Page 4 - ELG2304 Apr Issue 484

WELCOME . EDITOR’S LETTER

Does size matter?

With small multilingual countries steaming ahead
theteam can the old superpowers keep up?

MELANIE BUTLER, The summer is upon us, and the world of ELT is returning to normal. Or is it?
editor-in-chief, Pre-pandemic the UK had the largest number of accredited language centres in the English-speaking
started teaching EFL in
Iran in 1975. She worked world. However, as you can read on the page opposite, the number of accredited centres has now fallen
for the BBC World Service, by a quarter and still continues to fall.
Pearson/Longman and A good summer could save many and as we show in our supplement, which starts on page 17, the UK
MET magazine before can still boast an unrivalled supply of vacation courses, especially when it comes to residential centres.
taking over at the Gazette in 1987 and However, as we show on pages 24 and 25 the main competitor countries, Ireland and Malta may now be
also launching Study Travel magazine. the post-Brexit first choice for EU citizens; Ireland is already fully booked for summer 2023, the Maltese
Educated in 10 schools in seven countries,
she speaks fluent French and Spanish, and are not far behind. Small, it seems, is beautiful.
rather rusty Italian. The other small country to hit the headlines in this issue is Wales. With its three million people and
melanie@elgazette.com its handful of language schools this part of the UK pops up, unbidden, all over this issue. For the first
time a language school in the Welsh capital is named in our summer school rankings (see page 21). Take
LIZ GRANIRER, a bow Celtic English Academy. The school also appears – along with virtually all the accredited schools
editor, has edited for in Cardiff – on the list of those chosen to take part in the British Council’s PRELIM scheme, you can
parenting, travel and kids’ turn to page 19 for the full list.
magazines, writes for a Wales has another thing in common with Ireland and Malta Multilingual countries
number of print and online – it has more than one local language. All three teach at least
publications, and has are not only good
worked on a range of two local languages all through school – with the Maltese
well-known consumer and teaching at least three. The only other English-speaking at learning languages,
contract magazines. country where two languages may be the norm, is Canada, also
editor@elgazette.com a major hit with students. Perhaps students and agents have they are also good
finally realised that multilingual countries are not only good at
GILL RAGSDALE, learning languages, they are also good at teaching them. at teaching them
research news reporter, One thing that these three multilingual countries can tell
has a PhD in Evolutionary you, is that their other languages are much easier to read than English. Welsh, Irish and even Maltese
Anthropology from
Cambridge and teaches than English all have more transparent orthographies, so some children who can read well in these
Psychology with the Open languages may struggle with dyslexia in English.
University. She also holds As you can see from the story of Alex (page 26) it is perfectly possible to be bought up bilingually and
an RSA-Cert TEFL. Gill has taught EFL in read proficiently in one language while being severely dyslexic in the other. As was the case with Alex,
the UK, Turkey, Egypt and to refugees in
the Calais ‘Jungle’ in France. She currently such children may not even know they have dyslexia in English, until they are professionally diagnosed.
teaches English to refugees in the UK. Indeed about ten per cent of students in any EFL class may read well in L1 but struggle with English
– they are our hidden dyslexics. And precisely because they don’t know they have that problem – it
CHARLOTTE DYASON, doesn’t show up in their L1 - they are extremely hard to identify.
senior sales, a graduate How can we help them? One solution, as we reveal on page 27, is to do what they do in bilingual
of Canterbury and Wales and teach everybody to read twice – once in each language.
experienced education Back in Japan it is the teachers who currently face problems. British Council teachers in Tokyo
marketer, Charlotte has a are taking strike action against compulsory retirement, following around a decade of negotiations
wealth of expertise and (see page 6). But as Henry Rodgers explains on page 14 the fight for parity for Italy’s native-speaker
knowledge to assist with
promotional campaigns. language lecturers has been going on 44 years and they are still on the march.
info@elgazette.com, tel 020 3137 9119. It is a wonder anyone wants to train to teach English. But someone who has recently finished an
online TEFL course is Zoe Parrish, a classicist who has long taught Latin and Greek online. On pages 26
IAN CARTER, and 27 she gives us her insights on the experience.
publisher, has a The problems with online teaching also feature in our research news (on pages 14 and 15) as does the
Masters in Strategic subject of Growth Mindset, an idea which works well in theory but is proving hard to teach in practice.
Business Management For those who have always put practice ahead of theory, there is a treat on page 30 where Andrew
(Westminster) and Rossiter argues the case for taking linguistics out of grammar teaching.
30 years’ publishing Happy summer reading.
experience in the
professional and academic sector.
elgazette@media-shed.co.uk, EDITOR
tel 020 3475 6811.

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4 April 2023