In this issue we have included teachers who write for us, review materials for us, are regular readers and potential contributors. Will your story be next?
Clare, UK
Thirty six years ago, in the Terrace Room at Bell Cambridge, I was a fresh modern languages graduate doing my CELTA (then, the RSA Certificate in TEFLA). Now, I’m the longest-serving teacher and, in October 2024, I’ll have been working here for 30 years. Who’d’ve thought it?!
Back in 1987, I grappled with new terminology: to elicit (not illicit) vocabulary, drilling, infintive and gerund forms, activating schemata (fallen out of favour, along with Multiple Intelligences Theory), gist versus detail, cloze versus gapfill. Nowadays, I absolutely relish teaching language features: clefting, fronting, inversion, dangling participles, reduced realtives, the Oxford comma – bring ’em on. I teach all levels, from beginner to proficiency, one-to-one courses, Cambridge exam and IELTS preparation, and run a lot of specialist teacher training courses: Contemporary English, British Culture, Language and Methodology, English for Healthcare Professionals, English for German Lecturers to name a few.
I’ve been a regular contributor to MET for many years, reviewing coursebooks and other publications. It’s work like this that allows me to keep abreast of industry preoccupations: the timely and welcome inclusion in coursebooks of other Englishes and accent diversity (I myself am a speaker of standard Scottish English), critical thinking skills, self-regulated learning, adaptive teaching (differentiation, once upon a time) and metacogntion. What I like about MET as a publication is the voice it gives to teachers from all corners of the globe, whether you are a novice or an old hand. There’s a good balance of background theory and practical ideas. I often use back copies of the mag in teacher training: participants choose an article to read and present to the whole group, saying what they learnt about current thinking, or what practical classroom activities they can take away and implement.
I’m often most inspired by articles written in MET about language: this month there’s something fascinating about portmanteau words, and I think it’ll galvanise me into re-writing some of my PowerPoints about blends and other methods of lexical coinage.
I’m happy to play a small ongoing role in the life of MET. Long may the magazine continue!
