The Round: A New Publishing Idea
Luke Meddings, UK
Luke Meddings trained at International House London and worked as a teacher, journalist and school manager in ELT for over 10 years before co-founding the dogme in ELT movement with Scott Thornbury in 2000. Their book, Teaching Unplugged, was published by Delta in 2009 and won a British Council ELTon award for Innovation in 2010. Since then Luke has written and trained extensively on unplugged approaches, and in 2011 he founded the round, an independent e-publishing collective, with Lindsay Clandfield. Their first book, 52: a year of subversive activity for the ELT classroom, was published in 2012.
E-mail: lukemeddings@gmail.com
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Two conversations
What is The Round?
A visual identity for The Round
The Round fact file
Titles
Forthcoming titles
Reviews for 52
The Round is a new publishing idea which arose from two apparently unconnected conversations. The first related to the absence of edgy material in coursebooks, and the second to the sheer quality of a new wave of blogs that didn’t appear to be on the publishers’ radar.
The idea also came from two people, Lindsay Clandfield and Luke Meddings, with rather different reputations – Lindsay as a coursebook writer, and Luke as a co-founder of Dogme in ELT.
But when Lindsay shared his idea for a blog that would explore the kind of topics typically outlawed from coursebooks by the ‘parsnip’ rule1, it quickly became clear that we shared an interest in subversive stimulus and critical thinking. In fact, the idea of a ‘parsnips’ blog was so interesting that we wondered if it might make a book – but would any of the mainstream publishers take it on?
Meanwhile, Luke had been wondering whether there was some way to bridge the gap between the best of the new blogs and mainstream ELT books. Was there a market for a more tangible version of a well-written blog, one that collected the key posts and could be enjoyed offline?
In the end, the idea that became The Round suggested itself as a potential answer to these questions: a project that aimed to fill the gap between mainstream and niche materials, and between online blogs and print books.
As recently as five years ago we would have been defeated by the logistics and expense of printing, storage and distribution. But as soon as we hit on the idea of e-publishing, the ‘what if’ became a ‘when’ – and The Round started to take shape.
So what is The Round, and what do we believe it can offer?
We describe it as an independent e-publishing collective – a bit of a mouthful perhaps, but one in which all the words are worth exploring.
We’re independent because we aren’t sponsored or funded by anyone. There used to be numerous independent ELT publishers in the UK alone, but most have either folded or been subsumed into larger houses – with their lists often falling into desuetude. Being independent means we can publish niche titles that the big publishers wouldn’t want or judge economically viable, as well as – we hope – ideas with broader appeal which, as The Round starts to build a reputation, other houses won’t get!
Meanwhile, e-publishing isn’t just a low-cost alternative for a start-up. It allows us to offer titles which are:
- E-clectic in form and content: they don’t need to confirm to stakeholder expectations, or to a page-count that may suit one title but not another. They can feature colour photographs and illustrations
- E-conomical to buy: our first book, 52, retails at €5,00 – roughly the price of a couple of drinks
- E-asy to access: our titles will be available in the most widely accessible digital formats, for example Kindle for PC and a range of hand-held devices ; this is of real benefit in markets where small-run print titles can be hard to find
They are also rigorously E-dited (and that’s enough E’s for now): this represents a significant point of difference from self-published work and is another way in which we aim to bridge the gap between mainstream and niche content, blogs and print books.
Finally, it’s collective because the business model is geared towards our authors. Instead of the publisher retaining the lion’s share of the royalties from book sales and feeding a little back to the author, the author retains the lion’s share from sales – and feeds a little back to us.
The Round is also a learning environment: for example, more experienced authors are already mentoring less experienced writers, while readers can give their feedback on draft material from forthcoming publications on our ‘Labs’ page.
One our first steps was to ask Mark Bain to design our website. Developing a strong visual identity was crucial: for a collective of people who work in different countries, the website really is home. It’s also the shop window for our titles, although these – in keeping with the business model – are actually purchased direct from the author via Amazon or Smashwords.
Having an in-house designer who is also a teacher is a real bonus when it comes to briefing and discussing new work, and Mark’s distinctive cover designs (see below) are becoming a major feature of The Round.
52
Although setting up The Round quickly became our priority, we kept working on the idea of an e-book of subversive activities. The project changed in character as we went along, becoming less a critique of existing ELT materials (though there is still a fun element in the pastiche coursebook units) and more a collection of images, texts and ideas designed to promote critical thinking around a range of contemporary issues.
We decided to make 52 our first title, enabling us to test the process as we went along – and test the process it did. E-publishing is still a new and imperfect enterprise, and the learning curve was steep when it came to formatting the final typescript. We also responded quickly to customer feedback on purchase options by making 52 available on Smashwords, as well as on Kindle from Amazon.
But we made it: formally launched at IATEFL Glasgow in March, our first title – which has its own support website (http://subversive52.wordpress.com/) – has recently been joined by another, Nicky Hockly’s Webinars.
It took about a year to get from a new idea to our first publication, and we’re grateful to our colleagues for all the support and encouragement we’ve received. If it sounds interesting, take a look at our website and get involved!
Founders: Lindsay Clandfield and Luke Meddings
Designer: Mark Bain
Website: http://the-round.com/
Timeline:
23rd September 2011 – the-round.com goes live
9th February 2011 – our first title, 52, is published
20th March 2012 – we officially launch The Round and 52 at Iatefl, Glasgow
24th May 2012 – our second title, Webinars, is published
http://the-round.com/resource/52/
52: a year of subversive activity for the ELT classroom (Lindsay Clandfield and Luke Meddings)
Webinars: a cookbook for educators (Nicky Hockly)
http://the-round.com/labs/
Messaging: beyond a lexical approach (George Woolard)
Big Questions in ELT (Scott Thornbury)
My First Digital Journey (Özge Karaoglu Ergen and Jennifer Verschoor)
ELT blogs
There is an important message here - we should not assume what is and is not suitable for our classes. Rather, we should include our students by opening up the discussion to them and finding out what they think should (not) feature in their lessons.
Dave Dodgson
www.davedodgson.com/2012/04/review-52.html
Overall the book is a very interesting book which pokes the box of some big issues and as the authors hope, it isn't just about teaching English as a foreign language but raises questions of social policy, politics, consumerism, materialism, 9-5ism, charity, businesses and more.
Chris Wilson, eltsquared
http://eltsquared.blogspot.co.uk/2012/02/initial-review-of-52-by-round.html
Customer reviews for 52: a year of subversive activity for the ELT classroom (Kindle Edition)
I am happy to endorse this material as an excellent resource not only for classroom teachers of English in both EFL and ESL contexts around the world, but also as a source of refreshingly different and provocative warmers and discussion activities for trainee teachers. I strongly recommend this as amongst the best value for money publications I've ever had access to!
Graeme Hodgson
Thought-provoking activities that promote lots of interesting discussions. "Not a book for everyone" though; however, if you are the kind of teacher who likes taking risks, challenging your students and being surprised with the results, the activities in the book are perfect.
Malu Sciamarelli
Please check the How to be a Teacher Trainer course at Pilgrims website.
Please check the Creative Methodology for the Classroom course at Pilgrims website.
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