gi newsletter 2008

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GI

GISIG

NewsletterThe Newsletter of the Global Issues Special Interest Groupeptember 2008 Issue 23

Editorial Claudia Connolly

Coordinator’s Report Mike Solly

Putting the brakes on complexity Bill Templer

Critical Literacy Chris Lima

Education for World Citizenship Charles Merciera

Learning to live our Global Language: Hilary Hunt and Margot Brown

man Rights Education in the Language classroom

ELF and other Fairy Tales Hugh Dellar

Think piece: The Critical Global Citizenship Educator Maureen Ellis

Summary of GI online discussion Maureen Ellis

News from MATUPO primary school, Zimbabwe. Teacher to Teacher project 2008 Cindy Hauert

aching Materials

A poem for Earth Day Iqbal Muhammad

In the Green House Michael Berman

The Key Michael Berman

Endangered Species Yasmeen Lunpe Farid

and Zakia Sarwar

ok Reviews

Constructivi st Strategies for teaching English language learners Bill Templer

The Future Society in a Global Economy Maureen Ellis

The National Geographic, Footpr int Reading Library Claudia Connolly

Price £4.50 Free for GISIG members ISSN: 1026-4310


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EDITORIAL

Dear Readers,

The first publication from the new GISig committee! At last we made it!

Having before received newsletters nonchalantly in my inbox or at the front door, I now

appreciate all the shared work that goes into a publication and I now have quite a new

appreciation of them! Thank you to all our contributors, it’s wonderful getting a first look in

at what sort of work people are doing and the scale of interest within Global Issues, but

moreover the drive and belief , that you will see reiterated in the collection of articles here,

that there is increasingly a place for Global Issues within ELT. Be it through Educational

policy, teacher development or materials.

I’m pleased that we have been able to offer here ‘Think pieces’ as well as teaching materials,enabling the ever important theory into practice. I hope that this will remain the case for

future publications and look forward to receiving new articles and materials for the next

edition which will be published in February.

Just a quick mention concerning the last issue, we think we may have omitted to mention a jointauthorship of an article: Greening an Intensive English Programme, this was written by bothDavid Royal and Kira Davis GISIG Newsletter, Jan 08, Apologies to Kira for the omission of her name.

Claudia Connolly

Newsletter Editor

This newsletter needs you to wri te for it !!!

Contact the Newsletter Editor, Claudia Connolly, if you wish to submit an article or for additionalinformation.

[email protected]

mailto:[email protected]:[email protected]


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Coordinators Report

Dear Colleagues

A very warm welcome to our latest Newsletter which, after a bit of a delay, we hope you will

agree was worth waiting for! We are a largely brand new committee and so we are doing a

number of things for the first time. My debut newsletter task as coordinator of writing this

Coordinator’s report is a pleasurable breeze compared with the task of our new newsletter

editor, Claudia Connolly who has put this together pretty much single-handedly and gained a

bit of technical know-how into the bargain. I hope you agree it is a great start.

GISIG continues to be on online only publication and feedback I have had seems to support

this for both environmental and cost reasons. We are planning, however, to print off some

bound copies which could be offered for sale or for use at key events. We are interested in

your feedback on this policy, and on any other GISIG matters (please send to me or any othercommittee member).

If you have not visited our website recently http://gisig.iatefl.org/ please do have a look. Our

website Manager, Nik Peachey, has created an easily navigable space that is increasingly full

of content of interest to GISIG members. However, a good website is, of course, only as

good as what is on it. Please do send Nik anything that you feel may be of use to other

members. We are also currently looking into the possibility of an interactive element on the

site and at a password protected area specifically for GISIG members.

GISIG is no longer the smallest SIG – not by some way in fact. Membership has never been

higher and is currently at 247. This means that we are now in a position to look seriously athaving some extra events and activities in the programme (in addition to the Pre-Conference

event will be running with Teacher Development SIG at the annual conference in Cardiff next

Spring). It is also, I think, a reflection of the increasing importance that Global Issues have in

our profession, and, in an increasingly globalised world, the key role that teachers can play in

introducing critical and varied views of the world through language teaching.

Not long ago it was the case that the numbers on our discussion list (currently 164) were

higher than GISIG membership itself. While discussion list numbers continue to rise, it is

now clear that many members of GISIG are not members of the discussion list. If you are

able to join, I urge you to do so, as the list is very active (anywhere between about 30 to 100

postings a month) and everyone is welcome to contribute. We recently had a moderated

discussion on Critical Global Citizenship, and we plan to have more in the future. Perhaps

you would like to volunteer to lead such a discussion.

And so….back to newsletter editors. Many of you know (by name if not by site) Esther

Lucas. Following her 90th birthday, Esther decided, twenty five years after many people, to

“retire” from active membership and not renew her subscription to IATEFL. Esther was

central in the production of several SIG newsletters and has been an active member of GISIG

as well as a well known and respected figure in IATEFL generally. She has worked for a

number of NGOs promoting peace and dialogue –and has organised joint workshops that

bridged ethnic and religious groups in Jerusalem. I am sure you will join me in wishingEsther all the best for whatever she next turns her hand to!

IATEFL GISIG Newsletter, Issue 23 (September 2008) 2


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The next Global Issues newsletter is due in February and your contributions are very

welcome.

Warmest regards to you all

Mike Solly

[email protected]


mailto:[email protected]:[email protected]


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Global IssuesSpecial Interest Group GISIG Committee Members

The Global Issues SIG, created in 1995, aims toprovide a forum among ELT practitioners to stimulate

awareness and understanding of global issues, andto encourage the development of global educationwithin language teaching.

Coordinator: Mike Solly

[email protected]

Deputy Coordinator: Maureen [email protected] aims

• To assist in the exchange of information andideas surrounding issues within ELT such aspeace, justice and equality; human rights andsocial responsibility; globalisation and worlddevelopment; social identity; and the role of theEnglish language and English Language

Teaching in the world.

Newsletter Editor: Claudia [email protected]

Discussion List Moderator: Karen [email protected]

• To exchange ideas on integrating peaceeducation, human rights education, developmenteducation and environmental education intolanguage teaching.

Website Manager: Nik [email protected]

• To help members fulfil the two roles a language

teacher has in society: the conveyer of linguisticknowledge and the educator to enable studentsto understand better how the modern worldfunctions.

Membership Officer: Muhammad [email protected]

• To equip learners with the knowledge, skills andvalues which can help them confront both localand global problems.

General Commit tee Member: Paul [email protected]

For more information about the SIG,contact Mike Solly or any other

commit tee member.

For more information about IATEFLcontact:

IATEFL

Darwin CollegeUniversity of KentCanterburyKent, UKTel: + 00 44 (0)1227 824430Fax:+ 00 44 (0)1227 824431

Email: [email protected]

http://www.iatefl.org/

•

To promote a less Eurocentric perspective withinELT.• To provide a counterbalance to the idea of

language teaching as necessarily high tech andprofit generating. For example, we hope toprovide a forum for those developing successfulmethods of teaching large classes with minimalresources - typically working within poorly fundedstate systems in the developing world, where themajority of students learn English.

What we offer

GISIG aims to offer members:• 3 mailings per year (2 newsletters and one

other publication), including a wide range ofarticles and reviews.

• A lively online Discussion List.• GISIG programme at the Annual IATEFL

Conference.• Pre-Annual Conference Events and other

GISIG events.• Preferential rates for attending events.• Website - including electronic newsletter,

articles, contacts list, news of events.


mailto:[email protected]:[email protected]:[email protected]:[email protected]:[email protected]:[email protected]:[email protected]:[email protected]:[email protected]:[email protected]:[email protected]:[email protected]:[email protected]:[email protected]


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Putting the brakes on complexityEverything should be made as simple as possible, but not s impler. –A. Einstein

By Bill Templer (University of Malaya)

In this article I discuss the need for a leaner, simpler English and will develop four theses:

Say it plainer: downsizing discourses in L1 A simpler, ‘satisficing’ English for most ELLs Voice of America Special English: a unique neglected resource Class matters

Thesis 1. Say it plainer: downs izing discourses in L1 Talking about English native-speaker youngsters in American schools, William DuBay(2008a) recently noted:

We face an enormous task in the educational/academic world, where good writing isstill equated with complexity. In the early years, especially, progress is equated withdifficulty. Students in the upper grades, however, never learn how to put on thebrakes and tone down the complexity to meet the needs of different audiences.

This notion of putting on the brakes and toning down complexity for native-speakercommunication at levels average native speakers find comfortable to grasp is at the core ofthe Plain Language movement in the U.S., Great Britain, Holland and elsewhere. The PlainLanguage Association International is increasingly active across the globe(http://www.plainlanguagenetwork.org ). Innovative ways to ‘downsize discourses’ are alsocentral to the work of the recently founded Simplification Centre at the University of Reading( http://simplificationcentre.org.uk ), an exciting initiative.

Plain language discourse targets its audience, at their level of reading easei -- for clarity and

comprehensibility. The principle here is that ordinary people have a right to communicate –and be communicated to -- in language they understand, at their comfortable level ofcomprehensible input, their authentic literacy.

Texamen in Holland (www.texamen.com ) has research indicating that some 50% of Dutch

population has a maximum comfort zone in reading proficiency of about 8th grade, equivalentto B1 level in the Common European Framework scale. In many of our discourses, we swimin a world of texts at C1 academic level, even higher. Yet Texamen contends that it ispossible to communicate almost the information in our society at A2 level. The implications ofthat are far-reaching( http://www.texamen.com/index.php?id=11 ). Dubay (2008b) notes in a similar vein:

For a long time, we have known that the average reader in the U.S. is an adult oflimited reading ability. Almost 50 percent of adults read below the 9th-grade level.That's 104 million people. Some 21 percent, 45 million, read below the 3rd-gradelevel. By addressing reading skills, plain language gains specific and measurable

goals.


http://www.plainlanguagenetwork.org/http://simplificationcentre.org.uk/http://www.texamen.com/http://www.texamen.com/index.php?id=11http://www.texamen.com/index.php?id=11http://www.texamen.com/http://simplificationcentre.org.uk/http://www.plainlanguagenetwork.org/


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Mazur (2000) provides an overview of the Plain Language research & practice community.

Thesis 2. A simpler, ‘satisficing’ English for most ELLs (English Language Learners)Putting the brakes on complexity is also relevant for students learning English as a linguafranca (ELF). It does not entail ‘dumbing down’ but coming to respect what ‘reading ease’

(Flesch-Kincaid scales)

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and readability can mean for our less privileged, ordinary students(Dubay, 2004). A downshifted leaner model geared to about 1,500-1,800 word families as a‘satisficing’ target is a more reasonable level of real proficiency for many average learners,especially for those of us teaching low-income learners, often “in difficult circumstances”(Michael West, 1960). West (1955) repeatedly stressed a key point: “A vocabulary of 2,000words is good enough for anything, and more than one needs for most things” (p. 70). Thisstrong lexical base can be repeated and recycled until its literally in the learner’s bones,mastered and ‘over-learned’ until it becomes a tool for semantic ‘leverage,’ a minimalistmodel to say almost anything. My suggestion: get learners to that point in ELF proficiency,and then they can work autonomously, either staying at that plateau and deepening theirmastery of it, or continuing on to more advanced levels largely on their own, mainly throughextensive free reading (Krashen, 2004a; 2004b). Krashen (1997, p. 20) thinks that is a

“reasonable goal.”

This can lay a super-solid foundation that most students never really construct as they rushup the slopes of complexity, memorizing vocabulary of ever lower frequency and greaterdifficulty. And students can, through such extensive reading and listening, learn almost‘subconsciously’, to write better, speak better (ibid.; Krashen, 2004a). Research in theInternational Journal of Foreign Language Teaching (http://www.ijflt.com ) substantiates thishypothesis, as does much work reviewed in Krashen (2004a).

Thesis 3. Voice of America Special English: a unique neglected resourceOne time-tested simpler mode of English -- both for pre-intermediate-level learners and more

proficient students who want “recreational” reading to really strengthen foundations -- is VOASpecial English (SE), launched in 1959 on shortwave (now online:http://www.voaspecialenglish.com ). It is a power tool for a ‘leaner’ comprehensible input atpre-intermediate level.

SE works with a compact vocabulary of 1,500 ‘high-frequency’ headwords, available in aWord Book online. Sentences average 14 words. There are few adjectives, almost no idioms,with generally one ‘proposition’ per sentence. Syntax is transparent. There is substantialsyntactic parallelism and lexical repetition, without being repetitious. The speed of spoken SEis 90 words per minute, about 25% slower than 'normal' speaking tempo, good for listeningcomprehension and for really learning pronunciation. As Shelley Gollust (Special English

chief) recently commented: "It’s almost like Hemingway. You can write something easy anddirect, and it’s more powerful that way” (Goodman, 2007). It is my view that Special English,made active for speaking and writing, can serve as a reasonable proficiency target for manyaverage ordinary learners. Students can continue to deepen their control at that level, formost learners and communicative needs, it is enough.

A 30-minute daily broadcast provides 10 minutes of world news, followed by two featurereports (20 minutes) in 14 categories, for listening and simultaneous reading. Learners canfind hundreds of articles, can browse, self-select what interests them, all at a verycomfortable reading level. It is a good springboard for “free voluntary Web-browsing”(Krashen, 2007), inside the SE site.

The SE archive, going back to January 2001, now has over 5,000 separate feature textsonline, many with MP3 audio. This comprises something pretty close to what Krashen


http://www.ijflt.com/http://www.voaspecialenglish.com/http://www.voaspecialenglish.com/http://www.ijflt.com/


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envisions as a “library of print and aural comprehensible input” (1997, p. 44). Moreover, it isexpanded by 14-15 new texts per week. SE online is a vast storehouse of “authentic” (ibid.,p. 34) texts for extensive reading and listening. It can also be utilized for “narrow reading”(ibid., pp. 31-32) focused on a particular topic area (like health or economics), as well as‘narrow listening’ (Krashen, 1996). Many feature reports are a kind of ‘ESP Lite,’ adding

technical vocabulary where needed. The archives now contains more than 350 easilyunderstandable articles on health and medicine, for example, and in excess of 350 featurestories on business and economics, and much else. Special English is also a window onto American life and culture, present and past, and what’s happening around the world.

Surprisingly, there is no published research on VOA Special English, and few students orteachers in Southeast Asia, for example, have ever heard of it (Templer, 2009). No knownresearch is ongoing in the PRC, Thailand, Malaysia or Indonesia (personal communications,RELO Damon Anderson [Beijing] and RELO Michael Rudder [Jakarta], May 2008).Moreover, the VOA is prohibited by congressional law from broadcasting inside the US, soSE is unknown to many ESL learners stateside. Shelley Gollust & others are suggesting theneed to change that law (Smith-Mundt Act 1948).

Though run by the U.S. government, this is not a propaganda channel. It's coverage is quitebalanced. Biographies, for example, have included Margaret Sanger, Billie Holiday, KurtVonnegut, Bob Dylan (http://www.voanews.com/specialenglish/2008-06-08-voa2.cfm ).Teachers can guide students to learn to read such media texts ‘against the grain,’ becauseideology – “meaning in the service of power” (Thompson, 1990, p. 8) – is always there,waiting for critical literacy strategies to demask it (Richardson, 2006). My view is that VOASpecial English is one of the few good things the American government does; ditto for theirPlain Language site (http://www.plainlanguage.gov ).

For starters, recommend to your students to do ‘free voluntary reading’ with VOA Special

English online 25-30 minutes a day, at their leisure. Weave it into your mosaic of multimodalteaching materials. Engage in some empirical action research on its value, how studentsrespond. I’d like to see some probing mini-case studies of learners and their perceptions(Stake, 1995).

Simple English elsewhere Another possible site for free listening and reading is http://simpleenglishnews.com/. It offersvery short texts on daily news, maintained by an American based in Budapest. The SimpleWikipedia is yet another online source for easier material to read, growing by the week.These leaner text bases can serve as a springboard for ‘autonomous learning’ and newpathways in self-study and a more social ‘constructivist’ toolkit of independent strategies inacquiring ELF (Reyes & Vallone, 2008). Students who wish can also try their hand readingand listening to the regular VOA broadcasting, in normal American media English. Forextensive listening at lower intermediate level, another strong site is http://www.eslpod.com,run by one of Krashen's associates, Jeff McQuillan.

Thesis 4. Class matters An easier acquisition target for average learners of ELF is particularly relevant in a worldwhere only a small percentage of kids & adults have the socioeconomic privilege to acquire ahigher proficiency level in ELF, and gaps grow ever wider between the haves and have-notsacross a shrinking globe. Money talks. Money talks English. Class matters in classroomsacross the planet. Dave Hill (2003) notes: “Those who can afford to buy clean water don’t dieof thirst or diarrhea. In schooling, those with the cultural and economic capital to secure

positional advantage in a local school quasi-market do so. Those who can’t, suffer theconsequences.”


http://www.voanews.com/specialenglish/2008-06-08-voa2.cfmhttp://www.plainlanguage.gov/http://simpleenglishnews.com/http://www.eslpod.com/http://www.eslpod.com/http://simpleenglishnews.com/http://www.plainlanguage.gov/http://www.voanews.com/specialenglish/2008-06-08-voa2.cfm


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In a class-sensitive pedagogy for TESL/TEFL, we try to assess what the impact of thesesocioeconomic and cultural disparities may be among our own students, and why they maybe uninterested in books, resistant to over-disciplined instruction, unmotivated to learn muchL2, and from social backgrounds where a “highly interiorized literacy” (Ong, 1982) and

culture of reading are not part of the life worlds of ordinary working families. In what waysdoes our own “highly interiorized” literacy distort how we perceive the literacy of Others, inparticular working-class learners from the social majorities in the Global South? Often theycontrol and love a rich oral culture, while they are “less influenced than mainstream middle-class groups by essay-text literacy and the school systems that perpetuate it” (Gee, 2008,pp. 73-74). Educational equity means respecting the authentic realness of their experienceand life worlds (Reyes & Vallone, 2008), their basic dignity.

We need to build a foundation for working-class pedagogies of ELF, within curricula ofsolidarity with our students. The work of the Center for Working-Class Studies (CWCS) atYoungstown State University in Ohio is very relevant in this connection.

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References

DuBay, W. (2004). The principles of readability. Cosa Mesa/CA: Impact Informationhttp://www.eric.ed.gov/ERICDocs/data/ericdocs2sql/content_storage_01/0000019b/80/1b/bf/46.pdf (accessed 10 June 2008).

DuBay, W. (2008a). What is plain language? PlainLanguage listserv, Yahoogroups, 30 May. DuBay, W. (2008b). Comment on article. PlainLanguage listserv, Yahoo groups, 7 June.Gee, J.P. (2008). Social linguistics and literacies: Ideology in discourses. 3rd ed. London:

Routledge.Goodman, J. D. (2007). Easy does it: Language made simple. Columbia News Service,

November 11.http://jscms.jrn.columbia.edu/cns/2007-11-13/goodman-simpleenglish (accessed 9 June2008).

Hill, D. (2003). Global neo-liberalism, the deformation of education and resistance. Journal forCritical Education Policy Studies 1(1).http://www.jceps.com/?pageID=article&articleID=7%3E (accessed 5 June 2008).

Krashen, S. D. (1996). The case for narrow listening. System 24(1), pp. 97-100.Krashen, S. D. (1997). Foreign language education. The easy way. Culver City/CA: Language

Education Associates.Krashen, S. D. (2004a). The power of reading. 2nd ed. Westport/CT: Heinemann.Krashen, S. D. (2004b). Applying the comprehension hypothesis: some suggestions.

International Journal of Foreign Language Teaching 1(1), pp. 21-29.http://www.tprstories.com/ijflt/IJFLTWinter041.pdf (accessed 11 June 2008). Krashen, S. D. (2007). Free voluntary web-surfing. International Journal of Foreign Language

Teaching 3(1), pp. 2-9. http://www.tprstories.com/ijflt/IJFLTJuly07.pdf (accessed 10June 2008).

Mazur, B. (2000). Revisiting Plain Language. Technical Communication 47(2).http://www.plainlanguage.gov/whatisPL/history/mazur.cfm (accessed 10 June 2008).

Ong, R. (1982). Orality and literacy: The technologizing of the word. London: Metheun.Reyes, S. A., & Vallone, T. L. (2008). Constructivist strategies for teaching English language

learners. Thousand Oaks/CA: Corwin.Richardson, J. E. (2006). Analysing newspapers: an approach from critical discourse analysis.

Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan.

Stake, R. E. (1995). The art of case study research. Thousand Oaks/CA: Sage.Templer, B. (2009). Discovering VOA Special English. Forthcoming.


http://www.eric.ed.gov/ERICDocs/data/ericdocs2sql/content_storage_01/0000019b/80/1b/bf/46.pdfhttp://www.eric.ed.gov/ERICDocs/data/ericdocs2sql/content_storage_01/0000019b/80/1b/bf/46.pdfhttp://jscms.jrn.columbia.edu/cns/2007-11-13/goodman-simpleenglishhttp://www.jceps.com/?pageID=article&articleID=7%3Ehttp://www.tprstories.com/ijflt/IJFLTWinter041.pdfhttp://www.tprstories.com/ijflt/IJFLTJuly07.pdfhttp://www.plainlanguage.gov/whatisPL/history/mazur.cfmhttp://www.plainlanguage.gov/whatisPL/history/mazur.cfmhttp://www.tprstories.com/ijflt/IJFLTJuly07.pdfhttp://www.tprstories.com/ijflt/IJFLTWinter041.pdfhttp://www.jceps.com/?pageID=article&articleID=7%3Ehttp://jscms.jrn.columbia.edu/cns/2007-11-13/goodman-simpleenglishhttp://www.eric.ed.gov/ERICDocs/data/ericdocs2sql/content_storage_01/0000019b/80/1b/bf/46.pdfhttp://www.eric.ed.gov/ERICDocs/data/ericdocs2sql/content_storage_01/0000019b/80/1b/bf/46.pdf


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Thompson, J. B. (1990). Ideology and modern culture. Cambridge: Polity Press.West, M.. (1955). Learning to read a foreign language. London: Longmans Green.West, M. (1960). Teaching English in difficult circumstances. London: Longmans, Green.

1 A very user-friendly utility for calculating ‘reading ease’ and readability grade level is:

http://www.online-utility.org/english/readability_test_and_improve.jsp (accessed 10 June2008).1 Readability is discussed here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Readability ; Bill Dubay’s websiteis instructive, strong newsletter: http://www.impact-information.com/ (accessed 11 June2008).1 See the excellent material at the CWCS, Youngstown State University:http://www.centerforworkingclassstudies.org (accessed 10 May 2008).

Bio: Bill Templer is a Chicago-born educator with research interests in Englishas a lingua franca and cri tical applied linguis tics. He has taught on a lot ofperipheries, now at the Faculty of Education, Universit i Malaya , KL

[email protected]

Critical Literacy and Global Citizenship Education

By Chris Lima

National stereotypes, slavery and abolition, AIDS and women, news and the media,folk tales, literature and global awareness. The items in this apparently disjointed listhave many things on common: all topics are approached from a critical perspective

that questions given assumptions and tries to look at these issues from differentangles. All of them were intended to be discussed in English language lessons anddebated by language learners with their teachers taking the role of debate facilitators.Moreover, they are all topics included in a set of online materials written by Englishlanguage teachers from Brazil and Peru with no previous experience as materialwriters, but with large experience as educators.

For teachers already engaged in global citizenship education and globalissues bringing such topics into the language classroom is no big news at all. The UKDepartment for Children, Schools and Family (DsES) published the curriculum andstandards guidance document called Developing the Global Dimension in the SchoolCurriculum back in March 2005 stating the importance global education,


http://www.online-utility.org/english/readability_test_and_improve.jsphttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Readabilityhttp://www.impact-information.com/http://www.centerforworkingclassstudies.org/mailto:[email protected]:[email protected]://www.centerforworkingclassstudies.org/http://www.impact-information.com/http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Readabilityhttp://www.online-utility.org/english/readability_test_and_improve.jsp


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The global dimension incorporates the key concepts of global citizenship,conflict resolution, diversity, human rights, interdependence, social justice,sustainable development and values and perceptions. It explores theinterconnections between the local and the global. It builds knowledge andunderstanding, as well as developing skills and attitudes.

However, for most teachers and learners living in countries and societies thatare just emerging from decades of dictatorship, such as some countries in Latin America, or countries in which, for political or religious reasons, controversial andpolemical issues are still taboo or utterly forbidden, the idea of discussing social justice and responsibility, access to information, and cultural representations in theclassroom is a huge step towards a new understanding of education. That Englishlanguage teachers have embraced such ideas and concepts of their role aseducators, going beyond the teaching of linguistic codes and the four skills, issomething that shows us how intrinsically connected the ideas of education andsocial and professional responsibility are.

The political nature of education According to a document published by the Development Education Centre,Birmingham (2003)

Education is inherently political as it involves values and goals in relation tosuch fundamental questions as ‘What kinds of individual and society we aretrying to shape?’ These questions cannot be answered in a factual andtechnical way because they are questions of opinion, value and ideology andthere are inevitably disagreements and conflicts. Hence they are political.

Topics such as the ones chosen by the teachers engaged in our project areeminently political not only because of their very polemical nature but also becausethe way texts and contexts are presented to students. The critical literacy approachto global citizenship education proposes the reading of texts in the ‘context of social,historic, and power relations, not solely as the product or intention of an author’(Cervetti, 2001). Furthermore, learners are invited to question the positions advancedby texts, the dominant representations and the interests served by suchrepresentations and readings. Teachers and learners ask themselves theperspectives voiced and silenced in texts, their own perspectives of the topic and areinvited to reflect on the connections of such perspectives with their own local/global

context. For example, in the material about slavery and abolition (Walker, 2008)before and after reading texts in favour and against slavery, students are invited todiscuss questions such as,

• What is your surname? Where are you from?• Do you think your ancestors were slaves, or slave-owners or neither or both?• What were the basic claims (about human beings) of the anti-slavery

movement in England? How did they differ from what was ‘the receivedwisdom’ at the time?

• What cultural and social aspects have been heavily influenced by the contactbetween European/American and African civilisations?

• How different would the societies in all the continents involved in the slaverytrade be nowadays if this had not happened?



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• How would you define slavery today?• Do you have contact with actions or attitudes that you could call ‘slavery’ in

your daily life (family, work, school)?• Do you think there are socially accepted forms of slavery in your community?

If so, think of which they are and why it is so; if not, think of whether they ever

existed and when they were abolished.

Global issues and English language teachingEnglish language teaching has historically suffered from lack of content. Focus ongrammar and lexis and on methodologies, such as the communicative approach,have deprived language teaching of a subject matter and contributed to theperception that language is something dissociated of real life. The closer to itstudents would get in the classroom would be a role play of a tourist in a restaurantor going shopping in an English-speaking country. How real it is for the majority oflanguage learners in our times around the world is something highly debateable, tosay the least. What the critical literacy approach to ELT education proposes is tointegrate language learning to the discussion of global/local issues in order to helplearners to

• construct their own answers to these issues;• establish non-judgemental attitudes toward others;• develop a local and global sense of relationship;• respect (yourself and others ) and be respected;• understand who we are and our places in the world;• survive uncertainty and complexity and be OK• prompt change within;• learn about others and about themselves.

According to Maley (1992),English language teaching has been bedevilled with three perennial problems:the gulf between classroom activities and real life; the separation of ELT frommainstream educational ideas; the lack of content as its subject matter. Bymaking global issues a central core of EFL, these problems would be to someextent resolved.

We would add that by making critical literacy the approach to citizenship education,we are also giving to English language teaching the educational value that it has lacked,since we are helping learners to see world issues from a perspective that enables them to

examine their own values and attitudes and to analyse the values and attitudes that arebrought to them by texts – written, visual and oral. We are helping teachers and learners tomake informed choices and responsible decisions in a world that is increasinglyinterdependent in economic, cultural and linguistic terms.

The critical literacy in ELT projectThe project started with the Hornby Summer School Brazil 2006, has been supportedby the Hornby Trust and the British Council and was one of the winners of the 2007British Council Innovation Awards. The overall aims of the critical literacy in ELTproject are to expand the knowledge and understanding of the implications of criticalliteracy in ELT education; to develop a strategy for research and dissemination within

existing teacher networks and to publish relevant ELT sample materials for different



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levels and age groups, produced by educators on topics related to local/global issuesand grounded in their own teaching contexts.

To know more about and get engaged in the critical literacy in ELT project, please

visit the British Council Brazil ELT Community at http://www.britishcouncil.org.br/elt

References

Carter, C., Harber, C. & Serf, J. (2003). Towards Ubuntu: critical teacher education fordemocratic citizenship in South Africa and England. Birmingham: Development Education

Centre.

Cervetti, G., Pardales, M.J. & Damico, J.S. (2001). A Tale of Differences: Comparing theTraditions, Perspectives, and Educational Goals of Critical Reading and Critical Literacy. Reading Online, http://www.readingonline.org Posted April 2001. International Reading Association, Inc.

Department for Children, Schools and Family. (2005) Developing the Global Dimension inthe School Curriculum. DfES 1409-2005DOC-EN http://www.teachernet.gov.uk/publications

Maley, A. (1992) Global Issues in ELT, Practical English Teaching, (13 (2): 73.

Walker, S. (2008). Looking at Slavery and Abolition. CL in ELT Materials.http://www.britishcouncil.org.br/elt

Bio

Chris Lima is the coordinator of ELT and literature projects developed inpartnership with the British Council. She is based in Brazil and her maininterests are English literature, teacher education and [email protected]


http://www.britishcouncil.org.br/elthttp://www.readingonline.org/http://www.teachernet.gov.uk/publicationshttp://www.britishcouncil.org.br/eltmailto:[email protected]:[email protected]://www.britishcouncil.org.br/elthttp://www.teachernet.gov.uk/publicationshttp://www.readingonline.org/http://www.britishcouncil.org.br/elt


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42ND

ANNUAL INTERNATIONAL IATEFL CONFERENCE

AND EXHIBITION

ANNUAL INTERNATIONAL IATEFL CONFERENCE

AND EXHIBITION

http://www.iatefl.org/http://www.iatefl.org/IATEFL holds its International Annual Conference & Exhibition every spring, which is

attended by around 1500 ELT professionals from 70+ countries. It involves a 3.5 -4-day

programme of over 300 talks, workshops and symposiums and, in addition to giving delegates

a chance to meet leading theorists and writers, and exchange ideas with fellow professionals

from all sectors of ELT, it enables them to see the latest ELT publications and services in a

large resources exhibition involving around 70 ELT-related exhibitors.

The 43rd IATEFL Annual International Conference and Exhibition will be in Cardiff 31st

March - 4th April, at the City Hall and Museum.

Global Issues and Teacher Development Pre conference event

Cardiff 2009

That wouldn’t work for me, would it?

If you are reading this you are obviously someone who believes in your own development and

probably the development of those around you. Perhaps you go to conferences, join teachers’

associations, read methodology books, take training courses and all these no doubt lead to

your increased awareness of what it is to be a teacher, but do the ideas proposed always fit

with the reality of your teaching life and/or your beliefs about teaching?


http://www.iatefl.org/http://www.iatefl.org/http://www.iatefl.org/


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In this day-long workshop we will be looking at what we can do about the gap between the

ideas that we come into contact with and the reality of our day to day teaching and as such

will look at, among other ideas, course book design, diversity, geopolitical realities, and

dealing with large classes. We will try to come up with individualised approaches towards

dealing with methodogical and pedagogical input that mean we can each take what is most

appropriate for ourselves from such input.

These approaches should not only help us benefit maximally from the ensuing conference, but

also beyond, and the close cooperation of an all day workshop will, we are sure, form strong

bonds with the other participants which will leave us in great shape for the rest of the

conference.



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Education for World Citizens

By Charles Mercieca, Ph.D.President

International Association of Educators for World PeaceDedicated to United Nations Goals of Peace Education,

Environmental Protection, Human Rights & Disarmament

Professor Emeritus, Alabama A&M University

Education is derived from two Latin words: e (out of) and duco (lead). Hence,education is a process that is meant to lead people hopefully from ignorance intoknowledge, from darkness into light, and from confusion into clarity of mind.However, people could be led the other way round. It all depends on who is the

educator and on the willingness people have to see things genuinely into trueperspective.

Seneca’s Educational Philosophy

In the early first century A.D., Roman philosopher Seneca was very muchconcerned with the welfare of all people. He believed that a good education mayeventually bring joy, comfort and satisfaction to every human being withoutexception. He was convinced that this was possible through a good education, whichenables everyone to view the entire world and say, as he stressed: “Omnis orbsterrarium patria mea est – The whole world is my native land.”

To this end, Seneca stated that a true and meaningful education is one thatwould prove to be beneficial to everyone across every continent. Needless to say, ifthe entire world is, indeed, my own native land then I must be a genuine worldcitizen. Since then, this philosophy of education has been implemented merely on afew regional areas but never on a global scale.

A recent example of this is the European Union where people of variouscountries in Western Europe could travel to other countries without a passport. Theycould also work anywhere they want in these nations like each one of them was justone’s native land. However, for the past 2,000 years, Seneca’s concept of educationfor world citizens was never put into operation.

As a matter of fact, it was never taken seriously on a global scale, whichexplains why we have had, and we are still having, so many conflicts, struggles andwars, where everyone has been a loser and no one a winner. We may begin tounderstand why we have so many nations where we find people living still in abjectpoverty, deprived of all the basic essentials of life.

In order to understand where we stand with each other at this stage of history,we need to bring to our mind the words which former US President Dwight

Eisenhower told the US Congress in his farewell address. He reminded them saying:“Remember that all people of all nations want peace, only their government wants



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war.” This good and peace-oriented US President also revealed great concern aboutthe weapons industry and the military industrial complex, which he viewed as “two dangerous elements that, unless brought under control, may serve as the destructionof civilization the way we know it today.”

Evaluation of our Priorit ies

Over the next 50 years which followed, the words of this US President provedto be prophetic. Several nations, headed by the United States, emerged to becomeliterally monsters of our earthly community. Such nations put the bulk of their moneyon the manufacture and sales of more and more weapons and the waging of moreand more wars. As a result, the infrastructure of many of our cities has beendestroyed with tens of thousands, amounting to millions, becoming homeless. As aconsequence, these people have been also deprived of the necessities of life, whichwould include food and medicine.

Besides, millions end up being refugees living like discarded furniture for allpractical purposes. To turn insult into injury, most government officials who haveenriched themselves through the manufacture and sales of weapons and through thewaging of wars, view these lethal weapons and disastrous actions as a “necessity tosafeguard the lives of their people!” We need only one ounce of common sense torealize that people starve to death and die of manifold illnesses primarily becausetheir respective governments do not really care about them.

Education for world citizens instills in us great love and respect not only for ourrelatives and friends but for all people around us and across the world. This kind ofeducation enables us to feel responsible not just for the members of our immediatefamily but also for every single human being on earth. This type of education enablesus to see all people in the entire world as members of one same body: humanity. Ifsomeone smashes one of our toes, our entire body will immediately enter into anagony of pain, not just the one smashed toe alone.

Most governments are somewhat suspicious of the idea of promoting aneducation for world citizens. The more belligerent countries identify this kind ofeducation with peace, which is viewed as their enemy. Since they make plenty ofmoney through the manufacture and sales of weapons and the promotion of wars, asexplained earlier, they view peace as a threat to all that “blood” money they made

and they are still making.

In fact, if we were to analyze carefully the foreign policies of belligerentnations, headed by the United States, when their government’s representatives visitgovernments of the poorest nations especially, they tend to offer them mostlyweapons and military equipment. All that these nations need desperately is food fortheir hungry, medicine for their sick, and homes for their homeless. It seems quiteobvious in many ways that those government officials, who try to sell or buy weaponsand to assist in the waging of more wars, may be viewed with virtual certainly to bethoroughly corrupt.

Proper Exercise of Our Responsibilities



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The New Webster Dictionary of the English Language describes criminal as“guilty of a crime, wicked, atrocious, villainous, and felonious.” When we procureelements, which lead to the destruction of the infrastructure of cities and entirenations, along with the merciless massacre of thousands and millions of innocentpeople, we certainly qualify to be viewed as criminals in the strict sense of the word.

After all, we are fully responsible for the horrible and atrocious disaster of such acrime. Crimes of this nature would not have been possible if education for worldcitizens was fully in operation.

The Seneca approach to education on a global scale is still feasible, eventhough we would have to do plenty of home work to this end. As we already know, allthe mess we have in this world originates mostly from a hand-full of people we havein the government who proceed to abuse their power with no remorse whatsoever. All we need to do is to prepare a future generation that is properly equipped toreplace hatred with love and war with peace. Besides, we need to instill in our futuregeneration the idea that the best gift we could give on earth is to enable people to

live in peace with themselves and with others.

We also need to imbue the young generation especially with virtues such asprudence, meekness, patience, perseverance, kindness and detachment from thematerial things of this world. We need also to equip them with a philosophy thatwould view the spiritual and physical strength of people as a top priority. Like St.Catherine of Siena used to say: “ Anima sana in corpora sano – A healthy mind isfound in a healthy body.” When the mind is healthy, it will be able to put prioritieswhere they belong, especially in relation to all human beings.

Since the concept of education for world citizens is vital to the survival of thehuman race as we know it today, we should not hesitate any longer to startimplementing it in our classrooms. No permission or approval is ever required in lifefrom anyone when it comes to doing something that is good and fully beneficial to allhuman beings around the world.

Charles Mercieca, Ph.D. President of the International Association of Educators for World Peace.

Learning to live our global language: Human Rights Education in the language

classroom

By Hilary Hunt and Margot Brown

“ Dignity and justice for all of us”



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This year is the 60th anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR). It is

an important occasion to ensure that our rights are a living reality - that they are known,

understood and enjoyed by us all.

The Preamble to the UDHR reminds us that “ every individual and every organ of society,

keeping this Declaration constantly in mind, shall strive by teaching and education to

promote respect for these rights and freedoms …” (authors´ emphasis). Education is a

human right in itself and learning about our human rights and developing appropriate skills

for action are part of that right. Such learning is human rights education. As an educator, you

fulfil people’s right to education. This article is a contribution to supporting teachers in the

English language classroom to include human rights in their teaching.

“As a teacher of English, having the chance to explore how a human rights

education can be experienced and really lived in a language classroom setting

gave me a whole new perspective of my role as a teacher, a teacher who does

not only lead an English learning process but also contributes to develop social

awareness of how issues such as freedom of expression, equality of

opportunity and non-discrimination can be dealt with in a language class,

especially in a country where the violation of human rights is simply

unbelievable.”

Martha, September 2006

Spanish-speaking teacher of English in South America1

What is the Universal Declaration of Human Rights?

The UDHR was one of the first documents published by the newly formed United Nations, in

1948. Reaffirmed repeatedly by all nations of the world, the UDHR and its core values -

inherent human dignity, justice, non-discrimination, equality, fairness and universality - apply

to everyone, everywhere, always.

The UDHR is a living document that matters not only in times of conflict and in societies

suffering repression, but also in addressing social injustice and achieving human dignity in

times of peace in established democracies.

1 student in my English language classroom at the University of Belize 2002/3 (HH)



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The UDHR has inspired more than 60 human rights instruments, including legally binding

treaties. It is the most translated document in the world – it is now available in over 335

languages.

What are human rights?

Human rights are ours because we are human. They belong to all human beings regardless

of race, colour, sex, language, religion, political or other opinion, national or social origin,

property, birth or any other status. Human rights are

• Universal – because they belong to all people everywhere.

• Inherent - because every human being is born with human rights.

• Inalienable – because no-one can take our rights away. We always have all our rights

even when we don’t know about them or they are being denied or violated.

• Indivisible – because we cannot choose to respect some rights and disregard others.

• Interdependent - because respect for one right improves respect for other rights;

denying one right threatens other rights.

As Katarina Tomasevski, the former UN Special Rapporteur on the Right to Education,

2003, said:

“Education ... is the key to unlocking other human rights”.

What are the benefits of integrating human rights education into my language

classroom?

On Human Rights Day, 10 December 2004, Kofi Annan, then United Nations Secretary-

General, said “Human rights education is much more than a lesson in schools or a theme for

the day; it is a process to equip people with the tools they need to live lives of security and

dignity.”

If the aim in language teaching/learning is to promote constructive communication and

develop life skills, human rights education is more than relevant. Human rights are the core

values uniting us as members of the human race; in the language classroom they provide a

powerful tool to learn the skills to live together peacefully in our shared world. We all have

the right to know all our rights, to understand the responsibilities inherent in respecting them.



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Human rights education is values-based education, based on the over-arching

authority of over 60 years of international commitments to education and human

rights. All UN member States are legally obliged, through international treaty, to

educate all people within their borders about human rights.

UNESCO puts human rights education at the heart of quality education. UNESCO’s

international Linguapax project, started in 1987, considers that:

“Education is a fundamental part of the process by which individuals are socialised,

thereby acquiring values, attitudes and behavioural patterns. By presenting the learner

with communicative practices different from his/her own, language teaching offers an

excellent means of promoting values and representations favouring the development of a

culture of peace.”

(Starkey 2002, p14)

Rights literacy requires knowledge and understanding of human rights concepts,

instruments, organizations, people, realities and remedies. It requires both curriculum

content and the learning environment to be built on respect for human rights values and

principles.

I experimented with integrating human rights education into my TESOL classrooms in

India and Belize. Despite my considerable human rights experience and familiarity with

the concepts, documents and arguments, I had to learn how people would react in the

classroom and how to successfully use the subject matter at the appropriate level. I

started small – with language and topics of human interest. “What is an ideal woman?”

stimulated intense and hilarious discussion among husbands and wives in rural Tamil

Nadu. I then based my approach more explicitly on specific rights and freedoms in the

UDHR: right to equality and freedom in dignity and rights (Article 1); freedom from

discrimination (Article 2); freedom from degrading treatment or punishment (Article 5);

freedom of opinion and expression (Article 19), freedom to access information without

interference (Article 19); right to education (Article 26.1); right to education about human

rights and for world understanding, tolerance and friendship (Article 26.2).

Hilary Hunt



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Human rights education can enhance the acquisition of formal language skills – speaking,

listening, reading, writing, comprehension and analysis. Language learning and human

rights are both avenues to explore the connections between people and places. Critical

thinking, making informed decisions, growing self-esteem, confident self-expression, taking

responsibility for personal behaviour, valuing diversity, caring about others, are a few of

many other positive outcomes.

Overall, human rights education enriches the teaching/learning experience in both multi- and

mono-cultural language classrooms because it:

• Is a model for inclusion and constructive cooperation

• Uses a common language of global values to understand the context and complexity

of specific global issues in an uncertain world• Uses real-life experience and situations to develop language

• Creates awareness and appreciation of similarities and differences – of opinion, of

experience, of aspiration, of opportunity

• Puts human rights into practice to benefit people

• Motivates learners

“I have been working here with taboo topics and those dealing with human rights, and

I'm nicely surprised because I have seen that what I learnt from you has been very useful

in my classes. Now the students are more reflective about their role in our society.”

Jorge, September 2006

Spanish-speaking teacher of English in South America2

What do I need to be able to introduce human rights education into my language

classroom?

Some subject knowledge, materials, a commitment to human rights principles, motivation,

and courage, in some settings, are the main tools to start and to succeed.

2 student in my English language classroom at the University of Belize 2002/3 (HH)



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Teachers need access to key human rights texts and materials. Materials in the public

domain have legitimacy – texts of human rights instruments (original and simplified) such as

the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, the Convention on the Rights of the Child and

those which relate to professional standards; country and thematic human rights reports;

domestic laws; documents from national Human Rights Commission and human rights

NGOs. Good sources of information, materials and ideas for classroom activities include the

UN Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights, UNESCO, UNICEF and Amnesty

International. Newspapers, magazines and TV broadcasts are full of potential.

The teacher’s commitment to the success of human rights education and his or her own

respect for human rights are two sides of the same coin. How do teacher attitudes and

behaviour encourage learners to use and develop their language and communicative skills,

or not? To form ideas and express opinions on personal, new, sometimes controversial

issues, or not? How do teachers listen?

A human rights-friendly classroom is a place of mutual learning, and learner involvement is

as fundamental to human rights education as it is to language learning. Students can

transform human rights principles into reality through developing classroom behaviour

policies, being accountable to them and evaluating their effectiveness. Students’ personal

knowledge or experience motivates learning both the topic language and the language and

skills of debate and critical analysis. Students might have more direct experience of human

rights issues than the teacher who knows the language.

A multicultural class is a mini-world within which to explore human issues of global

importance. The greater the mix of age, language, race, colour, religion, gender, sexual

orientation, the more positive the action teachers have to take to provide equality of

opportunity to participate. Most students feel safer working with human rights issues in pairsor small groups, just as they do in the English language. Teachers can develop their own

confidence by starting with the least controversial subjects – the rights with which few

disagree. Their own interest in the world is essential. Universal themes which stimulate high

levels of interest and participation are: human security/ freedom from fear; freedom from

violence; the reality of the UDHR; gender relations; displaced people; children’s education;

the tension between different rights and the rights of different people.

What are some of the difficulties in integrating human rights education into the

language classroom?



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As in all new teaching/learning situations, there are difficulties, and the teacher´s own

knowledge, skills, attitudes, behaviour, preparation and confidence will help create a

nurturing environment for human rights education in the language classroom. It might be a

daunting prospect when the words “human rights” are synonymous for many with “other

people,” “controversy,” “danger,” “politics,” “fear” – and thus avoided. But human rights are

for all. Models of equality, non-discrimination, and respect for all views, will encourage

students to express ideas, in English, without fear.

It’s more learner-friendly to encourage understanding of the positive, unifying aspects of

human rights and to explore the realities of provision, protection and denial of human rights

rather than focus on violations. When students feel passionately about an issue, which they

will, teachers also need strategies and skills to prevent and resolve conflict.

Teachers might have to assess potential difficulties, professional and personal, in their

institutional and country environment. Managers’ and colleagues’ unfamiliarity with human

rights education can cause suspicion; traditional communication patterns can be even more

inhibited when controversy threatens. Topic choice will be affected by local conditions and

experience, for example, where countries are engaged in armed conflict, or where political

realities restrict freedom of expression.

Conclusion

‘Human interaction is fundamental to the aims of the language teacher’, conclude Michael

Byram and Manuela Guilherme in their appraisal of Human rights, Cultures and Language

Teaching (Osler 2000, p76). Human rights teaching provides a common language to enrich

that interaction. Students affirm their right to education in the language classroom. The

language of rights aspires to a decent and peaceful world for us all – the language classroom

can use it as a means to that end.

We advocate beginning with UDHR Article 26.2 as a valuable statement of principle:

“Education shall be directed to the full development of the human personality and to the

strengthening of respect for human rights and fundamental freedoms. It shall promote

understanding, tolerance and friendship among all nations…”



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A good practice checklist starts with these 5 points:

1) Use the Universal Declaration of Human Rights in the classroom, in student-friendly

and original language, to develop English, human rights and intercultural competence

2) Recognise the value of subject knowledge

3) Integrate language and human rights content using real-life examples

4) Integrate rights-respectful pedagogy and classroom practice

5) Be prepared to take the plunge

References

• OSLER, A (ed) (2000) Human Rights, Cultures and Language Teaching. Citizenshipand democracy in schools. Diversity, identity, equality. Stoke on Trent: Trentham.

• STARKEY, H. (2002) Democratic Citizenship, Languages, Diversity and HumanRights. Guide for the development of Language Education Policies in Europe. FromLinguistic Diversity to Plurilingual Education. Council of Europe, Strasbourg

Resource links:

UN UDHRhttp://www.ohchr.org/EN/UDHR/Pages/60UDHRIntroduction.aspx

OHCHR Resource Collection on Human Rights Education and Training.http://www2.ohchr.org/english/issues/education/training/collection.htm

Human Rights Educationhttp://www.ohchr.org/EN/PublicationsResources/Pages/TrainingEducation.aspx

ABC -Teaching Human Rights: Practical act iv ities for pr imary and secondary

schools [email protected]

Biodata

Margot Brown was until recently the National Coordinator of the Centre for Global

Education, based at York St John University, York, UK. She has developed training and

development programmes on global issues, including human rights, citizenship, diversity and

sustainability in the UK and in many other countries. She has published practical handbooks

for teachers and written on issues of citizenship for teachers of languages and others.


http://www.ohchr.org/EN/UDHR/Pages/60UDHRIntroduction.aspxhttp://www2.ohchr.org/english/issues/education/training/collection.htmhttp://www.ohchr.org/EN/PublicationsResources/Pages/TrainingEducation.aspxhttp://www.ohchr.org/EN/PublicationsResources/Pages/TrainingEducation.aspxmailto:[email protected]:[email protected]://www.ohchr.org/EN/PublicationsResources/Pages/TrainingEducation.aspxhttp://www.ohchr.org/EN/PublicationsResources/Pages/TrainingEducation.aspxhttp://www2.ohchr.org/english/issues/education/training/collection.htmhttp://www.ohchr.org/EN/UDHR/Pages/60UDHRIntroduction.aspx


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Bio data

Hilary Hunt, now based in England, is a freelance human rights education consultant, co-founderand former Executive Director of the Belize Centre for Human Rights Studies and former TEFLlecturer at the University of Belize Regional Language Centre. Her TEFL experience includes

working with rural women in India and Spanish-speaking immigrants in Belize.



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ELF - and other fairy storiesBy Hugh Dellar

As the use of English as a Lingua Franca spreads, and as more and more people around the world come tosome degree of English, so the arguments about appropriate norms and models for the classroom have raged longmain thrust of many of these arguments has been that as the majority of conversations in English are now held betwspeaker and non-native speaker, the imposition onto English language teaching of a tyranny of native-speaker normsis no longer appropriate. Instead, we all need to be teaching ELF - English as a Lingua Franca - or else Globish (GPersonally, I believe that many of the arguments that have dominated conferences over recent years ar misrepresentations of reality. Here, I aim to strip away some of the misconceptions surrounding the subject, to explothey can do and to suggest some alternative ways of viewing the inexorable spread of English.

The idea that native-speaker English somehow exerts a tyrannical hold has become increasingly popular over

and yet where is this dominance reflected? Now, of course, the majority of actors who record EFL material arespeakers, and many of the biggest-selling course books are written by native-speakers, but speaking as a native spcan honestly say that the vast majority of EFL material is many miles away from the English I frequently encounter native-speaker-only contexts. Have those who complain about native-speaker dominance been into any classroomtaught from the dominant course books? What, for instance, is native-speaker like about this exchange from a wellbook?

Extract:Your surname's Jones, isn't it?> Yes, it is.

And you're 27, aren't you?> Yes, that's right.You weren't at home last night at 8, were you?> No, I wasn't. I was at the pub.

But you don't have any witnesses, do you?> Yes, I do. My brother was with me.Your brother wasn't with you, was he?> How do you know?Because he was at the police station. We arrested him last night.

Or this, from another?

It must be very strange to be back home after such a long time.> Yes, it is. I . . . I mean, it's lovely to see everybody and I really appreciate my bed.Let's have a look at these photos, then.> Well, they're all mixed up at the moment. I've got to sort them out.Um, this looks nice. Where is it?> Where do you think it is?

Ah, well . . . it must be somewhere really hot. It looks like paradise. I suppose it could be Thailand or Bali, or it could even be India.

> No. I'll give you a clue. It's an island in the Pacific Ocean.Hawaii.> No, I didn't go to Hawaii.Oh right. I thought you'd been everywhere. It's probably Fiji, then.> That's right. Oh, it was lovely. This man wanted me to marry his daughter. She was beautiful.

EFL material is littered with similar examples and teachers develop good radar for sensing the exact points atnative-like conversation ends and grammar-dominated models takes over. Now, I am not saying that EFL materials shcompletely on native-speaker norms - I will move on clarify this point in due time - but what I am saying is that thenative-speaker norms dominating ELT are really not borne out by the evidence.

The screeching about the dominance of native-speaker English has had a seriously detrimental effect onteachers view their jobs. An unnamed linguist claims that he feels "sorry for poor learners of English who spend hour time trying to master the RP sounds of /th/ and /th/, as these are difficult sounds to learn if they do not exist in your

and, it turns out, they are not used in many varieties of English anyway." My first thought on reading was where onclasses where students spend hours trying to learn these things? In most classes I observe, you're lucky if



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pronunciation at all being taught, let alone whole hours devoted to minimal pairs! So, again, the nature of reality ishere to suit a particular kind of argument. My second thought, then, was how easily these kinds of comments can lefeeling it's simply not worth the effort; that there's no point bothering with all manner of aspects of English as studneed them anyway, especially in conversations with other non-natives and besides, some natives don't even botherall." At heart, I fear much of the current debate about ELF has an anti-teaching sub-text close to its core.

Obviously, these are slippery slopes for us to start to go down, but ones I think many teachers find themselvesevidence of this all over the place. At a recent conference I attended in Poland, I heard someone put forward theinternational contexts, the simpler, the better". It put me in mind of George Orwell's monstrous Doublespeak, the langupon us in some parallel or futuristic totalitarian world where words are kept to a purely functional minimum and whwith 'good', 'ungood', 'plus good' and 'doubleplusgood' - a world few of us would want to inhabit, surely.

This desire to simplify and strip away the language we teach runs deep among the ELFers - and, of course,we obviously do need to ensure that things are kept simple for students - and that we don't end up teaching things wutility when items that are more useful, items with broader surrender value, are available instead. However, onproblematic areas for the proponents of ELF or Globish lies in their attitudes towards level - and what should be taugh A well known linguist writes of an advanced-level French student who uses the word 'chill out' instead of 'relax', andthat this is a "native-like" form. She claims that this student may well be rewarded in exams for use of such language,real world, when he engages in conversation with other non-natives, he'd be at a disadvantage as he would not be a

himself to the listener, who might well not understand the expression. Similar arguments have cropped up again andyears. Another well known linguist, has argued that as corpora based on conversations between non-native speaker use of phrasal verbs and idioms than corpora based on the language of native speakers, these areas of the languagplace in ELT materials. Such ideas were echoed by a teacher at a school I did a talk in last year who said, "I see in ylevel book, you have some idioms. Well, what happens if my German student learns, say, "I felt like a fish out of watwith a Greek speaker who doesn't understand him?"

What happens in the real world is exemplified by a conversation I overheard in Istanbul airport last Decembedelayed and I was killing time when a German man approached the counter near where I was sitting and asked thedesk "Excuse me. Is there an ATM machine near here?" The woman looked slightly scared and said "Please?" Thtried again "A cash machine? To get money?" "Sorry. I no English" came the response. At this point, the German guout and acted putting it into a cash machine and asked once more "Money?" At this, the woman replied "Oh! Yes!and waved with her arm.

Now, this conversation was clearly an example of English being used as a Lingua Franca by two non-naticonduct a transactional exchange. What can we conclude from this exchange? Should we deduce that the Gesomehow learned too much English and is adopting too "native-like" a model of English? This would seem to be themany of ELF's proponents would draw. If we follow the logic of this linguist’s claims, a seething can of worms opens ADVANCED student should use 'relax' instead of 'chill out', are students also wrong to use - and are we as teachers,wrong to teach - items such as "great"? Surely "very good" should suffice! And what about "boiling"? Why bother whsay "very hot"? Let's forget about "Do you mind if I?" with its strange positive response of "No, not at all" - and let's juOK if I . . .?". Let's purge the syllabus of "I can't stand it" and "I love it" and stick to "I don’t like it" and "I really like it"!!the lexicon can go as they are essentially other ways of saying simpler concepts: so it'd be goodbye to 'SPARE time /more 'I overslept', forget 'sort out' and why worry about 'unemployed' when you can just go for 'He doesn't have a job!'

Obviously, there is an absurd reductionism about such arguments and it leads to a kind of Basic English that

right mind would suggest would be sufficient to allow non-natives to carry out all the many and varied conversations thhave amongst themselves! I would suggest instead that perhaps we should admire the German man's ability in taccommodate himself to his listener, to paraphrase his meanings and grade his language down when required todeduce that perhaps it's the Turkish woman here who needs to work on her language.

The point here surely is that whether we are native or non-native speakers, when talking to others, we have tassumption that they speak English at roughly the same level that we do. To do anything other than this is to patronwe are talking to. What would the linguist and co suggest the German man should do in this conversation? Start"Money?" What would you think if he started like this? Presumably you'd assume that he couldn't speak English! Andthen feel when you discovered that he could? Talked down to, at the very least!

Starting from the assumption that the people we are talking to speak English at roughly the same level as oumean we will necessarily always be understood, but it does suggest that if we find that we aren't, we are all capable of

In fact, I would suggest that in general fluent non-natives are often better at doing this than many native speakers! Imore language we know, the better we are at paraphrasing and stripping our language down.



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There is, however, a wider and more complicated issue that arises from the linguist’s comments about 'chill o

the difficulty students face with language - and the degree to which they perceive items as idiomatic or "native-depends to a degree on the learner's own first language. In French, for example, "chill out" is actually used as a loanbecome very common. On top of that, "chill out" has also become an international word through music. In other wor speaker, far from trying his hardest to be a native speaker, could well have just been using the word which came m

him in the circumstances!

To complicate things further, whether we are aware of it or not, students themselves often seek out idiomexpressions in English. All languages contain idioms, expressions and metaphorical ways of saying things, and lear ways of saying these things in English is part of what makes language learning fun and interesting. In a recent Pre-Intclass, one student arrived late - and left the door open, letting a draught in. One of my Chinese students became veryasked "How to say in English? In Chinese, we have expression: How long your tail is!" "Oh yes. I know what you mesay, "Were you born in a barn?" I'll write it up on the board." "Oh. Very useful." In this instance, of course, the idiodifferent from one language to another, but in many cases, as with "I felt like a fish out of water", for instance, yoexpressions are very similar in Arabic, French, Spanish, Chinese, English . . . which is always nice to know.

An additional problem revolves around the fact that students often simply translate directly from their own langrealise that things are not always the same in English - and this occurs even when they are talking to other non-nativ

the anti-"native-like" teachers do, for instance, when a German student shouts to Japanese "Huh? Do you think I havemy eyes?" Even if this sentence is intelligible from context, which wasn't the case when this happened in oneIntermediate classes, there's then the risk that the other student will think this is the actual English expressions and lthey'd be much better off - if you believe that students should be learning things that have maximum utility amongEnglish, the expression "Do you think I was born yesterday?" or "Do I look like I was born yesterday?"

One ELF argument has been that a student who uses an expression like "Do you think I have cucumbers onsay, "He drinks like a horse" is somehow being creative or else expressing their cultural identity and that to correct this to stifle both identity and the creative impulse. For me, this is to wilfully misunderstand what creative means. Thcreative about simply translating an idiom word for word from L1 - or misusing a common idiom such as "eats like a hosurely comes from knowing idioms and expressions in the first place and then subverting them. Anythinginterlanguage!

Note, by the way, that I am not saying here that I believe that idioms like "Were you born in a barn?" or "Doborn yesterday?" should necessarily form part of course book material or be in the syllabus at these low levels. Indthem appears in any level of my own course books. Rather, I am simply saying that there are often times when as teforced by circumstances to make principled decisions about such matters in the classroom.

The next issue to address here is the fact that the French student who used "chill out" was an ADVANCED sthe major problems that ELF / Globish people face is the whole issue of vocabulary. Who gets to decide that sometlike" and who gets to say what is supposedly more "neutral"? If we are teaching ELF, should we just never teach "cwhat do you teach at Advanced level? And how do our students ever get to be like the non-native speakers suSeidlhofer who speak incredible English? How do they end up becoming like the any number of businessmen or politJavier Solano, Ban-Ki Moon or Kofi Annan - or other high-fliers such as Pedro Alonso or Arsene Wenger? As an Italiaconference I attended recently, "You must remember, what people are calling International English is what we speatrying to speak something else - English!"

To move closer to the heart of what models are most appropriate for our students, let us consider the notion thof conversations our students engage in will be with other non-native speakers. Despite the fact that this may well be tdoesn't mean they will never talk to native speakers. Take Spain, for example. Over 1 million Americans and 17people visit Spain on holiday every year - and obviously many tens of thousands of Spaniards travel to Britain or theyear, around 100,000 British people leave the UK and join the 1 million-plus Brits already living in Spain, whilst the U100,000 long-term Spanish residents. Now, all of these movements of people are bound to result in people talkingWhen you start doing the maths, that's several million conversations a year in which non-native Spaniards will fiengaged in all manner of conversation with native-speakers, conversations which will cover all manner of subjectsbound to be both transactional AND interactional - and obviously the better the Spaniards English (and, of course,native-speakers ability to grade language down, where necessary), the more smoothly these conversations will go.

Add to this the fact that many, many Spaniards themselves already speak something approaching native-lik

that they may well often engage in conversation with other non-natives who speak similarly excellent English -



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happens all the time at conferences like IATEFL, for example - and you do really have to start questioning exactlEnglish ELF fans would like us to teach.

One of the many problems with ELF / Globish proponents is that it is never entirely clear whether they are afor greater tolerance of variation from Native-Speaker norms or some alternative model. My hunch over the last few ythat it’s the latter. The author of World Englishes, argues that the variations in native speaker English make it invalid a

many other writers have suggested that far more attention be paid in classrooms to World Englishes - or Emerging Enare also often called. However, as I have already suggested, whilst the fact that English is used a global Lingua Fr doubt, the notion that there might be such a thing as ELF is far more contentious. Any attempt to define ELF as an entinative-speaker norms is doomed from the outset. If native speakers are no longer to be the model, who is? PenelopeMerkel? You folk out there listening to or reading this? And, if so, then which of you? Or is the Nigerian security guy awho almost none of my students ever seem to be able to decipher? Or is it the Kurdish cab driver I had drive me to thflight here, who spoke broken pidginised English? Alternatively, as some suggest, should we just be exposing our stthe above and more, liberally sprinkling Singaporean English, Malay English, Nigerian English - whatever these labeand so on into our classroom stews - and leaving our students supposedly free to decide which they wish to copy?

Ivor Timmis, who works at Leeds Met, has carried out some quite extensive research into the attitudes of bstudents AND teachers around the world. Intriguingly, but perhaps not that surprisingly, he found that the vast mathough especially of students - see native-speaker competence as their goal, regardless of their ability - or lack of -

lofty heights and also regardless of whether they envisage themselves in the future talking to natives or non-natives.research does not go into what we actually mean by native-speaker English, but there is little doubt that for almostudent of any foreign language, the educated native speaker remains both the desired model and also the ultimatewell-meaning liberals may pretend that all versions of the language are equal - honestly! If only we weren't all so preality is that that some forms are more equal than others and it is useful for our students to learn the models which minsider status!

Similar arguments to these have flared around the issue of how best to teach working-class kids in the U American kids in the US. In the 60s and 70s, there was a well-meaning, but severely misguided, attempt to teachBritish kids in their own dialects, whilst the Ebonics movement in the US had similar aims for black Americans. This iled black activist and politician Jesse Jackson to claim that there was a conspiracy afoot which was both "foolish ablack students throughout the United States" and that the result was "teaching down to our children".

My feelings about ELF are very similar. Whilst some linguists may well be correct that certain sounds are norder to be understood whilst speaking English in an international context, and whilst one unnamed linguist may wellwhen she notes that communication is not hindered if students drop such "nativised" grammatical annoyances as thor if they confuse who and which, add redundant prepositions, use definite and indefinite pronouns differently or warpquestions, we have to ask ourselves is merely "being understood" what students want in the word of globalised English

Obviously, there is a huge difference between haranguing students for making these grammatical andmistakes and imposing endless correction on them (which I personally believe happens very infrequently) - and conscinot teach them. I feel that a lot of the ELF rhetoric has come about simply as a response to bad teaching - whether re As such, if there really are teachers out there who spent hours on /th/ and /th/, then they should stop it! If you doelderly colleagues used to do with her Elementary students and lecture them for half an hour on the difference betw'bathe', then don't! If you spend hours and hours at the same level fretting about whether or not students use the thirdgiven contexts, then you're wasting both their time and your own!

Clearly, we only have a limited amount of time to spend in class, and we all do need to make decisions aboutis useful for our students. As such, it's seems sensible to ensure that what we teach is language which is as widely usThis means that raw native-speaker data is not actually that useful. Rather, we need to be informed by educatedusage and to make decisions about how best to 'cook' it for students' consumption based on informed intuition. If texample, that we end up teaching I'm meeting a friend tonight instead of I'm meeting up with a friend tonight . . .to finish some work instead of the more native-speaker-like I just need to finish off some work, then that's fine byat Pre-Advanced levels. In the same way, I would personally always opt for teaching a standard range of questionlower-class London standard one-size-fits-all tag of 'Innit'. And I would tend to prefer "There are lots of problincreasingly common "There's lots of problems". There may well be aspects of native-speaker speech you decideperhaps because they're too high level, perhaps because they're regarded as too lower class, or perhaps bregionalisms. This may be especially true if you're teaching in a non-English speaking country. Does this mean, howitems should be completely removed? Even at Advanced and Proficiency levels? I am not so sure. In the end, of cou

decide what goes on in my classrooms and what goes into my coursebooks. It is you, the educated, often non-



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Pre online GISIG discussion think piece: The Critical GlobalCitizenship Educator. 27 June, 2008 By Maureen Ellis

Global Citizenship is not ‘charity for distant places’, nor simple answers and tellingpeople what to do. It is not too difficult for children, nor an extra subject to be

crammed into the sc

gi newsletter 2008

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