Shaping the Future


Book Description







Critical Issues in Foreign Language Instruction


Book Description

First Published in 1991. This is Volume 22 of the Source Books on Education series. Politically speaking the study of foreign languages and cultures helps maintain a strong competitive position in an increasingly global marketplace. It was hard to imagine in 1957 that the launching of a Soviet rocket would push the United States into its greatest investment ever in foreign language education. As American policy-makers attempted to play catch-up with our brothers and sisters behind the iron curtain, this country infused federal dollars into extensive foreign language teacher training and the creation of new foreign language educational programs. As suddenly as federal support was given, however, so was it taken away; and its withdrawal was responsible for one of the darkest periods in the history of foreign language education in America. Drawing on the expertise of a number of the nation's most experienced and creative foreign language educators, this volume, edited by Ellen S. Silber, addresses some of the crucial problems we face in foreign language education today.




Interactive Language Teaching


Book Description

Teachers and writers describe the approaches and techniques they have incorporated into their own teaching. The paperback edition is designed to help classroom teachers make language classes more participatory and communication oriented. A distinguished group of innovative teachers and writers describe, in a collection of essays, the approaches and techniques they have incorporated into their own teaching.







Successful Spoken English


Book Description

Successful Spoken English demonstrates how spoken learner corpora can be used to define and explore the constituents of successful spoken English. Taking the approach that language learners can speak effectively whilst still using some non-standard forms, this book: Examines databases of transcribed speech from learners at each different CEFR level to analyse what makes a successful speaker of English; Discusses features of communicative competence, including the use of linguistic strategies, organisation of extended stretches of speech, and sensitivity to context; Demonstrates quantitative and qualitative data analysis using corpus tools, looking at areas such as word frequency; Helps to reassess the goals of language learners and teachers, and provides recommendations for teaching practice and for further research. Successful Spoken English is key reading for postgraduate students of TESOL and Applied Linguistics, as well as for pre- and in-service English language teachers.










Second Language Pronunciation Assessment


Book Description

This book is open access under a CC BY licence. It spans the areas of assessment, second language acquisition (SLA) and pronunciation and examines topical issues and challenges that relate to formal and informal assessments of second language (L2) speech in classroom, research and real-world contexts. It showcases insights from assessing other skills (e.g. listening and writing) and highlights perspectives from research in speech sciences, SLA, psycholinguistics and sociolinguistics, including lingua franca communication, with concrete implications for pronunciation assessment. This collection will help to establish commonalities across research areas and facilitate greater consensus about key issues, terminology and best practice in L2 pronunciation research and assessment. Due to its interdisciplinary nature, this book will appeal to a mixed audience of researchers, graduate students, teacher-educators and exam board staff with varying levels of expertise in pronunciation and assessment and wide-ranging interests in applied linguistics.




Foreign Language Teacher Education


Book Description

This is a collection of essays dealing with ESL/EFL/FL teacher education by experienced ESL/EFL/FL teacher educators and student teachers of different cultural backgrounds, and from different countries. The essays cover topics that focus both on the teacher as learner and the learner as teacher. This book recognizes that the language classroom has a particular culture of its own while being part of a broader school culture. As a result, the multi-foci nature of the chapters serve to present the varied and diverse language education needs, programs, and approaches. Contents: The National Foreign Languages: Can we Get from Here to There?, Sophie Jeffries; FLES Teacher Preparation: Competencies, Content and Complexities, Gladys C. Lipton; Journaling: A Path to Reflective Teacher Development, Aleiline J. Moeller; Alternative Assessment in Foreign Second Language: What do we in Foreign Language Know?, Charles R. Hancock; Where are the African American Foreign Language Teachers?, Mark English; Foreign Language Teacher Education in a Professional Development School, Alan Garfinkel and Carol Sosa; Portfolio Design and the Decision Making Process and in Teacher Education, JoAnn Hammadou; Peer Evaluation in In-Service Teacher Education, Jeannette Morris; Professional Development for Japanese Teachers, Yoshiko Saito; Successful Listening Comprehension Strategies: Implications for Foreign Language Teaching and Teacher Training, Rhonda Chipman-Johnson; Emergent L2 Writing in the French Immersion Classroom: Implications for Teacher Education of Where are the Holes in Whole Language?, Stephen Carey and Rishma Dunlop; Multimedia and Foreign Language Teacher: A Humananistic Perspective, Josef Hellebrandt; Culture: How do Teachers Teach it?, Zena Moore.