IATE F L 2010 Harrogate Conference Selections
T. Pattison (ed.)
IATE F L 2011, 240 pp., free to members, 12.00 from
https://secure.iatefl.org/onl/shop.php
isbn 978 1901095 33 3
Attending conferences has never been easier: from
home, live internet access to key talks and presenter
interviews are often available; get involved in those
interviews through twitter or online chat, and you are
virtually there! Perhaps easier still is the opportunity
to read, at leisure, a selection of presentations and
plenary sessions. This also enables you to walk in
and out of any talk you please, dipping into those you
find immediately appealing or staying in a session
you did not expect to be gripped by! Such is my
experience with the IAT EFL 2010 Harrogate
Conference Selections, based on the 44th conference.
Tania Pattisons welcoming editorial introduction
puts the volume in context (five days of
presentations, symposiums, Special Interest Group
(SIG) programmes, posters, debates, etc.), and is
followed by three perspectives on the conference as
a whole, which also point out what readers missed:
write-ups not included (for example Scott Thornbury,
Dave Willis), the pecha kucha night, and Harrogate
spas, which no publication can provide! The
contributions are grouped into 11 topic areas.
Ema Ushiodas plenary paper opens Section 2 on
The learner, forefronting the innate role of natural
interactions for motivation. Subsequent papers
range from the study of a Chinese student in the
United Kingdom (Stuart Perrin 2.2) to a more
scientific analysis of learner autonomy (Fumiko
Murase and David Hall 2.4) and the discussion of
hybrid identities for learners in the United Kingdom
(Mikio Iguchi 2.3). Feeding directly into the
classroom are ready-made activities involving
movement (Juliet du Mont 2.7). A final symposium
paper discusses the good language learner and
reminds us to identify and understand individual
learners, like snowflakeseach having a unique
shape and structure (Kerstin Dofs and Moira Hobbs
2.6: 34).
Tessa Woodwards plenary, under Teacher training,
Section 3, described models of professional life
cycles. Her engaging style probably reflects an
enjoyable and informative talk. The subsequent nine
papers are by representatives from the United
Kingdom, Germany, India, Turkey, and Sri Lanka and
include scholarship winner Padmini Bhuyan
(Boruah) (3.3), whose paper anticipates later ones on
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global education and critical thinking (Section 6,
Reading). While storytelling has its own section,
Briony Beavens paper on teacher-training stories is
appropriately included here (3.6). The final three
papers in this section describe large-scale teacher-
training projects: Suzanne Mordue (3.8) involving
teachers in the Black Sea area on Moodle, Seamus
Harkin and Wasantha Yapa on teacher journals in
Sri Lanka (3.9), and Alan S. MacKenzie in India
(3.10) on a framework for monitoring large-scale
projects.
In Section 4, The global educator, focus is on
expatriate teacher communities (Susan Barduhn 4.1),
strategies for addressing political issues in class
(Danny Whitehead 4.3), and the unusual Bus project
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in South Korea. The paper summarizing the Hornby
Scholars presentation (4.5) draws in a geographically
wide spread of teachers. Other papers here address
cultural issues in coursebooks (Prem Bahadur Phyak
4.6), as well as the relevance of coursebook selection
criteria (Shu-er Huang 4.10), leading to the
symposium paper on materials writing (4.11).
The fifth section, Grammar, vocabulary and spelling,
goes for the jugular, with papers demonstrating the
importance for teachers of understanding tense
versus aspect, as well as epistemic meaning (Peter
Grundy 5.1). Accuracy versus fluency is brought
up-to-date in Martin Parrotts paper (5.3), which
challenges T EF L speak within the context of everyday
language. Focusing on lexis, subsequent papers look
at ways of learning vocabulary (5.4, 5.5) and contrast
with two lighter papers on acronyms (Mark Bartram
5.6) and the Spelling gym, for example, in Johanna
Stirlings talk (5.8).
Sections 6 and 7 relate to skills work: reading, and
speaking and writing. Not surprisingly, the first looks
more at the bigger picture of ways of approaching
texts. Peter Watkins paper (6.1) is key in this aspect
and is followed by papers that discuss ways of getting
students to interact with texts and develop critical
thinking skills (6.3, 6.4), as well as how to motivate
students (Hiroki Uchida 6.5). In-class tasks are also
represented, by, for example, the nicely personalized
idea Philip Prowse includes, with convincing
rationale, for the often frowned-upon reading aloud
activity (6.6). By contrast, Section 7 focuses in more
specifically on subskills: Robert Wilkinsons paper
compares gestures used in L1 and L2 presentations
(7.3), while Edward de Chazal (7.5) challenges what is
understood by cohesiveness in text. For those
wishing to broaden their students writing horizons,
Kuangyun Tings paper on using blogs for teaching
writing (7.9) stages an approach for developing
students online public confidence.
From skills, we move to more specialist areas of
teaching, with papers covering aspects of E S P ,
Business English (BE), and teaching younger
learners. Some of the topics covered could equally
well apply to other areas of teaching but are grounded
here through research and project work in the
presenters specific fields of work. In the E S P /BE
section, issues discussed include multiple
intelligences in engineering (8.3) and English as
a Lingua Franca in Prague (8.4) and Botswana (8.6).
On home ground, Barbara Skinner (8.1) describes
ways of helping international students integrate into
university life in Britain. In terms of encapsulating the
current range of issues faced when teaching learners
from 5 to 18 years of age, there is discussion of
bilingual teaching and plurilingual competencies
(9.6 and 9.4, respectively) and a summary of the
ELT J /I ATE F L Debate (9.2) this year on the feasibility
of CL IL , renamed Content and Languagean
ILlusion?. Two further papers I found particularly
interesting were the Question-Answer-Relationship
(QAR) method for developing reading skills (Sanja
Wagner 9.7) and Maureen Rajuans case on raising
cultural awareness and positive attitudes across the
JewishArab divide (9.9).
The lengthier Section 10, Teaching with technology,
highlights not only the what but also the how of
some current teaching contexts (Nicky Hockly 10.1).
Josefina C. Santanas paper (10.6) illustrates why
two-language Skype communication between
students in Guadalajara, Mexico and the United
States promoted considerably more engagement
than encouraging the Mexicans to use technology for
learning vocabulary or developing a podcast, again
proving the need for real communication. Such
a section would obviously be incomplete without
focus on Twitter (Graham Stanley 10.9) and Virtual
Learning Environments (Joe Pereira 10.8); other
papers lend support for how to set up e-learning
environments (Richard Pinner 10.3; Kalyan
Chattopadhyay 10.4).
In Testing, feedback and evaluation, Dawn Rogier
(11.2) highlights teachers lack of skills in assessment
and advocates what needs working on to integrate
assessment into course delivery. Melanie Shaul (11.3)
discusses testing that draws both on classroom work
and students cultural backgrounds for more
efficient, improved results. Subsequent papers detail
assessing speaking and dealing with errors, and Tilly
Harrison (11.9) evaluates online peer reviewing. The
symposium paper (11.7) on responding to students
writing looks at four action research studies, one of
particular interest on using audio files, an issue taken
up by Jane Nolan and Elizabeth Poynter (11.8).
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Finally, Section 12, Stories for all ages, opens with
a symposium paper on using narratives in ELT. As the
index illustrates, stories pervade language teaching,
but specifically here the reader finds both classroom
approaches with stories, such as Hitomi Masuharas
E EE E : Engage, Express, Enjoy, and be Empowered, as
well as ways of incorporating stories into the syllabus,
involving learners stories, and indeed using the class
itself as a story (Alan Maley, Symposium paper 12.1).
Subsequent papers look at using visuals with younger
learners (Symposium paper 12.2; Hege Emma
Rimmereide 12.3), students collaborating on story
projects (Sharon Ahlquist 12.4), and using literature
for developing sociocultural competency (Jennifer
Schumm Fauster 12.5).
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A wholly professional publication, the range of
topics covered in this volume accurately reflects
the wide variety of our teaching contexts. Overtly
academic papers are balanced by many practical
sessions. The Contents pages show at a glance
what the reader can expect, and the
comprehensive indices of both author and topic
further facilitate this. The title of each paper, its
introduction, andin most casesa clear
conclusion, enable efficient reading. This could be
down to the guidelines Tania Pattison provides
online (Pattison 2011), especially her R IC H
acronym (relevant, interesting, coherent, and a hot
topic). Email addresses are given, and some online
links. Each paper is referenced, although
a bibliography straddling three pages seems
excessive (2.1), and could have excluded another
paper. The topic index includes most cross-
references, but not all. Could perhaps a tag or label
system, common to blogs, be used in future to
enhance referencing?
With the poster presentations, I was disappointed not
knowing in advance what to expect when reading
these summaries. Some are, in effect, research
papers (5.5, 6.2) and lack much sense of reader
interaction. Maybe illustrations of posters would help
here.
Sent to nearly 4,000 I ATE F L members globally,
Harrogate Conference Selections will have a wide
audience. For some, seeing their name in print for the
first time is a significant milestone; others may look
for the talks they missed; those further afield could
usefully use one or more sections for in-service
teacher development discussions. However, not
merely a snapshot of the breadth of issues currently
under discussion, Harrogate Conference Selections
undoubtedly illustrates the treasures such
a conference affords, and as such, is an enormous
credit to the industry.
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Reference
Pattison, T. 2011. How to Write Successfully for IAT EF L
Conference Selections. Available at http://
iatefl.britishcouncil.org/2011/sessions/2011-04-19/
how-write-successfully-iatefl-conference-selections
(accessed on 11 September 2011).

The reviewer
Rachel Appleby works at ELT E University in
Budapest, Hungary, teaching methodology,
language, cultural studies, and communication skills.
She is also a freelance Business English teacher/
teacher trainer. She is a C ELTA trainer and writes
Business English teaching materials. She is co-author
of International Express Upper Intermediate (third

Downloaded from http://eltj.oxfordjournals.org/ at Jember University on September 11, 2014

edition, in press) and the Business one:one series
(advanced, intermediate+, pre-intermediate), all
Oxford University Press. She is also co-author of The
Business Advanced (Macmillan). Rachel has an MSc in
TE FL from Aston University and has also taught
English in the UK, Spain, Portugal, and Slovakia for
International House and the British Council.
Email: rachelappleby@mail.datanet.hu
doi:10.1093/elt/ccr080

130 Reviews