Dear HLT Readers,

Welcome to the October issue of HLT. I would like to welcome the new readers whom Pilgrims trainers met in the summer in Canterbury and at various conferences, for example and the LEND conference in Portonovo in Italy , and whose names have just been added to the mailing list. I hope you will enjoy reading HLT and perhaps one day writing for the magazine, just like the seasoned fans of HLT do.

In this issue the first area touched upon is teaching skills. In major article 1.: Total Physical Response in University EFL Listening Class, Ji Lingzhu Dai Jiandong shares with us his ideas for using TPR not just with children but with adult learners too. It is ideal for more timid learners or those with low self esteem as TPR focuses on comprehension and postpones the production of the target language. Therefore there is less immediate pressure on the learners and it is still possible to accurately assess the learners’ listening comprehension ability. You will find more on the subject of listening comprehension in Teaching listening comprehension - Where is the Problem? by Eva Homolová looks at teacher training programmes. She looks at teaching skills such as: reading aloud and reading comprehension, teacher’s reactions to mistakes in learner’s oral production and teaching listening comprehension. You will find more on errors in Authentic Error Correction by Neil McBeath whereas in The Implementation of Multimedia and Hypermedia in Foreign Language Teaching Alica Harajová writes about how IT can help us teach ad improve language skills.

In major article 3.: Preserving Students´ Motivation when Improving Oral Skills in the Foreign Language Classroom, Adriana Halušková looks at errors and mistakes which play a crucial role in the process of developing speaking skills. Adriana shares with us her teaching experiences and makes some suggestions for correcting oral production and at the same time enhancing the motivation of language learners. In major article 2.: `It’s a Living Thing’: a Neuro-Linguistic Programming Perspective on Essay Writing, Paul Tosey looks at self esteem and motivation in writing essays. Giving advice to his students on improving their writing he used the models of some excellent essay writers from among former participants. In his classes Paul combined these student generated materials with Neuro-Linguistic Programming (NLP) techniques. He used a form of NLP modelling to enquire into to the internal processing involved in essay-writing. It involves going beyond focusing on the goal but also takes into account the very experience of writing an essay. There is more on NLP and its practical teaching applications in: Look Into My Eyes by Tandy Taylor.

The articles related to NLP look closely at the learner as such. So does major article 4. Learner Differences: Implications for Language Teaching by Edy Isabel Torres Quedo and Rubén Cárdenas Cabello. The students bring a certain amount of unpredictability as to their preferred learning style or learning styles, and it is the teachers role to help the students to become aware of these styles. This in turn helps the students “to develop their language learning skills in the best and practical way”. The author’s claim is that the “ teacher may indeed be highly knowledgeable, creative, charismatic, and caring, yet still be unsuccessful in educating students whose learning is still developing and need to overcome their learning difficulties”. The authors offer a good overview of the various categories which we use in ELT to talk about learner differences and then present the results of their research.

In this issue you will find some ideas on CLIL (Content and language Integrated Learning).. In the Jokes section there are some good CLIL jokes submitted by Cécile Marit and Hanna Kryszewska. Then in the Student voices section Aleksandra Rydz, a language learner, shares with us her opinions on some CLIL Readers she has been reading.

Then there is CLIL ccombined with culture. In Project-based learning as CLIL Approach to Teaching Language Liubov Desiatova writes about a project the students from her school conducted on culture and the changes it undergoes. The students researched the perception of the changes in the American and Russian cultures. Another interesting idea comes from Yu-Hsiu Lee in Bingo Game and Poem-based Teaching of Chinese as L2, in which language and culture meet. Three learners of Chinese as L2 were taught in accordance with the principles of Culturally Responsive Pedagogy theory. The techniques that have been used for teaching Chinese were “a cinquain (a five line poem) and an interest bingo game to affirm students’ native culture, while learning Chinese as L2”.

In this issue you will find a lot on what I would call the teaching and learning environment. In Teaching English to Pupils Affected by a ‘Pervasive Developmental Disorder’ Anna Maria Aiazzi offers an insight into the world of students with special educational needs (SEN). In the past two years HLT has had a number of articles on this subject, e.g. by Jarosz, Anna (September 2006), Anna Hyzniak (January 2008) and Celina Wyppich (June 2008). In Teaching at a Monastery in Tibet Sezgi Yalin takes us on an interesting journey into Tibet while in IATEFL Conferences and Rural Teachers Muhammad Iqbal takes us to the teachers’ community in Pakistan and in CHINA EFL: Foreign Teacher Needed, Niu Qiang and Martin Wolff take us to China. Then there is a journey into the past: My Encounters with Classrooms and Students and My Teaching Endeavours: A Sentimental Look Back on How It All Started by Milenko Pecanac.

Of course, there are some interesting teaching techniques. In Off the Beaten Path: Oblique Strategies, Hall Houston introduces us into the world of an unusual deck of cards created by musicians Brian Eno and Peter Schmidt in 1975. Then there are some ideas on story telling for young learners in The Mouse and Santa by Daisy Glass and on how teachers can create and write their own stories in Halloween: Writing Drill-based Texts for YL Learners by students of English Unlimited Teacher Training College in Gdańsk, Poland. For those who are into drama and psychodrama there is something very special in the old exercise section, some very interesting notes by late John Morgan (Empty chairs).

As for Corpora ideas in this section we look at the language as a corpus which we, especially non-native teachers, encounter. We were taught English in our countries, often in some kind of isolation from exposure to the actual and authentic target language. When we experience encounters with the permanently changing matter of the language we tend to feel our knowledge is shattered. In her article OXFORDENSHIP Maja Aleksic shares with us her own discoveries about modern English.

As for publications there is an auto review of the new OUP TT book ( Introduction to teaching English): Wood or Trees? Finding a Way through the TEFL Jungle by Jill Hadfield, New Zealand, information on the 2008 reading awards: The Extensive Reading Foundation: 2008 Language Learner Literature Award Winners submitted by Philip Prowse, information on a new website: The Guardian Weekly Project by Jamie Keddie and recommendations of some ELT books in: Short Book Reviews by Hanna Kryszewska.

For your entertainment there are some poems: Poems for HLT by John Feakins, Recipes for life: Poems from an Oxford Summer, 2008 and ABC'S for Children and Other Peace Promoting People by Francisco Gomes de Matos and, of course, some interesting readers letters.

The busiest time for Pilgrims trainers as is it is time when most courses are run in Canterbury, UK. But Pilgrims in Canterbury in the summer is not the only way in which we can meet. We can organize special groups for you here in the UK at any time of the year or we can come with seminars to your country or town. Pilgrims trainers have been to most European countries as well as to Vietnam, Greenland, Mexico, Iceland, China, Siberia just to name a few. Your school may be our next destination. For more information please go the course outline section of this issue of HLT (Special Groups and Overseas Workshops - Pilgrims Course Outline) in which Mandy Briggs tells you all about these options and tells you how to get in touch with her.

Soon we will be able to let you know about the new courses we will be offering at Pilgrims in 2009. Don’t miss it. Perhaps you will be able to join us next year.

Best
Hania Kryszewska
Editor

E-mail : hania.kryszewska@pilgrims.co.uk
old.hltmag.co.uk

PS. Here is a message from GISIG at IATEFL