What Postgraduates Appreciate in Online Feedback on Academic Writing #researchbites

In this article, Northcott, Gillies and Coutlon explore their students' perceptions of how effective online formative feedback was for improving their postgraduate academic writing, and aim to highlight best practices for online writing feedback.

Reading Support Worksheets for EAP

Much is said in published literature about the necessity of EAP students reading authentic academic texts, and also about providing scaffolding and support for them to do so. I believe lecturers and academic tutors teaching their subject content in English and/or on a CLIL-based approach will also need to help students digest the readings for their …

Phonology in ELT – A Manifesto

"Achieving Phonology's Potential in the ELT Classroom"    - A very inspiring talk by Adam Scott on 5th April at IATEFL 2017 in Glasgow.  In his talk, Adam presented his manifesto, a call to arms, to bring about a shift towards higher awareness of the importance of phonology in ELT. He's convinced that we will experience …

An iatefl quickie – Writing Methodology Notes

A very quick summary of some key points from Scott Thornbury's talk "Writing Methodology Texts" on 4th April at iatefl 2017. He surveyed methodology book writers to gain some insight into what makes such texts most useful for teachers, much of which applies to writing any kinds of teaching notes or rubrics! The key points …

An iatefl quickie – Choosing & Using Authentic Texts

A very quick summary of some key points from Sue Kay's talk, "The genuine article (you couldn't make it up)", presented at iatefl 2017 on 4th April. Questions to ask when choosing a text:  Will it interest and engage learners? Can learners relate it to their own lives? Is it age-appropriate? Can learners learn (well …

Competency-based planning and assessing

Earlier this week, I attended a workshop on competency-based (or competency-oriented) planning and assessing held by Dr Stefan Brall at Trier University, and would like to share some of the insights here. The workshop was aimed at university-level teachers from various subject areas, and so concentrated generally on Competency-Based Education (CBE). According to Richards and …

Peer Presentation Feedback

I teach an EAP module which focusses on language and study skills. It's aimed at first-semester students starting an English Studies degree where English is a foreign language for almost all students. They're at the B2+ level. In a 15-week semester, we spend the first five weeks or so looking at what makes a good …