3 Activities and procedures for teacher preparation Rod Ellis The last few years have seen a number of teachers’ manuals for preparing teachers of English as a second or foreign language (e.g., Abbot and Wingard 1981; Gower and Walters 1983; Harmer 1983; Hubbard et 1983; Willis 1983). These manuals vary in their intended audiences and also in their approaches, but in their different ways they all provide information about both the theory and practice of second language ) teaching. This information is presented in a variety of ways. (1) There are expositions of theoretical principles and procedures for carrying out different kinds of lessons. (2) There are examples of lesson plans and ) of teaching materials. (3) There are activities for teachers-in-preparation to carry out in order to explore and evaluate different aspects of second iching. These manuals, then, not only inform us about the ‘of second language teaching but also try to involve student teachers actively in the process of making decisions about what to teach and how to teach it. ) ‘The main purpose of teacher preparati framework for desc ) and the different procedures for exploiting them, I hope to encourage their use in teacher preparation courses and also provide practical in- formation about how to devise and use activities. ) ‘There are three parts to this chapter. The first consists of a schematic ne of teacher preparation practices. This is intended to provide the xt for the second part, in which a framework for describing teacher ) preparation activities is presented. This part also includes an example ‘of an activity. In the third part, a list of teacher preparation procedures is given, together with a sample of a plan for exploiting an activity An outline of teacher preparation practices Teacher preparation practices, in the fist instance, can be divide those that are experiential and those that raise auareness. Expy rity Press 1986. Reprinted by perm Activities and procedures for teacher preparation actual teaching. This can occur c the student teachers are required to teach actual students in real classrooms, or in “simulated” practice, as when the student teachers engage in peer teaching. Awareness-raising Practices are intended to develop the student teacher's conscious un- derstanding of the principles u language teaching and! or the practical techniques that teachers can use in different kinds of lessons. Two points need to be made abs and awareness-raising pe: exclusive, Teacher preparat ithe distinction between experienti t, the two types are not mutual ve both kinds, although nmon in preservice courses, ing practices predominate in inservice courses. Thi however, is perhaps more the re ce and tradition principled decision making. Second, experiential and awareness-raising practices do not need to be separated; they can be combined in a single activity. This occurs, for instance, when teaching practice is used not only to develop the student teacher's practical classroom know-how, but also to develop understanding of particule issues through reflect and evaluation, The broken line in Figure 1 is meant to represent the f the two types of pra purpose of this chapter lative merits Of the two kinds of practices. The assump \derlies the use of awareness-raising practices, however, is thatthe practice of actual teach- ing can be improved by making teachers aware of the options open to them and the principles by which they can evaluate th is not known to what extent this assumption is just ‘educators, in fact, realy influence what teachers do in the classroom by making them think al nd practice of teaching in sessions remote from the too easy to assume that a betterinfor become a better teacher. It would be com- c assumption. ing practices. These teacher preparation consist of the materials that they correspond to materials, ing, Each activity will give the student teacher a number of tasks to perform. ‘These tasks are likely to be based fon some data, which constitute the raw material of the activities. It follows that activities can be described by specifying the different ways in which data can be provided and the different kinds of operations that ied to carry out in the tasks based on the itute the teacher educator's + preparation sessions. Just as for use in classroom language tea 7Rod Ellis Procedures Figure 1 1 of teacher preparation practices up a lesson plan for exploit teaching ma- or needs to draw up a preparation plan ocedures for exploiting different teacher is teacher preparation preparation s. Figure 1 diagrams the vari practices that have been described. A framework for describing teacher preparation activities ‘The purpose of a des: is not to suggest wha are suggested), Teacher preparat can be provided and (2) rudent teachers can be asked to perform. Ways of providing data 1, Video or audio recordings of a Eyerm Caran oy Meth? ‘whether the video or audio mat of whole lessons or selected ex 2. Transcripts of lessons. Anott is by preparing transeri al isto ig classroom data ing to prev: or audio materials in con) 3. Classroom teaching. 4. Peer teaching. 5. Microteaching. ies 3, 4, and $ are all experiential. That is, they can be used to sive the student teacher direct experience of teaching and do not need to be accompanied by awareness-raising tasks. However, they can also serve as further ways of providing data about teaching for analysis and evaluation, 6. Readings. Student teachers can be provided with readings from articles and books on second language teaching as ends in them- selves these readings can be used as a bi range of asks. : 7. Textbook materials. Samples of teaching materials ~ both good and bad, appropriate and inappropriate — cat‘be © as data for is for a ines. Apart from complete lesson plans, student te: various tasks based ci plans that have been spec 9. Case studies. Case studies are an can be studies of particular class dual teachers orlearners, or of whole courses. Wi vides two case studies of reading programs that are good examples of the kind of raw material that can be utilized in teacher prepat 10. Samples of students” written work wited to prepare s can be asked to perform lesson plans S. lata. They to provide an indication the teacher educator ean use 29 - 'Any single activity may ake use of just one data type or a combination of types. Different kinds of tasks ‘operat perform on whatever raw needed for each two lesson plans provided and why. ig scheme that you could use to tached sample of students’ ‘After watching the video ex the different decide which errors you would choose to reacher and say why.” Look through the language teaching materials at- tached and then rank them according to how ‘eommunicative" you Rearranging. E.g., “Look at the video recording of a teacher or- ing group work. Make a list of the different steps the teacher follows. What changes to the order of these steps would you recommend Other operations are doubtless possible. Once again, the aim has been rate the range of pos: ‘Any single training activity can make use of just a single task or a series of tasks. A sample teacher preparation activity ith operations to isto increase 1 students in using a variety ‘one specific language form. The students should feel free ig whatever resources they choose. be designed to be done by the ‘The activity should should not be designed to control what hould use. The choice about what language to use should the one below. Put a checkmark if you think the activities, Put an X if you think they do not. In some cases you may not “Activities ia 132 Ab dition aden 6 3Rod TABLE 1. (cont) according to how comm 1. (most communica ) 6. {least communicative) Source: Harmer (1983), ies ind in particular to make them aware that a simple dichotomy the student teacher's understanding of what communicative a and not possible. language teach inguage teaching activities. the language and (2) ranking (ve. ranking the acti cording to how communicative the student teachers consider them). Teacher preparation procedures student teachers work individ prepare something, such as classroom material lesson plans. 4, Individual worklassignments. 5. Demonstrations. The teacher educator demonstrates a particu- lar technique, using either actual students or the student teachers themselves. 32 or in groups 10 teaching, aids, or Ac 's and procedures for teacher preparation 1. Group work ‘Work in groups of three. Study the example and then continue. Student Ato > Student B to —> Ask Kay to give youher Give me Student C (Repl ur pen, YES (Here you are pen. ‘Ask Mrs. Wright to give Could we have a ‘YES (Certainly, usa sandwich, sandwich, Mrs, NO. 2. We must do some NO. shopping tomorrow. to give to give YES onary. you want more YES 2. Communication t 3. Pair work : ~ Work with your partner and ask cach other dustons about accommodations in your country. Here are some of the questions a, What isthe cheapest type of accommodation? 'b. Ate meals served in all types of accommodation? Dos the price of a room always include breakfast? Whi ies are provided? €. Is advance booking advisable? 33+a Rod Ellis Tanue 2. (cont) into your exercise book. Put an X if you do not like ruta checkmark next to each Like ke mer each item in the table. Your partner should accept or refuse it and say why. Your partner should then offer you each compare your versions Source: Doff, Jones, and Mi 6. Elicitation, The educator works with the student teachers and tries to draw out opinions on specific points using a question-and-answer technique. 7. Plenary discussion. There is gencral discussion of language teaching issues with all the trainees together. 8. Panel discussion. The teacher educator can use panel discussion in several different ways. One way is to invite several student teachers to form a panel, The other students then prepare some questions on ‘chosen issues to ask the panel. The course leader acts as the chair- person of the panel. ile session may involve just one of these procedures or, as will be the case, of several. For sessions need to draw up a plan procedures. The in the previous of procedures lar teacher preparation activity. s Activities and TABLE 5. SAMPLE PLAN b. Discussion of rankings from 1 to. 6. Individual assignment Students write an evaluation of Activity $in 1 place in the rank order. of the six criteria and “This plan is based on the sample wea +r preparation act ‘Summary and conclusion Since the mid-seventies ind foreign language tead iges in second by intensive debate about n contrast, as Rich- 35Rod Ellis ards points out in Chapter 1 of this book, there has been litte discussion of teacher preparation practices (see, though, Holden 1979; British Council 1981; and Jordan 1983). Given the importance of teacher prep- aration, this is a serious deficiency. This chapter has de — obviously not the only one possible ~ for thinking about the content of teacher preparation. To this end, I have suggested that it is useful to distinguish between experiential and awareness-raising practices. In ad- dition, T have outlined a framework for describing different types of teacher preparation activities by isting the various ways in which data can be provided, and also the kinds of tasks that can be based on the data, Finally, | have described the procedures the teacher educator can use. Together these constitute an embryonic taxonomy of teacher prep- aration materials and practices. Such a taxonomy can serve two principal functions. First, it can act as a checklist that teacher educators can refer to when planning a program. Second, it can be used to introduce would- be teacher educators to the range of options that are open to them. It should be emphasized, however, that the framework is descriptive. If we are to develop our understanding of teacher preparation practices further, it will also be necessary to decide upon evaluative criteria for making principled selections from the large range of options, both in devising teacher preparation activities and in drawing up teacher prep- aration plans. Richards J. 4 Nonan D. ( ond Lary ya leader Cdoco: 36 Questions and tasks Chapter 1 (Richards) 1. Richards draws a distinction between micro and macro approaches to teacher education. Analyze a teacher education program with which you are familiar. What is the balance between micro and macro approaches? 2. Key terms in Richards are effective teaching and classroom manage- ‘What is your understanding of these terms? 3. Summarize Richards by completing the following tabl Effective teaching oneffective teach Low inference behaviors 4. Having read Richards, what are some of the things you might observe ‘or encourage teachers-in-preparation to obserye in the classroom? 8. Research cited by Richards indicates that teachers generally employ ed repetoire of tasks which essentially define their methodology. Observe a teacher over a number of lessons. To what extent do your observations bear out this claim? Analyze the tasks according to: a) response mode demands b) interactional mode demands ©) task complexity demands 4) whav/how/why were decisions made about = the order of tasks = pacing products learning strategies participation 37