Humanising Language Teaching
Year 6; Issue 2; March 04

In the January 2004 issue of HLT , Eleanor Watts soberly described how she was debarred by the Israeli military from getting to Gaza to do a teacher training course. She had been invited by the Palestinians and the British Council.

Two Letters from Israel

I am shocked that you chose to print this article in your journal.

Julie Posner
Jerusalem

Dear Mario,

One of the short articles in the January Issue of HLT featured a teacher who had been prevented from giving a teacher training workshop in the Gaza Strip by the Israeli Defense Forces. She said that she felt that politics was a fair issue to bring up because of its effect on education.

I am a veteran English teacher in Israel. I cannot begin to imagine why she was prevented from reaching Gaza that day; it may have been something to do with here own security or not. But I feel it is unfair to present a second- hand portrait of teaching and learning in the Palestinian Authority without offering a picture of what it means to teach and learn under the shadow of terrorism, as we do each day in Israel.

Would you consider publishing such an article? If so, please let me know and I will attempt to write one.

All the best,
Lisa Harvith

( Gill Johnson, a close Pilgrims colleague of the editor, was chided for not reading HLT. Here is her eloquent response:)

Hey!

I DO read HLT….. and I have a file of stuff re the lexical approach, corpora ideas and some of the 'Old Exercises'. I keep the file for CELTA type seminars. I also read the major articles and anything else that catches my eye. So, you see, I am a convert, and because I have got so much out of HLT, I thought it only fair to put a bit back; here's an article. You see?

Gill