Exploring ‘unknown worlds’: The lives and careers of non-native speaking teachers of English in Asia

It is a decade since Richards remarked that “How the teacher believes, thinks, acts and reacts is central to educational endeavour, but about the EFL (English as a foreign language) language teacher we know almost nothing” (1997:243), going on to suggest that the world of the teacher of English as a foreign language was terra incognita (1997:251). Regrettably, this remains particularly true of non-native speaking teachers of English working in their own state educational systems. Even within particular countries the experiences of ‘ordinary’ teachers – who are far from ‘ordinary’ in so many ways – is given little prominence in debates about educational innovation and improvement. We hear so much about methods and materials in English language teaching but too little about the teachers who work with these in their classrooms on a daily basis. This paper argues, then, that much greater importance needs to be given to investigating and understanding the contexts of English language teaching in all their variety, within countries and across countries, from the perspective of teachers themselves. It will draw on life history interview data from teachers in Sri Lanka and Thailand to illustrate what may be gained from such research in three important areas: as a means of extending the knowledge base of English language teaching worldwide; as a means of redressing western – non-western imbalances in status, power and prestige within ELT; and as a means of enabling teachers to reflect on their own lives and careers as a means of professional self-realisation and self-empowerment. It is surely time that the voices of classroom teachers were heard more widely, their experiences and perceptions given greater prominence in our professional thinking and this paper hopes to contribute to that process

Book review: Creative universities: reimagining education for global challenges and alternative futures by Anke Schwittay

In Creative Universities: Reimagining Education for Global Challenges and Alternative Futures, Anke Schwittay proposes imaginative strategies to secure radical change to higher education and resist the instrumentalisation and commodification of knowledge, teaching, learning and research. This powerful, bold, vivid and engaging account is an antidote to the challenges of our times and offers a critical-creative-imaginative manifesto for alternative educational and social futures, writes David Hayes

Environmental Responsibility, Active Social Learning, and Political Action

Critical criminology will be applied to a discussion of environmental responsibility and the proposed controversial practice of 'fracking'. First, Green Criminology is discussed, as it seeks to re-direct the traditional focus of criminology onto patterns of crime and forms of criminality often marginalised by dominant research agendas and discourses. Green Criminology seeks to examine behaviours and actions that may not necessarily be deemed criminal, but can potentially or actually cause social and environmental harm. Links will be made throughout between environmental issues, economic development and social and environmental justice. Another key feature of Green Criminology is the way in which it seeks to align with environmental activism, and an account will be given here of ethnographic research into a contemporary environmental protest movement, the 'anti-fracking' movement. In relation to this movement and its potentiality, there will be a particular focus on what is known as active social learning and the ways in which community views can be formalised in order to facilitate a dialogical relationship with representative structures. In the context of environmental responsibility, the case for active social learning as a critical pedagogy is the need to find ways of interacting that bring about necessary changes in situations where there is much we don't know and need interactions with others to find out, with an emphasis on the co-creation of knowledge. This can be seen as vital for the development and success of social/environmental and political movements, as well as for creating and preserving the conditions for genuine participatory democracy

Children as Storytellers

While listening to stories requires making mental illustrations and invites internalization of story structure, the telling of stories demands blending thought and language to the enhancement of both. The rewards for children who learn this art form, retelling favorite stories or creating new ones include an increasingly mature language fluency, expanded vocabulary, a bridge to their own written narratives, and the confidence to speak in front of groups

College Students Reading to Preschoolers

It is not enough to expose future teachers and parents to good literature for children. It is important that they see young children reacting to books being read to them, an opportunity education majors get during preservice training. Non-education majors enrolled in my children\u27s literature class were given, as an alternative to a traditional term paper, a chance to interact with preschoolers through the medium of books. Twenty-one students chose to participate in this project

Book review: Creative universities: reimagining education for global challenges and alternative futures by Anke Schwittay

In Creative Universities: Reimagining Education for Global Challenges and Alternative Futures, Anke Schwittay proposes imaginative strategies to secure radical change to higher education and resist the instrumentalisation and commodification of knowledge, teaching, learning and research. This powerful, bold, vivid and engaging account is an antidote to the challenges of our times and offers a critical-creative-imaginative manifesto for alternative educational and social futures, writes David Hayes. Creative Universities: Reimagining Education for Global Challenges and Alternative Futures. Anke Schwittay. Bristol University Press. 2021