ARTESOL

Mario Luis López-Barrios holds a Dr. phil. (Universität Kassel, Germany) and a degree in Language Education in English and German (Universidad Nacional de Córdoba, Argentina). Professor of Foreign Language Teaching (School of Languages, UNC). Areas of interest: Foreign Language Teaching, Materials Development, Research Methods in Applied Linguistics and Second Language Acquisition.

EFL coursebook contents and local curricula

The syllabus typically states the actual subject matter of a language course and its organization. In the school context, the topics included in EFL curricula are decided by an educational authority in accordance with national guidelines that frame the organization of the teaching and learning processes. In the Province of Córdoba, Argentina, themes are labelled in the curriculum as ámbitos de experiencia e interés, i.e. topics that relate to the experience and interests of the target learners, and include, apart from the typical everyday situations, cross-curricular topics from the social or natural sciences. Because some of these topics are controversial, they tend to be underrepresented or absent in commercial EFL materials. Despite the relevance of the non-language contents in foreign language education, these have scarcely been the object of research. Thus, this presentation examines their presence in five EFL coursebook series popularly used in some local schools and analyses them quantitatively to determine the coverage of said curriculum topics by the coursebooks. The study aims at raising awareness of the relevance of the inclusion of interest areas in teaching materials and at providing further insights into this marginal topic in materials development.

Dr. Ken Beatty, Anaheim University TESOL Professor, has worked in Asia, the Middle East, and North and South America, lecturing on language teaching and computer-assisted language learning from the primary through university levels. He’s author/co-author of 148 readers and textbooks and has given 500+ teacher-training sessions and conference presentations in 35 countries.He is Series Consultant for Pearson’s StartUp.

Language Teaching: New Models, Tools, and Attitudes

Times of stress in society are known to produce political, pedagogical, and technological innovations. Sometimes, these innovations are temporary solutions that disappear with the problems that inspired them. Other times, innovations become part of the fabric of everyday life. This presentation examines new models, tools, and attitudes around teaching and learning languages: Models include completely online and hybrid classroom models; tools include social media platforms that accommodate different forms of interaction and learning opportunities, and; attitudes rethink such ideas as teacher, student, and parent roles, strategies for shifting responsibility for learning to students, and a re-thinking of assessment. Overarching concerns include teachers’ and administrators’ engagement with digital technologies that make new learning possible.

Christine Feak is a faculty member at the English Language Institute, University of Michigan, where she is the lead lecturer for dissertation writing and writing for publication courses. She is co-author (with John Swales) of Academic Writing for Graduate Students and the English in Today’s Research World book series focused on the writing of research genres and subgenres. In addition to teaching and textbook writing, she also serves as co-editor of ESP, an international peer-reviewed journal focusing on topics relevant to the teaching and learning of discourse for specific communities. Her current research interests include academic writing in education, medicine, and business; writing for publication needs of scholars in developing countries; and the development of effective academic writing curricula.

Responding to the changing landscape of graduate student writing

The academic writing challenges faced by the new generation of graduate students are becoming more complex. It is no longer enough to master traditional research genres such as conference proposals, literature reviews, and journal articles; graduate students today must also write to share their research and expertise with non-expert audiences within and outside the academy and to navigate new rules of research engagement. To be successful graduate students need a more enhanced set of knowledge brokering skills and a broader genre repertoire that will allow them to transport their research and expertise across many boundaries. This talk will explore the changing landscape of graduate student writing and ways that EAP writing programs can respond through new course offerings that allow students to develop writing agility.