Dear HLT Readers,

Welcome to the October issue of HLT. First some Pilgrims news. We have just finished an inspiring summer at the Hilltop at the University of Kent in Canterbury. We hope you will join us one day. To come to Pilgrims, apart from the Erasmus+ grants you can apply for the Bonnie Tsai Scholarship, the details of which you will find in the Course Outline section, in the August issue of HLT.

Also I am very happy that Mario Rinvolucri, one of the founding fathers of Pilgrims and the first editor of Humanising Language Teaching, has contributed to this issue of HLT: One-liners from Edinburgh Festival, 2017 and Some Old Exercises. We are hoping for more contributions as Mario goes gradually through his old notes and files.

A major part of this issue is co-hosted and edited by Zhivka Ilieva who has harvested the articles from among the Bulgarian English Teachers‘ Association members (BETA). I would like to thank Zhivka for finding such interesting contributions and for her hard editorial work. I am impressed by her dedication and passion. Working with you, Zhivka, has been a real pleasure. Note that this part of the issue is colour coded in the contents page in blue.

The other contributions come from all over the world: Russia, Taiwan, Poland, Italy, Saudi Arabia, the UK, Egypt, Vietnam, Iran and Hungary, As usual this issue contains a lot of information from the publishing market in Publications, Short Book Reviews and Book Preview sections.

Happy reading

Hania Kryszewska
HLT editor
hania.kryszewska@pilgrims.co.uk

Dear HLT Readers,

This issue of HLT has a section dedicated primarily to Bulgarian English Teachers‘ Association members. BETA (www.beta-iatefl.org) has more than 25 year history. It is a member of IATEFL (www.iatefl.org/), FIPLV (https://fiplv.com/) and TESOL (www.tesol.org/). In June 2017 was our 26th conference which was also The First FIPLV East European Regional Congress. This unique forum gathered more than 200 professionals from 35 different countries from 6 continents presenting in 5 languages. There were more than 120 presentations. Our members are now happy to share their experience and ideas.

We offer two major articles, five short articles, some ideas from the corpora and a publication review.

Milka Hadjikoteva‘s article EFL Acquisition at University via Real-Life Input views the Natural Approach and the Task-Based Learning Approach and presents a task which lowers the affective filter, provides comprehensible input and opportunities for meaningful communication. Bill Templer's article Rachel Flees Religious Persecution: Teaching an Animated Video focuses on the migration crisis and suggests ideas for working with the video “Rachel‘s Journey from a Country in Eurasia“ and developing students‘ social empathy.

Desislava Terzieva and Zhivka Ilieva offer having Fun and Play with Very Young Learners relying on games, rhymes, songs, riddles and TPR activities. In her article Teaching Speaking Skills through Drama: Inspiration Matters Mariya Neykova focuses on the implementation of the action-oriented approach in speaking activities. She acknowledges interaction with art as one of the most effective ways to inspire and motivate learners and accentuates that teaching speaking skills through drama creates conditions for implementing the action-oriented approach and for developing collaborative learning skills. There is another interesting contribution by Bill Templer, Teaching A Memorable Classic Short Story: O. Henry’s ‘The Romance of a Busy Broker’ (1906), which offers two versions of the story, suitable for A2 and B2 level, comparison made on the basis of readability indices. The author includes links to a lesson plan and a story quiz, to other works of O‘Henry and additional information about him. A short article with practical arts and crafts ideas for developing very young learners‘ creativity is offered by Zhivka Ilieva and Iliya Iliev, Creativity and Arts and Crafts in Teaching English to Young Learners.

Irena Raykova's article How eTwinning Fosters the Development of English Language Skills presents an eTwinning project that influences the whole personality of the student and contributes to multiple intelligence development.

In the Corpora Ideas section in the article entitled Ways of Expressing Inducement in Classroom Language: Comparison Between Bulgarian And English Petranka Ruseva views a variety of possible ways to organize what is happening in the classroom and direct the students appropriately on the basis of Bulgarian and English structures used in classroom during the future teachers‘ internship.

Zarina Markova in Book Review: Creativity in English Language Teaching recommends the book as well-balanced, informative and stimulating for different types of educators.

I would like to say THANK YOU to Hania Kryszewska for the opportunity for BETA to be popularized and for her trust in me as a guest editor, to all contributors for sharing their ideas and to you, the readers!

Enjoy reading this HLT issue!

Zhivka Ilieva
HLT Host Editor
e-mail: zh.ilieva.bg@gmail.com