Professional Development

for English Teachers

The 29th P.A.R.K. Conference

I wanna be me (but in English)

picture

Simon Gill

KEY WORDSculture, Czech, observation, discovery

AGE GROUPSteens, young adults, adults

CEFR LEVELSA2, B1, B2, C1, C2

AUDIENCEmixed

Culture, it is often said, is a key feature of language teaching and learning. I agree. However, a question arises: which culture? In this talk I will argue that in many cases the main focus should be on the learners’ own culture rather than what is sometimes called the ‘target culture’, a term I would like to discuss in detail. I would then like to introduce some practical activities that have been used, are being used, and could be used that involve learners in going out into their own world and collecting data that we can then work on in our English language classes for both linguistic and more general educational purposes.

Simon Gill has been working in ELT in this counry since 1989. For many years he worked at the Faculty of Education of Palacky University in Olomouc. He no longer works full-time but remains keenly interested in the English language and how it is taught and learned and continues to get great pleasure from meeting and working with teachers.