Toyohashi JALT:

Getting Back to Basics in English Language Teaching

Date: Sunday, December 14th, 2008 Time: 1:30 PM - 4:00 PM

Speaker: David Barker

Description:
Since the advent of Communicative Language Teaching methodology, many highly effective language learning techniques and promising avenues of research have been abandoned on the grounds that they were not sufficiently 'communicative' or 'authentic'. These include things that many successful language learners swear by, such as rote learning, memorization, substitution, drilling, grammar-translation, and error analysis. Despite this 'progress', there is no evidence whatsoever to suggest that Japanese students learn any more English now than their parents did, and many people believe that the opposite is true. Moreover, the battle among publishers to grab the attention of busy teachers has led to a situation where most textbooks look like glossy magazines written entirely in the target language, and are designed more as a series of recipes for teachers than as a real resource for learners. In this presentation, the presenter will introduce a new range of materials, which follow a 'back-to-basics' approach focused on what actually works for Japanese learners, and discuss the principles and research evidence on which they are based.

Organization: Toyohashi Chapter of the Japan Association for Language Teaching (Toyohashi JALT)

Cost: JALT Members: free
Non-members: 500 yen

Venue: Aichi University, Bldg 5 - room 543

Location: Toyohashi City, Aichi Prefecture, Japan

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