Category: English Central Blog

The number of “A” grades has tripled over the past seven decades, to the point where it is now the most common grade awarded by American post-secondary institutions. What is the cause? Entitled students who demand better marks because they paid for them? The general whittling-away of educational standards? Affirmative action? Changes in the philosophy of pedagogy? An interesting opinion piece in the Washington Post looks at “The rise of the gentleman’s ‘A’ and th GPA arms race.”

Is anyone else out there a Globe and Mail reader? We read it almost every day and almost every day for the past little while it has seemed like there has been at least one story claiming that after months of battling one goverment agency or another, they finally have gotten access to some very important information that someone was trying to conceal. It is like they want to make themselves out as the forces behind the Panama Papers, but in a Canadian context.

Anyhoo, something they have revealed is a Citizenship and Immigration Canada report – which the government was trying to keep secret – that states that the work program designed to encourage international students tos spend their education dollars at Canadian post-secondary institutions has actually created a pool of cheap labour from which Canadian businesses can exploit. The majority of those employed on work permits are in low-skilled jobs in the service sector and have median eranings that are less than half of other rececent graduates.

Read the full article in the Globe and Mail.

The title says it all, but we would like to congratulate the publishers of products in our catalog that have been nominated:

In the Innovation in Learner Resources category, Express Publishing has been nominated for the Explore our World CLIL Readers and Helbling Languages has been nominated for The Thinking Train series of children’s readers. Congratulations!

See the full list.

The IALC Study Travel Report is a great resource for those in the industry, as it gives very comprehensive numbers on who is going where for what and seeing what the trends are.

Fun teaser: the next big thing is predicted to be English-language nurseries.

A great summary is available from the EL Gazette, but if you like your information in raw form, download the actual report.

If you are at all like us here at English Central, you bristle at these young kids going to teach English overseas who don’t think they need any training because either they are native speakers or because they did an English major in college. Bless the occasional one who has enough respect for teaching that they decide to take a course…. but sadly, pity them because they usually do not do enough research into which programs are decent ones and just go with the cheap and quick weekend course that ends up being a waste of time (and that makes them think that there isn’t much to teaching after all).

Well, rejoice! Cambridge English has just released a free MOOC with Future Learn. The goal of this MOOC is to educate these kids (and others interested into getting into the ELT gig) on what good teaching is and how important it is to get appropriate training. We suspect it may be a soft sales approach to getting more people to take CELTA, but we would actually have to do the course to be sure and that’s not going to happen because we have books to sell. However, even if that is the case, we would’t object, because CELTA is as good as it gets when it comes to short teacher-training courses and if it stems the tide of people taking bogus weekend courses, the world of ELT and the respect for our profession will be all that much better off.

The remaining question is: how will the kids find out about it? We are not entirely sure, but we hope you will pass the word along to anyone who could benefit.

Visit the Future Learn site.

The Transferable Academic Skills Kit is pretty much the only book of its kind. What do you think makes this resource so unique?

I think TASK is unique because it is so practical, with a focus on activities and exercises to help students develop essential academic skills. It is also highly flexible, allowing students to dip into specific modules according to their needs or interests. And the focus on transferable skills means that it can be used in a variety of contexts, by students of almost any background or level.

 

Why did your team put this material together?

The book was originally put together by a team from the University Reading, led by Anthony Manning, TASK’s creator and one of the principal authors. The material grew directly out of our experience teaching students on the International Foundation Programme here at Reading. We understood the importance of supporting students transitioning into higher education by helping them acquire a set of skills and tools that they could apply across any academic discipline and even beyond university. It therefore provides students with their own individual toolkit to draw on when faced with new situations – in and out of the classroom.

 

How is the second edition different from the first edition?

The new TASK has the same core aims and structure, but the material has been updated to ensure it is still relevant to the current HE context. Some modules were removed; IT Skills, for example, had become less relevant to our increasingly digital students. Other modules were re-worked, with new exercises and/or topics added, or with a new focus: for instance instead of Teamworking we created Group Work and Projects. I should add that it’s a testament to our own good group work that quite a number of the authors contributed to the final version of this module! Another important change was in re-working and extending the previous module on Research and Referencing into two new units: Research and Online Sources, and Referencing and Avoiding Plagiarism. This was to recognise the importance of these challenging topics, and to offer students space for a deeper exploration, more practice, and more activities.  Finally, another exciting addition, especially for me as a non-maths specialist, is a brand new module on Numeracy, reflecting the recognition that maths is essential for everyone and in a wide range of fields.

 

 

Seeing as this material does not teach language skills and most EAP classes are defined by the skill(s) they teach, how can TASK fit into an EAP program’s curriculum?

TASK can usefully complement any EAP programme, precisely because of its focus on academic skills practice. Its modular nature means units can be used at any point in the curriculum, either alongside language work, or as standalone topics in their own right. For example: Presentations could enhance work on spoken language by offering additional practice activities; Critical Thinking could be added at any point to engage students in written and spoken exercises.

 

Dr Elisabeth Wilding is Deputy Head of the International Study and Language Institute (ISLI) at the University of Reading, which specialises in providing a range of language courses and academic training to international students. Elisabeth’s teaching and research interests relate to technology-enhanced learning and academic skills development. She has co-authored two course books in the 2015 TASK (Transferable Academic Skills Kit) series: Presentations and Research and Online Sources.

At the begining of March, Florida Sentators passed a bill that would allow high school students to take computer coding in place of their foreign language requirement. Not everyone is on board with this change, including colleges and universities which do not recognize coding as an alternative to their language requirements!

Read more about the kerfuffle.

For those of you who love to hate IELTS – or for those of you merely interested in the accuracy and effectiveness of language proficiency testing – here is the story of Kevin Wall, a 30 year old Irishman and paralympian living in Perth on a visa. He has repeatedly failed to pass the IELTS test, thus preventing him from becoming an Australian citizen and from representing Australia in the Rio Paralympic Games.

Read and watch more.

We recently blogged about how Pearson, the international educatioal publishing giant, has announced a 10% cut to its workforce to deal with sumping sales and profits. For a number of years, Pearson seems to have sticking their toes in different waters in an effort to find some other means of staying afloat.

A recent and unique experiment is in the form of an agreement with the Cincinnati State and Technical College. The college has been suffering from falling registration for several years. Under this new agreement, Pearson will take over all marketing, recruiting and student services. The agreement is until 2026 and will cost the college over half a million dollars a year. Pearson has apparently been a content provider for Cincinnati State (and many other post-secondary institutions) for years now, but this agreement is new and – so far – unique.

We have to wonder….

Read more on Inside Higher Education.

Canada has begun an 18-month pilot program to cut visa waiting times from 5 to 2 months ad will also require applicants to show fewer financial documents. The move is intended to bring Canada more in line with the US, UK and Australia and thereby make it a more attractive destination for Vietnamese students. The next country that will be trageted with such a program will be Nigeria.

Read more in PIE.