Editor’s note


Written by - Brett Reynolds

In the last issue we took a quick look at cognitive linguistics. This time, Jackie Nenchin introduces us to systemic functional linguistics (SFL). Elizabeth O’Dowd then shows us how one MATESOL program that teaches SFL is updating their curriculum, considering the growth of English as a world language. If revamping your program sounds good, and you think you have the management skills to do it, Kara Mac Donald and Ketty Reppert have some hints about how to become a program administrator.

Continuing with the least-you-should-know series about other languages, John Steckley provides a gentle introduction to the Ojibwa language. This also inspired our cover image “Learning” by Ojibwa artist Benjamin Chee Chee.

Our remaining articles are from Alina Filip, who describes dynamic writing assessment,  Continue Reading →

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Editor's Note
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Beyond tradition: Using systemic functional linguistics in ESL teaching and teacher preparation


Written by - Jackie Nenchin, Molloy College

Abstract

This paper1 examines some uses of Systemic Functional Linguistics (SFL) in teacher preparation and offers some ideas and activities for ESL classrooms. The paper begins with a rationale for the use of SFL in teacher training and language teaching, followed by a description of Hallidayan systemic functional linguistics (SFL) and its application to pedagogy, as represented by the work of Rose, Martin, Butt, Lock, and others. It examines certain aspects of grammar from an SFL perspective and provides an example of a project that was completed by teacher learners, including related activities for the classroom.

As an ESL teacher and teacher trainer, I have always been certain of the inadequacy of the traditional understanding of English grammar as a set of rules to be memorized and subsequently applied.  Continue Reading →

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Professional Development, Teaching
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Teaching, methodology, and English as an international language: Lessons for one MATESOL program


Written by - Elizabeth O’Dowd, St. Michael’s College

Our small university in northern New England has a 60-year tradition of preparing students to teach English in the USA and around the world. For several decades, Communicative Language Teaching (CLT) has been our stated approach, while we acknowledge that the term itself is rather loosely defined and is perhaps best seen as a methodological umbrella that reflects several key cognitive, affective, and linguistic principles such as student-centered instruction, relevant and comprehensible input, balancing accuracy with fluency, and integration of productive and receptive skills. The CLT approach has allowed for flexibility of teacher styles and adjustments to the perceived needs of our students, both native (NS) and non-native (NNS) English speakers. However, in recent years we have realized that those needs are shifting in a direction that claims English as an International Language,  Continue Reading →

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Teaching
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TESOL program administrators: How do I get the skills to become One?


Written by - Kara Mac Donald, Defense Language Institute & Ketty Reppert, Kansas State University

The need for formalized training for ELT program administrators is a recurring topic in the field of TESOL. Navigating the transition from faculty to administrative authority is rarely covered in TESOL programs, yet many TESOL graduates find themselves offered administrative and/or management positions based on their advanced degrees and classroom experience. Additionally, those who do not have a background in TESOL and would like to complete a postgraduate degree to legitimize their teaching experience, professionalize themselves, and gain management skills to move beyond the classroom find few options in TESOL programs with a management focus.

This article1 discusses the skill set educational program administrators and managers typically have and then compares those to the distinct skill set TESOL program administrators and managers may need.  Continue Reading →

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Professional Development, Training
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The least you should know about the Ojibwa language


Written by - John Steckley, Humber College

Aanii “hello” or Boozhoo (adapted from the French bonjour), reader of this article. This is an article about a language that still has thousands of speakers across Canada, from Quebec west to Alberta. In the more northern of the Ojibwa communities there are still people who are more fluent in their native language than in English. This article concerns such people as students of English.

Perhaps the first important point to keep in mind about the Ojibwa language is that like the names of other Aboriginal peoples and their languages, Ojibwa is the name the settlers gave them, not what they called or call themselves. The people call themselves Anishinaabe (and this includes peoples otherwise often called Chippewa, Mississauga, Odawa, Algonquin and Saulteaux).  Continue Reading →

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Other
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Dynamic assessment of L2 writing


Written by - Alina Filip, International Centre for EAP

“But I did everything you said and my grade is still low…” If you teach writing in an ESL or EAP class is quite likely that you routinely have a handful of students expressing their disappointment at the grades they receive. Teaching academic writing is of particular interest in my teaching setting, an EAP language program for international students who intend to pursue a masters in Education. While process writing is reinforced in my course, I often find that my students are feeling ineffective and frustrated with their writing progress. In order to help them develop their writing skills and nurture their confidence as writers I started using dynamic assessment (DA). In this article, I will try to define what dynamic assessment is and provide a model that could be easily adapted to any level.  Continue Reading →

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Assessment, Writing
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The oral group essay


Written by - Jocelyn Wiley, American Community School of Abu Dhabi

Before I became an English teacher, I was a freelance journalist and a publicist. I wrote almost every day, almost always for publication. I remember working in a newsroom full of reporters, most of them muttering to themselves at their computers as they composed their stories. They would write a sentence, read it aloud, and alter it—or not.

In the classroom, I’d advise my students to read their writing aloud to themselves as they drafted, edited and proofread because that was what I’d learned by observing the professional writers around me. My students, however, were resistant. They thought it was downright crazy to talk out loud to themselves; they believed they could edit perfectly adequately by doing so silently, in their heads; or else they wrote assignments the night before the due date without ever editing their work.  Continue Reading →

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Teaching, Writing
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“Please look at me!”


Written by - Trudy O’Brien, Carleton University

Cross-cultural competence in the ESL classroom

Our understanding of theories of Second Language Acquisition (SLA) and more speci cally teaching English as a Second Language (ESL) has traditionally been grounded in linguistics, psycholinguistics, cognitive psychology, and more recently in pragmatics and speech acts. I would like to argue that in order to do the most effective teaching of ESL, especially in light of the many recent newcomers to Canada, we must also have a stronger sense of the theories and best implementation of cross-cultural communication1.

How often have we been in a classroom, intent on being as helpful and constructive as we can, only to nd that some students are resistant or silent or respond in totally unexpected ways? Even when we fully intend to respect the diverse cultures of our students,  Continue Reading →

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Professional Development, Research, Teaching, Uncategorised
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Insights from cognitive psychology for the ESL classroom


Written by - Jeff Brown, George Brown College

Reflecting on the question of what recent findings or ideas ESL teaching might take from other fields, I suggest that recent insights on learning from the eld of cognitive psychology are worth exploring. Cognitive psychology is the study of the neural processes that underpin mental operations such as memory, attention, and creative problem-solving, among others. It is a broad, multi-disciplinary area of study, and its empirical findings have been drawn upon by a range of other fields. ESL teachers would do well to take notice of some of these findings.

My remarks here draw exclusively upon Brown, Roediger, and McDaniel’s (2014) fascinating book, Make it Stick: The Science of Successful Learning. I highly recommend it to anyone curious about the vast body of research in cognitive psychology.  Continue Reading →

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Other, Professional Development, Teaching, Training
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Literacy lessons


Written by - Rachel Heydon, Emma Cooper, & Annie Tran, Western University

Core Concepts from Multiliteracies for Language Teachers in Contemporary Times

Three nine-year-old boys are sitting on a porch in urban Canada. They are engaged in a multiplayer session of Terraria, a video game that purports to combine the creativity and freedom of a sandbox environment with the strategic requirements of an action game. Each child is holding his own device—an iPod Touch, an iPad, an android tablet. Their eyes are xed on their own screens, sometimes scanning over to the others’, ngers busily pushing and swiping as they build biomes. During the game, one of the boys opens an Internet browser, types in a term from the game, and the children collectively research how to nd an element they want. Through the search results they read blog posts from other players and add their own information to the mix.  Continue Reading →

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Professional Development, Research, Teaching
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The interdisciplinary nature of language teaching


Written by - Julie Kerekes, University of Toronto

The English language classroom is one of only a handful of settings in which language is used and learned simply for the sake of using and learning it. Beyond the classroom, English is used for a myriad of transactional reasons—getting things done—and relational reasons—using language to build relationships. Just as one’s L2 is used beyond the classroom in innumerable disciplines and for in nite purposes, so too can multifarious elds contribute to our approaches to teaching the language. Here I will touch on three that have in uenced my teaching in ways that have been useful to my students in their real lives, beyond the classroom.

The rst is phonetics (i.e., how the human body makes the sounds of a particular language). How can English learners’ awareness of phonological processes enable them to accurately articulate the sounds of English which do not exist in their native languages?  Continue Reading →

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Professional Development, Teaching
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Let’s remember


Written by - Eufemia Fantetti

Years ago, while I still lived in Vancouver, I came across the Italian translation of Ehrmann’s “Desiderata” online and sent it to my father.

He called as soon as the mail arrived. “Thank you for the nice poesia you sending, so beautiful.”

For a moment, I considered letting him think I wrote the poem. I wondered how bad it would be for my karma to be so low as to claim authorship. This mistaken identity situation happened once before by accident, when my parents wrongly assumed I had written our graduating drama class production—a little known play called Oedipus Rex. I was a member of the chorus, dressed in a black, hooded cloak with my face painted to look skeletal. I crawled around the auditorium stage in this harbinger of doom costume with eleven other teenage girls,  Continue Reading →

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Other, Professional Development
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