Between a ROCK and a very HARD PLACE…(Pt 02)
Maybe, I need to go back to the “rant” to give a bit of context! It seems that whenever I meet a bunch of teachers and ask them about some of the biggest challenges they face…I am told many of them feel a little like this:
Encourage teachers to focus on traditional forms of “teacher-centered instruction”
Result in teachers doing less "cognitively demanding" work in their classrooms and fewer "long-term projects" with their students
Lead to “topics” that are not tested being “dropped”
Promote the increased “packaging” and “fragmentation” of curriculum knowledge into "test-related practice" activities
Force teachers to make “curricular adaptations” that reduce the overall effectiveness of programmesSound familiar? Knowing all this (because we always do our "research" and due diligence before making decisions that will affect our LEARNers and teachers)...some ELT "genius" (no doubt also working on a "sponsored" textbook project) decided that we needed to "import" the idea of pacing into ELL:
…the problems we face now of (some) students being unable to speak beyond short broken sentences or switching off because there’s just too much being covered too quickly will continue. Teaching to the test will be more rife than ever. Most lessons, whether we like it or not, will be teacher-centred.
...but, that's for Part 03!