A method is a recognised and acknowledged set of teaching techniques and procedures that put into practice a set of beliefs about teaching and learning. The term is sometimes used interchangeably with approach, while others reserve approach to refer to theories and principles of language teaching. Richards and Rodgers (2001) say of the two 'a method is theoretically related to an approach, is organisationally determined by a design, and is practically realised in procedure' (p .16). Some prominent methods in English language teaching include Total Physical Response, Task-Based Learning, Grammar Translation. A teaching method covers syllabus, materials and classroom activities.
Celce-Murcia, Marianne, ed. 2001. Teaching English as a second or foreign language, 2nd edition. Boston, MA: Heinle and Heinle.
Thornbury, S. (2006). An A-Z of ELT. London: Macmillan.
The typical practices, procedures and techniques that a teacher uses in the classroom, and that may or may not be based on a particular method. Methodology can also refer to the study of these practices, procedures and techniques and of the beliefs and principles on which they are based.
"The methodology of the Structural Approach consisted mainly in listening to and repeating strictly graded grammatical structures."
Kramsch, C. and Sullivan, P. (1996) Appropriate pedagogy. ELT Journal 50/3.
Swan, M. A critical look at the Communicative Approach (1). ELT J (1985) 39 (1): 2-12.
Waters, A. (2012) Trends and issues in ELT methods and methodology. ELTJ 66 (4): 440-449.
Widdowson, H.G. (1985) Against dogma: A reply to Michael Swan. ELT J 39 (3): 158-161.
Micro-teaching (also known as peer teaching), which originated at Stanford University in the 1960s, is a practice now widely used in general, as well as ELT, teacher training contexts worldwide. Micro-teaching practices vary in some respects, but essentially the procedure consists of teachers trying out short lesson sequences for an audience of their peers, some of whom adopt the roles of learners. These lesson sequences may be video-recorded, and the teachers receive oral feedback from peers and / or a supervisor, and written feedback from the supervisor. In some versions of micro-teaching, teachers are given the opportunity to address the issues highlighted in the feedback stage by re-teaching the same lesson sequence.
Bailey, K.M. 2006. Language Teacher Supervision: A case-based approach.Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Brown, G. 1975. Micro-teaching: A programme of teaching skills. London: Methuen.
Geddes, M. & H. Raz. 1979. "Pupil-Teacher Interaction". In Holden, S. [Ed] Teacher Training. London: Modern English Publications.
Gower, R., D. Phillips & S. Walters. 1998. Teaching Practice Handbook. Oxford: Heinemann.
Moore, A. 1979. "Microteaching without video". In Holden, S. [Ed] Teacher Training. London: Modern English Publications.
Richards, J. 1998. Beyond Training. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Tanner, R. & C. Green. 1998.Tasks for Teacher Education: a reflective approach. Harlow: Longman.
Wallace, M.J. 1979. "Microteaching: Skills and strategies". In Holden, S. [Ed] Teacher Training. London: Modern English Publications.
In this activity several/all the members of a class get up and go to a free space in the classroom. They then carry out a communicative task (e.g. a survey, Find Someone Who) which requires them to talk to all other members of the group, and often to note down answers.
"On the first day of our course the teacher gave us a worksheet then asked us to all get up and complete it. We had to go round talking to every other student to get personal information about them. It was a great ice-breaker."
A modal verb is a verb which expresses an attitude or wishes about the meaning in the main verb, or a statement of its likelihood or possibility. The modal verbs in English are: may, might, can, could, must, should, will, would. These modal verbs have distinctive forms, too: not taking 's' in the 3rd person singular of the present simple, not having an infinitive or a participle, and forming the question form of the present and past simple through inversion of the subject and verb, and the negative simply by adding 'not'.
We had to move country even though it seemed the future would be difficult. But we couldn't stay where we were. Now we can't go back home but we may be able to at some point in the future.
This is the way in which we express our attitude to what we are saying. We often associate modality with verbs (obligation, possibility, ability, necessity etc) but modality can also be expressed through adjectives, adverbs and nouns. This latter is called lexical modality.
In the sentence He may come tomorrow we see modality expressed in the modal verb may. We can use lexical modality to express this too e.g. Perhaps he will come tomorrow (modal adverb), there's a chance he will come tomorrow (modal noun), it's possible he'll come tomorrow (modal adjective).
Fachinetti, R., Krug, M.G/ Palmer, F.R. (2003) Modality in Contemporary English. Berlin: Walter de Gruyter.
This term has two distinct meanings in ELT. The first comes from one of the five hypotheses that make up Krashen's input hypothesis, a theory of language acquisition in which he maintained that when a learner is monitoring their use of language, they are focusing on accuracy and inhibiting acquisition. In this use monitoring means the learner checking and evaluating their own language output, as they produce it, whether it be speaking or writing.
The other meaning of monitoring refers to the teacher observing and assessing learners in class.
"I find that when I monitor my own language use as I speak, it really slows me down and makes me hesitate and make mistakes."
O'Malley and Chamot, A. (1990). Learning Strategies in Second Language Acquisition. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
This is a learner dictionary (a dictionary that is graded to suit the learners' language level and needs) in which the dictionary entries, explanations and examples are all in the target language.
I have tried hard to encourage my students to use monolingual learner dictionaries so that they just think in the target language, but they keep using bilingual dictionaries instead. They say they find them more helpful.
Chan, A. (2008).Why do learners prefer bilingualized dictionaries to monolingual dictionaries, or vice versa? Oxford University Research Archive.
Cowie, A.P. (2013). English Dictionaries for Foreign Learners, Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Schmitt, N. (Ed.) (2010). An Introduction to Applied Linguistics, 2nd edition. Abingdon: Routledge.
Morphemes are the smallest meaningful and grammatical units in a word. A morpheme 'cannot be divided without altering or destroying its meaning' (Longman Dictionary of Teaching and Applied Linguistics, p.375). For example, phones contains two morphemes – phone and s; helpless contains two morphemes – help and less; table contains only one morpheme. Many morphemes are suffixes or prefixes, but there are also grammatical morphemes in English such as 3rd person singular s, past tense –ed, and –ing in a gerund or present participle.
In many vocabulary books you can find activities on word formation that in fact are based on morphemes e.g. deciding on the right prefix, matching parts of compound words, making opposites by adding the correct suffix.
This is the study of the use of morphemes (See Morpheme) to form words. Morphology shows us how different kinds of morphemes combine or operate singly to form words.
Carstairs McCarthy, A. (2001) An Introduction to English Morphology: Words and Their Structure. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press.
Carter, R. and McCarthy, M. (1988). Vocabulary and Language Teaching. London and New York: Longman.
A group of words (e.g. a verb + adverb particle or preposition) which has a meaning as a whole and for which the meaning of the whole group of words is different from the meaning of each individual word. Multi-word units are often phrasal verbs, idioms, compounds. Examples of multi-word units are fall in love, a hand-set, once in a blue moon, to look after. It is useful for learners to learn these units as chunks rather than piecing them together from individual words. Multi-word units are sometimes referred to as polywords.
"Learners seem to learn phrasal verbs more easily if they see each one as a multi-word unit which is a complete lexical item in itself, rather than as a verb + an adverb or preposition."
the learning of words. In N. Schmitt and M. McCarthy (ed.s) Vocabulary: Description, Acquisition, Pedagogy. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Lindstromberg, S. and Boers, F. (2008). Teaching Chunks of Language. Helbling Languages.
Nattinger, J.R. and DeCarrico, J.(1992) Lexical Phrases and Language Teaching. Oxford: Oxford University Press.