachers often include explicit instruction in
cooperative skills. The teaching of cooperative skills is a cooperative learning
principle. Examples of these cooperative skills include praising others, asking
for help, and giving and receiving suggestions (Gillies, 2007). These coopera-
tive skills are also vital second language skills; skills that will serve our second
language students well in their future academic careers and in other aspects of
their lives where they collaborate with others.
Johnson and Johnson (1999) explain a useful six-step procedure for facili-
tating students’ regular use of cooperative skills that can be used in second
language classrooms:

1. Students understand why a particular skill is important.

2. Students know the words, phrases, gestures, etc. typical of use of that one
skill.
3. Students practice the skill in isolation, e.g., they do a game or role play that
features the skill.
4. Students use the skill during a cooperative learning activity involving regular course
content.
5. Students monitor their use of the skills and discuss their findings.
6. The skill is emphasized in an ongoing way, rather than just once.

Another means second language teachers have of promoting collaboration

in their classrooms is to foster an overall atmosphere in which cooperation
acts not just as a methodology for second language learning, but also a topic in
itself for learning, and as a value embraced in all learning activities (Jacobs,
Power, and Loh, 2002). Examples of cooperation as a topic for learning would
be second language students writing compositions about the times that they
(or people whom they interview if this can be incorporated into the course)
have collaborated with others. To establish cooperation as a value, the class as
 Emphasize the Social Nature of Learning 33
a group can look at what processes in the school, such as norm-referenced
evaluation and in society, such as contests with only one winner, promote
competition as a value. It should be noted that the aim is not to eliminate
competition or individual work; the aim is to achieve a better balance.
One way to encourage students to think in terms of cooperating with
others, in particular others outside the class involves service learning projects
(Roehlkepartain, 2009; National Service Learning Clearing House, 2009 http://
servicelearning.org). Service learning is the combination of service to others
with learning related to students’ course curriculum. Learning could be added
to the same experience in several ways:

z Investigation. Students could, work in pairs to study the eating habits of other
students. Pairs, where possible would be formed by people with different first lan-
guage backgrounds (or different L1s); if the entire class has a common L1, students
could decide to devote a percentage of the time to speaking the second language
(or L2) and could study vocabulary they would need in that discussion.
z Planning. Before beginning their service learning actions, students could discuss
what would be a good project to do toward improving people’s eating habits.
z Implementing. Students could prepare talks, posters, flyers to encourage others to
eat more wisely and then could arrange to do the talks and disseminate the materi-
als they had prepared.

These service learning activities provide opportunities for students to learn

together for a purpose other than to get a high score on an exam, although the
learning that takes place might lead to higher exam scores. An example of a
service learning project done by second language students is documented by
Wilhelm (2006), whose university ESL students in Illinois did presentations on
U. S. culture for preschool students.

Classroom implications
Group work
The most common way that teachers can implement this view of learning as a
social activity is by the use of cooperative learning activities in their second
language classes. As noted above, cooperative learning offers second language
teachers many ideas for how they can go beyond merely asking students to
work together in pairs or groups. Different techniques will be appropriate with
different learning goals and will match with different views of teaching;
34 Essentials for Successful English Language Teaching

furthermore, techniques can be adapted to fit particular learning situations.

We now outline and discuss two group techniques: Snowball and Building
Community.

Snowball
Snowball (adapted from Kearney, 1993) is actually two techniques in one:
Forward Snowball and Reverse Snowball. Forward Snowball involves students
in working together to generate ideas, and in Reverse Snowball, students choose
from among the ideas their group has generated. Forward Snowball is used for
brainstorming and highlights the benefit of heterogeneity because it is good
for gathering as many ideas or as much information as possible.

z Step 1 – Each group member works alone to list ideas or information.

z Step 2 – Pairs explain their lists to each other and then make a combined list.
Duplications are eliminated.
z Step 3 – Pair One and Pair Two get together and make a combined list. Duplications
are eliminated.

Forward Snowball is also useful for teambuilding (creating bonds among

group members) because it provides dramatic proof that two (or more) heads
really are better than one. Within second language teaching such as an English
as a second language (ESL) class, Forward Snowball can be used as follows: The
teacher writes a word on the board, such as “important.” Students do Forward
Snowball to see how many words they can generate using the letters of
“important.” Perhaps they can use various aids, such as electronic dictionaries
and websites, to find more words.
In Forward Snowball, the group’s list gets bigger and bigger, however, in
Reverse Snowball, it gets smaller. Thus, this technique builds analysis and
evaluation skills as in the following steps:

z Step 1 – Each group member works alone to list ideas or information.

z Step 2 – Pairs explain their lists to each other and then make a list of only those
items that appear on both lists or only those that they think are the best.
z Step 3 – Two pairs repeat the same process.

Reverse Snowball could work as follows: Each group member lists four
examples of good writing in a particular text. By Step 3 of Reverse Snowball,
they try to agree on the best example of good writing in the text and prepare
to explain their choice.
 Emphasize the Social Nature of Learning 35
Snowball is a useful cooperative learning technique because each member
works alone first and then presents to the group, thus students are discouraged
from either doing nothing or, the opposite, attempting to dominate the group.
The group has a common goal, e.g., in Forward Snowball, their goal is to make
a long list, and each group member contributes to that goal. Also, the group has
a single product and this encourages them to work together.

Building community
Important factors in successful collaboration are feelings of caring, trust, and
safety. Students are more likely to ask for help, take risks, and share with others
in an atmosphere in which people care about, respect, and protect one another.
At the same time that we are part of a community, we also maintain our indi-
vidual identities. Creating such an atmosphere takes time and skilled effort.
We present the following ideas for promoting this community spirit in second
language classrooms.

z Discussing group functioning. One way to foster collaborative skills (one of the
cooperative learning principles mentioned above) is for individual groups and the
class as a whole to discuss how groups are functioning (Gibbs, 2006). For instance,
a group that has been working together fairly well can share with the rest of the
class their ideas about what helped them work well together. Other topics for
group and class discussion are what groups can do to work better in the future and
how students can apply what they have learned about groups in the classroom to
groups they are in outside the classroom.
z Electronic cooperation. Information technology offers a wide and growing array of
opportunities for students to work together. For instance, chat software provides
for synchronous (at the same time) interaction among students. E-groups involve
asynchronous (at different times) interaction. These electronic forums can be open
only to course members. Blogs are yet another form of electronic communication.
Then, of course, there is old-fashioned email. For example, students can mail their
work to each other, give each other feedback, using such features as Track Changes
and Comments in MS Word, and then send the work back to the original author.
Yet another software, Etherpad allows two people on different computers to
simultaneously type on the same document (www.etherpad.com).
z Groups helping other groups. When cooperative learning is used successfully,
groups believe that their task is not completed until,

a. everyone in the group understands the concepts being taught and has
improved their skills. For instance, if a group has finished answering the problems in
a grammar textbook, they are not finished until everyone in the group, working
alone, could do all the problems and explain how they arrived at their answers;
36 Essentials for Successful English Language Teaching

b. everyone in the class understands the concepts being taught and has improved
their skills. Thus, a group is not done just because it has finished their task.
Instead, all the group members look around the room to see if other groups might
be able to benefit from their assistance. In this way, the feeling of positive inter-
dependence, i.e., “all for one, one for all,” extends beyond the small classroom
group to encompass the entire class.

Cooperative learning can take place in many different places and with many
different types of people. Here are some examples:

z Cross-age tutoring (from Fisher, 2001). In cross-age tutoring, older second language
students work with younger students. For instance, upper elementary school
Spanish as a second language students can read aloud to lower elementary school
students and help the younger Spanish as a Second Language students with their
writing. The older students provide positive models to the younger ones, and the
older ones build confidence and skills in the process. Ideally, such tutoring programs
involve even lower-proficiency older students, as the experience can provide these
lower-proficiency students a boost to their motivation and self-esteem.
z Out-of-class academic collaboration. Bloom (1984) states that peer interaction out-
side the classroom – not just inside the classroom – can also be crucial to academic
success. Such out-of-class academic collaboration (OCAC) can be organized in at
least three ways.

{ Institutionally-sponsored OCAC, e.g., peer tutoring programs established by

institutions where students who are more proficient in English are chosen by the
institution (and sometimes paid or otherwise rewarded) to tutor students
weak in that subject. These programs may be sponsored by the institution where
students are studying, or by other organizations, such as religious or ethnic
organizations.
{ Teacher-initiated OCAC, e.g., a teacher assigns students to work together on an
ESL homework assignment. Project work is another area in which teachers often
organize students to work together outside of class.
{ Student-initiated OCAC, e.g., a group of students meet together on their own
to study for an examination or to complete an ESL assignment.

Project work
Another way second language students can be encouraged to work collabora-
tively together is by engaging in project work (Beckett & Miller, 2006).
Projects, such as those involving service learning, offer students an opportu-
nity to break down the artificial walls that often separate them from the wider
world (Freire, 1970). Projects can take many forms and can last anywhere from
 Emphasize the Social Nature of Learning 37
30 minutes to several months. One cooperative learning method for facilitat-
ing longer-term projects is Group Investigation (Tan, Sharan, & Lee, 2006).
Here, the class functions as a group of groups, with the class choosing an
overall theme, such as careers, and each group deciding to study one career,
such as tennis instructor, or one aspect of careers, such as how to be promoted
or achieve a salary increase. Within each group, members make a plan, divide
up the work, report back to and consult each other frequently, and put together
a report to present to the other groups. Group activities can also play a role in
the groups’ presentation. Rather than each group, one at a time, coming to the
front to present, while their classmates sit motionless soaking in the presenta-
tion, group activities can be used here as well. For example, the presenters can
give their audience issues to discuss with a partner, or the audience members
can interview each other. Group Investigation is very similar to what is
perhaps now a better-known method, Problem-based Learning (Hmelo-Silver
& Barrows, 2006).

Grading group/project work

One important question we should consider at this stage is, should group
members all receive the same grade? If students have worked together on a
project or some other task, giving everyone in the group the same grade makes
sense for several reasons:

z Many times in life, groups succeed or fail together. For instance, if people are work-
ing together to support or oppose a ballot initiative, they all win or lose, regardless
of how much each contributed to the effort.
z Positive interdependence may increase when students all receive the same grade.
Thus, students may be more willing to ask for and give each other help.
z Determining how much each student contributed to their group can be very
difficult.

At the same time, a number of good reasons can be given for why group
members should each receive a separate grade such as,

z People looking at students’ grade, such as university admissions officers, may have
difficulty interpreting what a group grade says about an individual student’s ability
and work.
z The same student could get a different grade depending on their groupmates.
With higher achieving and more motivated groupmates, a higher grade would
be likely.
38 Essentials for Successful English Language Teaching

z Students may be demotivated if they feel their grade doesn’t clearly reflect what
they themselves have contributed.

A third option when grades are used to accompany group activities lies in
using a combination of individual and group grading. Consequently, second
language teachers have a very important role to play when setting up coopera-
tive learning activities in their classes and these roles along with student roles,
will be outlined in the following sections.
In addition to the above activities we suggest several ways by which the
materials teachers use to accomplish these activities can promote collabora-
tion among second language students. These include the following:

z The materials or teachers’ guides that accompany them can give specific sugges-
tions for which activities to do via collaboration among students and how such
collaboration should be organized.
z Students and teachers can use their own knowledge and experience to decide
these issues.
z Rather than relying on existing materials, students can rely on one another as well as
others in the school and beyond to locate learning materials and can develop their
materials for themselves and others. An example of students developing their own
materials is when students do research, e.g., by interviewing classmates, family
members, and others, write a report on their findings, and disseminate their report.

Practicing vigilance
This story comes from the fictional tales of Nassredin, a character from
Turkey, known for being sly at times. In this story, Nassredin found a job as a
teacher, but he did his best to teach as little as possible.
Nassredin began the first day of school by asking students, “Do you know
what I will be teaching you?” When the students replied that they did not know,
“Since you do not even know what I will be teaching, there is no point in my
even trying to teach,” and he immediately left the classroom and adjourned to
his favorite cafe.
On the second day of school, Nassredin repeated his question. The eager
students were prepared this time. Therefore, they responded with an enthusi-
astic “Yes.” However, Nassredin was ready too, and quickly replied, “Oh, as you
already know what I plan to teach, it would be a waste of everyone’s time for
me to teach you,” and again, he immediately left the class. In just a few minutes,
he was making himself comfortable with a potent cup of espresso.
 Emphasize the Social Nature of Learning 39
The third day, the students had a plan to outsmart their sly and reluctant
teacher. When he asked the students if they knew what he was there to teach,
half of the expectant learners said “Yes,” while the other half replied, “No.”
However, Nassredin, without missing a beat, responded with his own mis-
guided version of cooperative learning, “Oh good,” he said while heading out
the door. “In that case, those of you who know, please teach those of you who
don’t know.”

Role of teachers
When teachers use a Social Nature of Learning focus within a CLT approach
to second language education they will usually,

z Be observers, noticing such phenomena as how well students are working together,
their understanding of the material, and the process by which they are going about
their work.
z Participate in work similar to what students are doing, either alone or as a group
member. For instance, if students are doing science projects, they can join a group
or be doing a project of their own, perhaps with people outside a school, e.g., a
local environmental organization.
z Give students space to try to learn on their own. The way that most teachers use
group activities is to first give some teacher input and then have a group activity in
which students use in some way what the teacher has taught. But what if, instead,
students had reached the point of group autonomy in which they could reduce the
time needed for teacher input or move it to a later part of the lesson? In other
words, students would be reaching a stage in which they don’t always need the
teacher to predigest everything for them – even materials written especially for
students.

Role of students
Students play a wide range of roles as they interact with peers and others. Within
a group, possible roles include (Jacobs, Power, & Loh, 2002) the following:

z Facilitator (also called Coach) – keeps the group on task and checks that everyone
knows what the instructions are
z Time Keeper – keeps track of the time limits
z Checker – checks to see that all group members have understood
z Encourager (also called Cheerleader) – encourages everyone to participate and
leads the celebration of success
40 Essentials for Successful English Language Teaching

z Recorder – keeps notes on what the group has discussed – these can be in normal
note form or in the shape of a graphic organizer, such as word webs or mind
maps
z Reporter – reports the group’s work to other groups or the whole class
z Materials Manager – makes sure the group has the materials it needs and that
these are properly taken care of
z Questioner – asks questions to prompt the group to go more deeply and broadly
into their task
z Summarizer – highlights the main things the group has discussed, keeps track of
the group’s progress
z Paraphraser – restates what the previous speaker said to check comprehension
z Praiser – compliments groupmates for their ideas and their role in the group
z Elaborator – connects the group’s ideas to other things they have studied or to
out-of-school contexts
z Safety Monitor – helps to see that safety procedures are followed when groups use
potentially dangerous equipment
z Conflict Creator – plays the role of devil’s advocate bringing out opposing points of
view and other possibilities, as well as unearthing the conflicting ideas that are
already in the group but that are being unexpressed or ignored
z Sound Hound – makes sure the noise level does not go too high
z Observer – notes how the group is working together and reports this back to the
group.

These roles rotate so that students have opportunities to try on different

responsibilities for group success.

Conclusion
To understand and promote learning, we look not only at individuals but
also at the people who make up their world and the connections among
them. These people include not only teachers, but also peers, and others in
the community. This chapter has suggested that cooperation is valued over
competing or working alone, although there is still a place for competition
and individual work. When students collaborate they all play leadership
roles. The chapter suggests that we focus greater attention on the Social
Nature of Learning in our second language classes rather than on students
as separate, decontextualized individuals because ultimately this will
make second language learning more accessible and more enjoyable for our
students.
 Emphasize the Social Nature of Learning 41

Reflection
z Review the opening story of this chapter and ask yourself why group work may fail
in many second language classes?
z What do you think of David’s ideas on implementing group work in his classes?
z Have you ever used group work in your classes? If yes, how did you set these
groups up and how did you evaluate their level of success?
z If no, how do you think you would go about implementing group work in your
class?
z What can you do as a second language teacher to ensure all members of the group
participate and cooperate?
z How do you or would you grade group work? What would be your rationale for
such grading?
z What do you think is the greatest obstacle to using group work successfully in your
classes? How would you overcome this?
z What would you do if one student said that he or she does not like group work and
anyway it is not part of his or her cultural background?
z What would you do if one student said that he or she paid you, the teacher, to
teach and not his or her classmates and that he or she feels cheated with this
method of learning?
z What do you think are the roles of both teachers and students within group
work?
4 Develop Curricular Integration

Chapter Outline
Vignette 42
Curricular integration 44
Classroom implications 46
Variety of resources 47
Practicing vigilance 54
Too real realia 54
What’s in a name 54
Role of teachers 55
Role of students 55
Conclusion 55
Reflections 56

Vignette
Jane Smith is a master at integrating the curriculum in her fourth grade
ESL classroom. She instinctively knows how to help students see and
make connections between the English language/Language arts and
among other things they are studying in their classes. Jane Smith
makes sure that her students realize that almost all science, math, and
social studies lessons are connected in some way to Language arts.
For instance, as part of a science unit on the water cycle, Jane pointed
out to her students that they can apply their knowledge and under-
standing of the water cycle to write a creative monologue in English
 Develop Curricular Integration 43
about the life cycle of a water droplet, thus practicing all they learned
from Jane about the writing process in English. Before the writing
assignment, which emphasized using descriptive detail, the students
were asked to complete a pre-writing activity in which they visited
seven stations representing each of the places water is found: rivers,
oceans, plants, reservoirs, ground water, soil, and lakes, with particu-
lar emphasis on local instance. This helps students see the relevance
of the lesson to their own lives. Equipped with the language and
content knowledge gained and remembered from this pre-writing
activity, students wrote initial drafts. Then, in their groups of four, they
took turns sitting in the author’s chair and reading their stories to their
groupmates who listened and offered comments and compliments. In
this way, the various language skills are integrated, as first students
write, then they read and speak, while groupmates listen. One of Jane’s
students, Pamela, a particularly dramatic student, received a great
deal of positive feedback from her peers on the first draft of her story,
both due to her expressive reading and the humorous details she
incorporated into her narrative. Pamela’s group broke into laughter and
applause when she read the following in a high, squeaky voice, “I was
swallowed by a big salamander, and he peed me out as a big, yellow
puddle!” Groupmates then tried to follow Pamela’s example when they
rewrote their own drafts. Here, the academic (science and language
arts) is linked with the social and emotional, as groupmates listen and
respond to each other’s efforts. Jane is convinced that, in her teaching,
she must continue to point out how each subject area is linked to other
subjects and to the world beyond the school, and how knowledge and
skills of the English language, her students’ second language, are nec-
essary for success.

Integrated curriculum can be defined in a variety of ways. For our purposes, we

focus on linking language with other curricular areas, on linking the various
language skills, on linking the academic with the social and emotional aspects of
students’ lives, on linking different ways of learning, and on linking classroom
activities to the wider world. Sometimes these links are small connections within
a single lesson, and at other times, the links involve larger concepts that unify a
course of study. Many opportunities to make connections between various parts
of the curriculum present themselves, and it is the responsibility of teachers and
administrators to recognize and reinforce these opportunities.
44 Essentials for Successful English Language Teaching

Many of the ideas advocated in this book are supported by the findings of
recent research on how the brain works. Integrated Curriculum is one exam-
ple. Brain research tells us that our minds are constantly looking for connec-
tions (Jensen, 2008). Integrated Curriculum guides students to find and create
the many connections that exist to be explored.
A key link between Curricular Integration in education generally, and the
CLT paradigm shift in second language education, lies in the concept of
going from whole to part rather than from part to whole. For instance, under
the traditional education model, students study a given historical period,
e.g., the 19th century, in an atomistic way. In history class, they study key
events, people and movements. In science class, in another year or semester,
they discuss notable scientific discoveries from the 19th century. In first or
second language class, in yet another year or semester, they read literature
from the period. Thus, students miss valuable opportunities for understand-
ing context.
In second language class, students might read about one topic, listen to con-
versations about a different topic, and write about a third topic, or they might
read or listen to a text in one text type and write a text in a different text type.
Thus, not only are connections missing between language class and the other
subjects the students might be studying, or the careers they might be pursuing
or planning to pursue, but connections are not even made across different
aspects of the language curriculum. Jane Smith, the fourth grade ESL teacher,
attempted to show her students how different subjects are linked and then
gave them practical examples of how this worked while also showing them the
importance of mastery of English language skills so that they can be successful
in all their subject areas. This chapter outlines and discusses the concept of
integrated curriculum and shows from a practical perspective how second
language teachers can utilize this concept to ensure their students are studying
within a CLT approach to language learning.

Curricular integration
Curricular Integration serves to overcome the phenomenon in which students
study one subject in one period, close their textbook and go to another class,
open another textbook and study another subject. When various subject areas
are taught jointly, learners have more opportunities to see the links between
subject areas. By appreciating these links, students develop a stronger grasp of
subject matter, a deeper purpose for learning and a greater ability to analyze
 Develop Curricular Integration 45
situations in a holistic manner (Brinton, Snow, & Wesche, 1989). Curricular
Integration is just one of the many aspects of the CLT paradigm that overlaps
with a more recent trend in second language education, the standards
movement.
The concept of language across the curriculum offers one route for imple-
menting a Curricular Integration (Chamot & O’Malley, 1994). The idea is that
language competence is necessary for learning in all subject areas. For instance,
students cannot understand their textbooks if they have weak reading skills;
they cannot do tasks if they have weak speaking and writing skills. As students
develop their language skills, they simultaneously deepen their grasp of con-
tent matter. For example, asking students to write, even in mathematics class,
about what they understand, what they are unclear about and how they can
apply what they have learned offers a powerful means of deepening students’
competence in a subject area.
In second language education, another means of implementing Curricular
Integration is content-based instruction (Crandall, 1987; Shrum & Glisan,
2000). In content-based instruction, rather than lessons focusing mainly on
the second language, the second language becomes the vehicle for learning
about content that connects to students’ needs and/or interests. As Wilga
Rivers (1976, p. 96), an authority on second language education since the 1960s,
has written, “As language teachers we are the most fortunate of teachers – all
subjects are ours. Whatever [the students] want to communicate about, what-
ever they want to read about, is our subject matter.” Therefore, we have the
flexibility to work with students to craft curriculum.
Project work is yet another method of implementing Curricular Integra-
tion, in that projects are often multidisciplinary (Ribe & Vidal, 1993). For
example, an environmental project, e.g., on water pollution, could involve
scientific knowledge about how to analyze water samples, mathematics knowl-
edge to do calculations based on the sample, social studies knowledge about
the role of governmental, private, and civic sectors in cleaning up water pollu-
tion and language knowledge to write letters and prepare presentations based
on the project’s findings. This example of using projects as a tool for integra-
tion across content areas also exemplifies integrating instruction with students’
lives beyond the classroom, as an adequate supply of clean water matters to
everyone. One concept related to this integration of education and life is
termed critical pedagogy. Critical pedagogy encourages a view of learning as a
process in which students actively take part in transforming themselves and
their world, rather than learning being a process in which students passively
46 Essentials for Successful English Language Teaching

take part in the transmission of information from their teachers and textbooks
to themselves (Crookes & Lehner, 1998; Vandrick, 1999).
Language for Specific Purposes (LSP) (Robinson, 1980) provides an addi-
tional path toward Curricular Integration. For example, a group of hotel
employees studying Japanese might focus on the Japanese they need in their
work. Thus, the conversations they listen to and practice might involve
exchanges between hotel guests and staff, and the material they read might
include hotel brochures and other travel industry literature. Their language
learning clearly integrates with their occupational needs.

Classroom implications
Here are more ways to implement various aspects of Curricular Integration.

z Parallel topics – instruction in several subjects is organized around a common topic

such as Mexico. Students may study the history of Mexico in Social Studies, read
literature from Mexico in language arts, and create Mexican folk arts in art class.
Although the topic is parallel in each of the subjects, instruction does not empha-
size making connections between disciplines.
z Interdisciplinary Instruction – instruction is organized to help students more readily
find the connections between disciplines. Students might study the concept of
proportion in math and art and the concept of fractions in math and music. The
emphasis is on understanding a concept from the perspective of more than one
discipline.
z Immersion experiences – learning is organized to more closely resemble life. Within
this real-life context, students find meaning. Students might organize a service
project to provide coats for children in need. Students learn skills and concepts
from multiple disciplines within the context of real-life problems.

The following continuum (Figure 4.1) illustrates increasing levels of

integration.
There are varied approaches to creating more integrated settings for learn-
ing, many of which are discussed later in the chapter. In general, quality inte-
grated instruction is organized to include materials from a variety of resources,
interdisciplinary investigation, and higher-level thinking.

Separate Disciplines Parallel Topics Interdisciplinary Instruction Immersion Experiences

Figure 4.1 Increasing levels of integration

 Develop Curricular Integration 47
Variety of resources
The possibilities for curriculum integration are endless, ranging from small
connections within a single lesson to more lengthy and complex units of study.
There are a variety of rich, multi-disciplinary resources that can enrich a les-
son or unit. They may be used to teach concepts, motivate and engage students,
promote critical thinking through experiences, or represent learning in multi-
ple forms. The following list suggests some of the more common strategies.

Teach a concept with children’s literature, music, art, or

other resources

z A language arts teacher uses the book “Listen to the Rain” to help middle school
students understand the concept of onomatopoeia.
z A science teacher uses stringed instruments to help students study the physics of
sound production.

Promote higher-level reasoning through experiences

z Students participate in Báfa báfa, a cross-cultural contact simulation, to better

understand elements of trade and cultural diffusion.
z Students participate in the Project Wild activity, “How Many Bears Can Live in this
Forest?” Students “walk into the forest” as bears with different characteristics
(injured young male, female blinded by porcupine quills, and mother bear with
cubs), gather food cards and then return to their dens.
z During a science unit students assume the role of crickets, birds, or hawks. They
simulate the dynamics in the food chain through a game of tag.

All of the previously mentioned examples focus on incorporating rich resources

and interdisciplinary activities within more traditional lessons. Please note
also the wide range of intelligences brought to bear on the topics (for more on
Multiple Intelligences, please see the chapter on Diversity). To expand connec-
tive thinking, there are a variety of more structured models that help teachers
think about organizing curriculum in an integrated fashion.

Interdisciplinary units
In this model, a topic, theme/concept or piece of literature usually serves as the
organizing framework for a collection of lessons over an expanded period,
48 Essentials for Successful English Language Teaching

usually two to four weeks. The unit examines the topic/theme from the per-
spective of two or more disciplines and may contain many of the types of
activities listed previously. Varied resources from multiple disciplines are then
sequenced to expand students’ understandings. The degree of integration var-
ies by unit, ranging from incorporation of activities around a topic such as
China, to complex units organizing study around a central theme such as
Interdependence.

Topical unit example

In the simplest form, a study of the topic China would include varied activities.
These might include reading a piece of Chinese literature, working with tan-
grams, creating Chinese paper cuts, sampling food, map studies, and noting
cultural treasures such as the Great Wall and the terra cotta warrior figures.
Upon unit completion, students will know many new things about China but
not necessarily how they are interconnected.

Thematic or conceptual unit example

In a thematic unit, the teacher may use the same activities as those in a topical
unit but with the added lens of the theme to guide students in finding connec-
tions. Let’s return to the example of China. We can give a conceptual focus to
the unit on China by identifying a theme such as interdependence, adaptation,
change and continuity, or conflict. Selecting interdependence as the theme
shifts the way China is studied while guiding students toward recognizing that
examples of interdependence are found in all time periods across the world.
Thus, sampling Chinese food includes an examination of how peoples’ diets
depend upon the food resources produced in a region. In the north, wheat-
based products are common. In southern China, the climate supports growing
rice and its inclusion as a dietary staple. Since arable and grazing lands are at a
premium, pork products (hogs require very little pen space) and ocean/river
products (fish, eel, squid) become the meat staples. Diets depend upon the
available resources.
The theme of interdependence shapes a focus for studying about the Great
Wall of China. The original series of many walls were built to protect the terri-
tories of different rulers from their warring neighbors. The first emperor of
China united the northern ends of these walls to protect the people from invad-
ing Mongols from the north. Thus, the separate kingdoms came to depend upon
each other to protect themselves from invaders. Each lesson on an aspect of
Chinese life adds a layer to understanding how pervasive interdependence is.
 Develop Curricular Integration 49
It is important to remember that a good theme is a broad concept that
crosses the disciplines. Since there are many themes, the first task is for the
teacher to select a theme to use in exploring a topic. The following questions
aid in identifying a theme:

z Does it apply to different disciplines?

z Can it be applied to different times and places?
z Does it reveal similarities and contrasts?
z Does it fascinate?

For example, the concept of interdependence is a lens for finding patterns in

life. The following list shows how different disciplines might address the theme
of interdependence.

z Social studies

{ Family members
{ Trade
{ Political systems

z Science

{ Food chain
{ Ecological systems
{ Water cycle
{ Acid rain

z Mathematics

{ Operations
{ Balancing equations

z Language arts/ESL

{ Context in reading/writing
{ Story lines

z Music

{ Chorus/orchestra
{ Musical compositions

Once you start looking for examples of interdependence, you begin to realize
that the possibilities are endless. Thus, interdisciplinary instruction makes
learning fun and meaningful as follows: The integrative nature of interdisci-
plinary units encourages students to “see” the interconnectedness of the world
50 Essentials for Successful English Language Teaching

around them. This linking renders the world more relevant by connecting
content, self, and community. Understanding the links generates excitement
and fuels the desire to learn more.

Integrative studies
We can take a thematic unit to a higher level by adding the dimension of
questioning found in the integrative studies model. The integrative studies
model (Davies, 2005) is adapted from an American Studies approach to study-
ing culture. This model uses themes, resources organized around a theme, and
questions to make sense of a complex world. A theme or pattern acts as the
vehicle for organization. Students are presented with a variety of resources
around a theme and examine the development over time of interrelationships
between data. This process promotes a deeper understanding of the theme and
recognition that it is a pervasive part of life. Students discover interrelation-
ships through time by examining data from different disciplines. This varied
information might include excerpts from speeches or diaries, photographs,
maps, music, poems, literature, works of art, or other primary and secondary
resources. In structuring the unit, the challenge is to locate varied resources
representing different ways of examining the theme. Access to web-based
resources makes the task of locating materials easier. This is similar to the
strategies for teaching concepts with a rich variety of resources. However,
the balance provided by studying a concept from multiple disciplines and
the added dimension of questioning bring depth of understanding.
Theme selected and materials assembled, the teacher uses a four-tier
questioning strategy to assist students in identifying interconnections:

1. Understand the artifact. These questions assure that the specific artifact is under-
stood. The questions focus on knowledge and comprehension. For example, what
does the poem mean?
2. Explore the inter-relatedness of artifacts. Ask questions that examine the inter-
relatedness of artifacts and connect the data to students’ prior experiences.
Analysis forms the crux of this level of questioning. For example, have you ever
experienced feelings similar to those expressed in the poem? Or how are the events
in the poem similar/different to those identified in the timeline?
3. Explore how data might be expressed through other perceptual modes. Guide stu-
dents in expressing data through a different mode of perception. This requires
mental flexibility, a key component of creative production. For example, translate
the events of the timeline into a poem.
4. Examine the relationship of chronology to the various artifacts. Could such a poem
have been written fifty years ago? Why or why not? This stage incorporates critical
and analytical thinking.
 Develop Curricular Integration 51
Example of Integrative Studies Model
In order to understand freedom quests as a human condition, students study
several examples of quests from different eras and cultures. For example, they
might examine data representing how searches for freedom influenced Chief
Joseph of the Nez Perce, Harriet Tubman, Martin Luther King, Jr., Mahatma
Gandhi, and so on. This allows for comparisons between quests which guide
connection finding. An excerpt from an exploration of the theme, Quests for
Freedom, illustrates this model. Sample activities from a study of Chief Joseph’s
quest follow.

Procedures:

1. Read Chief Joseph’s quotations. What did they reveal about Nez Perce beliefs?
How did these beliefs differ from those of white settlers? Was conflict inevitable
between the white settlers and the Nez Perce? Explain.

CHIEF JOSEPH’S QUOTATIONS

The earth is the mother of all people, and all people should have equal rights upon
it. The earth and myself are of one mind. The measure of the land and the mea-
sure of our bodies are the same. . . . I never said the land was mine to do with as
I chose. The one who has the right to dispose of it is the one who has created it.
I claim the right to live on my land and accord you the privilege to live on yours
(Gidley, 1981).

2. “Play the song, Earth is Our Mother” (Gass, 1986, cited in Davies, 2000) or another
selection of native American music. Direct students to rhythmically walk to the
music. What does the song reveal about the Indians’ relationship to the earth?
Would Chief Joseph agree with the song’s lyrics? Using the content of the song
and the quotations, write a speech that Chief Joseph delivers to white settlers
expressing his people’s beliefs about the land. Does this song reflect the beliefs of
American Indians today?
3. Distribute a chronology of Chief Joseph. Direct students to identify all examples of
culture contact between whites and the Nez Perce. For each contact, discuss if it
was a positive, negative, or neutral experience from the perspectives of the whites
and the Indians. How might the world views expressed in the song and Chief
Joseph’s quotations help account for these interactions? Describe the changing
nature of these interactions over time. What factors account for this? Write a song
or poem that reflects these changing interactions from the perspective of a Nez
Perce or a white settler. Create a timeline that shows these events and those influ-
encing Harriet Tubman’s life (pre-Civil War through the turn of the century). Chief
Joseph and Harriet Tubman were contemporaries. Were they influenced by the
same events? Why or why not? How were their experiences similar? Different?
52 Essentials for Successful English Language Teaching

Community connections
We can extend the concept of the integrated unit approach even further by
organizing study outside the school doors. Field trips, service learning
projects, and immersion experiences provide examples of connecting to the
wider community.

Field trips
Many opportunities for field trips abound in the classroom and often curricu-
lar connections focus around these experiences. For instance, students that
attended a musical performance of the “Voice of the Whale” also went to the
local aquarium to study marine life, and explored the beach. Each of these
experiences connected nicely with their science curriculum on ecosystems, the
social studies focus on human interaction with the environment, and provided
a variety of opportunities for reading and writing.

Service projects
Social Studies includes a focus on service learning to help students under-
stand themselves as citizens within a larger community. The very nature of
service learning presents itself as an opportunity for organizing curriculum
around a purpose or project to help students see connections to real life. For
instance, ESL students in a grade class can choose to restore the turtle pond
that stood in the courtyard garden of their elementary school. The students
can sell carnations at Valentine’s Day to raise money for the project, research
the ecosystem of the pond, estimate costs for materials and supplies, and write
an article in the school newspaper about the project. This way they get expo-
sure to all aspects of school, and community life while developing all skills in
English.

Immersion experiences
Middle school students study some issue in history that focuses on continuity
and change. In small groups, the students select topics of interest relating to
their issue that includes information about education, women’s roles, home
crafts, and religion from that period of time. They research their topics using
library, internet, and community resources. From the community a number of
individuals assist in the research. For example, those researching food can get
help from a local chef so he or she can help them cook the pre-planned meals
over an open fire and a local fisherman can help them attempt to catch fish at
a nearby pond, just as has happened during that period in history. After a day,
 Develop Curricular Integration 53
students return to school for a debriefing. They compare life now and then and
discuss factors contributing to these changes.

Integrating skills
One of the meanings of Integrated Curriculum involves linking the various
language skills. Most teachers think of four skills: reading, writing, speaking
(including) pronunciation, and listening. It is not uncommon for ESL pro-
grams to offer separate courses in each of these skills. Sometimes grammar is
included as a separate skill and a separate course. These skills can easily be
integrated. For example, group discussions can accompany reading. Of course,
once students are discussing what they have read, speaking and listening have
been combined with reading. Writing is easily added as well, for example, when
students are asked to write about how they can use what they have learned
from what they have read. Grammar could certainly come in along with
the writing and speaking, and students can notice features of what they are
listening to and reading (Cross, 2002).
Here is a sample reading lesson that integrates reading, writing, listening,
and speaking.

Students are doing Extensive Reading (for more on this method, see the chapter of
Learner Autonomy). After each has finished a book, they meet in a group of two
to tell each other about what they have read. First, students write a brief summary
of their book to help them prepare to share about it with their partner. The partners
ask each other questions. (The teacher has led the class to develop these questions
– which will vary depending on the type of book – and to develop ways to answer
them). Then, two groups of two combine to share about their books, but this time,
each student tells about the book that their partner read. One goal here is that stu-
dents will provide each other with ideas for good books to read next.

Integrating the academic with the social and emotional

Nowadays, we see an increased emphasis on test scores. This encourages edu-
cators to focus only on academics and to neglect the social and emotional
aspects of education. Such a focus is a mistake for at least two reasons. First, by
involving the social and emotional side of students, we attempt to foster an
environment that boosts learners’ liking for self and others, helps them develop
cooperative skills and the attitudes necessary for employing such skills,
increases positive behaviors, leads to more student–student and student–
teacher interaction, and decreases drug use, truancy, bullying, and violent
behaviors (Collaborative for Academic, Social, and Emotional Learning, 2008).
54 Essentials for Successful English Language Teaching

Second, if we emphasize only students’ cognitive development, we are neglect-

ing important areas of what empowers students to enjoy a successful, useful
life. (Goleman, 2005)

Practicing vigilance
Read the following stories and see how teachers must be aware of how far they
want to connect their classroom to the real world in the first story (Too Real
Realia) and in the second story (What’s in a Name) how focusing on meaning
doesn’t mean forgetting to teach form; it means teaching form in the context of
meaning.

Too real realia

A well-meaning teacher in India believed that use of the L1 should be avoided
and that potentially difficult vocabulary should be taught, to the extent possi-
ble, by way of realia. One day, he was planning to teach some of the terms for
the parts of a cow’s body, such as horns and tail. Thus, the logical thing to do
seemed to be to bring a cow into the classroom.
This the teacher did. The lesson might have gone alright had not an officer
from the local school district chosen that very day and that very class for a
surprise lesson observation. The classroom was rather crowded, leaving the
only place for the inspector up in front with the cow. As the teacher had aptly
chosen a cow with large horns, the better to teach this vocabulary item, the
inspector decided to seat himself at the other end of the cow.
This decision also had its drawbacks, as the cow felt the call of nature, and
the poor inspector, who had entered the room dressed in a spotless white
uniform, suddenly had his favorite uniform decorated in various shades and
shapes of brown.
Needless to say, the inspector was furious and wanted to demote the teacher.
However, after the teacher explained that he had only been following the guid-
ance of his university professors, the inspector decided to let him go with just
a warning, as long as he promised to forget all that the idiots at the university
had taught him (Story by B. R. Sundara Rajan).

What’s in a name
An ESL teacher in Bahrain was using a Study Skills book written by Richard
Yorkey. (It is important to know that the first syllable receives the stress in this
 Develop Curricular Integration 55
author’s last name.) At the end of class one day, the teacher asked his students
to, “Remember to bring Yorkey to the next lesson.”
When the next lesson came, students were asked to take out their
books, which they all did, except for one student who had nothing on her desk
other than a pencil and a single key. The teacher asked, “Did you forget your
Study Skills book today?” “No,” the student replied. I thought you said, “Bring
your key.”
Here was a teachable moment, an opportunity to focus on form, in this case
how English distributes stress. This is what the teacher did, in a short, simple
way, before returning to the Study Skills lesson.

Role of teachers
Sometimes the teacher is more actively involved in leading student learning
and at other times acts more as a facilitator, depending on the particular activ-
ity or depth of integration. If you are going to teach students connective rea-
soning, the teacher must model the process and look for opportunities to
question students that guide their thinking to understand concepts. The
teacher helps orchestrate the collection of resources and organizing experi-
ences that will provide optimal opportunities for learning as well as providing
a structure for organizing and making sense of learning.

Role of students
Learning is actively constructing meaning with focus on metacognitive skills
and connective reasoning. Thus, active involvement becomes a critical learner
role. The integrated curriculum offers many opportunities for engagement
including making choices about areas of study, monitoring one’s thinking,
and experiencing topics/concepts from multi-sensory and multi-disciplinary
perspectives.

Conclusion
Integrated curriculum holds great potential for deep learning in the classroom.
It helps students to see connections between disciplines, to their own prior
knowledge, and to real-world contexts. Integrated curriculum takes many
forms, but generally it includes the use of a variety of resources, an interdisci-
plinary approach, and an emphasis on higher-level thinking. Although any
56 Essentials for Successful English Language Teaching

attempt to help students see connections is worthwhile, some forms of integra-

tion are more complex and promote deeper levels of understanding. Discover-
ing the inter-relatedness of all life is truly the challenge and reward of learning.
Like the roots of a tree, we seek connections to better understand and
sustain life.

Reflections
z What is your understanding of integrated curriculum?
z Have you ever tried to show your ESL students how skills in English are used
throughout their studies in school?
z If yes, how did you go about this and were you successful?
z If no, how do you think you would go about this?
z What kind of Field Trips would be suitable for ESL students?
z Have you ever taken your students on a Field Trip? If yes, how did you set it up and
where did you go?
z What do you think would be a good Field Trip for ESL Elementary school students
and why?
z What do you think would be a good Field Trip for ESL High school students and
why?
z What do you think would be a good Field Trip for ESL university students and
why?
z Have you ever organized a Service Project for your students? If yes, how did you set
it up?
z What do you think would be a good Service Project for ESL Elementary school
students and why?
z What do you think would be a good Service Project for ESL High school students
and why?
z What do you think would be a good Service Project for university level ESL students
and why?
 Focus on Meaning 5
Chapter Outline
Vignette 57
Focus on meaning 59
Classroom implications 61
Task-based language teaching 61
Building meaningful vocabulary 63
Inquiry 65
Tell/rephrase 65
Helping students find meaning in the curriculum 67
Role of teachers 67
Role of students 68
Conclusion 68
Reflections 68

Vignette
Sherman Elementary School decided to focus their monthly professional
development (PD) session for their pre-service ESL teachers in training
on the idea of connecting second language lessons to other subject
areas these students are studying. The leader of the PD session set up an
activity where three pre-service teachers that are assigned to the school
for practice teaching, Farah, Ricardo, and Jocelyn, would simulate being
math teachers rather than ESL teachers so that they could better appreci-
ate what math teachers must cover and especially what type of language
58 Essentials for Successful English Language Teaching

they must use. And so Farah, Ricardo, and Jocelyn, found themselves
deep in thought, trying to solve the math problem they were given by the
workshop leader. After some time, two of the three pre-service teachers
admitted that they could not solve the problem as they had forgotten the
formula, and after all they were ESL teachers and not math teachers.
However, the workshop leader reminded them that they will encounter
such math problems that they will have to explain to their ESL students
who may have problems understanding the language attached to the
problem if not the problem itself. The problem, as shown below, is not a
complex one. Why then could these teachers not solve a simple problem?
Here is the problem: You have taken a loan of $500 for 7 years at a simple
interest rate of 12.5% per year. How much interest will you have to pay
during the 7 years? Many adults admit to a drill and rote learning (memori-
zation) approach in their education. Many of us would admit to not remem-
bering the many mathematical formulae that we learned in our mathematics
lessons in school or college. Even if we had forgotten the formula for sim-
ple interest, would we have been able to solve the problem if we had
meaningfully learned the first principle of simple interest? Yes, if learning
had been meaningful, we would understand the meaning of “an interest
rate of 12.5% per year.” We would know,

a. For each $100, the interest per year is $12.50,

b. For $500, the interest per year is $12.50 x 5 = $62.50,
c. For a loan taken for 7 years, the interest is $62.50 x 7 = $437.50.

Hence, even if the formula (principle x rate x time/ 100) is forgotten, we

can calculate the interest using our understanding of what simple interest
means.

Some people think (at least within behaviorist psychology) that one size fits all
for learning; give the same to all students and they will all learn equally – at
least that is how it should go, but we teachers know a different reality, one that
shows us that each student reacts in a different manner to what is in a text,
or on a black/greenboard or an overhead projector. In contrast to the one-
size-fits-all metaphor mentioned above, socio-cognitive psychology stresses
that people learn by chunking new information with existing knowledge and
that meaning plays a key role in forming those chunks. In other words, learn-
ing cannot take place in isolation from what learners already know about a
topic and meaning provides a purpose for that learning because it enables
 Focus on Meaning 59
deeper thinking to take place. Indeed, research on the brain highlights that our
brains seek meaning (Jensen, 2008). The German philosopher Nietzsche
emphasized that people need to have reasons for what they do, “He [sic] who
has a Why to live for can bear almost any How.” In a book on his experiences
as a World War II concentration camp prisoner, Frankl, who was also a psy-
chiatrist, disagrees with Freud’s view that humans primarily seek pleasure and
with Adler’s view that humans’ main goal is power. Instead, in Man’s search for
meaning (1959), Frankl argues that our central quest is for meaning.
In the not too distant past, second language education also emphasized
drilling and rote memorization of the second language in the hope that some
of this would stick in long-term memory. In other words, the idea was that if
learners do something often enough, they will remember it. While drills and
memorization might be of benefit for short-term language learning, such as
providing an answer for a grammar question on past tense construction in a
fill-in-the-blank type exercise, long-term learning and the extension of that
learning require that students focus on the meaning of the language they are
using. In second language education, “meaning” can be understood in terms of
the meaning of individual words and whole texts, as well as the meaning that
particular topics and events have in students’ lives (Halliday & Matthiessen,
1999). As Richards and Rodgers (2001) maintain, in a CLT approach to second
language education, “Language is a system for the expression of meaning”
(p. 161). The math problem given earlier that the learner ESL teachers are
trying to solve needs language to explain its meaning, and that is why it is
important that these teachers are able to explain how to solve the problem to
their ESL students using the target language. We see many examples of how
drill and rote learning leads to less than effective learning not just in mathe-
matics education (as in part of the example above), but in all fields of educa-
tion, including second language education. This chapter outlines and discusses
the essential Focus on Meaning within a CLT approach to second language
education and suggests that second language teachers can actively implement
more student collaboration in their classes so that the students can further
develop their second language skills and abilities.

Focus on meaning
Underpinning the view of learning for understanding is the central role
that learners play in constructing their own knowledge. Constructivists
60 Essentials for Successful English Language Teaching

(as opposed to behaviorists) view learning not as a passive process of absorbing

information transmitted by a teacher. Rather, learners actively seek to make
sense of new experiences and new information through the filter of their
purposes, interests, prior experiences, and knowledge. Language plays a crucial
role in this process. As Powell and Caseau (2004) maintain,

The relationship between learning and language is at the core of constructivist

approaches to education. . . . the belief that learners construct their own meaning
from interaction with texts, problems, materials, students, teachers, and other
features of the learning environment. (p. 8)

So rather than knowledge being something independent of the knowers,

something that is the same for everyone, learners’ active personal construction
of meaning determines the sense made of any situation. As we interact with
our environment, there is constant active construction of meaning which may
be modified in the light of new purposes, experiences, and knowledge. As
educators, regardless of our subject specialization, learning should be seen as a
process of knowledge generation by learners whose prior knowledge is elabo-
rated and changed as a result of their interactions with us, their peers, others,
and their environment. Table 5.1 highlights the key differences between the
behaviorist and constructivist classroom.

Table 5.1 Behaviorist and constructivist classroom

Behaviorist Constructivist

Knowledge imparted from teacher to learner Knowledge constructed by learner based on

prior experience and understanding
Learning is observable changes in behaviors Learning is the search for meaning by linking
prior knowledge with new experiences.
Meaning implies understanding parts in
context of wholes.
Learning occurs with the learners’ understand-
ing continually undergoing construction and
reconstruction
Learners are passive, listening to teacher, note- Learners are active, doing inquiry-based investi-
taking and completing worksheets – rote and gations individually or in cooperative groups
memorization with self-reflection
Teachers are active, dominate through exposi- Teachers are facilitators and co-constructors of
tion knowledge with learners through inquiry
More covered but rote learning leads to less effec- Less covered but learned meaningfully with under-
tive learning – short term benefit standing – long term benefit
 Focus on Meaning 61
Within second language education, we see many examples of a shift toward
emphasizing meaning and understanding that is the core of the CLT
approach. In CLT, the focus lies in using language, not in language usage
(Breen & Candlin, 1980), such as in the story in the introduction to this
chapter where the learner ESL teachers realized that they had to use the
language to explain the math problem just as their second language students
would also have to use the language to explain how to solve the math problem.
Thus, fluency rather than accuracy is prioritized; we are not trying to get our
second language students to be grammatically correct with each sentence,
rather, we are trying to get them to use whatever knowledge of the second
language they have to explain the math problem. For example, when the
ESL learner teachers in the above story interact with their students (or when
students interact with each other), rather than making immediate corrections
of language errors, the learner ESL teachers are encouraged to focus on the
meaning and only to interrupt if they think the meaning is being lost,
obscured, or imperiled by students’ language errors. Yes, feedback on usage
(accuracy) remains important, but is not always the first priority within
a Focus on Meaning essential in second language education (Richards &
Rodgers, 2001).

Classroom implications
Task-based language teaching
Within a Focus on Meaning approach to second language education we can
find some general classroom applications such as Task-Based Language
Teaching (Long & Crookes, 1992) that emphasize meaning by stressing that
students are using language to achieve a purpose. Even though recent years
have seen a greater role for explicit grammar instruction, this explicit
instruction still takes place within the context of whole texts, i.e., beginning
with an understanding of the text and its communicative intent, then looking
at how the grammar aids the accomplishment of that intent within the specific
context from which that intent derived (Long, 1991). A simple example would
be that if speakers’ task is to recount a past event, they might want to use the
past tense.
Long (1997) emphasizes that tasks should be authentic. While there are
many definitions of “authentic,” one definition of this term is that the tasks
students do in class should mirror the kinds of tasks they are or might be
62 Essentials for Successful English Language Teaching

doing in the world outside. For example, students interested in online gaming
could play such games, discuss them, write about them, etc. all in the target
language. Another example of an authentic task could be students who are
looking for a part-time job could work on a job application. This meaning of
authenticity links with a core concept in the chapter on Integrated Curriculum
that education should connect with students’ lives. Therefore, what counts as
authentic would vary depending on the learners’ context.
Here, with this definition of authenticity, we also see another sense of the
term “meaning” as used in this chapter’s element. For learning activities to hold
meaning for students requires more than students knowing the definitions of
the vocabulary they are using. Meaning also involves activities being meaning-
ful to students’ lives.
Tasks are defined as “activities in which language is used for carrying out
meaningful tasks to promote learning” (Richards and Rodgers, 2001, p. 72).
As such, Task-Based Language Teaching (TBLT) is supposed to develop
students’ communicative competence, a cornerstone of CLT. Thus the mer-
gence of “TBLT is a recent extension of traditional CLT” (Richards and
Rodgers, 2001, p. 224). We use Nunan’s (2004) definition of a pedagogical
task as “a piece of classroom work that involves learners in comprehending,
manipulating, producing, or interaction in the target language while their
attention is principally focused on mobilizing their grammatical knowledge in
order to express meaning, and in which the intention is to convey meaning
rather than to manipulate form” (p. 4), for the tasks students can complete in a
CLT approach to second language education. For example, Feez and Joyce
(1998) suggest that successful implementation of the text-based approach
must go through five phases in which the teacher and students work together
at understanding text-types:

z Phase 1: Build the context, i.e., students build their knowledge of the topic they
are going to be exploring through language.
z Phase 2: Model and deconstruct the text, i.e., students examine one or more
samples of texts (spoken or written) in the content area and the text type, and
seek to understand the purpose, organization, and language features (e.g., tenses,
connectors, specific vocabulary).
z Phase 3: Joint construction of the text, i.e., students cooperate with the teacher
and/or partners to create texts in the same text type and content area.
z Phase 4: Independent construction of the text, i.e., students work alone to create
their own texts with feedback from peers and teachers.
z Phase 5: Linking to related texts.
 Focus on Meaning 63
The whole idea of TBLT is that both teachers and students are working together
in completing a task. This is especially true where Feez and Joyce (1998)
outline what can happen in phase 3 above – joint construction activities:

{ Teacher questioning, discussing, and editing during whole class construction of

a text, then scribing onto board, computer or OHT.
{ Skeleton texts – an outline of a text; students use their content knowledge and
their knowledge of the text type to fill out the skeleton.
{ Jigsaw and information gap activities – Jigsaw is a well-known cooperative
learning technique (see more on cooperative learning in the chapter on The
Social Nature of Learning); information gap tasks provide each learner with
unique information which must be shared in order for the task to be
completed.
{ Small group construction of texts – in which students work in pairs to recon-
struct a text that has been read aloud to them. This is not a word-for-word
reconstruction, but one which is faithful to the meaning of the text and its text
type.
{ Dictogloss (Jacobs & Small, 2003).
{ Self-assessment and peer assessment activities.

Building meaningful vocabulary

While the brain understands in multiple ways, especially for academic
purposes, words are essential for making meaning, whether in language class
or elsewhere. For instance, Holliday (1991) estimates that a high school
chemistry text might contain as many as 3,000 new vocabulary items – more
than most students learn in a year in a foreign language class. How can this
vocabulary learning be done meaningfully? First, words can be learned by
means other than other words. Thus, definitions and written explanations
aren’t the only means. For example, visuals and demonstrations can also be
used. For instance, students can create concept maps that show new vocabu-
lary and concepts in their natural networked state.
Figure 5.1 presents a concept map of how energy cycles.
Second, games can engage students and help them understand new terms.
These are not games for games sake, although having fun is a worthy goal. For
instance, students can play the game Twenty Questions using terms that they
have encountered in their studies. Furthermore, games can be played coopera-
tively, rather than games always being about competition. With a cooperative
perspective, the game derives meaning not just from the vocabulary but also
from the effort to support one’s groupmates.
64 Essentials for Successful English Language Teaching

sun

PHOTOSYNTHESIS

light energy oxygen, water

RESPIRATION carbon dioxide, water
green plants
stored food energy energy for growth, reproduction
and all other life processes

animals (herbivores) animals (carnivores)

stored food energy stored food energy

RESPIRATION

energy for growth,

reproduction and all other life processes

RESPIRATION

animals (omnivores)
stored food energy

Figure 5.1 Concept map of energy cycle

A third way that learning vocabulary can be meaningful is via writing.

Students need to be able to understand meaning and to create meaning that
others can understand. Just being able to recall the composition of a chemical
compound or just remembering the date of an important historical event has
little value without a deeper understanding of the meaning behind these facts.
The point is that understanding involves more than just knowing something
or even being able to do something. It is a bit like the insightful reply we once
heard from a teacher in response to the sarcastic line that “Those who can do,
those who can’t teach.” This teacher replied, “Those who only can, do. Those
who also understand, teach.”
Too often, students have read the homework assignment or listened to the
teacher explain something, but it was in one ear/eye and out the other. Unless
they have opportunities to grapple with, apply, explain, and teach, they are not
likely to understand. This is one area where the concept of Writing to Learn
 Focus on Meaning 65
can be valuable. One form of writing to learn involves response journals which
students write as they read material or during and after a class. Examples would
be good here.

Inquiry
Constructivism provides the philosophical basis for inquiry-based teaching
and learning. In inquiry-based learning, also known as problem-based learning,
questions arise out of students’ experience and interests. In other words,
the questions and problems are meaningful to students. They can start with
one question but develop others while investigating the initial question.
A non-linear, recursive activity cycle – similar to the Action Research cycle
(see chapter on Teachers as Co-learners) is involved in which students

Ask – Investigate – Create – Discuss – Act – Communicate – Reflect

This cycle is nonlinear and recursive because the various steps can happen
many different times and at many different points in the cycle. We see many
examples of what happens in drill and rote learning without understanding
the basics. For instance, young children can often recite their timetables with-
out any meaningful understanding. When children have no understanding of
sets or the concept of multiplication as repeated addition, they are unable to
figure out the answer when they are unable to remember what they have rote
learned. Children who have understood the meaning of 4 × 3 will know that it
represents three sets of four objects per set, making a total of 12 objects. Hence,
if the children forget what has been rote learned for 3 × 5, they can figure it out
by representing and counting the number of objects in five sets of three objects
per set. Once grasped, this understanding can then be put to use to answer
questions and solve problems.

Tell/rephrase
When we ask students if something is clear, some will invariably nod their
heads in the affirmative, but if we ask them to summarize and explain, these
same students are many times at a loss and this is very true for second language
students. Oftentimes, students really do not understand, but even when they do
understand, second language students do not know how to put their under-
standing into words. Swain (1999) who developed the Output Hypothesis,
believes that, “Students gain insights into their own linguistic shortcomings
66 Essentials for Successful English Language Teaching

and develop strategies for solving them by working through them with a part-
ner” (p. 145). Tell/Rephrase is part of a family of cooperative techniques that
encourage students to listen carefully to what others say and to express that
same meaning in other words or to go beyond the meaning expressed. The fol-
lowing steps can be a useful guide for teachers wishing to implement this
activity:

z Step 1: One member of a group of two or more makes a statement, e.g., “Humans
have much longer intestines than do animals who eat meat. Animals who eat meat
are called carnivores. Carnivores’ shorter intestines allow meat to pass out of their
bodies before it can cause harm.”
z Step 2: Another member of the group attempts to paraphrase the previous
statement, e.g., “You stated that our intestines are much longer than the intestines
of animals who eat other animals. These animals’ shorter intestines are useful,
because the meat they eat leaves their bodies quickly without hurting the animals’
health.”
z Step 3: The original speaker (or another group member) says whether the para-
phrase was adequate, e.g., “Yes, that is what I meant.” If it wasn’t the original
speaker and the reteller try again.
z Step 4: The rephraser makes a statement, e.g., “However, humans only have one
stomach, whereas cows (who are herbivores) have four stomachs,” and pattern of
statement/paraphrase/statement/paraphrase continues.
z Step 5: The teacher may call on a few students to summarize some of their group’s
discussion.

There are many variations on Tell/Rephrase. Here are just a few:

z Tell/Repeat: Students try to repeat what their partner has said. Tell/Disagree: In
addition to or instead of rephrasing, a partner can disagree with the first speaker’s
statement.
z Tell/Exemplify: The second speaker can demonstrate their understanding by giving
an example of what the previous speaker said.
z Tell/Generalize: Instead of being more specific, the second speaker makes
a statement at a higher level of generality, e.g., if the first person talked about
asking people to sign a petition, the second group member could talk about ways
to make ones’ voices heard.
z Tell/Spin Off: The second speaker takes one idea from what the first said and
transfers it to another context or otherwise extends it in some way.
z Tell/Vary: The second speaker shows another way to do the same task, such as the
same math problem, or to express the same ideas.
 Focus on Meaning 67
Helping students find meaning in the curriculum
As is discussed in detail in the chapter on the element of Learner Autonomy,
students learn best when they feel they have some power over and responsibil-
ity for their own learning. In this way, students can better craft and grasp the
meaning of the curriculum in which they are participating. Equipped with this
meaning students are better prepared to understand what they are doing in
class and why they are doing. This should not only boost learning but also pre-
pare students to be life-long learners.

Role of teachers
When our second language students are struggling or seem uninterested,
teachers need to resist the powerful temptation to jump in and explain
concepts. Everyone involved might think that such interventions improve the
situation. The teachers have done their jobs – teaching = talking – and stu-
dents have done theirs – learning = listening attentively to teachers. However,
constructivism makes clear that such a transmission model just does not work
and this is especially true for second language students. Along with the meta-
phor of construction of knowledge is another metaphor from building, the
idea of scaffolding. This involves providing support for learners as they go
about constructing their own knowledge. Teachers can provide support, as can
peers. Textbooks too can play an important role in helping students construct
knowledge and these must be chosen carefully by teachers. Current second
language textbooks provide many forms of scaffolding for learners. These
include pre-reading information and activities that can make reading passages
more comprehensible, hands-on activities, graphic organizers, open-ended
questions, experiential tasks, and summaries and text features (such as bold
type) that highlight key ideas. Furthermore, textbooks are often accompanied
by VCDs and other media that offer video, animation, and other aids to learn-
ing. That said, even the best textbook has inherent limitations, as due to the
need to serve a general audience and the fact that it is out-of-date before it is
even printed, it cannot possibly meet the needs of students in a particular place
and time. Thus, students and teachers need to search beyond the textbook for
a diverse range of resources. This can provide a range of perspectives. Authen-
tic sources, when understandable, are best, as they often have greater meaning
for students.
68 Essentials for Successful English Language Teaching

Role of students
Inquiry extends beyond observations, asking questions, data collection, analy-
ses and interpretation, inference, testing explanations against current scientific
knowledge, predictions and communications to the processes of problem
solving using critical and logical thinking. Thus, in an inquiry driven class-
room, learners should be actively engaged in working to construct their own
understanding by making connections between facts, questioning, analyzing,
interpreting, predicting, thinking and communicating with peers, teachers,
and others. In the final analysis, inquiry is as much an attitude toward learning
as it is a way of going about learning.

Conclusion
Underlying this shift from a view of learning as drill and memorization to one
based on meaning is the shift from a behaviorist to a socio-cognitive frame-
work. Socio-cognitivists believe that each person constructs their own under-
standing of reality in tandem with their environment, and that other humans
are the most important elements of that environment. Thus, socio-cognitivists
are also known as constructivists or generativists. This chapter has outlined
various ways second language teachers can implement an inquiry approach
into their teaching. The question remains however as to the relevance of rote
learning within second language because many approaches to second language
education that emphasize rote memorization of isolated vocabulary and
drilling of grammar rules remain very popular in many parts of the world
today. However, a Focus on Meaning approach to second language education
de-emphasizes memorization and drilling and understanding is paramount
that recognizes that learning takes place in context, students can transfer what
they have learned from one context to another, students discover for them-
selves, even if what they are discovering is something that others already know,
and transmission of information from teachers to students is not the preferred
way of learning.

Reflections
z Underlying this shift from a view of learning as drill and memorization to one based
on meaning is the shift from a behaviorist to a socio-cognitive framework. Which
framework do you support for second language learning and why?
 Focus on Meaning 69
z Underpinning the view of learning for understanding is the central role that
learners play in constructing their own knowledge. What would a constructivist
ESL classroom that focuses on student understanding look like to you?
z Reflect on how you learned in school. What is an example of a meaningful learning
experience you took part in? What is an example of a rote learning experience?
Which type of experience was most common?
z Is there a place for rote learning? Or can all learning be meaningful?
z How did you learn a second language in school? Did you memorize or use any
meaning approaches such as inquiry?
z Is there a place for rote learning in second language education? Or can all
learning be meaningful?
z If you say yes to the first part of the previous question, where do you think rote
learning in second language education is useful?
z Given that many of your students probably learned many things in their own
education using rote memory (e.g., multiplication tables) how would you go about
explaining and implementing a Focus on Meaning approach in your ESL classes?
z What do you think of the introductory story to this chapter? Do you know how to
solve such a math problem and how would you explain it to ESL students?
z This chapter suggests that fluency is emphasized over accuracy in a Focus on
Meaning approach. Why do you think this would be a good idea or a bad idea?
6 Celebrate Diversity

Chapter Outline
Vignette 70
Diversity 72
Teacher awareness 72
Learning styles 73
Communication styles 74
Multiple intelligences 75
Cross-cultural communication 76
Classroom implications 77
Spot the difference 77
Think/write time 77
Charades and role play 78
Bloom in group discussions 78
Spot the bias 79
Build cultural respect 80
Role of teachers 80
Role of students 80
Conclusion 81
Reflections 81

Vignette
Hee Soon Park is a Korean born naturalized US citizen teaching ESL in a
junior high school in the US. Because she moved to the U.S. when she was
 Celebrate Diversity 71
a child, she does not remember much about her early childhood in Korea
but she was constantly reminded of her “different” facial appearance from
Caucasian classmates during her grade school years in the U.S. So she is
very interested in inclusiveness in her ESL classes and sees that mix of
ESL students of different ethnic, religious, social, and economic back-
grounds in her classes as a plus rather than a minus because she uses the
mix of cultures and different first language backgrounds as lessons for all
the students. When she plans her classes she keeps her students’ varied
interests and abilities in mind. Furthermore Hee Soon knows her students
learn in different ways and some of her students are fast language learners
but others need more time. Hee Soon also realizes that boys and girls
in her classes approach their learning in different ways. In addition, Hee
Soon scans whatever materials the department (or school district) wants
her to cover in her classes for possible cultural biases and when she finds
any, she brings this to the attention of her supervisors. So Hee Soon is a
second language teacher who tries to accommodate all her students’
differences and similarities under the umbrella term of Diversity as she
tries to vary her instructional approaches to address the different ways her
students learn a second language. Plus, Hee Soon seeks to create an
inviting environment for all students by watching out for anything in materi-
als which might inadvertently lead to an unfriendly environment for some
of her students.

In general education, “Diversity” has different meanings for different people

and situations. In second language education, we see Diversity in the mix of
second language students we have in our classrooms in terms of backgrounds,
e.g., ethnic, religious, social class and first language, sex and gender, sexual
orientation, achievement levels, learning styles, intelligences and use of learn-
ing strategies. We noted in Chapter 2 that a key tenet of learner-centered
instruction is that each learner is different and that effective second language
teaching should not only celebrate these differences but also take these differ-
ences into account when preparing lesson plans, activities, and materials. Hee
Soon in the opening vignette of this chapter is one such teacher because she
continuously attempts to observe, accommodate, and build on the Diversity of
her second language students.
Diversity as it is outlined and discussed in this chapter means that teachers
(and students) recognize and celebrate that each of our second language
students is unique, and that while all humans share many characteristics, each
72 Essentials for Successful English Language Teaching

student and each group of students is unique. We maintain that Diversity and
thus student uniqueness is about

z Understanding that second language learners differ in such matters as personality,

intelligence profile, learning style, ethnicity, race, religion, sexual orientation,
nationality, social class, and physical and mental abilities.
z We must create an environment where all second language students feel respected
and welcomed in our community and classes so that we can promote the worth of
all of our students.
z We must be aware of the wide range of learning styles and be attentive to these as
much as possible so we can encourage second language students to try out differ-
ent ways of learning depending on how comfortable they are with any changes.
z We must help second language students appreciate the benefits of working toward
common goals with people different from themselves so that our classes are exam-
ples of places where cultural differences are respected and our students are made
aware of ways of communicating between these different people and within
cultures.

The chapter outlines and discusses the essential concept of Diversity within
a CLT approach to second language education and suggests how second
language teachers can actively implement this concept in their classes so that
second language students can further develop their language skills and
abilities.

Diversity
As mentioned above the term Diversity means different things to different
people and we recognize this; however, we focus our discussion on Diversity
in this chapter by suggesting that second language teachers consider
Diversity from the following perspectives: teacher awareness, learning styles,
communication styles, multiple intelligences, and cross-cultural communi-
cation. We feel this focus will help second language teachers better accom-
modate the essential of Diversity within a CLT approach to second language
education.

Teacher awareness
We suggest that any discussion of Diversity start with second language teach-
ers in that we need to become more aware of who we are as people and second
 Celebrate Diversity 73
language teachers. As people, we language teachers need to develop a critical
level of awareness of who we are in terms of our own background influences
such as our race, ethnicity, gender, and socioeconomic backgrounds. This
awareness allows us to understand how people’s background affects who they
are, what they do, and how they feel about themselves and others. Equipped
with this growing understanding, we are better prepared to gain insight
into our students and how they too are affected by their backgrounds. Also, as
we become more aware of the effects of background, we can see how we may
have become biased in our perceptions and practices over our careers and
how these may have influenced our teaching although we may not have
realized this. As Sleeter, Torres, and Laughlin (2004) maintain, teachers need to
develop “a critical consciousness of their own reality as persons of a specific
race, ethnicity, gender, and socioeconomic status, with specific abilities, and
stories” (p. 84).
However, it may not be easy for teachers to become aware of possible biases
because over the years we build up a wall between our inner selves and outer
performances so that we can forget who we really are. So, Palmer (cited in
Farrell, 2007) urges all teachers to “ask the ‘who’ question – who is the self that
teaches?” (p. 5). Farrell (2007) proposes that second language teachers can
become more aware of who they are as teachers by articulating their stories to
themselves or others because these stories reveal the experiences that guide
their work. By telling their stories, Farrell (2007) maintains that teachers can
make better sense of seemingly random experiences because we hold the
inside knowledge, especially personal intuitive knowledge, expertise, and
experience that is based on our accumulated years as language educators and
students, teaching and learning in schools and classrooms. In this way then
second language teachers can become aware of their past influences and can
thus be better placed when attempting to accommodate the needs, different
learning preferences, and styles of their students.

Learning styles
Learning styles can be defined as “distinctive behaviors that serve as indicators
of how a person learns from and adapts to his [sic] environment” (Gregorc,
1979, p. 234). When second language teachers examine the concept of learning
styles, their own and those of their students, they come to realize that everyone
has a learning style; however, they may not be able to articulate this style to
others. For example, some students think in a linear, step-by-step way while
74 Essentials for Successful English Language Teaching

others like to chunk their thoughts holistically. However, second language

teachers must remember learning styles are unique to individuals and are a
“biologically and developmentally imposed set of characteristics that make the
same teaching method effective for some and ineffective for others” (Dunn,
Beaudry, & Klaves, 1989, p. 50). Thus second language teachers may need
to modify their instruction to accommodate different learning styles by
realizing that not all our language students learn best while sitting at a desk, or
in a quiet setting, or even through group instruction. Indeed we must realize
that some of our students may be field-dependent second language learners
and thus need to be immersed in the second language, while others are field-
independent because they focus more on the details of the language they are
learning and look at its structure independent of its use in society. In terms of
learning modality preferences, some of our students may be visual learners
and thus may like to see patterns, pictures, shapes, while other students may be
more auditory learners and like to listen and talk and even sing while learning,
yet other learners are tactile (or kinesthetic) type learners and as such like
more hands-on activities such as role plays, body movements, and gesture a lot
while speaking the second language. So language teachers face the constant
challenges of helping students become aware of their learning styles and then
trying to accommodate these different styles in their classrooms. Second
language teachers can try to respond to these differences by using a variety of
teaching methods and grouping patterns.

Communication styles
Hymes’ (1972) work on communicative competence, a key facet of CLT’s
foundation, includes the role of culture and people from different cultures that
view the world differently and that these differences have an impact on com-
munication style (Heath, 1983). Teachers should realize that second language
students interpret classroom activities through their own frames of reference
(Farrell, 2007), which are sometimes different because all our students have
different experiences and background knowledge which in turn is different to
the teacher’s background. In second language education, students already face
the difficulty of communicating in a new language. This difficulty is com-
pounded when students’ learned ways of talking and other forms of language
use do not conform to the patterns of communication expected in classrooms
and may, therefore, be misunderstood and unappreciated. Second language
educators need to be aware of this and attempt to come to understand and
 Celebrate Diversity 75
appreciate their students’ frames of reference. For example, teachers must
realize that their own behavior in their classroom is affected by their own
background and as such we should be aware that some of our cultural norms
may differ a lot from our students’ cultures. Language teachers can become
more aware of their students’ cultures by making a conscious effort to learn
more about their students’ home–family relationships, their community
culture, and their cultural heritage. Language teachers can augment this by
looking for cultural bias in textbooks and curricular materials to see if they
contain any distortions about minority cultures or ethnic groups.

Multiple intelligences
Connected to the fact that our students have different learning styles is the
view that intelligence is composed of a mixture of nature and nurture, or
heredity and experience. Furthermore, intelligence had previously been viewed
as a unitary construct. Today, the more dominant view sees intelligence as
more varied, as plural, intelligences, not singular. Gardner’s Multiple Intelli-
gences theory is probably the best-known theory espousing this view. Gardner
theory states that every person has distinctive sets of capabilities and inclina-
tions that all work together. In its present form, the theory identifies eight dif-
ferent intelligences:

z Verbal-linguistic – Thinking in words; learning through reading, writing, listening,

and talking.
z Logical-mathematical – Thinking in numbers and patterns; learning through
problem-solving, symbols, and analysis.
z Visual-spatial – Thinking in pictures and images; learning through visualizing,
drawing, and creating graphic organizers, such as mind maps and tables.
z Musical-rhythmic – Thinking in rhythm, lyrics, and melody; learning through music,
chants, and poetry and the words that accompany them.
z Bodily-kinesthetic – Using the whole body or parts of the body to solve problems,
make things, and demonstrate ideas; learning through hands-on activities and role
play.
z Naturalist – Being aware of and interested in nature; learning by classifying and
observing nature and other phenomena, including people and people-made
objects.
z Intrapersonal - Feeling comfortable with oneself and understanding oneself;
learning by taking time to reflect and consider the relevance of ideas for oneself.
z Interpersonal – Understanding and respecting others; learning by discussing,
explaining, asking, and debating with others.
76 Essentials for Successful English Language Teaching

The implication of the presence of multiple intelligences for second language

teachers is that instruction must be varied so that in a particular unit, at differ-
ent times, each student gets a match with the intelligences in which they most
prefer to operate. Each student gets stretched by working with intelligences in
which they are less developed and students come to appreciate the value of
working with people of varied intelligence profiles. Additionally, by being
aware of the different intelligence profiles of themselves, their classmates, their
teachers, and others and by appreciating the benefits of learning with people of
different profiles, students celebrate Diversity.

Cross-cultural communication
Diversity means difference and that we humans are not all the same and we
may not all have the same common style and patterns of communications of
the majority within a culture. This is especially true in second language educa-
tion where many of our students come from different ethnic, social, political,
occupational, religious backgrounds and beliefs, not to mention different
geographical backgrounds. This is a real challenge for second language teach-
ers because we may not knowingly practice discrimination against some of our
students unless we become knowledgeable in how to communicate cross-
culturally and thus respect human rights and Diversity. One way of becoming
proficient in cross-cultural communication is by becoming more aware of
what prejudice is and then trying to avoid prejudging in teaching.
According to the Alberta Human Rights Commission (1978) prejudice is
“an attitude or belief formed or held without really considering the facts. It is
for or against something or someone” (p. 6). Taken in its negative form then
(“against”) unfortunately in today’s world we have racial profiling that is very
prejudicial against certain races; for example, if one has a name that originated
in the Middle East, travel in North America can be difficult. In second lan-
guage education, teachers must become aware of any negative “prejudging”
attitudes they may have in teaching certain ethnic groups. Once we are aware
of such attitudes, we need to try to avoid any preconceived notions we may
have because they can have many negative consequences for our students and
ourselves. Teachers must also become aware of positive (“for” in the above
definition) because these may put unfair expectations on that ethnic group; for
example, we may assume that our Japanese second language students are
always polite and rarely question what others are doing, but what will we think
if one Japanese second language student begins to question our teaching
 Celebrate Diversity 77
methods? Will we think less of this student because of our preconceived
notions of how a Japanese student should act? Will we react differently if
a student from North America questions our teaching methods? Consequently
we must become aware of our prejudices and be careful that we do not
discriminate (according to the Alberta Human Rights Commission, discrimi-
nation is “prejudice transmitted into action” (p. 6) against any of our students.
Teachers can also help their students and themselves by teaching their
students about cultural Diversity.

Classroom implications
Spot the difference
Many well-established second language teaching techniques can be used to tap
a range of intelligences. For example, Spot the Difference is a technique which
taps students’ naturalist intelligence, discussed above. As students work in
pairs, each has a different item, for instance, one has a detailed anatomical
drawing of a butterfly and the other a drawing of a grasshopper, or one has an
advertisement written to appeal to teenagers and the other has an advertise-
ment for the same product but written to appeal to people in their twenties.
The two students do not show each other their materials. Instead, they care-
fully describe the materials to their partner and identify the similarities and
differences. Spot the Difference promotes attention to detail and careful obser-
vation, proclivities of people who enjoy using their Naturalist intelligence.
Other uses of Spot the Difference include comparing two versions of the same
story, two countries, or two paragraphs with different grammatical structures.

Think/write time
Connected to intrapersonal intelligence discussed above, we realize that
some of our second language students may need some time before speaking in
the second language to their groupmates, the whole class, or the teacher. We
remember that Diversity means that not all our students learn in the same
way or at the same pace and as such, more time is given for these students to
think about what they are going to say before they say it. We can accommodate
this by telling them that we will give them a few minutes to think about what
they want to say and say nothing until our students speak, or we can ask
them to write out what they want to say before they say it. This extra time helps
78 Essentials for Successful English Language Teaching

students develop the propensity to think on their own. The advantage of Write
time is that it is easier for students to share with others what they have written
than what they have said.

Charades and role play

When students use their physical as well as their mental energies in learning
and sharing their learning, bodily-kinesthetic intelligence comes to the fore.
Charades offers one means of getting students out of their seats and moving
more than their mouths. Even more simply, students can use their hands, etc.
to represent individual vocabulary items. Indeed, almost any concept can be
captured in some gesture, hand symbol, or other type of body movement.
Another opportunity for students to move around is when they participate in
role play, which can also involve charades.

Bloom in group discussions

One reason group discussions in many second language classrooms end as
quickly as they begin is that both teachers and students take a closed approach
to accomplishing set tasks because as Barnes (1976) maintains, “The group
finds nothing to encourage active engagement, nothing to provoke questions
or surmises” (p. 38). A closed approach to discussions within a group limits
investigations and exploration of issues because probing questions that under-
lie an issue are not asked. Bloom’s Taxonomy (Bloom, 1956) of Thinking Skills
is very useful for guiding second language students during group discussions
especially when they want to apply, and synthesize information in order to
create something from that information (see also Chapter 7 on Thinking Skills
for more details). For example, if students want to analyze information in a group
they can break down the information into its component parts by first discuss-
ing this as a group. They can then synthesize this information by formulating a
new plan, and further evaluating this plan by judging the value of the ideas gen-
erated by the group and then deciding on a course of action agreed upon by each
group member. This type of process can be represented as follows:

z Analyze – Break down information into parts by group discussion and make lists of
the parts.
z Synthesize – Put together the ideas/parts into a new plan by group discussion.
z Evaluate – Evaluate the merit of the ideas/materials based on an agreed (by group)
set of standards in the form of group discussion/ debate.
 Celebrate Diversity 79
z Apply – This plan can be put into action by using the new accepted ideas/materials
in new situations.

Thus various Thinking Skills are called into play as students attempt to explain
concepts and procedures to their group members, as group members give each
other feedback, and as they debate the proper course of action. Because of the
absence of the teacher in group discussions, the students themselves must ini-
tiate, respond, and in certain cases evaluate and/or acknowledge responses and
initiations made by other group participants. As mentioned above, group work
does not mean a complete absence of the teacher. In fact, the teacher remains
central to the success of group work and project work (Gillies, 2007). The
teacher can influence the success of the group by making sure that the task
undertaken is appropriate, and that the students all know what is expected
from them during group work. The teacher may also want to monitor group
discussions because these discussions may remain at the superficial level or
they may not be able to conclude successfully if they have no guidelines to
follow for the discussions.
Thinking Skills also come into play in terms of another meaning of Diversity.
This involves diverse answers to the same question, diverse solutions to the same
problem, and diverse questions and problems in search of answers and solu-
tions. Thinking is a messy process, and this messiness must not only be allowed;
it must be encouraged. Based on their different backgrounds, students will come
to classroom tasks from different perspectives, and the value of this difference
should be appreciated. For example, rather than looking only for the answer we
expect to a question we’ve asked, teachers should encourage a range of answers.

Spot the bias

Most teachers use particular materials and textbooks in class to teach a particu-
lar concept or language point. However, many teachers do not realize or take the
time to consider that some of these materials and texts may contain certain bias
or distortions about particular ethnic groups (Byrnes & Kiger, 2005). We can
guard against this by looking for some of the following misrepresentations:

z Omission of relevant facts – leaving out relevant facts about particular groups.
z Defamation – only looking at groups’ faults in stereotypical ways that portrays the
group in overly negative ways.
z Validity – the information about a group is incorrect, or invalid, because it is not
accurate, or up to date for whatever reason.
80 Essentials for Successful English Language Teaching

Build cultural respect

Second language teachers respect human rights and differences and celebrate
these multiple diversities so that we can fully implement the CLT approach
in second language education by trying to establish cultural respect in their
classes. This can be achieved by asking each student to research their
family background and then have them present their findings to the class.
This can include details of not only their particular family backgrounds, but
also the cultural backgrounds in terms of literature, music, art. If time permits,
students can present the music and art of their culture to the class. Also,
if musicians and/or artists from a particular culture live in the community,
they could be invited to give talks and perform for the class and/or the
school.

Role of teachers
Second language teachers need to understand the varied characteristics of
both themselves and their students and look for ways to help all students learn.
First, teachers need to develop a sense of self and an examination of their own
ethnic and cultural identity to see if they have any hidden bias against any
ethnocultural groups. Next, they need to learn about their students in terms of
their backgrounds and their learning modalities and preferences. Second
language teachers can accommodate Diversity in their classes by addressing
the following:

z Become clear of own (teacher’s) ethnic and cultural identity.

z Establish own attitudes towards other ethnic and culture groups.
z Become familiar about all prejudice and racism and avoid in classes.
z Discover relationships between language, culture, and second language learning.
z Learn about learning styles of various ethnic groups and try to accommodate these
different learning styles.
z Get to know all students as individuals and not as a representative of a particular
ethnic group.
z Use instructional materials that reflect diverse cultural backgrounds.

Role of students
Students too have a role in accommodating Diversity in their learning.
For example, students need to respect and welcome all their classmates
 Celebrate Diversity 81
irrespective of where they come from geographically or politically and despite
the differences that may exist between them. In addition, all students, regard-
less of who they are, should be able to see themselves in the materials used in
class. This will undoubtedly mean going beyond the materials found in text-
books. For instance, the languages and non-standard dialects of students
should appear in materials. Students should make teachers aware of any bias
they may see in textbooks and material rather than resenting these materials.
So students can help play the role of teacher too and show their classmates
how these materials are biased against a particular ethnic group.

Conclusion
This chapter on the essential of teaching for Diversity recognizes that within
all classroom activities we second language teachers need to strive for class-
rooms in which students can be their unique selves without fear of derision or
exclusion, in which difference can be appreciated rather than demeaned.
Language and identity are inextricably mixed. This is why a school can be a
place of alienation for those students who do not speak the standard variety of
the language of instruction which, for example, in the U.S. is Standard English.
Yes, students need to know this standard in order to succeed in academia,
but we want to strive for an additive abroad to language in which students
who speak different dialects or languages add Standard English to what they
already speak, rather than a subtractive approach in which students replace
their mother tongue with Standard English. So we second language teachers
have an important role to play to ensure that Diversity is accommodated
in our classes as we implement a CLT approach within second language
education.

Reflections
z What does the term “Diversity” mean to you?
z What is your particular learning style and can you see any signs of this style being
represented in your instructional materials?
z As a result of this reflection do you think your instructional materials may be biased
towards to your preferred learning style rather than those of your students?
z Do you check the instructional materials you use for bias against any ethnic groups?
How do you check the materials you use for these biases?
82 Essentials for Successful English Language Teaching

z Looking at the different ways teachers can spot the bias in textbooks and materials
discussed above, do you implement any of these now?
z Can you think of other ways second language teachers can spot the biases in
materials to accommodate Diversity in their classes?
z Looking at the different roles of the teacher discussed above, do you implement
any of these particular roles in your classes at the moment?
z Can you think of other roles second language teachers should implement to
accommodate Diversity in their classes?
z Recall a time when, either as a student or a teacher, you witnessed an incident in
which a minority student was made to feel unwelcome in a classroom or elsewhere
in a school. How did the teacher and others react? Do you have any suggestions for
how they might have reacted better to the incident?
z The teacher for this class in Japan came up with some very inventive ways of
helping her students (the roles and the clapping) to help expand the group discus-
sions. When she did have to intervene she said that she consciously attempted to
limit her utterances and avoid evaluations by reacting to the content of the discus-
sion. What do you think of this type of intervention? How do you intervene in
group discussions?
 Expand Thinking Skills 7
Chapter Outline
Vignette 83
Thinking skills 85
Classroom implications 89
Question-and-answer pairs 89
Critical writing 90
SUMMER 91
K-W-L 92
Problem-based learning 93
Practicing vigilance 94
Role of teachers 95
Role of students 95
Conclusion 95
Reflections 96

Vignette
Mrs. Haley teaches in an elementary school and she has noticed that
some of her 4th graders continue to struggle with the language demands
of their mainstream classes, especially science class. Mrs. Haley has
analyzed the science textbook and with the help of a linguistics book, she
has determined that one of the main academic language functions that
is typical of science texts that is especially challenging for ESL students is
expressing cause and effect, i.e. what will happen if and when X happens
84 Essentials for Successful English Language Teaching

or why something happens. Mrs. Haley decided to plan a lesson focusing

on this problematic language function by presenting it in the context of the
science textbook. Mrs. Haley first decided to give her ESL students graphic
representations of cause and effect. She then told her students that
a useful way of identifying cause-and-effect is by asking questions that
have them answer “what happens as a result of an action” and then she
explained the action as follows, “I worked out hard every day for six months
in preparation for the race.” This is a cause statement. The effect, or result,
is what happened as a result of the action, such as, “I won the race.” She
then proceeded with the lesson using the science textbook examples of
cause and effect. Mrs. Haley gave directions for her students to work in
pairs, and then distributed an activity to each pair. When each pair had
completed their activity, she used a general class discussion format for
each pair to share their responses. Following this discussion, and other
activities, Mrs. Haley was happy that the students had a better idea of cause
and effect, and at the end of class she told them that they should try to prac-
tice and use this construct in their speech and writing as much as possible
so that they will be able to quickly recognize it when they see it in a reading
passage in whatever subject they are studying in future. When they “see it”
they should write the example in their journals so that they can compare.

The essential of Thinking Skills within a CLT approach to second language

education contrasts with rote learning and finding “right there” answers,
i.e., answers to comprehension questions in which the answer is right there on
the page that students have just read with no real Thinking Skills required.
Thinking Skills activities ask students to go beyond the information given, to
draw on what they have previously studied, their experiences, their views of
the world, their hopes and their thinking strategies. Perhaps the best known
taxonomy of Thinking Skills is the one developed back in the 1950s by Bloom
and his colleagues. Bloom’s Taxonomy consists of six overlapping categories of
thinking.

1. Knowledge – This category involves students in recalling what has been taught.
For example, if students have read a passage about clothing, a knowledge ques-
tion might be, “What color was Manuel’s shirt?,” when the answer is right there
in the text.
2. Understanding – This category asks students to demonstrate comprehension of
what is being studied. For example, with the same task, an understanding task
might be to construct a table that includes the people in the text, the clothing they
 Expand Thinking Skills 85
are wearing and their style preferences. Another understanding task might ask
students to retell an incident described in the text.
3. Application – This category of thinking involves students in using the ideas/
information in the text to do something or to plan to do something. Examples
would be coming to school the next day dressed similarly to one of the people in
the text and explaining the similarity, or cutting clothing pictures from magazines
or newsletters and using the vocabulary in the text to describe the pictures.
4. Analysis – This category in Bloom’s Taxonomy is about comparing, contrasting,
separating, and examining. For instance, after reading our clothing text, students
might want to compare their clothes when they were younger to what they wear
today.
5. Synthesis – While analysis focuses on the parts, synthesis is about wholes and con-
structing. For instance, students might enjoy creating a list of clothing suggestions,
with drawing, for what their teachers should wear to school.
6. Evaluation – This category of thinking involves students giving opinions, taking
positions and doing ratings. An example of this type of thinking related to the
clothing text might be to look at pictures of celebrities and rate their clothing on a
5-point scale with reasons given for the ratings.

The point of discussing Bloom’s Taxonomy is that too often education used to
include only Knowledge and Understanding types of thinking, whereas in the
real world students do all types of thinking. Thus, if we want to bring the class-
room closer to the real world and prepare students to cope with that world, we
need to broaden the type of thinking we encourage and to help students to
engage successfully in these many types of cognitive activity. Table 7.1 outlines
Bloom’s Taxonomy in detail.
This chapter then outlines and discusses the essential of Thinking Skills
within a CLT approach to second language education and gives specific
examples of how second language teachers can implement Thinking Skills in
their classes.

Thinking skills
The essential of Thinking Skills flows from the CLT approach in a few senses.
First, thinking is a process and the emphasis lies in the quality of that process
rather than solely on the quality of the product resulting from that process.
Additionally, Diversity (see previous Chapter 6 for more details on this essen-
tial) comes into play, as many valid routes may exist toward thinking about a
particular situation or performing a particular task. Another connection
86 Essentials for Successful English Language Teaching

Table 7.1 Bloom’s Taxonomy of thinking processes (adaptation)

Level of Taxonomy Definition Student Roles Action Verbs

Knowledge Recall of specific responds; absorbs; re- tell; list; define; name;
information members; recognizes identify; state;
remember; repeat
Comprehension Understanding of explains; translates; Transform; change;
(understanding) communicated demonstrates; restate; describe;
information interprets explain; review;
paraphrase; relate;
generalize; infer
Application (using) Use of rules, concepts, solves problems; apply; practice; employ;
principles and theo- demonstrates; use; demonstrate;
ries in new situations uses knowledge; illustrate; show; report
constructs
Analysis (taking Breaking down infor- discusses; uncovers; analyze; dissect;
apart) mation into parts lists; dissects distinguish; examine;
compare; contrast;
survey; investigate;
separate; categorize;
classify; organize
Synthesis (creating Putting together of discusses; generalizes; create; invent; compose;
new) ideas into a new or relates; contrasts construct; design;
unique plan modify; imagine;
produce; propose;
what if…

Evaluation (judging) Judging the value of judges; disputes; forms judge; decide; select; justify;
materials or ideas on the opinions; debates evaluate; critique; debate;
basis of set standards or verify; recommend; assess
criteria

Adapted from Farrell (2006).

between Thinking Skills and the current paradigm is that Learner Autonomy
(see Chapter 2 for more details on this essential) is promoted by encouraging
students to connect the language learning they do in school with the world
beyond. This attempt promotes the idea that learning is not a collection of
lower-order facts to be remembered and then regurgitated on exams, but that
the aim of school learning is to apply our knowledge toward making a better
world.
Connecting education to the wider world in order to improve that world
means that students – along with their teachers – need to analyze existing situ-
ations, synthesize new ideas, and evaluate proposed alternatives (Freire, 1970).
 Expand Thinking Skills 87
Certainly, a great deal of higher-order thinking is needed here. For example, if
students are studying the water pollution problem mentioned above, they will
encounter the kind of tangled thicket of variables that make it so difficult to
implement solutions to the mess that humans have made of our planet’s envi-
ronment. Indeed, communicating about global issues, such as environment,
peace, human rights and development, requires students to develop and
employ their Thinking Skills (Cates & Jacobs, 2006). A trend in this direction
can be witnessed by the fact that many organizations of second language
educators have subgroups devoted to global issues, e.g., the Global Issues
Special Interest Group in IATEFL (International Association of Teachers of
English as a Foreign Language http://www.iatefl.org).
Among the many strategies that our students need to acquire and use to
succeed in our classes are those that involve going beyond the information
given and utilizing and building their Thinking Skills, also known as critical
and creative Thinking Skills (Paul & Elder, 2006). Critical thinking for teachers
of second or foreign languages generally means educating language students
to think about their thinking, its strengths and weaknesses, and then to decide
if it needs improvement. Although there seems to be disagreement concerning
what actually qualifies as “critical and creative thinking,” most educators agree
that it includes awareness of standards in abilities and skills, and aspects of
student dispositions or attitudes. Both of these can be learned while at the
same time recognizing the uniqueness of individual students. In this chapter
we define critical thinking as “the intellectually disciplined process of actively
and skillfully conceptualizing, applying, analyzing, synthesizing, and/or rea-
soning, or communication, as a guide to belief and action” (Scriven & Paul,
1987). Critical thinking means getting our students to interpret, analyze,
synthesize, argue, reflect on, and evaluate their thoughts, beliefs, and actions to
see if they are credible or not.
Critical Thinking Skills can be taught and as such can be learned. Beyer
(1984) came up with the following procedures that teachers can emphasize
when teaching critical Thinking Skills:

1. Distinguishing between verifiable facts and value claims.

2. Determining the reliability of a claim or source.
3. Determining the accuracy of a statement.
4. Distinguishing between warranted or unwarranted claims.
5. Distinguishing between relevant and irrelevant information, claim, or arguments.
6. Detecting biases.
7. Identifying stated and unstated assumptions.
88 Essentials for Successful English Language Teaching

8. Identifying ambiguous or equivocal claims or arguments.

9. Recognizing logical inconsistencies in a line of reasoning.
10. Determining the strength of an argument. (p. 557)

So the ability to think critically can be taught and learned and can be brought
into most discussions in a second language speaking class as well as in most
writing assignments. For speaking activities, small groups can engage in
problem solving activities by practicing brainstorming on possible answers
and then by discussing the reliability and validity of these possible solutions.
Second language learners can practice how to disagree, how to challenge, and
be challenged. Second language teachers can enhance creative thinking by
going on field trips with their students, and/or by inviting expert speakers on
specific topics to class so their students can practice exploring their target
language skills in situations that get them to stretch their thinking. Second
language students can also be encouraged to write journals to help them “see”
their thoughts and then to help them take some action in order to again stretch
their thinking. Journals offer language students the time for delayed reflection
so that they can look back at what happened and then to be able to make
informed decisions about the way forward.
This adaptation also suggests the action verbs teachers can adapt when
helping second language students access this higher order thinking; for
example, at the thinking level of knowledge where students are asked to recall
specific information by having teachers use action verbs as ‘define’, ‘identify’
and the like, the students must remember first and then respond to these
teacher solicits; at the application level where new concepts are noted teachers
ask students to demonstrate their thinking by getting them to solve problems
using the new concepts to show they understand how to apply the new
concept.
Today, Thinking Skills are seen as an essential part of all aspects of general
education, because information is easily obtained, so the essential task is now
to use that information wisely. Thinking Skills can be infused into any content,
even with students of low L2 proficiency. For example, the teaching of lan-
guage skills offers many opportunities to infuse Thinking Skills. For example,
Early (1990) describes how an ESL instructor teaching basic biology to
elementary ESL students used graphic representations of such knowledge
structures as the classification of types of animal and the sequence of the food
chain to support student writing, both of which also comprise an academic
function. This principle of paying attention to the relationships between
 Expand Thinking Skills 89
knowledge structures that are reflected in the accompanying language
functions has instrumental implications for second language instruction.
First, in teaching content in a second language it is not enough to teach
vocabulary, which seems to be a common practice, because meaning is
constructed through knowledge of the relationships between forms and
vocabulary. It is clear from research that knowing the vocabulary of a text does
not equal comprehending the text (e.g. Nation, 2008). It is imperative to teach
language functions as well to gain understanding of these relationships.
Second, this principle gives support to the assertion that language should be
taught contextualized, through meaningful content, because in order to be
able to use language, learners need to understand language functions that
reflect how language is used.

Classroom implications
We now outline some specific implications that second language teachers can
consider when trying encouraging Thinking Skills in their everyday second
language classes. Many of these involve group activities. As explored in
Chapter 3 on the Social Nature of Learning, interaction provides a venue for
sparking students to think more deeply, as peers may ask questions, disagree,
provide new insights, and provide assistance.

Question-and-answer pairs
This technique (adapted from Johnson & Johnson, 1999) has the following
steps that teachers need to consider when implementing question-and-answer
pairs.

z Step 1 – Both members of a pair of second language students write questions

about a particular topic or concept under study. These questions can be of many
different types that include review questions or questions about content currently
being studied. This is a good opportunity to help students learn how to ask specific
thinking questions.
z Step 2 – Students write answers to their own questions first to make sure they
know what they themselves expect in a “correct” answer. With questions that have
many possible answers, students can write a model answer.
z Step 3 – Students exchange questions (all this can happen in class, during class, or
electronically from home using computers) but not answers, and then they must
attempt to answer each other’s questions.
90 Essentials for Successful English Language Teaching

z Step 4 – Students then compare answers. Part of this comparison involves an

important aspect of Thinking Skills and that is the student must state the evidence
for their answers. The ideal is for the students to agree on an answer that is
better than either of their initial answers thus proving that two heads are better
than one.

A variation on Question-and-Answer Pairs is for two pairs to work together in

the same way that the two partners work together. First, each pair prepares
questions and then writes answers to their own questions. To encourage all
group members to be active, each member of the pair writes their own ques-
tions and answers before showing them to their partner. Then the pair decides
on the best questions and answers. Next, the two pairs exchange questions and
create answers to the other pair’s questions. Finally, the pairs compare their
answers. Just for fun, occasionally students can exchange answers and then try
to guess their partner’s question as in the game show “Jeopardy.” Yet another
variation of Question-and-Answer Pairs is for students to write questions for
which they do not know the answer. This is a more real world use of the
technique, because it is only at school that people ask questions for which they
already know the answer. However, students do not just write questions. Even
though they do not have answers to their questions, they should write their
ideas for what might help toward finding an answer.

Critical writing
Farrell (2006) suggests the following six-stage approach to creative writing
that second language teachers can consider within CLT:

z Stage 1 – Input (Prewriting): Input sessions consist of idea-generating activities to

help the students focus on the assignment. Ideas for a topic to write about are
generated by one or all of the following means:

{ Brainstorming. This is where individuals, pairs, or groups speak or write a

number of possible topics and then write them on a piece of paper. Each pair or
group reviews the list and, by a process of elimination, arrives at a shortlist of
topics to write about; however, the final choice for a specific topic is left to the
individual writer.
{ Free writing. After brainstorming, students can be encouraged to engage in a
period of free writing. Here, the students are required to write as much as
possible within a short period of time (usually 15 minutes), without focusing
on correctness of grammar, sentence structure, or composition mechanics.
 Expand Thinking Skills 91
The pairs, groups, and so on, can then read each other’s work and advise or
suggest an alternative focus for the story, not the grammar.

z Stage 2 – First Draft: Audience awareness is the focus of this stage, with discussions
about the different rhetorical traditions and expectations highlighted. Students are
asked to write their first draft at home and further develop the ideas generated in
the first stage. Of course, students are free to throw out these ideas for some new
focus if they so desire.
z Stage 3 – Peer Evaluation (Review): Reviewers have a chance to use their knowl-
edge of writing in a way that promotes learning from their own advice. Students
should take the advice of their reviewers most of the time and even appreciate the
importance of the feedback reviewers provide.
z Stage 4 – Second Draft: Students are encouraged to make changes in the content (or
even start over) as a result of the feedback received in the previous stage. Students are
then required to write a second draft at home and bring it to the following class.
z Stage 5 – Peer Evaluation (Revise): At this stage, peers read again and students are
asked to revise again.
z Stage 6 – Final Draft/Input: The final draft is submitted along with notes from the
previous drafts so that students and their teacher can see all the critical thinking
and discussions along the way. At this stage of the process, the teacher reads, com-
ments, and returns the composition to the students the following week.

SUMMER
Another communicative language technique that promotes Thinking Skills
goes by the acronym of SUMMER. The technique presented in this chapter is
slightly adapted from one developed by Donald Dansereau. Here’s how this
pair technique works:

z Set the mood: The pair sets a relaxed, yet purposeful mood. Students can engage
in a little chit-chat and also make sure they are clear on the procedure to follow.
z Understand by reading silently: A reading passage (or section from a textbook) has
been divided into sections. (The teacher can do this or students can use natural
breaks in the passage, such as chapter sections to divide it.) Each student reads the
first section silently.
z Mention key ideas: Without looking down at the text, one member of the pair acts
as Recaller, summarizing the key ideas of the section. Comprehension difficulties
can be raised here.
z Monitor: The partner looks at the text and acts as Monitor, pointing out any errors,
omissions, or unnecessary information in the Recaller’s summary and praising the
Recaller for a job well done. The roles of Recaller and Monitor rotate for the next
section.
92 Essentials for Successful English Language Teaching

z Elaborate: Both students elaborate on the ideas in the section. Types of elabora-
tions include:

{ connections with other things the students have studied

{ links between the section and students’ lives
{ additions of relevant information not included in the section
{ agreements or disagreements with views expressed
{ reactions to the section such as surprise, gladness, and anger
{ applications of the ideas and information
{ questions, either about things not understood or questions sparked by the
section

Not all types of elaborations are relevant to every section and modifications
can be made based on the topic being discussed. Groups repeat the Under-
stand, Recall, Mention, and Elaborate steps for all the sections of the passage.

z Review: The pair combines their thoughts to summarize the entire text.

Clearly, SUMMER involves many Thinking Skills. We wouldn’t expect students

to be good at these skills right away, although it is surprising how many
students seem much better at using them in nonacademic contexts. Thus, we
need to provide guidance before expecting students to be effective in SUMMER.
Also, pay attention to the difficulty level of the texts used; how can students
summarize and elaborate on a text that they can’t understand?

K-W-L
K-W-L (Ogle, 1989) is by now a well-known learning technique, with many
variations. Here is one variation, but first let us look at the basic K-W-L ver-
sion. Table 7.2 is a sample K-W-L table. In the first column, students write what
they already know on a topic. This is the K step. This is done alone first, and
then students combine knowledge with their groupmates. They also explain
the source of their knowledge. Providing sources gives other ideas about where
to learn more and raises the issue of what constitutes a trustworthy source. The
next step in K-W-L is the W step, in which student, first alone and then in a
group, discuss what they want to know about the topic. The step builds
students’ motivation to learn more related to the topic. The W step also high-
lights Diversity, because groupmates are likely to want to learn about different
aspects of the topic. The third step is the L step, in which students record and
report to each other on what they learned. They can also explain to each other
 Expand Thinking Skills 93
Table 7.2 KWL

What I/We What I/We Want to What I/ We What I/We Still

Know Know Learned Want to Know

where they learned this new information. Even if students all read the same
text, it can build their reading comprehension to discuss what they learned
and where they learned.
A somewhat new twist on K-W-L is to add a fourth column to the K-W-L
table (see Table 7.2), a column for what students still want to know. This S step
promotes Information Age thinking in which students need to know where to
find information. This fourth step also provides students with choice to pursue
their own interests and then share what they learned with groupmates.

Problem-based learning
Problem-Based Learning (PBL), mentioned in Chapter 3, is a teaching method
in which a problem actually drives the learning, and students discover that
they need information or skill to solve a problem. PBL is student-centered,
which problems are relevant to students serving as the organizing focus and
catalyst for learning which usually occurs in small groups. The language teach-
er’s function is to act as a facilitator of learning and to keep the students focused
and on task and to encourage them to use all their language skills to inform
other students. In second language learning the problems are a vehicle for
learning the second language and for developing problem-solving skills and
development of their second language skills (Neville & Britt, 2007). Second
language learners develop a sense of self-directed learning a second language
because they use that second language to learn how to

z organize prior knowledge about the problem

z discover the nature of the problem at hand
z pose relevant questions about the problem
94 Essentials for Successful English Language Teaching

z formulate a plan for solving the problem

z decide on proper resources to solve the problem
z generate possible solutions
z weigh the pros and cons of each possible solution
z select one solution
z test solution.

Practicing vigilance
While some textbooks and grammar books may attempt to present language
as simple and straightforward, anyone who studies any language and who
reflects on their own language use and the use of those in their environment
will readily agree with the eminent linguist, Michael Halliday who once stated
in a talk in Singapore that language is more complicated than nuclear physics.
Although this complexity makes learning a second language, and even a first
language, more difficult, it also opens up myriad opportunities for students to
develop and employ their Thinking Skills as they grapple to understand the
ever-changing ways that human language operates. The following story
illustrates language’s complexity.
A teacher, Ketsara Kumpoomprasert, observed a junior colleague teaching
a lesson that focused on one of the differences between “can” and “could.”

“Can you swim?” she asked one student, who replied, “Yes, I can.”

“Could you swim when you were two years old?” she then asked, and he replied,
“No, I could not.”

This was exactly what the teacher had hoped to hear, and she used this real life
example to tell the class, “He can swim now, but he could not swim when he
was two years old.”
The teacher continued to lead the class to develop more examples, which
they did fairly successfully. Thus, it was with a feeling of accomplishment that
the teacher ended the class and collected the instruments of her trade in
preparation for moving on to her next class. As the teacher’s arms were full, she
asked the same student to help her with the door.

“Could you open the door for me?”

After a little thought, the student smiled and replied, “No, I couldn’t but I can now
because I’ve already finished my exercise.”
 Expand Thinking Skills 95

Role of teachers
ESL teachers should resist the temptation to think that teaching Thinking
Skills is the role of content area teachers, and that our job is only to provide
students with the language skills they need for thinking. We ESL teachers do
indeed have very important roles within a CLT approach to play to encourage
our students to think critically and creatively. For example, we must show how
to use such Thinking Skills as recognizing main ideas when they read and then
formulating and highlighting main ideas in their own writing. We can scaffold
for thinking in many ways, for example, by,

z providing clear models

z demonstrating
z helping students choose topics about which they have the background knowledge
need for thinking tasks
z providing graphic organizers and other tools that promote thinking
z facilitating student–student interaction in setting where risk taking is promoted
z teaching students questions to use to encourage themselves and peers to think
more deeply, such as questions from a variety of categories in Bloom’s Taxonomy.

Role of students
For Thinking Skills to work with students they must become curious consum-
ers of knowledge and not believe what they see or hear or read on first take.
This means that they must be able to go beyond their comfort zones and
develop a tolerance for ambiguity in that they may not know all the answers
(incidentally their teachers must also be able to develop such a tolerance for
ambiguity), nor even the correct questions; however, they will also discover
over time that they will develop the courage to ask questions and thus may
ultimately become producers of knowledge rather than just consumers of
other people’s ideas. Surely this is the whole point in educating our children.

Conclusion
The amount of knowledge is increasing in geometric proportions in our world.
Perhaps at one time, it was possible to know most of what there was to know.
Now that is clearly impossible. Rather than knowing every fact, we need to
know how to find, evaluate, and synthesize facts. This chapter on Thinking
96 Essentials for Successful English Language Teaching

Skills has outlined the importance of this concept within a CLT approach to
second language education and how teachers can implement such an approach
in their ESL classes. This essential aspect of CLT maintains as our ESL students
become critical thinkers; they can move from a position where they have been
consumers of others’ knowledge to a position where they can become creators
of knowledge for others and thus be productive members of our society.

Reflections
z What is your understanding of Thinking Skills?
z Have you ever tried to show your ESL students how Thinking Skills in English are
used throughout their studies in school?
z If yes, how did you go about this and were you successful?
z If no, how do you think you would go about this?
z What do you think of Mrs. Haley’s method of teaching cause-and-effect?
z Would you teach it in any different way? If yes, how?
z What do you know about Bloom’s Taxonomy and have you ever used it? If yes to
using it, how did you use it?
z How do you teach writing? What does critical writing mean to you?
z How do you teach reading? What does critical reading mean to you?
z What is your opinion of the SUMMER activity and how would you adapt it to your
context?
 Utilize Alternative Assessment
Methods 8
Chapter Outline
Vignette 97
Alternative assessment 99
Classroom implications 101
Portfolios 101
Peer assessment 102
Self-reports 104
Anecdotal records 105
Attitude scales 105
Alternative testing of language proficiency skills 106
Group tests 107
Practicing vigilance 107
Role of teachers 108
Role of students 108
Conclusion 109
Reflections 110

Vignette
John Smith was grading papers one day when he wondered what exactly
his middle school ESL students were learning. John usually assessed his
students using traditional testing methods of multiple-choice type tests
and essay writing because he found that this way of testing the students
yielded specific results that to some degree helped him reflect what his
98 Essentials for Successful English Language Teaching

students knew at different times during the semester. These were in

addition to the standardized test that students took in his school at the end
of the year. However, John also realizes that each one of his students is
unique and has different skills and abilities that are not always reflected in
the results of these tests. For example, John knows that Mary, who is shy
and exam phobic, is excellent at project work and assignment organiza-
tion, and realizes that she should be assessed in a way that would fairly
reflect these abilities. So, John, while not abandoning the traditional
methods of assessment for his class as a whole, has decided to add a
portfolio assessment approach for his writing class. He set this up by tell-
ing his students that these portfolios would contain a record of all their
work and their progress during the year in their writing such as all the
drafts of their writing, from the very first rough draft to the final version of
the essay. John and other teachers in the school decided on general crite-
ria that they would use for grading these portfolios and they also asked the
students to help establish these criteria. For example, all students agreed
that John would review these portfolios once a month and that students
would be assessed based on how they updated their portfolios and their
reflections on their own writing development. After using this Alternative
Assessment method for his writing class, John has noticed that students
like Mary are much more productive and seem to enjoy writing class more.
This progress may be a direct result of being able to see the different
drafts that each essay has gone through. More importantly, Mary (and
other students) no longer fears assessment and her grade better reflects
her work holistically.

Of course, we language teachers cannot escape from doing assessment, as it is

essential for us to evaluate how effective our teaching is, and assessment serves
as a guide to how we will plan future lessons. Traditional assessment formats,
such as multiple-choice tests, matching, true–false, fill-in-the-blanks, short-
answer, and essay, are the norms in many language classrooms and should not
be discounted, because they provide language teachers and students with some
indication of progress. Multiple-choice tests offer the test-takers a choice of
choosing the correct answer out of a number of choices, short-answer item
tests require students to supply a word, or a sentence in response to a question
or a statement that they must complete, while the traditional essay item tests,
the most common form of assessment, are when teachers want students to
 Utilize Alternative Assessment Methods 99
generate long answers in the form of a paragraph or a complete essay (usually
consisting of 3–5 paragraphs).
Language teachers have long used such assessment devices, and we suggest
that they continue to do so; however, we suggest that the essential of Alterna-
tive Assessment can also be used as an option for language teachers because
these Alternative Assessments are ongoing, formative measures rather than
one-time, summative test results (that discriminate against a student like Mary
in the opening vignette of this chapter). This chapter outlines and discusses
the essential of Alternative Assessment within a CLT approach to second
language education.

Alternative assessment
Many teachers will tell you that they are required to test or assess their
students these days more than at any other time in the past. Assessment
involves the “documentation of student performance that is planned,
collected, and interpreted by language teachers as part of the instructional
cycle” (Gottlieb, 2006, p. 8). Just as the contents of all the previous chapters
have suggested that the overall CLT approach has expanded expectations for
what second language students need to learn to include such areas as fluency
and not just accuracy, social appropriacy of use, and Thinking Skills, we
maintain that the CLT approach has also advanced alternative means of
assessing student language learning that complement rather than replace
traditional instruments that use multiple choice, true–false, and fill-in-the-
blank items and that focus on accuracy, grammar, and lower-order thinking.
Alternative Assessment instruments attempt to more closely mirror real-
life conditions and involve higher order Thinking Skills. Although these
instruments are often more time-consuming for teachers to implement, as well
as more difficult to use in a reliable manner in terms of consistency of scoring,
they are gaining prominence due to dissatisfaction with traditional modes of
assessment, which are faulted for not capturing vital information about
students’ competence in their second language and for only serving to measure
students, not to teach them. Even when students have to take large-scale
standardized tests, Alternative Assessment can help them prepare for these
(Stiggins, 2007) because the goal of Alternative Assessment is not just assess-
ing; the goal is also to teach. With these Alternative Assessment methods at our
100 Essentials for Successful English Language Teaching

disposal, language teachers can now include five important features of assess-
ment not included in traditional testing:

z First, there is an emphasis placed on meaning rather than form. This emphasis
underlies many of the new assessment instruments outlined in this chapter.
z Second, many of the Alternative Assessment methods outlined in this chapter seek
to investigate process rather than end product.
z Third, the understanding of the Social Nature of Learning has led to the inclusion
of peer assessment and to the use of group tasks in Alternative Assessments.
z Fourth, in keeping with notions of Learner Autonomy, students are now more
involved in their own learning processes and how these processes will be assessed,
understanding how they will be assessed, and even participating in that assess-
ment. For example, self-assessment can be an important part of Alternative
Assessment.
z Fifth, linking Alternative Assessment to integrated curriculum, students are now
asked to engage in assessment tasks that have a real world feel thus integrating
with the world beyond the classroom.

Figure 8.1, below, outlines some of the main differences between Alternative
Assessment and traditional assessment.

Alternative Assessment Traditional Assessment

• Represents a complete range of topics • Assesses students across a limited
and subjects students are engaged in range of topics and subjects
• Cannot be mechanically scored. Often • Can often be mechanically scored or
some form of scoring rubric is used scored by teachers using an answer key
• Students are involved in their • Scoring is done exclusively by the
assessment. teacher or a machine
• Assessment is collaborative: teacher • Assessment not collaborative
and students
• Student peer- and self-assessment • No student peer- or self-assessment
ultimate goal
• Allows for individual differences in • Assesses all students on the same
achievement criterion
• Assessment for achievement and
development—effort included

Figure 8.1 Alternative assessment versus traditional assessment

 Utilize Alternative Assessment Methods 101

Classroom implications
Portfolios
Portfolios are a systematic collection of information about each student.
This information consists of evidence of students’ accomplishments and skills.
Students are responsible for compiling their own portfolio and, it must be
updated as the students develop and add to their achievements. Most impor-
tantly, portfolios encourage students to take more responsibility and owner-
ship for their own learning. Gottlieb (2006) suggests that portfolios are
excellent ways for students to showcase their newly acquired language skills as
well as to share their accomplishments. Another means of sharing involves
supplementing portfolios with one-on-one conferences with the teacher or
peer conferencing. Construction and assessment of portfolios is facilitated
when teachers and students have come to joint decisions regarding the content,
quantity, quality, timing, and presentation of portfolio entries before the pro-
cess begins. Of course, these decisions can be modified, as a class becomes
more familiar with the portfolio process.
In a writing course, using the example of the change in approach to teach-
ing and learning writing, portfolios offer language teachers a complimentary
means of looking at students’ writing processes (Rea, 2001). With portfolio
assessment, students keep the writing they have done over the course of a term
or more, including early drafts. Then, they analyze their writing to understand
the progress they have made. Next, they select from among their pieces of writ-
ing to compile a collection that demonstrates the path of their writing journey.
To promote student reflection on their learning journey, students also prepare
an introduction to the portfolio in which they present their findings as to what
they have learned, how they have learned it, their strengths and weaknesses,
and what they can do to continue toward becoming full-fledged members of
the community of writers in their target language.
Devising a scoring system for portfolios requires careful thought, because
some scoring guides can be so detailed that evaluators can become over-
whelmed, while other guides may be too general as to render the scoring
process too subjective. The key is to come up with a balanced scoring system.
Although the contents of student portfolios may vary greatly, guidance sheets
for their students that can suggest a familiar structure to each portfolio entry,
for example:
102 Essentials for Successful English Language Teaching

z Description: What is this entry?

z Reason: Why did I include this entry?
z Opinion: Why do I think this entry is important? What am I proud of in this entry?
z Reflection: What did I accomplish with this entry?
z Teacher comments (optional): Teachers (and peers) can add comments after each
entry.

Peer assessment
Another alternative form of assessment in education involves peers, where stu-
dents themselves evaluate each other’s levels of participation, work samples,
and behavior in the class. Students can rate their peers in many ways. For
example, students can use the same rating instruments as teachers use such as
when students give a presentation in class, their peers can fill in the same rat-
ing scale that the teacher uses, either along with the teacher or instead of the
teacher. To make the task easier for students, they might only use some of the
items that teachers use, or the items might be divided among students, so that
each student or group of students focus on just one item, e.g., in assessing
speaking, some students might focus on whether a peer spoke with the proper
degree of loudness, while others listen for fluency. Instead of using an instru-
ment developed by the teacher or taken from an established text, the students
can design their own rating instruments with the guidance of their teacher.
Also, they can rate their peers on matters that teachers may know less about,
such as students’ participation in their group. Regardless of how the peer
assessment instrument is developed and what the instrument looks at, time
should probably be spent to help students understand the instrument and how
to use it. When properly conducted, peer assessment adds a new dimension to
assessment and may make assessment seem more equitable in the students’
eyes. Examples of peer assessment items include:

z Who are some of the hardest workers in class?

z Who are some of the people who work the least in class?
z Which student(s) helps his/her fellow students the most with homework/
classwork?
z Which student(s) helps his/her fellow students the least with homework/
classwork?
z Which student(s) shares materials with his/her fellow students the most?
z Which student(s) shares materials with his/her fellow students the least?
z Which student(s) does his/her homework the best?
z Which student(s) seldom does his/her homework?
 Utilize Alternative Assessment Methods 103
z Which student(s) does not do well on tests but works hard?
z Were tenses used properly in your groupmate’s essay?

From these data, teachers can obtain extra information about their students;
information about the students from the students. Teachers must be careful to
realize however, that some of the students’ answers about their peers may have
an element of assessing their peers’ social acceptance rather than an honest
answer. Therefore, teachers should carefully explain the reason for using this
rating system to their students before they use it.
In addition to providing an alternative source of assessment data, peer feed-
back offers another important advantage. When students attend to particular
features of their peers’ work, this focus helps students attend to and under-
stand features that teachers and students have agreed are valuable. The hope is
that, as a result of peer assessment, students will focus on these same features
in their own work, thereby enhancing the quality of that work. Here is an
example of an area in which the experience of doing peer assessment might
subsequently improve individuals’ own efforts. Many students have difficulty
with reference when they speak and write. For instance, they use multiple
pronouns without careful attention to what or whom the pronouns refer,
e.g., “My brother loaned his friend his MP3 player, and his friend loaned him
his game player, but then he broke it.” If students are assigned to check the
reference in peers’ work, by focusing on this specific aspect, students grow
their understanding of reference, and their awareness grows as well. Therefore,
when students do their own writing, they may be more likely to exercise care
regarding reference.
Although in the example above of the students’ reference error, sometimes
peer assessment will highlight errors, it may actually be more useful to focus
peer assessment on what peers have done well. Indeed, a frequent teacher-
induced assessment error that students make is focusing on the negative in
the mistaken view that good assessment is mostly about hunting for errors
(Compton, 2005). We call this a teacher-induced error because in too many
cases, students have been endured a steady diet of teacher assessment which
included seeing their assignments and tests returned to them bloodied by their
teachers’ red pens.
If in contrast, students (not to mention teachers) focus their feedback on
what peers have done well, it builds students’ confidence that they can indeed
communicate successfully in the target language. However, it must be stressed
that this positive feedback is not just a stream of vague expressions of praise,
104 Essentials for Successful English Language Teaching

such as “Good job!” and “Awesome!” Positive assessments should be specific

(Chalk & Bizo, 2004). They must say and show what exactly peers have done
well. Such specificity is both for the sake of students receiving the praise, as well
as for those giving the praise, not to mention those third parties, e.g., the third
and fourth members of a group of four, who witness the specific praise.
An example of showing would be, to return to the learning of reference, students
circling the pronouns and the nouns to which they refer in a peer’s writing, and
then drawing lines to connect pronouns to the appropriate nouns.

Self-reports
Self-reports are student self-generated documentation of how they think
they are progressing and promote direct involvement in the learning process.
Gottlieb (2006) suggests that self-reports benefit students in the following
ways; they

z provide a venue for students to convey their depth of understanding

z invite students to take responsibility for their own learning
z honor student input in the assessment process
z recognize the student perspective as a valid data source
z foster the creation of a shared set of expectations between teachers and students
z encourage students to do their best work
z help students set realistic goals based on their accomplishments
z offer personalized feedback to teachers
z promote students becoming life time learners.

Self-reports are most important because they involve students directly in

the assessment process thus providing them greater motivation to learn. They
are also a useful way of obtaining information directly from the students.
In addition, language teachers would have a better sense of what their language
students are able to do if only they would ask them for example, to summarize
what they have done (by drawing, speaking, or writing), describe their favorite
or most challenging activity, or explain some aspect of learning of the lan-
guage. Gottlieb (2006) outlines the following Biography Self-Assessment that
has students list what they accomplished during their assignment as follows:

z Write a list of persons who you admire and respect. Then chose a person to study.
z Collect information on the person from two sources (books, the Internet, newspa-
pers, magazines).
 Utilize Alternative Assessment Methods 105
z Include: personal information; important life events; contributions to society.
z Make a chart of the similarities and differences in what the two sources say about
the person.
z Summarize the information from the two sources.
z Find pictures or other visuals about the life of the person.
z Use all the above information to write a 1- to 2-page biography with pictures.

As with peer assessments, self-reports need to highlight what students have

done well and the progress they have made, in preparation for further progress
ahead. Such a positive outlook may enhance students’ self concept. Self con-
cept is people’s perception of themselves. It is learned over time, beginning
from an early age, as a result of verbal and nonverbal reactions of significant
others – parents, teachers, siblings, peers, and the individuals themselves. Self
concept can be general, as well as specific to particular contexts. Self concept
forms the basis for students’ assessments of themselves as language learners
and their predictions as to their ultimate level of language attainment. Too
many students have formed negative self concepts of themselves as language
learners and users. Too many brilliant lesson plans have been sunk by students
unwilling to believe that they have the capability to succeed at the tasks in the
lesson.

Anecdotal records
Teachers know their individual students better than anybody else and espe-
cially in terms of their linguistic abilities, their willingness to participate in
class, how they take tests and how they generally prefer to learn a second lan-
guage. This knowledge is built up from the teachers’ daily observations of their
students in action in their classrooms (and outside the classrooms). Gottlieb
(2006) suggests that structured observation, where teachers systematically
maintain written anecdotal records of their students over time, can be used
successfully to focus on specific aspects of their students’ literacy development
and systematically document their performance over time.

Attitude scales
Alternative Assessment involves not just the assessment of students but also
the assessment of teachers, the curriculum, and other factor that impact
students’ experience in education. Attitudes scales provide one means of col-
lecting data on such topics. These scales, usually designed by teachers, can be
106 Essentials for Successful English Language Teaching

a useful means of gauging the students’ feelings and opinions about various
aspects of their schooling such as classroom activities, peers, school events,
teachers, and administrators. These scales can give teachers a more detailed
understanding of their students’ preferences for certain activities and the like
and can aid teachers with their planning, both inside and outside the
classroom. For example, regarding classroom activities, teachers can design an
attitude scale for activities conducted in specific subject matter areas such as in
a Math class taught in the second language. Teachers can design a scale that
measures their students’ liking for such activities as adding, problem solving,
playing math games, and doing math homework. Teachers can obtain useful
information from these scales about their students’ perceptions of certain
activities that can be used for teacher lesson planning and course revisions.
However, teachers should also realize that sometimes students may perceive an
activity that they cannot do or feel negatively about regardless of how educa-
tional, important, or useful the activity may be. Because teachers are the people
closest to their students, they are the best to judge the value of the overall
responses.

Alternative testing of language proficiency skills

Regarding testing discrete skills of proficiency in a language, Alternative
Assessment has much to offer language teachers. For example, Gottlieb (2006)
suggests that English language learners may demonstrate their listening
comprehension skills in nonverbal ways such as simply pointing to the objects
in an illustrated book in response to questions or commands in a listening test.
In addition, a two-way task can add the oral dimension in assessment where
each of paired English language learners has half the information on a graphic,
such as location of places or landmarks on a map, and through commands or
phrases, attempts to complete the missing half with the partner. In addition to
the above, Gottlieb (2006) suggests that language teachers interested in
alternative modes of language assessment consider the following activities
(used individually or in combination):

z Debates on school-related topics or current issues

z Dialogues between students on social or culturally related topics
z Interviews between students or between students and adults
z Presentations/reports on content-related assignments
z Role plays/dramatizations of historical or social events
z Speeches or reports based on research or topics of interest
 Utilize Alternative Assessment Methods 107
z Task analyses or demonstrations on how to do activities, processes, or procedures
z Story (re)telling from illustrations or personal experiences
z Student-led conferences on original work or portfolios
z The use of visuals, such as drawings, mindmaps, and flow charts (all of which com-
puter software facilitates)
z Poems that represent concepts and information learned
z Songs that put those concepts and that information into words and use familiar
tunes

Group tests
In keeping with the essential of the Social Nature of Learning (Chapter 3),
some teachers are using group tests as an alternative to or as a preparation for
the more traditional individual tests. For example, Hicks (2007) used group
tests with radiologic technology students. His rationale was quite similar to
one of those expressed in Chapter 3: students need to know how to communi-
cate and cooperate in the work world, and group tests serve to prepare stu-
dents for that. Hicks found that after completing the course, students’ acceptance
of group tests increased. Similarly, group projects, such as Problem-Based
Learning (Lambros, 2004) are often done instead of individual ones.

Practicing vigilance
A frequent problem in assessment stems from lack of common expectations
between students and teachers as to the goal, i.e., what is being assessed. This
edited story, told originally by Peter Brown, illustrates such as mismatch
between a father, who can’t stop being an English teacher, and his 5-year-old
son. The boy thinks the goal of the discussion is to relate with what happened
at school, whereas the father’s focus seems interested only in the boy’s gram-
mar. The story begins with the boy recounting what happened at a jumble sale
at his school the previous day.

Boy: My friend Robin didn’t have enough money, so I gived him one of my coins
and then he buyed a cake and then I gived the man another coin too for a cake.
Father: You shouldn’t say, “I buyed a cake.” You should say, “I …”
Boy: “Bought.”
Father: So why did you say, “Buyed?”
Boy: I don’t know. Let’s switch it off!
Father: Well, alright then . . . and what did you do with the cake you bought?
108 Essentials for Successful English Language Teaching

Boy: I eated it all.

Father: You said, “I eated.” What should you say?
Boy: “Ate.”
Father: Well, why did you say, “Eated”?
Boy: Well, er … I don’t Knooooooooooooooow!
Father: Oh, alright! … How about if I hop around like a kangaroo every time you
say “eated” and “buyed”? (the father begins to hop)
Boy: Stop!
Father: Alright.

Role of teachers
Second language teachers have the following vitally important roles to play
when designing Alternative Assessments as follows:

z Teachers understand learning processes. Teachers must realize that learning

a second language is not a linear process and that students need to be encouraged
along the way with examples of progress from specific evidence from their own
work such as in portfolio examples. This again shows them that learning is a pro-
cess; it is not, as is emphasized in many traditional tests, only a product. Students
can become more involved in their own processes of learning.
z Teachers as models of Alternative Assessment. In this chapter we suggested that
the new paradigm approach to teaching and learning writing involves writing as a
process.from brainstorming at the beginning to the first draft, to other multiple
drafts to the final draft. Teachers too can show their students their own writing
drafts and explain how writing is also a process of discovery for them rather than
producing a perfect end product. Both students and teachers can engage in a dis-
cussion of their learning processes (see Chapter 9 on Teachers as Co-learners) and
students can then try to apply some of the strategies they may have picked up from
these conversations in their own learning.
z Teachers as developers of different assessments. Language teachers will be most
active in designing and implementing these alternative methods of assessment
because all we really have now is the ready-made traditional tests and many of
these commercially produced. Of course, as we will see in the next section, students
will also be asked to contribute to the design and implementation of Alternative
Assessments.

Role of students
Teachers need not design Alternative Assessment tasks alone. For example,
when designing assessments that take real-life situations into consideration,
 Utilize Alternative Assessment Methods 109
teachers need to consider what people do in their everyday jobs. In order to
learn about this, teachers can involve students by asking them to interview
people in various careers. In this way, students can begin to see relationships
between the real world and what they learn in school. The students can see
exactly why they are doing the particular assignments. The students can ask
these people to answer such questions as follow:

z What do professors study in their daily work? How do they do it?

z How do newspaper writers get their ideas?
z How do scientists identify, study, and solve problems?
z How do restaurant managers organize different aspects of their work?

Students can be further involved by having them set the criteria by which their
assignments will be assessed. These criteria should be agreed upon before the
start of the assignment so that each student (and the teacher) is aware of what
is required. Students are also involved in the peer and self assessment compo-
nents of Alternative Assessment.

Conclusion
This chapter has outlined Alternative Assessment methods. It showed that new
assessment instruments have been developed to complement (or even replace)
traditional instruments that use multiple choice, true–false, and fill-in-the-
blank items and that mostly tend to focus on lower-order thinking (Stiggins,
2007; Wiggins, 1998) and a process–product approach to learning. Alternative
Assessment instruments, on the other hand, attempt to more closely mirror
real-life conditions where people struggle though process while arriving at
product. Thus, assessment captures vital information about students’ develop-
ment through the process of learning. Although these instruments are often
more time-consuming and costly to use, as well as less reliable in terms of
consistency of scoring, they are gaining prominence due to dissatisfaction
with traditional modes of assessment, which are faulted for not capturing vital
information about students’ competence in their second language. Now,
even when students have to take large-scale standardized tests, Alternative
Assessment can help them prepare for these (Wiggins, 1998) because the goal
of Alternative Assessment is not just assessing; the goal is also to teach. In fact,
students who are assessed with Alternative Assessment instruments may even
be better prepared to take standardized tests because they are more aware of
110 Essentials for Successful English Language Teaching

learning as a process of discovery and that a standardized test is only one

measure of that learning.

Reflections
z Reread the anecdote at the beginning of this chapter. Do you think John Smith
is a typical language teacher in terms of his reflection on his students’ need for
Alternative Assessment? If yes, why? If not, why not?
z How do you approach the whole idea of testing and assessment? Is there a differ-
ence for you between assessment and testing and if so, what is the difference?
z What is your understanding of Alternative Assessment?
z List some of the advantages and disadvantages of Alternative Assessment.
z What criteria do you think should be part of the evaluation process of a portfolio in
order to make scoring consistent?
z Can you think of any other means of assessing second language students?
 Promote English Language
Teachers as Co-learners 9
Chapter Outline
Vignette 111
Teachers as co-learners 112
Classroom implications 114
Teachers and students learning together 114
Teacher mentoring 115
Peer coaching 116
Teachers conducting research 117
Role of teachers 119
Role of students 120
Conclusion 120
Reflections 121

Vignette
Lucille Michaels teaches Spanish at her high school. For a recent 12th
grade class, the main course objective was for the students to be able
to write a full essay at the end of the course. When thinking about how to
teach the course Lucille wondered if before each assigned essay she
should lecture about how to write, give them a model essay and then ask
her students to work on an essay similar to the model one so that she
could monitor and control their writing. Alternatively, she wondered if
she should let each student work alone on their own essay based on their
individual interests. Lucille, as a believer in learner-centeredness and in
112 Essentials for Successful English Language Teaching

trying to make learning meaningful to students, decided to encourage

students to come up with their own essay topics (based on their individual
purposes for writing and the audiences they chose to write for), and work
together in groups of two or three to share their work with the other
students so that her students could get a sense of audience for their
writing. Lucille was pleasantly surprised during the term and especially at
the end of the semester, for not only had students completed their own
essays, but she herself had learned a lot from all the different topics they
had written about, and Lucille felt she knew her students better as people
from the interaction she had with them and from observing their interaction
with peers. She also learned more about her students’ writing processes
and how to facilitate them. Part of this pedagogic learning came from what
she had listened to in the group discussions because of the many diverse
questions students asked each other when writing drafts of their essays,
the problems they encountered when writing their drafts, and the solutions
they all came up with together in their groups.

Some teachers and administrators perceive their students as receivers of their

knowledge and believe that the best way they can learn is by following teachers’
directions in a “chalk-and-talk” style learning environment. However, this
chapter outlines and discusses the idea that teachers and students actually
become co-learners in the second language classroom. This essential of
Teachers as Co-learners within a CLT approach to second language education
involves teachers learning along with students.

Teachers as co-learners
The essential of Teachers as Co-learners focuses on second language
education teachers learning along with the students (and teacher colleagues),
learning from the students while at the same time learning about the students
such as their first language education backgrounds, their lives and learning
various teaching methods from colleagues. Because the world is complex and
constantly changing, life-long learning is available and is important for both
teachers and their students. Teachers, by their very choice of profession, have
expressed an unquenchable delight in learning and, indeed, model this desire
for their students so that they too can catch the same life-long thrill of learning
and sharing one’s learning. In this learning process, teachers learn more
about their subject, in this case the second language they are teaching, and they
 Promote English Language Teachers as Co-learners 113
learn more about their students and about people generally. They also learn
more about how to teach (Bailey & Nunan, 1996; Freeman & Richards, 1996).
To promote their learning, teachers depend more on themselves, their col-
leagues and their students, rather than on outside experts. This is sometimes
called bottom-up professional development (Richards & Farrell, 2005).
In many institutions and language schools, second language teachers are
seen as workers who need to be supervised by so-called “experts,” and usually
from the university and relevant government ministries and other such insti-
tutions, in order to make sure that prescribed curriculum goals are being met
and students are performing according to these predetermined schemes such
as learning x number of new vocabulary words each week, or learning the past
tense verbs within a two-week lesson period (outcomes of which include being
able to fill in the blanks of the correct verb tense in decontexualized sentences).
Within this view (some would say the “old paradigm” view) of language educa-
tion, teaching is seen as a skill that can be learned in discrete items from how
to plan lessons to how to ask questions in class. When these skills have been
learned, the teacher is seen as qualified to teach. In second language teacher
education this approach is seen as “training” (Freeman, 1989). In the previous
paradigm, second language teachers’ opinions and experiences are more often
than not excluded. Instead, the “experts” in the universities do the research on
how to teach and administrators do the assessment of teaching effectiveness.
Their pronouncements are then handed down to practitioners. However,
the eight essentials view of second language education as discussed in this
book sees teaching and learning as social processes where the students are active
co-constructors of knowledge with their teachers. The teachers are more of
facilitators and fellow learners alongside the students and who are responsible
for not just the students learning, but also their own as well as that of their
colleagues.
In fact, the theory behind how teachers learn parallels that behind how
students learn. In other words, the same theories which argue the other seven
essentials discussed in these pages’ seven previous chapters, apply to teachers
just as they do to students. In the traditional paradigm, top-down decision
making and external control by experts from universities and government
agencies is emphasized as the most efficient way to promote education. As the
Minister of Education of one country once boasted to a visitor, “It’s 10:00am.
I can tell you what page in their textbook every teacher in the country is on
right now.” Teachers have a rigid set of content, materials, and methods to
follow and are to follow that without exception in order to ensure uniformity
114 Essentials for Successful English Language Teaching

and prepare students for standardized exams. However, with an Essentials view
to language education, a more bottom-up decision making process is used by
both teachers and their students. Language teachers are considered (and
appreciated) as full-fledged professionals who, individually and collaboratively,
do their own thinking and conduct their own research so that they can learn
how to best cater to the particular needs of their own language students.
As such, language Teachers as Co-learners take more responsibility for cur-
riculum development and implementation so that their students can have lan-
guage learning experiences adapted to their specific needs. Also, when teachers
see the effectiveness and experience the joy of learning in this way, they desire
deeply to facilitate similar success and similar experiences for their students.

Classroom implications
Teachers and students learning together
Second language teachers have many ways to create an environment in which
students come to see their teachers not as all-knowing second language experts
infallibly dispensing knowledge, but as fellow searchers after learning. This
may sound strange to those students who depend on the language teachers as
a source of input for language practice but consider the following ways teach-
ers can learn together with their students:

z Asking students about their experiences, knowledge, and opinions on the topics
being written and talked about during second language practice and also share
your own.
z Asking students to do research on specific topics and then report on their findings
to the class so that all can learn not only the second language in question but also
some new information for the teacher and the other students. Teachers can also do
research.
z Admitting to students when we make errors or do not know something about
the target language we teach, regardless of what students expect. And, we explore
with students how to use various resources to check our ideas and to learn new
information about the language.
z Talking about our own history as second language learners, either of the target
language or of another language.
z If we are in the beginning or intermediate stages of learning a language that one
or more of our students speak, we might every once in a while use that language
with students as a way to show that we are willing to risk stepping outside our
language comfort zone.
 Promote English Language Teachers as Co-learners 115
z Expressing wonder at the marvelous and endless complexities of language.
Paraphrasing a remark once made by noted linguist Michael Halliday at a lecture,
“Language is much more complicated than nuclear physics.”
z Inviting students to take part in choosing topics of study in order to promote
students’ interest in learning and to make it more likely students will possess
background knowledge on those topics rather than selecting the same topic for
each student to talk and/or write about which is (unfortunately) common practice
in many schools today.
z Be willing to let the entire class discover learning as they go along. In fact, language
teachers do not need to fully structure their daily lesson plans to the point that each
class minute is planned.
z Be willing to jettison the lesson plan to talk about something in today’s headlines
or something which has just happened in the school or elsewhere in students’
lives.
z Inviting students to teach others about what they learned, thus increasing their
feelings of expertise.
z Communicating our enthusiasm for the topic the class is studying by sharing our
experiences, thoughts, and opinions as equal contributors to the learning
moment.
z Participating alongside students in their activities, and not standing off watching
and listening “like a teacher” that is the case in many classrooms. For example,
while students do independent reading, teachers also read. Then, when students
share about what they’ve read, teachers do too. Even if teachers have read some-
thing beyond students in terms of language level and/or cognitive complexity,
teachers can share in a way that students can understand.

However, just because teachers are no longer in total control (or omniscient
sages on stages) does not mean that they are just like any other class member
with no special knowledge, skills, or role. It’s a bit like realizing that we are
experts in certain areas, and students are experts in others. By sharing our
expertise and welcoming the expertise of others, we all learn more and the
classroom becomes a more equitable, livelier place to be.

Teacher mentoring
Second language teachers can implement teacher as co-learner by engaging
in some form of reflective practice with their students, where beliefs and
practices are subjected to some scrutiny (Farrell, 2007). For this to happen,
both teachers and their students should reflect on their teaching and learning.
For example, teachers help each other learn when more experienced or more
effective teachers serve as mentors for peers. Research has indicated that
116 Essentials for Successful English Language Teaching

beginning teachers who are mentored are more effective teachers in their early
years and are more likely to remain in teaching, since they learn from guided
practice rather than depending upon trial-and-error alone (Porter, 2008). The
mentor–mentee relationship need not be one in which a gap exists between the
two in terms of experience. Two teachers at the same experience level and
same rank in the teaching hierarchy can form a critical friendship. A critical
friend acts as an observer who can talk about teaching in a collaborative under-
taking and give advice as a friend, in order to develop the reflective abilities of
the teacher who is conducting his/her own action research (Yeigh, 2008).

Peer coaching
Peer coaching also emphasizes collegiality between colleagues because one
teacher will learn from a colleague (Bruce & Ross, 2008). Teachers become
empowered to set their own goals, by analyzing their teaching with the help of
a peer. The peer, acting as coach/friend, offers suggestions to a colleague based
on classroom observations. Teachers make their own decisions as to what
changes, if any, to incorporate into their teaching. In other words, each teacher
still has the main responsibility to develop and does not hand over control to a
colleague. Suggestions as to how teachers can act as coaches to foster language
teacher development include the following:

z Informal chats about their teaching in the form of anecdotes about what is
happening in their classroom.
z Collaborating to design materials.
z If colleagues are teaching the same subject area, they can come together and
analyze what they are doing and make suggestions to add or take out some of the
existing curriculum.
z Observing each other’s lessons.
z Co-teaching lessons and observing each other’s approach and teaching style.
z Video taping lessons and watching them together.

An example of this can happen when the coach observes the fellow teacher and
makes a record of the observation. Depending on the amount of detail required
by the teacher and the focus of the observation, which is decided by the teacher
(not the coach), both will reflect on practice. Remember, the main purpose of
peer coaching is to support a teacher’s existing strengths and develop unex-
plored capacities. The process has three main phases: Pre-observation meeting;
classroom observation; post-observation meeting. The classroom observation
 Promote English Language Teachers as Co-learners 117
may be assisted by the following data-gathering instruments: audio-tape;
video-tape; classroom transcriptions. Both parties may reflect on the whole
process by engaging in journal writing and discussions. Both participants
should write down their reflections of the process and what was achieved.
They should then meet and discuss what was written and what was achieved.

Teachers conducting research

One way for teachers (and students) to learn more is by doing research, rather
than relying solely on the research of others from outside the classroom. For
example, Freeman (1996) suggests that it is necessary to “put the person who
does the work at the center” (p. 90) of that work and the best way to do this is
to have practicing teachers research their own classrooms. His basic premise
for putting teachers at the center follows a jazz maxim: “you have to know the
story in order to tell the story” (p. 89). So, language teachers have the inside
view of their world in that they live in it each day and know up close what
issues are most important for them and their students. There has been some
heated discussion however in second language education circles about what
constitutes real research and how this should be conducted by practicing
language teachers. Sometimes this argument comes down to two main
approaches to research and data collection, namely, quantitative, the more
traditional approach that includes large scale data collection and a lot of
number crunching at the end, and the newer qualitative approach that allows
for an insider’s view of what is happening (and in our opinion more appropri-
ate for language teachers conducting classroom research).
One form that teacher research can take is action research in which
teachers – alone, with colleagues, with students, and/or with outsiders –
conduct small-scale research to address questions or concerns that have arisen
in their teaching (Richards & Farrell, 2005). Teachers then share this research
with others, thus establishing a source of knowledge on teaching that is organic
to the school. Action research concerns research into action and through
action. At the heart of action research is the idea that language teachers must
take some action to improve their practice. In order to carry out an action
research project, teachers can follow several steps to make this possible:

Step 1 – A problem, issue, question

{ Problem: Students are too noisy when they work in groups

{ Question: How to integrate Thinking Skills, extensive reading?

{ Issue: Intrinsic vs extrinsic motivation in extensive reading

118 Essentials for Successful English Language Teaching

Step 2 – Search for information

{ books

{ journals

{ internet

{ colleagues

{ the person next to us on the bus

{ parents

{ students

Step 3 – Make an action plan

{ To reduce noise during group work, students sit closer together and use 30 cm

voices (voices that can only be heard 30 cm away)

{ To integrate Thinking Skills, we explain what thinking questions are; students

write their own for peers to answer

{ To investigate different means of motivating students, we do one series of

classes with intrinsic motivators and another series with extrinsic

Step 4 – Collect baseline data

{ Audio and/or video record the class

{ Estimate noise level on a 10-point scale

{ Examine students’ answers to higher-order questions for evidence of thinking

{ Estimate level of students’ motivation by observing how frequently students are

on-task or by asking students via interview or questionnaire

Step 5 – Implement your plan

{ Involve colleagues and others

Step 6 – Collect more data

Step 7 – Analyze your data

{ Compare with baseline

{ Ask why changes or lack thereof

{ Add own intuition

Step 8 – Share your findings

{ Staff sharing session

{ Internet discussion groups with other language teachers

{ Other language schools

{ Journals/magazines/newspapers

{ Students

{ Parents, Community

{ Administrators

{ Education conferences

Step 9 – Make a new plan

z Can be follow-up to previous one
{ Can involve new people (new class, new teachers, new content area)
 Promote English Language Teachers as Co-learners 119
{ Can take up a related question, issue, or problem
{ Or can involve a new topic
z Research often raises more questions than it answers.

Role of teachers
Teachers have the following vitally important roles to play when seeking
a co-learning relationship within the eight essentials as follows:

z Teachers as searchers for knowledge. Teachers demonstrate to students that

learning is a life-long pursuit. Learning is a messy business filled with ambiguity,
uncertainty, false understandings, and overthrown beliefs. Nonetheless, it is an
exhilarating journey, a journey as worthwhile as the destination.
z Teachers as models of effective learners. Because teachers are learning along
with students, they are in a position to act as models (of course they will also be
obvious models of the second language they are teaching) by showing the students
problem-solving strategies in whole-group activities and with smaller groups. The
students then observe how these tasks are done and then asked to apply what they
have learned (the strategies) in an observe–reflect–discuss–apply pattern.
z Teachers as guides. We have a responsibility to act not only as co-explorers, but
also as guides on the hike. As important as it is that we involve students in the cur-
riculum, it is also important that we fulfill our roles as teachers – as those who have
gone ahead, those who have experienced more, to guide students toward those
experiences which we believe will be most educative; not just for that moment, but
for the times that students cannot know what they might encounter.
z Teachers as researchers, materials developers, and decision makers. Because
teachers are seen as the experts on the own teaching rather than as technicians
carrying out the plans and instructions of others, teachers’ roles in the school
broaden. Instead of being consumers of others’ research, materials, and decisions,
they are doing and making their own, in collaboration with colleagues.
z Teachers have to go off the beaten path. Thus, textbooks and other ready-
made materials will not suffice. Instead, teachers and students contribute materials
that they find and develop as part of their quest for knowledge. Also, the knowl-
edge in textbooks is questioned by new information and insights that teachers and
students gather and create.
z Teachers as engaged intellectuals. We all realize that what happens in our class-
rooms is impacted in a major way by the world outside. However, too often we
educators limit our actions to the confines of our classrooms or at most our schools,
leaving the wider arena to the politicians. A countervailing trend is for teachers to
work collectively with colleagues and with students to become “engaged intellec-
tuals” (Kecskes, 2006). Issues addressed can relate to education, such as English
Only ballot initiatives or other matters, such as animal welfare or environmental
120 Essentials for Successful English Language Teaching

issues. In this way, we demonstrate to students that when we talk about connect-
ing education to the wider world and about engaged citizenship, we are practicing
what we preach.

Role of students
Students also have a very important role in ensuring that the essential of
Teachers as Co-learners becomes a reality in our language classrooms.
For example, students need to adjust if teachers are to succeed in being co-
learners. Students are involved in,

z accepting that teachers do not know everything, that teachers, regardless of how
intelligent and learned they may be, are trying to learn too
z understanding that new knowledge is being created all the time, thus rendering
today’s understanding as obsolete
z joining with teachers as investigators, seeking a better grasp of the content area
they are studying as well as of their own and the classmates’ education process
z acting as sources of information and insight for teachers and classmates
z collaborating with teachers to put their new-found knowledge to the service of
others.

Conclusion
This chapter has discussed Teachers as Co-learners, an eighth essential within
a CLT approach to second language education. For this essential both teachers
and students learn while carrying out their particular roles in the classroom,
and thus the classroom is seen to be a center of inquiry for both teachers and
their students. In fact, the essential of Teachers as Co-learners maintains that
just as students take more control of their own learning, so too do teachers
have more control over their own teaching and develop their own professional
growth paths. This connects with all the other chapters already discussed in
this book. For instance, Teachers as Co-learners embrace the Social Nature of
learning (see Chapter 3) where the co-learning that teachers engage in involves
collaboration with peers, students, and others. It also involves the essential of
Thinking Skills (see Chapter 7) because the learning that teachers undertake
involves many complexities and calls for a variety of Thinking Skills.
Teachers, like others outside of formal education, learn in a contextualized
manner, and they learn best when studying areas important to their lives.
Such learning encourages teachers to facilitate similar learning environments
 Promote English Language Teachers as Co-learners 121
for their students, and this also includes the essential Focus on Meaning
(see Chapter 5). Teachers as co-learners also includes the essential of inte-
grated curriculum (see Chapter 4) because even though teachers may be com-
fortable to stick with their familiar subject-area textbook year after year, this
essential (Curricular Integration) pushes them to learn about other subject
areas and to put aside the textbook now and then to link with particularities of
students’ lives. Of course, as teachers learn about students’ lives they also come
to appreciate student Diversity (see Chapter 6) and the wonderful variety that
exists among the students, not to mention their own uniqueness as teachers
given that they have different teaching styles, interests, and strengths. Language
teachers should explore this student Diversity in order to gain a greater under-
standing of the students’ backgrounds as also to understand themselves as
learners. Alternative Assessment (see Chapter 8) also provides many tools for
teachers to learn about their teaching and, along with others, to conduct research
on education. Finally, Teachers as Co-learners fits with the essential Learner
Autonomy (see Chapter 2) because just as students take on a larger role in their
own learning, so do teachers take greater control over their own teaching.

Reflections
z Do you think that teachers and students can learn together or is this too lofty a goal
for CLT?
z How can we create a situation such that the best teachers spend more time in the
classroom? Often teachers who demonstrate better than average skill, devotion,
and understanding are “promoted” to roles in which they spend less and less time
in the classroom?
z Are all teachers suitable to become mentor teachers?
z What are the main difficulties with a peer coaching relationship?
z How valid is teacher research?
z What about teachers who only want to teach and are not interested in being
mentors, researchers, materials developers, etc.?
z Look at the teacher roles in the essential of Teachers as Co-learners; do you think
these are all achievable? Can you add more?
10 English Language Education:
The Essentials

Chapter Outline
Integrating the eight essentials 123
Reflecting on the essentials 127

As stated in the preface, this book is about how we teach English as a second
language (ESL) and English as a foreign language (EFL) and how our second
language students learn. Kurt Lewin’s famous dictum, “There’s nothing as
practical as a good theory” (Lewin, 1951, p. 169) probably best sums up how we
arranged the contents of this book. We think the ideas presented in this book
represent a practical approach to teaching second language, yet all the activi-
ties are backed up solidly with clearly explained theories about where they
came from.
We also readily acknowledge that we are not creating new theories at the
expense of older theories; rather educators at this time are developing and
applying what others have already done, building upon, not demolishing, these
excellent theories and practices, because we recognize that we could not have
developed these eight essentials without having stout shoulders to stand on.
As Einstein put it (quoted in Zukav, 2001, p. 19),

Creating a new theory is not like destroying an old barn and erecting a skyscraper
in its place. It is rather like climbing a mountain, gaining new and wider views,
discovering unexpected connections between our starting point and its rich
environment. But the point from which we started out still exists and can be seen,
although it appears smaller and forms a tiny part of our broad view gained by the
mastery of the obstacles on our adventurous way up.
 English Language Education: The Essentials 123
Table 10.1 Contrasts between positivism and post-positivism

Positivism Post-positivism

Emphasis on parts and decontextualization Emphasis on whole and contextualization

Emphasis on separation Emphasis on integration
Emphasis on the general Emphasis on the specific
Consideration only of objective and the Consideration also of subjective and the
quantifiable non-quantifiable
Reliance on experts and outsider knowledge – Consideration also of the “average” participant and
researcher as external insider knowledge – researcher as internal
Focus on control Focus on understanding
Top-down Bottom-up
Attempt to standardize Appreciation of diversity
Focus on the product Focus on the process as well

In addition, and as already pointed out in Chapter 1 of this book, we consider

our Eight Essentials as a type of “paradigm shift” and when a paradigm shift
takes place, we see things from a different perspective. Twentieth century
paradigm shifts across a wide variety of fields can be seen as part of a larger
shift from positivism to post-positivism (Wheatley, 2006). Awareness of this
broader shift helps make clearer the shifts that have taken place in second
language education. Table 10.1 provides a brief look at some contrasts between
positivism and post-positivism.
In second language education, the CLT paradigm shift, which started in the
early 1970s, has become the driving force that affects the planning, implemen-
tation, and evaluation of many second language programs throughout the
world, and as we suggested in Chapter 1, involves a move toward more
inclusiveness in all areas of language learning and teaching. This means that
both second language teachers and learners take on new roles in the class-
room. Now, instead of mastering discrete grammar items through drill and
memorization following a teacher model, learners take center stage as they
interact with their peers, while their teachers step back into the role of active
facilitators.

Integrating the eight essentials

As outlined in Chapter 1, the eight essentials for second language learning
are Learner Autonomy, Social Nature of Learning, Integrated Curriculum,
Focus on Meaning, Diversity, Thinking Skills, Alternative Assessment, and
124 Essentials for Successful English Language Teaching

Teachers as Co-learners. Each essential is summarized once more below for

convenience:

z Learner Autonomy: this essential generally means our learners have greater choice
over their own second language learning, both in terms of the content of that
learning as well as processes they might use to accomplish the learning. In second
language education as has been discussed in many of the preceding chapters, the
use of small groups is one example of this, as is the use of self-assessment.
z The Social Nature of Learning: this essential emphasizes that learning a second
language is not an isolated individual private activity (which many second language
learners unfortunately still think is the case), but rather it is a social activity that
encourages and really depends upon successful interaction with others. The popu-
larity of the cooperative learning movement that has been discussed in many of
the chapters of this book reflects this viewpoint.
z Integrated curriculum: this essential suggests that the connection between differ-
ent strands of the curriculum should be emphasized, so that English as a second or
foreign language is not seen as a stand-alone subject but is linked to all other
subjects in the curriculum. Within second language education, text-based learning
is one of many trends which reflects this essential, as it seeks to develop fluency in
text types that can be used across the curriculum. An additional example can be
seen in project work in language teaching and learning, which involves students in
exploring issues outside of the language classroom. Both are discussed in detail in
various chapters of this book.
z Focus on Meaning: in this essential meaning is viewed as the catalyst for real learn-
ing. Within second language learning, content-based teaching, for example, reflects
this essential, as it seeks to make the exploration of meaning through content the
main focus of language learning activities.
z Diversity: this essential urges that teachers not forget that all our students are
different, and that these differences can be positive for second language learners,
because, for instance, they learn in different ways and thus have different strengths.
Second language teaching then should take these differences into account and use
them for a positive outcome rather than try to force students into a single way of
learning. In other words, second language teachers must gauge their students’
learning styles while also emphasizing the implementation of different learning and
communication strategies.
z Thinking Skills: this essential maintains that learning a second language should
serve as a means of developing higher-order Thinking Skills, also known as critical
and creative thinking, and not just listen and repeat. Thus, second language
students do not learn language for its own sake but in order to develop and apply
their Thinking Skills in situations that go beyond the language classroom into the
community and the wider world.
 English Language Education: The Essentials 125
z Alternative Assessment: this essential suggests that new forms of assessment are
needed to compliment the more traditional modes of assessment, such as multiple-
choice. Varied forms of assessment, such as students creating portfolios of all their
work (e.g., all the drafts of a composition rather than just the final product) can be
used to build up a comprehensive picture of what students can do in a second
language rather than just giving them a final grade.
z Teachers as Co-learners: this essential suggests that teachers do not just teach and
students learn; rather, teachers are viewed as facilitators who constantly try out
alternatives, i.e., learning through doing. As a result, the classroom is not only
a place where teachers blindly follow the teachers’ manual and the higher-ups’
dictates. In language teaching, this essential has led to an interest in reflective prac-
tice, action research, and other forms of classroom investigation

Throughout this book, we have urged our fellow second language educators
to take a big picture approach to the changes in our profession. Although we
presented eight essentials in separate chapters, we also pointed out that these
essentials should not be taken as eight isolated parts of second language
instruction and that in order to implement the CLT approach to second lan-
guage education (or a “new paradigm” approach as we call it in this chapter –
see above), all eight are and must be connected.
For example, the concept of Learner Autonomy fits with the overall change
with a CLT approach to second language education because it emphasizes the
role of the learner rather than the role of the teacher. It focuses on the
process rather than the product and encourages students to develop their own
purposes for learning and to see learning as a lifelong process.
The Social Nature of Learning emphasizes cooperation among all the
stakeholders involved in second language learning. As with Learner Autonomy,
the use of group activities places second language students at the center of
attention, offering them one means of taking on more rights and responsibili-
ties in their own learning. Additionally, cooperative learning acknowledges the
place of affect in education, highlighting the importance of positive interde-
pendence, where second language students feel support and belonging at the
same time that they are motivated to try hard to assist the group in achieving
results.
The essential integrated curriculum involves going from whole to part rather
than from part to whole. For instance, under the traditional education model,
students study a given historical period, e.g., the 19th century, in an isolated,
decontextualized, atomistic way. In history class, they study key events, people,
126 Essentials for Successful English Language Teaching

and movements. In science class, in another year or term, they discuss notable
scientific discoveries. In language class, in yet another year or term they read
literature from the period. Or, even if the 19th century is simultaneously dealt
with in multiple classes, little or no effort is made to build learning links. Thus,
students miss valuable opportunities for understanding context unless the
curriculum is offered in an integrated manner where students can see the links
for all the different subjects they are studying.
The essential Focus on Meaning takes a different view of learning from
Behaviorist Psychology’s emphasis on one size fitting all for learning and
learners. In contrast, Socio-Cognitive Psychology stresses that people learn by
chunking new information with existing knowledge and that meaning plays a
key role in forming those chunks.
A key tenet of Diversity is that each second language learner is different and
that effective language teaching needs to take these differences into account.
As such, Diversity among our second language students is not seen as an
obstacle, but as a real strength. The essential concept of Thinking Skills suggests
that thinking is a process and the emphasis lies in the quality of that process
rather than solely on the quality of the product resulting from that process.
We also suggest that the essential of Thinking Skills can connect the language
school with the community and world beyond. This attempt promotes the idea
that second language learning is not a collection of lower-order rules and facts
to be remembered and then regurgitated on exams, but that we learn in school
in order to apply our knowledge toward making it in, and providing for,
a better world.
Of course, the new paradigm from which flow these essential changes
informs these changes in myriad ways. For example, an emphasis on meaning
rather than form underlies many of the new assessment instruments, many
Alternative Assessment methods, such as think aloud protocols, seek to inves-
tigate these processes, and the understanding of the Social Nature of Learning
has led to the inclusion of peer assessment and to the use of group tasks in
assessment, called Alternative Assessment in our eight essentials. Finally, under
the “old paradigm” (as opposed to the “new paradigm” that we are suggesting
in this book), second language teachers are seen as workers who need to be
supervised by “experts,” usually from universities and government agencies,
the better to meet curriculum goals and lead students to perform according to
prescribed schemes. Teaching, in this old paradigm view, can be broken into
discrete skills that can be learned in isolation in an overall training approach
to second language teaching education (Freeman, 1989). However, the new
 English Language Education: The Essentials 127
paradigm sees second language teaching and learning as social processes
where the language students are active co-constructors of knowledge with
their teachers. Thus, second language teachers are seen as co-learners and the
teacher as co-learner is more of a facilitator and fellow learner alongside the
students than a taskmaster who follows a prescribed instructional checklist.

Reflecting on the essentials

Finally, we suggest that each of the following questions be considered with
other learner teachers and/or experienced teachers, so that you can all share
your reflections. Perhaps you can form a teacher development group (see
Farrell, 2007 for more on this topic and other topics related to reflecting on
practice) and different members can take responsibility for leading the discus-
sion on each of the questions below. This way, the person responsible for
leading the discussion will arrange for a place to meet, make sure each partici-
pant has prepared for the meeting, make arrangements for who will record the
ideas talked about during the meeting in case you may want to follow-up with
another discussion or application of ideas discussed. In addition, the group
and/or individuals may want to follow-up the discussions/reflections with an
action research project on ideas and materials discussed in the book and/or at
the group meetings. The idea is that the group as a whole should not just meet
and leave it at that hoping for some inspiration to take place on its own; rather,
we see this book as a beginning of your journey into your classroom as you
reflect on what works best for you and your students. Here are a few questions
to get you started but no doubt each teacher and each group of teachers will
come up with their own questions based on their own needs and the needs of
their students.

1. Within a CLT approach to second language education, Richards (2005) has sug-
gested that in order for this approach to succeed, we need to consider the follow-
ing ten core assumptions:
a. Second language learning is best facilitated when students are interacting in
meaningful communication.
b. Tasks and activities have students negotiating meaning through meaningful
interpersonal exchanges while at the same time noticing how the second
language is used.
c. Students process content that is purposeful, relevant, engaging, and
interesting.
128 Essentials for Successful English Language Teaching

d. More than one language skill may be in use when communication is considered
a holistic process.
e. Inductive style learning activities where students discover underlying rules of
language best aid second language learning.
f. Errors are a natural and normal product of learning because second language
learning is a gradual process.
g. Second language learners progress at different individual rates of learning and
also have differing motivation levels and needs.
h. Learning and communication strategies when used effectively aid language
learning.
i. The second language teacher creates the learning environment that facilitates
language learning by creating opportunities for lots of practice in the language.
j. Collaboration and sharing within a classroom community is seen as central to
language learning.

z Look at each of the assumptions (a) through (j) above, and then ask yourself:
{ How many of these assumptions apply to your own classroom practices?

{ How many of these assumptions are being adhered to by faculty and adminis-

trators of your language program and/or your school or institution?

{ Choose one (or more) of the assumptions and detail how you have applied it in

the past to your class, or how you intend to apply it in future.

2. In Chapter 1, we explain two reasons why the paradigm shift to CLT remains
incomplete, despite CLT being the dominant paradigm for many years, at least in
books, articles, and courses on how to teach second languages. The first of these
two reasons is that the shift to CLT has been understood in a partial manner, with
one essential or other CLT-linked concept focused on without seeing its fit to the
larger picture. The second reason is that the shift has been implemented in a piece-
meal manner. For instance, Learner Autonomy was honored via the establishment
of a self-access center and the implementation of an extensive reading program.
However, other essentials were ignored. For example, the Social Nature of Learning
was left out, as students did their self-access work and their reading alone, without
peer interaction. Similarly, the Alternative Assessment and the Thinking Skills essen-
tials might have been neglected, with students still participating in only traditional
forms of assessment and answering only lower-order thinking questions.

z Please describe how you do or how you could implement multiple essentials as a
synergistic whole.

3. We have talked about eight possible essentials in English language education

that we think are very important in order to properly implement Communicative
Language Teaching (CLT). We have also suggested that these eight are inextricably
linked to each other and cannot be treated as separate entities (although many are
in different contexts).
 English Language Education: The Essentials 129
z Can you think of any other essential that we may have missed but is also inextrica-
bly linked to a successful implementation to a CLT approach to English language
education?

4. When we talk about change throughout this book we mean that English as
a second/foreign language teachers should consider a change in the usual way of
teaching second languages. We also maintain that change does not happen quickly
in any field. For example, in the physical sciences, Kuhn (1970) has suggested that
change in a scientific field does not occur as a step-by-step, cumulative process.
Rather, he argued that new paradigms emerge as the result of tradition-shattering
revolutions in the thinking of a particular professional community. These shifts
involve the adoption of a new outlook on the part of researchers and others in that
community. When a paradigm shift takes place, we see things from a different
perspective as we focus on different aspects of the phenomena in our lives.

z What changes (if any) do you think has taken place in your thinking about teaching
ESL/EFL as a result of reading the contents of this book? Try to explain the changes and
why you have now come to think this way about ESL/EFL teaching. If you have not
changed your thinking, please try to suggest reasons why you have not changed.
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 Index
NOTE: Page references in italics refer to figures and tables;
page references in bold include a vignette.

accuracy 61 bodily-kinesthetic intelligence 75, 78

action research 117–19 bottom-up decision making 114
Adler, Alfred 59 bottom-up professional
alternative assessments 10–11, 12, 97–8, development 113
99–100, 109–10, 125, 126 brainstorming 34, 88
classroom implications 101–7 for critical writing 90
of language proficiency skills 106–7 bring your own piece (BYOP)
students’ role in design of 108–9 jigsaw 23–4
teachers’ role in design of 108 Brown, Peter 107
traditional assessment vs. 100 BYOP jigsaw see bring your own piece
analysis jigsaw
in Bloom’s taxonomy of thinking
processes 85, 86 cause and effect 83–4
anecdotal records 105 charades 78
application checkers 39
in Bloom’s taxonomy of thinking checklists
processes 85, 86 for self-assessment 22
assessments cheerleaders see encouragers
alternative see alternative assessments Chomsky, Noam 4
notion of 99 classroom activities
problems in 107–8 gauging students opinions about 106
attitude scales 105–6 see also group activities
auditory learners 74 classroom observation
authentic tasks 61–2 in peer coaching 116–17
closed approach to discussions 78
behaviorist classrooms 60 CLT see communicative language teaching
Beyer, Barry coaches see facilitators
on teaching critical thinking collaborative learning see cooperative
skills 87–8 learning
biases communication styles 74–5
in pedagogical materials 79 communicative competence 4, 62, 74
biography self-assessment 104–5 communicative language teaching
blogs 35 (CLT) 1–2
Bloom’s taxonomy of thinking definition and notion of 3–5
processes 78–9, 84–5, 86 implementation of 7–11
138 Index

communicative language teaching decision making

(Cont’d) bottom-up 114
need for holistic approach to 13, 14 teacher’s role 119
partial implementation of 2–3, 128 defamation 79
variations in implementation dialogues 106
of 12–13 dictogloss 63
community building 35–6 discrimination 77
community connections diversity 10, 12, 70–1, 81, 124, 126
curricular integration and 52–3 classroom implications 77–80
concept maps 63 K-W-L learning technique and 92
example of 64 notion of 71–2
conflict creators 40 students and 80–1
connective reasoning 55–6 teachers and 80
constructivist learning 59–60 drill and rote learning 17, 58, 59,
content-based instruction 45, 124 65, 68
cooperative learning 12, 30, 39, 125
contexts of 36 e-groups 35
promotion of 32–3 elaborators 40
studies on 31–2 electronic cooperation 35
see also group activities email 35
cooperative skills encouragers 39
teaching of 32 essay writing 97–8, 98–9
critical and creative thinking Etherpad 35
definition and notion of 87 evaluations
teaching of 87–8 in Bloom’s taxonomy of thinking
critical pedagogy 45–6 processes 85, 86
critical writing 90–1 of courses by students 22–3
cross-age tutoring 36 explicit grammar instruction 61
cross-cultural communication 76–7 extensive reading 128
Csikszentmihalyi, Mihaly 17 integration of language skills
cultural norms and 53
diversity of 74–5 for learner autonomy 19–20, 21–2
cultural respect
building 80 facilitators 39
curricular integration 9, 11–12, 42–3, field-dependent learners 74
43–4, 55–6, 124, 125–6 field-independent learners 74
implementation of 45–54 field trips 52, 88
notion of 44–6 flow
role of students 55 Csikszentmihalyi’s 17
role of teachers 55 fluency 2, 3–4, 61, 99, 124
forward snowball techniques 34, 35
Dansereau, Donald 91 Frankl, Viktor 59
debates 106 free writing 90–1
 Index 139
games (IATEFL). Global Issues Special
as tool for vocabulary learning 63 Interest Group 87
Gardner, Howard 75 interpersonal intelligence 75
grading see scoring/grading interviews 106
grammatical competence 3–4 intrapersonal intelligence 75, 77
group activities 29–30, 125
grading of 37–8 jigsaws 63
learner autonomy and 19, 22 bring your own piece jigsaw 23–4
learning as social activity and 33–6, joint construction activities 62, 63
37 journals 88, 117
preparation for 32 response 65
role of students 39–40
role of teachers 39 knowledge
see also cooperative learning in Bloom’s taxonomy of thinking
group discussions 78–9 processes 84, 86
group investigation 37 teachers as searchers of 119
group tests 107 Kumpoomprasert, Ketsara 94
guides 119 K-W-L learning techniques 92–3
K-W-L-S learning techniques 93
Halliday, Michael 94
hidden curriculum 18 language
higher-level thinking 55, 87 complexity of 94
through experiences 47 identity and 81
Hymes, Dell 74 role in learning 60
language competence 45
IATEFL see International Association of language for specific purposes
Teachers of English as a Foreign (LSP) 46
Language language skills
identities alternative assessment of 106–7
cultural and ethnic 80 integration of 53
language and 81 learner(s)
immersion experiences 46, 52–3 teachers as models 119
information gap tasks 63 learner autonomy 8, 15–17, 27, 124,
inquiry-based learning see 125, 128
problem-based learning notion of 17–18
institutionally-sponsored out-of-class role of students 26–7
academic collaboration 36 role of teachers 26
integrative studies 50–4 learning
intellectuals constructivist view 59–60
teachers as 119–20 constructivist vs. behaviorist view 60
interdisciplinary instruction 46, 47–50 social nature of see social nature of
International Association of Teachers of learning
English as a Foreign Language learning strategies 18
140 Index

learning styles 18, 73–4 positive assessments 103–4

definition of 73 positive interdependence 30, 37
listening 53, 75 positivism 123
to TV soaps 25 post-positivism 123
listening tests 106 praisers 40
logical-mathematical intelligence 75 prejudice 76–7
LSP see language for specific purposes presentations 106
prewriting 90
materials managers 40 problem-based learning (PBL) 37, 65,
meaning, focus on 9–10, 57–8, 59–61, 68, 93–4, 107
124, 126 role of students 68
classroom applications 61–6 role of teachers 67
mentoring of teachers 115–16 problem-solving activities 88
Michaels, Lucille 111–12 project works 36–7
multiple-choice tests 97–8, 98 grading of 37–8
multiple intelligences 47, 75–6 as tool for curricular integration 45
musical-rhythmic intelligence 75
qualitative research 117
Nassredin (fictitious character) 38–9 quantitative research 117
naturalist intelligence 75, 77 question-and-answer pairs 89–90
Nietzsche, Friedrich 59 questioners 40
non-linear, recursive activity cycle 65
reading 53
observers 40 extensive 19–20, 21–2, 128
OCAC see out-of-class academic recorders 40
collaboration recursive activity cycle 65
out-of-class academic collaboration reporters 40
(OCAC) 36 research
by teachers 117–19
parallel topics 46 resources
paraphrasers 40 for curricular integration 47
Park, Hee Soon 70–1 response journals 65
PBL see problem-based learning reverse snowball techniques 34
pedagogical materials role plays 78, 106
spotting biases in 79
pedagogical tasks safety monitors 40
definition of 62 scaffolding 67
peer(s) scoring/grading
as resources 19 of group activities 37–8
peer assessment 102–4, 126 of portfolios 101
of critical writing 91 second language education
peer coaching 116–17 CLT paradigm shift 1–3, 5–7,
poetry 107 12–14, 123
portfolio assessments 98, 101–2 essentials of 2, 7–12, 113, 123–7
 Index 141
reflection on essentials of 127–9 synthesis
thinking skills and 88–9 in Bloom’s taxonomy of thinking
self-access 128 processes 85, 86
self-assessment
learner autonomy and 20, 22 tactile learners 74
self-reports 104–5 task(s)
service learning 33, 36, 52 authenticity of 61–2
short-answer item tests 98 definition of 62
snowball learning techniques 34–5 pedagogical 62
social nature of learning 9, 11, 12, two-way 106
29–30, 40, 53–4, 124, 125 task-based language teaching
implementation of 33–8 (TBLT) 61–3
notion of 31–3 TBLT see task-based language teaching
role of students 39–40 teacher(s)
role of teachers 39 as fellow learners 114–15
socio-cognitive psychology 5, 58, 68, 126 learner autonomy and 26
songs 107 reflection on essentials of second
sound hounds 40 language education 127–9
speaking 53 research by 117–19
speaking activities 88 role in accommodation of diversity 80
speeches 106 role in alternative assessments
spot the difference techniques 77 design 108
story (re)telling 107 role in co-learning
student(s) relationship 119–20
autonomy and 26–7 role in curricular integration 55
benefits of peer assessment 103 role in inquiry driven classrooms 67
benefits of self reports 104 role in “old paradigm” 126–7
role in accommodation of role in problem-based learning 93
diversity 80–1 role in promotion of thinking skills 95
role in alternative assessment training of 113
design 108–9 teacher(s) as co-learners 11, 111–12,
role in co-learning relationship with 112–14, 125, 127
teachers 120 classroom implications 114–19
role in curricular integration 55 CLT essentials of second language
role in inquiry driven classrooms 68 education and 120–1
thinking skills and 95 students and 120
student course evaluations 22–3 teachers’ role 119–20
student-generated materials 24 teacher awareness 72–3
student-initiated out-of-class academic teacher-centered approach 17
collaboration 36 teacher development groups 127
student-led conferences 107 teacher-induced errors 103
student-selected reading 21–2 teacher-initiated out-of-class academic
summarizers 40 collaboration 36
SUMMER techniques 91–2 teambuilding techniques 34
142 Index

team then teacher (TTT) 19 TTT see team then teacher

tell/rephrase 66 TV soaps
textbooks promotion of learner autonomy and 25
spotting biases in 79 two-way tasks 106
students’ knowledge construction
and 67 understanding
thematic or conceptual units 48–50 in Bloom’s taxonomy of thinking
think aloud protocols 126 processes 84–5, 86
thinking skills 10, 83–4, 84, 95–6,
124, 126 verbal-linguistic intelligence 75
Bloom’s taxonomy 78–9, 84–5, 86 visual learners 74
classroom implications 89–94 visual-spatial intelligence 75
notion of 85–6 vocabulary learning 89
role of students in development of 95 meaningful 63–5
role of teachers in teaching 95 Vygotsky, Lev 17
think time 77–8
time keepers 39 write-pair-switch techniques 30
topical units 47–8 write time 77–8
traditional assessments 98–9, 109 writing 53
alternative vs. 100 portfolio assessment of 101
traditional education models 1–2, 113 vocabulary learning and 64
part to whole curriculum approach 9, ‘writing to learn’ 64–5
44, 125–6
training 113 Yorkey, Richard 54–5