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1. Why did you become a teacher?
Well, both my parents were teachers so I just knew that I was NEVER going to be one. But I taught a class in Nigeria while I was travelling in Africa in 1979 and I loved it. I realised that it was exactly what I loved doing.
2. Tell us about your career in ELT?
I started teaching at International House in London in 1981. I also started a theatre Company teaching English through Drama in several countries. Later, I worked in Brazil for 2 years before returning to IH. I spent a year researching then creating a Learning Centre at IH, using computers and other resources to encourage individual learning. I became a teacher trainer then in 1989 I was appointed as Director of Studies for Teacher Training at IH.
In 1991 I moved to Lancaster to study for an MA in Linguistics. I stayed in Lancaster , initially working at the University before starting to write full-time with my good friend Steve.
3. What makes a secondary school student different?
Well, living with my teenager daughter is a crash course into a teen outlook on life. It's a time of sudden responsibility, growing skills and insights and all the very real problems of dealing with your own life. There's so much to do in life that school often feels like the wrong place to be - sometimes completely irrelevant.
So, at best, secondary school students are enthusiastic, hungry for challenges and full of raw appetite for new things, with the energy and the intelligence to start really making a difference in their own lives. But if we don't keep that excitement all the energy turns to disillusion, boredom and even aggression quite quickly. That outlines our task as teachers.
4. How did you get the idea for Energy?
We wanted to write a book that was easy to use and reassuring for teachers and students, but it had to have that feeling of the excitement of being a teenager. Steve and I would ask each other "Does it smell like teen spirit" while we were writing. At the same time, we saw excellent teaching being wasted because students couldn't fix or memorise what they were learning. We wanted to change that.
5. What makes you most excited about Energy?
Lots of things. I think it looks really fresh. We found a really great photographer who worked with our wonderful designer to make it feel young and vital. I love the material in it. I used to leave the texts lying around when there were teenagers in the house to see which ones they wanted to pick up and read.
But secretly, the idea of memorisation is top of my list. Where did that idea come from? Teachers, of course. It's what we saw teachers actually doing. 'Memorisation' was thoroughly discredited after Chomsky's passionate rejection of Behaviourism, but it has become clear that not all memorisation is bad. When you mix active memorisation with thoughtful, cognitive learning and communicative approaches, it's a very powerful combination. We hope we can break the demoralising cycle of learning and forgetting. Now I think that's really exciting.
6. How important is technology to ELT?
Nothing is as important as good teaching. Smart, challenging, sensitive teaching is a great human skill. But students can become more independent with video, CD-ROMS, computers and the internet, downloaded MP3 texts and so on. When people talk about technology they often focus on high-end stuff that costs loads and isn't available in most classrooms. I'd like to see more good quality basic stuff like CD players and cheap CD-ROM drives becoming available in schools. The internet also offers exciting possibilities for teachers to converse with each other and exchange ideas and materials.
7 What do you do to 'get fit'?
That's an abrupt change of subject! Was I boring you?
I cycle. During the day I sit at home working (on lots of lovely hi-tech stuff) and I get lazy and slow, then I put on my cycling gear and head for the hills to clear my mind and wake up again. I'm lucky because I live in the middle of some of the most beautiful countryside on earth, and it takes me 2 minutes from my house to the moors above Lancaster , though you can only see them when the rain lifts. My family is horrified because I've got 3 bikes and the racing bike has to live in the kitchen. They have also banned me from wearing cycling gear near them or their friends!
8. If you can change something in your life, what would it be?
I'd spend more time playing music, seeing friends, cycling, eating great food, going to the cinema and the theatre, travelling in new places with my kids. I'd also learn a new language properly, study history and read thousands of books, and stay up late every night. Apart from that, I like it just as it is.
9. What the best advice you could give to teachers?
In fact, I think teachers should be giving me advice, not the other way round. But you asked so here goes ... I get the chance to meet, watch and talk to teachers all the time and one thing strikes me as sad - that so many talented, gifted, hard-working teachers feel tired, unappreciated, and guilty that they aren't working hard enough. You certainly can't stop feeling tired, but you can appreciate yourself and you can cut the guilt. Remember the great teachers you had at school? They continue to live in your mind for the rest of your life. That's you.
1. Why did you become a teacher?
I started teaching students in Lancaster University , and enjoyed doing it. Then I saw an advertisement in a newspaper to train to become a teacher teaching English in Turkey . I did that and enjoyed it too. This was 27 years ago...
2. Tell us about your career in ELT?
I taught in Turkey , then a short period in Algeria , at a university in London and at International House London. I started writing ELT books in 1980, and have written or co-written about 25 since then. I took five years out between 1988 to 1992 to work as a campaigner for Greenpeace, but apart from that I have always worked in ELT.
3. What makes a secondary school student different?
They're teenagers. Teenagers are different. Their minds are changing, their way of learning is changing, they are finding out how to become independent, and they have a whole factory of new chemicals running through their bodies. I have lived with teenagers for the past nine years, and I really enjoy their company. They are independent, witty, clumsy, and usually taller than me. It's like living with a herd of well-meaning wildebeest. They have definite ideas of what they want in the classroom, however.
4. How did you get the idea for Energy?
Jim got the idea of memorisation when we were researching material for a workshop. After that, it was our usual way of working - lots of discussion, a few arguments, and a lot of fun.
5. What makes you most excited about Energy?
Memorisation. I think the book can really make a difference to students' lives. I hope so, anyway. And the writing gyms are really good.
6. How important is technology to ELT?
I don't think it's important at all. A good teacher can't be replaced by anything.
7 What do you do to 'get fit'?
I play tennis, walk, run, and in the summer I swim most days in the sea. I also snorkel, scuba dive and sail.
8. If you can change something in your life, what would it be?
I have enjoyed all my life, even though as in all lives there have been some sad times. So I wouldn't like to change anything. Maybe one less chin...
9. What the best advice you could give to teachers?
Trust your own instincts. You're the expert in your class, not anyone else.
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