Other Featured Titles

Oldie but a 'Goodie'

Perfect for new teachers and a must have for every TESOL training library shelf, Teaching Tenses is a genuine classic.

This excellent resource focuses exclusively on the main tenses in English, and is a fabulous source of information and ideas for presenting and practicing grammar.

This book provides everything a teacher needs to know about the form, functions and concepts of every tense and presents the information in ways that are immediately transferable to the classroom.

We love it because of its:

• succinct and clear focus on meaning, form, use and pronunciation

• attention to common learner difficulties and errors

• interesting and relevant suggested contexts and practice activities

Further details and information

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Cool Websites

Free Stuff from the Publishers


In case you haven't visited the Cambridge website recently, you might be unaware of the fabulous free Research and Methodology Booklets.

Written by the big names in ESL, there is some excellent stuff here. Want to learn more about using the corpus in the classroom? How about pronunciation techniques? Teaching speaking skills?

There are 10 booklets in downloadable pdf format.

Not to be outdone, Oxford has provided interesting articles and booklets, penned by their authors.

New content from Tricia Hedge (who wrote THE writing skills book, Writing), new jazzy chants from Carolyn Graham and new activity ideas from the updated edition of Vocabulary (another golden gem) are available for all.

New content is published regularly, so both of these sites are worth penciling in to check back at in a few months.

Also deserving a mention is Longman. Excellent tips and articles are on offer here.

And finally... our favorite publisher, Garnet, has a plethora of fantastic stuff for English for Academic Purposes. Check it out for great links to journals and websites dedicated to EAP - and definitely don't miss the www.englishforacademicstudy.com pages - a huge body of content with links and information all relevant to the EAP context.

All good - all free.

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Teaching Tips

Teaching with Movies

Having your students watch a movie with no input or classwork is like using a gold mine as a local swimming pool.

There is so much excellent material to mine, and planning how you will exploit the language, cultural information and listening skills, is truly worth the effort.

A recent study in Australia found the following benefits of using film in class included:

• increased motivation levels
• greater understanding of context-bound expressions
• development of concentration

Tips for Lesson Preparation

However, even the best laid plans can go astray, so here's some tips to wise planning:

• select appropriate content - keep age and interests in mind

• Anticipate how many times you will need to replay - usually at least twice

• Match tasks with students' level - avoid frustration

• don't lose sight of the magic - appreciating the movie may be as important as working with the language and content

General Lesson Ideas

Here's a few generic industry ideas to get your creativity flowing:

• Generate language from the students as they describe scenes to their classmates who can't see the screen

• Play with the sound off and anticipate what the characters are saying

• Pause at critical times and ask what will be said next

• Create a quiz - show a snippet, put students into teams and have them test the observation powers of other groups

• Choose a controversial clip that will generate a lot of discussion

• Set up questions to highlight the context - relationship, environment, emotion - then note what language emerges from the scene.

And for even more ideas, check out the following:

Lesson Plans

Cool ideas

Individual movie guides

Happy teaching!