Fiona's ESL Blog

ESL/EFL Resource Review: Coming Soon!

2009-10-04T13:11:00.000-07:00

Well, judging by the date of my last post, it seems I've been a bit of a blog-slacker. That's all going to change with the launch of my new and improved Functionall Books fabulous book review blog-a-rama! Ok, that sounds a little goofy, but I have decided to pepper my already-fascinating ESL teacher tips and observations with reviews of current ESL/EFL teaching and learning resources. Not only is there a plethora of resources, they don't come cheap (except, of course, Functionall Books' incredible downloadable e-lessons). Let this old hat do some research and save you some time and money. Lord knows, we teachers need more of both!

Email me or post below the title and isbn# (if you have it) of a resource you love, hate, or really want to know more about and I'll take a closer look. Look for the first review in my next blog post. In the meantime, click the links on the left under "Stuff To Think About", to read previous posts on all kinds of fascinating teaching and learning topics.

Being Yourself

2008-10-26T13:23:00.000-07:00

It’s usually a quick one hour lecture out of the hundreds budding teachers endure. Um, I mean enjoy. The lecture is a platform for rule-setting – for the teachers, that is. Don’t do this. Don’t say this. Don’t wear this. Sometimes Power Point images of stick figures with low-cut blouses and g-string underwear are involved. A few giggles. A few women (and the men beside them) quickly glance down their necklines to make sure they are “classroom-worthy”. Giggles and surreptitious looks aside, there is always a serious undertone and understanding that, particularly in the hyper-culturally-sensitive environment of an ESL classroom, PROFESSIONALISM is the word of the day. However, while professional dress codes may seem, ahem, clear cut, professional conduct falls under a far more arbitrary umbrella.

Let’s face it, only in the last decade or so have TESL/TEFL and TESOL (Teaching English as a Second/Foreign Language and Teachers of English to Speakers of Other Languages) members and institutions acquired any semblance of academic or “official” recognition as true educators. There are still locales that will take any EFL teacher, biology degree and all, but for the most part, we’re finally bona fide! That said, there is a grand grey area where professional boundaries are concerned.

Student-teacher relations, for example, and particularly those in an adult learning environment, may be bound by a strict zero-contact policy. Yet, just as likely, some institutions may encourage extra-curricular involvement such as pub trips, potluck parties, and sports activities. Regardless of the “rules”, most adults are aware of what crosses the ever-shifting line and behave accordingly. But what about what teachers believe? What about what teachers say about their beliefs in the classroom?

Oh sure, we teach all “the skills”: grammar, listening, reading, writing, etc…but in what context, under which cultural or political influence? Well, SURPRISE! Our own. Just as writers write what they know best, teachers teach from their own experience. What else would we do? Ironically, teachers are often considered community leaders, wise and influential, yet we are cautioned in our initial training and further PD to be culturally, politically, every-ally neutral in the name of professionalism. In some cases, it seems teachers are trusted only to regurgitate the curriculum, not truly educate from a position of knowledge and experience.

I certainly agree that in order to be respectful to all students and colleagues, one should be thoughtful and diplomatic when expressing personal opinions but I believe it imperative that teachers show their true colours. Recall your favourite or most influential teacher. Unbiased, dispassionate, and predictable are likely not the words that best describe your memories. An impartial, “neutral” educator is not the stuff from which inspiration blossoms. Share your passions. Be yourself. Wear full-bottomed underwear. The learning and growing will follow.

Mentoring & Learning

2008-08-10T13:34:00.000-07:00

When Bill emailed and asked if I knew of anyone who could offer a materials development internship for one of his MATESOL candidates, I racked my brain and came up with one or two lame possibilities. Bill politely mused on my suggestions and showed his characteristic patience and humour while I stumbled into the most obvious solution and the real reason Bill had asked me at all. Me.

While mentoring or sponsoring an intern or practicum student is a great opportunity to guide a new, enthusiastic soul through the maze of your profession (and also, hopefully, your passion), it is also a journey of self-exploration. Such a journey, as most of us know, is both inspiring and painful. My inspiration came in the form of a young woman named Rachael, an enthusiastic and creative intern (a sample of her materials is shown below; please look, use, & share your impressions with me!). Inspiring because she came equipped with the newest in language pedagogy...a side of PD veterans often let slide in the pursuit of "teaching"...and the excited energy of one discovering her niche in the world. Painful because, in order to be a worthwhile and purposeful mentor to her, each choice, suggestion, or path I offered had to be supported by something meaningful and legitimate. In other words, not only was it necessary for me to re-evaluate my teaching philosophy, but I had to hit the books myself, again...

Over the four or so months we worked together, using email, Skype, IM, and (egads!) the telephone to cobble together our individual and collective visions, I learned a great deal about my strengths and my limitations. Most significantly, Rachael reminded me of how hard one will work, and overcome, to show she has got what it takes. Hats off to you Rachael!

Some sponsors or mentors might imagine an internship in which the student is like a little bird, mouth open and wings atwitter, ready to swallow whatever bologne you feed it or fly off to complete whatever goofy task you assign it. A mentor may see his or her efforts as glorious acts of noblesse oblige, or perhaps a colossal waste of time. The reality of mentorship is quite different. It is not something grand or self-sacrificing, nor is it fruitless or futile. It is not the dawn of something new, nor is it a continuing of the status quo. It is a hybrid; it is a negotiation; it is a compromise. It is a relationship.

It’s NOT About You!

2008-03-13T20:20:00.000-07:00

I’ll never forget the words of an early mentor at the beginning of my teaching career: “The students will learn in spite of you.” She said this to reassure me, to give me the freedom to screw up and not beat myself up for it. I took it to mean: whatever mistakes you make, the students will still learn something. It did reassure me.

Over the years, though, her words have come back to me with my own various twists of interpretation. My students will learn in spite of me because my good methods always outweigh my missteps. Early years. My students will learn in spite of me because they are self-motivated enough to wade through the muck that is English language learning. Later years. My students will learn in spite of me because they are younger, smarter, and worldlier than me. Recent years. My students will learn in spite of me because their learning is not about me, it is about them. Now. Epiphany. Students will take what they need when they need it. No less. No more (unless unintentional!).

I suspect this is what my early mentor had actually meant but sometimes we can only hear what we need to hear. My husband often talks about “taking himself out of the equation” in business dealings, about just listening to the client’s needs, forgetting about his own if even just for awhile. A teacher taking himself or herself out of the equation means all the obvious things and more: a student-centred classroom; a relevant curriculum; a needs-based syllabus; less “teacher talk”. There is another aspect of stepping back and out that we teachers often forget, however many times it came up in our theory studies: not getting trapped in the students’ affective filters.

Remember that term? I’m certain you do. All the things that can get in the way of learning. Family. Health. Stress. Culture. Fear. Money. Work. Um, life. An endless list that can lodge itself in a student’s brain and block his or her openness to learning. Basically any adult has an affective filter as thick as the Bible. Perhaps it is my recent work with adult immigrants but it seems that suddenly, it’s not “get a life”, but “hey, got a life and am just squeezing you in” or “have no life ‘cause I’m cramming English to jump through some hoops”. Either way, it’s got nothing to do with me. The missing homework assignments. The falling asleep in class. The absences. The attitude. Even the good stuff: the perfect grammar score; the impeccable essay; the creative journal entries; the animated presentations. My doing? Not so much. The reasons for both the good and bad results are countless, and none of my business. I’ve stopped sweating my students’ affective filters.

Don’t get me wrong. This isn’t a call to inaction or worse, apathy, but rather a reminder to relax. Teachers can offer, inspire, and support. Students? Well, students will do what is necessary, to and for themselves. The future is not ours to see. Que sera sera.

It's not right just because you googled it!

2007-12-02T15:29:00.000-08:00

It is never good when your parents tell you you have done something wrong; it's worse when you're 30-something and it's a professional error they have so constructively drawn your attention to. You can imagine I was pretty embarrassed when my Mum emailed the other day to point out a typo on a recent newsletter I had sent out (yes, I send out my stuff to everyone!). Here I am, a supposed English teacher and writer, making minor boo-boos in my professional communications! As the Brits say, it's just not on.

The only thing that makes me feel better is that I'm not alone and not only am I not alone, but I have heaps of company: basically, everyone who has ever contributed to that wonderfully fluid and written history that is the Internet. Well, this makes me feel better on an I-was-too-much-in-a-hurry-to-edit-what-a-loser level, but as a teacher, it brings me darn near panic. Who is monitoring all these language errors? Who is perpetuating all these language errors? Why hasn't Google found a way to demerit these sloppy writers? Just who is in charge here?

I feel like a frustrated lexicographer in London, circa 1476. Too many spellings to choose from. Eenee, meenee, mainee, mo... While the advent of the printing press "froze" English spelling (for better or for worse), the Internet is spewing out old words with a vast array of new spellings. The Internet is melting the rules. The implications are mind-boggling.

As a language geek, the thought that anything goes both excites and terrifies me: vive la révolution! Even as I write this, though, I wonder how far we can go before easy comprehension is lost, before the natural flow is staunched; how many misspellings away are we from the tower of Babel?

As an ESL teacher, it is a daily battle. "But, teacher, I read it on the Internet". "I googled it!". In the old days, students would simply say, "My teacher in ______ told me that...". My stock response was always that perhaps he or she had misunderstood what the teacher had said. Not now, nooooooooooo. Now, the student has a print-out of the article, or blog, or random googled sentence. My only defence is this: It's not right just because you read it on the Internet.

As a businesswoman, it is vital to me that my clients take me seriously and particularly because my "stuff" is the stuff of language, I cannot afford mistakes. I have yet to find an error-free website for any business I've sought out online. The errors always make me pause, make me consider the professionalism of the organization. It seems website content editing is not a valued service. It should be. I just hired my Mum. Cheap for me. You? You'll have to buck up.

It goes without saying that it is so much easier to google what we need to know than walk down to the library or bookstore and hope we can find what we need in, say, less than ten hours. I'm certain I don't need to point out that the world of the Web and the popularity and ease of self-publishing allow all and sundry to put their thoughts in both concrete and cyber-black and white. Of course, no one is in charge; the sane and the insane are running the asylum.

My kingdom for an editor. Don't even get me started on texting.

Language Debate

2007-11-30T13:42:00.000-08:00

Online Surveys & Market Research

Why Study English?

2007-11-28T12:42:00.000-08:00

From from The Economist, March 7, 2009:
Language and trade (Letters)

SIR- Charlemagne lamented the fact that English has arisen as the main language that Europeans choose to learn while Anglophones remain monolingual (February 14th). In his gloominess, Charlemagne missed an important point: the linguistic unification of Europe can yield economic returns in addition to the cultural and social ones enjoyed by those of us who speak English, whether or not it is our first language.

In a recent paper, we found that bilateral trade between European countries depends positively on the probability that two randomly chosen individuals, one from each country, would be able to communicate with each other in english. We predicted that if knowledge of English in all European countries increased by ten percentage points, European trade would rise by 15% on average. Bringing all European countries up to the level of English proficiency enjoyed by the Dutch could increase European trade by up to 70%.

This comes close to the gains reckoned to accrue from adopting the euro. But unlike joining the euro and having to give up your currency, you need not give up your own language to use English. Our analysis does not hinge on English enjoying official-language status across Europe, only that Europeans are able to speak it well.

Jan Fidrmuc
Senior Lecturer in economics
Brunel University

Jarko Fidrmuc
Professor of political economy
University of Munich

So what's wrong with "milking it"??

2007-10-31T14:29:00.000-07:00

"Milk it for all it's worth!" A great refrain and one a teacher should never feel guilty for uddering....uh, I mean uttering. O.k. corny joke aside, it is true there are usually two types of teachers that love to stretch a lesson or theme or activity as far as it will go: a new teacher who is accidentally inadequately prepared, and an experienced teacher who is intentionally inadequately prepared or, in other words, perfectly prepared.

As experienced teachers know, the fabulous news is that as long as your students aren't snoring and drooling on their desks, "milking it" is exactly what a good teacher should be doing! Now, exploring a lesson to its full potential does not mean desperately clinging to every last related thread but truly allowing students to learn, practice, and review practical and relevant language points. In this day of instant-everything, you and your students know that language learning is often a slooooooow journey with many dimensions.

Not tooting my own horn or anything but one favorite lesson for students and teachers is from my Function-all 1: Unit 2 "Checking Understanding". I think it's popular because students find it very relevant to their lives and it uses very practical language. I've taken that unit and created a 15-hour lesson plan that "milks it" in a fun and effective way. Below is 1) a model of the basic steps in building context and 2) a 15-hour lesson plan with the fabulous Unit 2

Check out the materials at the website and give yourself a break and your students a fantastic language journey!

The Language of Facebook

2007-10-03T12:03:00.000-07:00

The language geek that I am sees teaching possibilities in almost everything I see or do (Like how CSI would make a great context for modal perfects), so it makes sense that my new Facebook addiction has me wondering about its classroom application. Now, I’m a newbie and what I don’t yet know about Face or FB or Crackbook (as my son calls it; due to its addictive properties I assume!) and all its associated applications is extensive but what I do see is a great opportunity for language learning. Because I’m not currently in the classroom, I can only imagine how FB can be utilized but I see it something like this:

Step 1: At the beginning of each term, create a “group” for each new class. Students can decide how much personal information they want to share or they can even make stuff up for the purpose of the group! Hey, they can even be mystery identities and by the end of the term, everyone can guess who is who based on their postings/profile/etc…
You can dissolve the group at the end of the term or leave it and see what happens.

Step 2: Have students use FB and add applications and exchange posts and pokes and generally do what everybody else does!

Step 3: If they “facebook” every night (or a couple times a week), they can orally report happenings the next day. Teachers can expand from there with related topics, be it grammar, functions, reading, writing…anything!

Check out the wealth of mixed verb practice and other grammar!
Where I’ve travelled/Cities I’ve visited/Superpoke: present perfect
Status Updates: present continuous, adjectives
News Feed: simple past, present perfect, passive
Horoscopes: simple present, future
My questions: any tense!
Moods: adjectives
and so many more…

Well, really, there are all the language elements of conversation and reading and writing here (with idioms galore!) and in a context most students can relate to…because it’s about them!

I know that some of my colleagues are already using Facebook in the classroom to great success. I would love to hear about some effective activities or anything that others have done with it. Leave comments here, so others can benefit from your experiences!

In Context

2007-09-05T19:04:00.001-07:00

If you have been in my classroom, hung out in the teacher's room, snooped around my desk, or used my materials, you would never wonder what my teaching philosophy is; I may as well tattoo it on my forehead: IN CONTEXT.

As a recurring motif in all things pedagogical in the TESL/TEFL world, contextualized language teaching seems such an obvious approach. Ask any teacher of ESL or EFL whether he incorporates context into his lessons plans and I'm certain the reply will be something along the lines of "Well, duh". However, I'll also bet that if you probe a little further, that same teacher may be unable to explain how he builds context into a lesson; even more likely is that you'll discover while he may have a "theme" (holidays, travelling, health...), there is very little actual context-building going on. Now, I'm not just saying all this because my texts are context-based (well, that's kind of why). I'm flogging this particular horse because, while there is an overwhelming consensus that context-based teaching is an effective method, few teachers seem to do it.

A theme can be, of course, a form of context. Teachers will often work within a theme and practice vocabulary and dialogues with relevant readings and listening activities. Many textbooks are already designed for thematic lessons. Grammar and functional gambits, however, are often left to their own devices. True, some worthy attempts have been made to create contextualized grammar lessons (Grammar Dimensions and Focus on Grammar are two series that come to mind) , but overall and with particular attention paid to the greatest selling grammar series of all time, the Azar series, grammar is rarely taught in context. Worse, functional gambits are still being filtered through the likes of Functional American English and the basic, Gambits 1, 2 & 3. I've been told that functional English has fallen from favour, but really only the labelling has changed. "Situational English", even "ESP" embody the functional
approach. It goes without saying that grammar has never fallen from favour, it just went underground for awhile. So why the lack of context-based grammar and gambits lessons? I have my theories.

One possibility is that the context-based grammar texts that do exist are boring as heck. They are often simply not relevant to the students' lives. Another is that, without a textbook, building context is just too much darn work. Teachers have big piles of work. As far as gambits go, aren't they contexts unto themselves? Uh, no, not really. Handing students a list of gambits is not building a meaningful context.

From my first textbook, Function-all 1: Intermediate Plus, teachers have used and built upon several successful contexts that their students have not only enjoyed immensely but have acquired some useful language in the process! Among these are: "Guessing: Stereotypes"; "Likes and Dislikes: Smells"; and a particular favorite: "Checking Understanding: Jargon". I'm not suggesting I have the key to all language success but I'm working on it!

If you need a process for context-building, email me: fiona@eslenglish.ca and I would be happy to send on some materials used in our English in Practice workshops.

If you have built some fun and successful contexts in your ESL/EFL classroom, I'd love to hear about them: fiona@eslenglish.ca . Join the mailing list at www. eslenglish.ca and I'll send you a free unit!

Description vs. Prescription: Finding the Balance

2007-05-18T19:53:00.000-07:00

As I learn this new art of self-promotion, I find myself doing things out of my comfort zone. Waaaaaaay out of my comfort zone. My web designer suggested I join some ESL/EFL online forums, so I reluctantly signed up to a few, certain all manner of wackos would suddenly show up on my doorstep or worse, nothing would happen; it would all be just a colossal waste of my time.

Actually, one wacko did show up in my inbox, but what also happened was that I got addicted, addicted to answering questions about English, addicted to that high that teachers get when they feel they are genuinely helping someone. Although I am "a member" on a few sites, one is particularly active and I sometimes find myself there when I should be doing a million other things.

The great thing is, of course, that I can pick and choose the questions that interest me and that are in my field of knowledge. The downside is that, more often than not, one of my threads will become this relentless back-and-forth of "expert" opinion and some poor student who just needs an answer to last week's quiz is completely tossed aside like a cheap paper cup. The underlying issue in almost all of these wayward threads is prescriptivism.

Don't get me wrong. I love rules as much as the next prescriptivist; they make me feel secure and fuzzy and warm. I have sometimes been referred to as a grammar geek and what grammar keener doesn't embrace boundaries. The problem I see here is my esteemed online colleagues are overlooking the students' needs. Teachers of language quickly realise that there are "textbook" rules and then there are the "usage" realities in language practice; throw in regional and dialectal differences and a simple question about the present perfect becomes a cauldron of debate.

I am a teacher first and a linguist second and although the latter clearly informs the former, I try to recognize that when an ESL student is trying to sound like his native-speaking peers when ordering a beer at the pub, he is not interested in a lecture on the use of the subjunctive!

Books for Africa

2006-11-26T13:08:00.000-08:00

When I first founded Functionall Books, my husband was full of advice and classic business axioms, some of which I heeded, other bits, not so much.One piece, however, I squirreled away and have since come to embrace: start the way you intend to finish. This, of course, can mean a multitude of things. For me, it has meant: don’t cut corners; end-point visualize; be true to yourself; keep learning and growing…and so on. Most importantly, though, it has meant: be philanthropic. From the start. Embed it in your business plan, in your corporate culture. Don’t wait until you’ve made it to spare your buddy a dime. However little I make in the beginning, a part of my profits will always be earmarked for something more significant than lil’ ol’ Functionall Books or lil’ ol’ Fiona. Hence, Books for Africa and, hopefully, other mutually beneficial partnerships down the road.

In the words of Kofi Annan, former U.N. Secretary-General:“Books for Africa is a simple idea, but its impact is transformative. For us, literacy is quite simply the bridge from misery to hope”.

Our Books for Africa Bookraiser and bookband Launch in May, 2009 raised over 300 books and almost $800.00 for shipping costs. Thank you friends and colleagues!