1. Seven brief reviews, reprinted from The Teacher Trainer 19.1
2. [ If you have not already visited our sister magazine's website, it's still not too late: www.tttjournal.co.uk]

The following thumbnail sketches of books are written to save you time. By reading the swift descriptions below we hope you will know if the books are useful in your setting or not. Print size and width x height are noted only if unusual. Only the absence of indexes and bibliographies is noted. MLT = modern language teaching.

Student induction in practice Ed. Philip Frame (2001) SEDA paper 113. ISBN 1-902435-16-8. Deals with the practicalities of induction of students in UK institutions of higher education. Checklists, case studies and questionnaires included and so may help anyone planning, executing or evaluating induction.

Gifted and talented children Shirley Taylor (2001) Jessica Kingsley ISBN 1-84310-086-X. Answering the questions, Who are they? What are we doing about them? What do we need to do?, this planning guide for teachers, principals and support staff is based on three ideas: children with special abilities can be provided for in an inclusive school setting, special abilities are broad-ranging and identification and programming for giftedness are linked.

Symposium for Language Teacher Educators: Papers from three IALS Symposia: 2000, Politics, policy and culture in Language Teacher Education (LTE); 2001, Autonomy in LTE; 2002, Teaching Practice in LTE. J Gollin, G Ferguson and H Trappes-Lomax. IALS, University of Edinburgh. ISBN 1-87-191403-6. CD-ROM. Ten plus papers per symposium. Focus on LTE in TESOL. A rich trove of views and research reports on a wide variety of issues in LTE and LTE programmes, chiefly in Europe but also, e.g., Egypt, Vietnam, Japan, Hong Kong, and Turkey. Table of contents, two page introduction, no index; four other Symposium publications are listed on the small leaflet inside the CD cover.

International Handbook on the Continuing Professional Development of Teachers. C Day and J Sachs, eds. (2004) Open University Press. ISBN 0-335-20974-2 (hbk). xiv+320pp. Twelve chapters and twenty contributors. No focus on TESOL. Its three parts are: A critical overview, Regional case studies, CPD for professional renewal. The authoritative designation 'handbook' has some potential to mislead for, as is noted in the forward, contributors have different stances on some issues; as to 'international', coverage of the world scene is distinctly uneven. Title apart, this anthology is likely to be of relevance to those involved in shaping and running CPD programmes in areas covered by the case studies (i.e., Europe, the USA, Latin America, Australia, and Singapore). Other chapters, especially the second ('Literature, definitions and models', R Bolam and A McMahon), merit attention from readers whose interest in CPD is more general.

Making Sense of Education: An introduction to the philosophy and theory of education and teaching. D Carr (2003) Routledge Falmer. ISBN 0-415-23074-8. xiii+294pp. In the preface the author sets out three broad areas of coverage: (1) the relevance to contemporary philosophy of education of positions taken by some one dozen great philosophers from Plato onwards, (2) developments in educational philosophy since the early 20th century-in which connection ideas of Dewey, Piaget, Bruner, Foucault, and others are examined, and (3) 'key issues and problems of professional policy and practice that are to a great extent the raison d'etre of educational philosophy' (p. ix). Each of the fifteen chapters concludes with two tasks-e.g., 'Identify a range of possible instances in which forms of formal assessment might be held to have a distortive effect on the learner's educational appreciation of some subject, activity or skill' (p. 164). The print is rather small-10 point? Near the book's end there is an instructive fifteen page glossary of terms ranging alphabetically from action research through to virtue ethics.

Research Methods in Education, 5th edition. L Cohen, L Manion and K Morris (2001) Routledge Falmer. ISBN 0-415-19541-1. xvi+446pp. 19x25 cm. A rewritten and up-dated version of an admirably comprehensive, standard handbook for would-be and developing educational researchers in any discipline. No special focus on language learning. The publisher notes the inclusion of five new chapters (e.g., one on curriculum research); of expanded discussion (e.g., of questionnaire design and ethnographic research); and of coverage of such new developments as the internet as a research facility. The 22 chapters are grouped under five major headings: 1) The context of educational research, 2) Planning educational research, 3) Styles of educational research, 4) Strategies for data collection and researching, and 5) Recent developments in educational research. Includes many potentially helpful checklists and summary boxes. With respect to statistical analysis, the strong point of this book is that it says what statistical measures are appropriate for what kinds of data. (For worked examples and explanation of the mathematics a novice would need to go to an introductory work on statistics or see the corresponding chapter in Brown [2001], just below.) One avoidable blemish is that a number of terms are defined pages later than their first occurrence in the book (e.g., Hawthorne effect). Likely to be an indispensable reference book especially for advisors whose graduate students are likely to carry out a wide range of research projects.

Action Research in Practice: Partnerships for social justice in education. B Atweh, S Kemmis and P Weeks, eds. (1998) Routledge. ISBEN 0-415-17152-0. xxiii+350pp. Sixteen chapters from 38 contributors. Blurb: 'a collection of stories from action research projects in schools and a university'. Topics include: how to make a school a healthier place, involving parents in decision making, students as action researchers, promotion of gender equity in schools, improving assessment in social sciences, staff development planning, and doing a Ph.D. through action research. This book usefully fleshes out and further exemplifies the coverage of action research in Research Methods in Education (further above).

Working for a Doctorate: A guide for the humanities and social sciences. N Graves and V Varma, eds. (1997) Routledge. ISBN 0-415-14731-X. vii+202pp. Thirteeen contributors and ten chapters (plus introduction): How to succeed in study, The research process, Financing a doctorate, Problems of supervision, Writing a theses, Student experiences, Intercultural issues, Gender issues, and Comparative perspectives on the British PhD. Includes four figures indicative of key trends (e.g., dwindling per student provision of resources) and four summary boxes (e.g., 'Guidelines for writing'). Each chapter concludes with its own list of references.