The English Teachers

This book is dedicated to its subjects: The English Teachers. Thank you for making the lives of others better… and for making my life interesting

Why does anyone write a book?

Looking back, perhaps this should have been one of the questions I asked in my interviews since articulating my own answer to that question has proven difficult. I often find that discussing questions with other people helps form my own perspective, but since this really is only a question I can answer, I will muddle along with what I have.

The idea for this book did not come to me overnight in a single burst of creativity. It was a confluence of several events. One of these was my DELTA (Diploma in Teaching English to Speakers of Other Languages) Module 3 research, during which I noticed a wealth of books and blogs about how to teach and what to teach, but very little on the teachers themselves in terms of how they felt about their work. Perhaps the closest was Peter Medgyes’ “The Non-Native Speaking Teacher” which did a very good job of capturing the thoughts and feelings of many teachers throughout the world along the divide of native and non-native speakers.

I found Medgyes’ work to be quite influential in terms of appreciating the issues facing teachers regarding this most crucial of issues and how to raise awareness in teachers and students of how to approach it. Perhaps at present a two-tier system exists between native and non-native speaking teachers in some cases, but working towards an ideal where there doesn’t have to be such a divide is something we could all benefit from.

Similarly, Kathleen Graves also recorded the thoughts and feelings of teachers as they related to course design via direct quotes from teachers in question. In turn, I would like to quote Kathleen’s insightful observation that: “Dialogue among teachers is a crucial step in giving teachers more power in their professions: it helps teachers to be more aware of their own practice and how it relates to that of their colleagues.” As with Medgyes’ awareness raising, I drew a great deal of inspiration from this when forming my ideas about how to structure this book.

One of the unfortunate aspects of the work of these two writers, however, is that the wealth of sources in Medgyes’ case had a focus on the particular native/non-native cleavage, and Graves’ focus solely on course design limited the scope of the work for my purposes. I hope to address these issues by increasing the range of issues facing teachers and changing the focus to the teachers themselves respectively. The primary aim of this book is to help current and prospective English teachers by showing them what teaching is actually like for those already working in the profession.

It seemed a common flaw in the books on how and what to teach was that they largely neglect a crucial source of information: the teachers themselves in the teaching environment. Often the reason authors seek to provide information is out of a feeling that budding professional teachers need it (and they often do in my experience!) but this has led to an imbalance in texts. Some authors have tried to address this with comments and examples from teachers and I hope to continue this.

A second origin point was my own science fiction book, “The People’s War”, published in the summer of 2019. The book was based around a series of interviews with people following the end of a galactic conflict. Of all the books I had written up to that point, it was the one I had the most fun writing and I often wondered if I could do something similar with real people. The one issue was I had no idea what I would ask them about.

That crucial gap was bridged after an unexpected question came up during a conversation I had with a colleague while I was working in Moscow. I’d just delivered a presentation for a workshop and outlined some useful sources of information. I was a regular presenter at my school and also in others, and my colleague asked me when I would be bringing out a book. I explained I had already and I was a science fiction writer, but she clarified in a straightforward manner with words to the effect of, “No Rory, I’m not interested in science fiction. I mean, when will you be writing a book about teaching?”

Afterwards, while walking to my afternoon classes, I wondered what I could actually write about teaching. It seemed that everything about teaching had been said and a lot of what I was presenting – and indeed what teachers were doing in their classes – was just the work and words of other people. And therein lay the answer: not presenting something about teaching, but presenting the voices of teachers and what they have to say about their work. There’s so much theory and so many practical ideas, but little on what people do or say or feel.

Lastly, the book aims to tackle an issue that emerges as a side effect of English Teaching and Learning as a business, summarised in the following comment: “I don’t feel listened to as a professional teacher, when I have so much important information to share.” You could perhaps replace the job title “teacher” with any role since this lack of “listening” seems a feature of many businesses. I do not believe this is because managers are evil and do not care (at the time of writing I myself am a manager and I am reasonably certain I am not evil – though others may beg to differ!). The first four letters of “business” give the problem away; in business we are all very busy and do not have the time to sit down and actively listen to every single thing people have to say. Much as I would like to in my day job, if I did this I would get nothing done and then I would really be in trouble.

So, I set out to ask questions and listen to what I heard. My aim was to listen to teachers’ answers to relevant questions about themselves. I tried not to place unnecessary limits on what participants said and allowed them to interpret questions as they saw fit. In a day and age where teachers find themselves increasingly constricted by red-tape and so-called “teacher-proof” courses (where the teacher has little control over the material and methods used), I wanted to give them as much freedom as possible. They are, or were, in public and private institutions. Newly-qualified and experienced. Teachers, academic managers and teacher trainers. While they were being interviewed as English teachers first, sometimes other roles crept in to provide some invaluable insights.

A final point about the writing of the book was one that emerged months down the line as I was writing the final draft in the spring of 2020. As I made the final edits, the world found itself in the grip of the coronavirus (Covid-19) and face-to-face contact was limited, narrowing our capacity for “real conversation” as everyone switched to digital options for interaction.

It seems we may be in this situation for some time and must remember the significance of genuine conversation with another human being. With this in mind, I hope that bringing some examples of this to people in an accessible format will not only remind us of what we have lost, but to truly value it when we find it again. Listening to the voices of other people has helped me through self-isolation in Moscow. Hopefully, it will help others, too.

How to read this book

Ironically for a teacher and academic manager, I hate telling people what to do. However, sometimes ways of doing things are not so obvious and some pointers can be useful. This is how I justify myself at least.

With that in mind, you could read this book line after line, cover to cover. And if you can keep track of over 30 different conversations in your head at the same time, then you are welcome to do this.

Another way might be choosing what you want to focus on and skipping right to the section which catches your eye. This is also valid and I’ve tried to give some comments of what was discussed previously for context, though you might need to read the parts of the interviews in surrounding chapters to get a fuller picture. It’s also possible to read this book one conversation at a time and appreciate them as single, continuous dialogues. This might give a fuller experience as though you are a fly on the wall of the conversation.

Whatever your approach, it should be the most comfortable one for you.

This work is for the following groups of people

1) Teachers I often find one of the features of even general conversations with teachers is the constant quest for ideas. How can I improve my practice? How can this lesson be more interesting? How do I make more money!? Hopefully, this work will assist with answering these questions, but they are not the primary focus for teachers. I hope teachers will find common ground in terms of the issues they face and help each other (however indirectly) to find solutions. In particular, the matters of stress management seem particularly pertinent for teachers already in the profession. This book is also designed to be relevant to those who are considering teaching as a start or change to their career. I have found that several teachers have come into the profession with certain expectations which are then not met and they are left bitterly disappointed. I would encourage those prospective teachers to read the sections on what the students are like and the reality of teaching English. Hopefully, it will help them prepare for the rewards and challenges that lie ahead.

Many of the people in this book are teaching, or have taught, in the Russian context and so this book might best be called, “The English Teachers of Moscow”, but I believe the issues discussed here are largely universal and any teacher (or potential teacher) working in any context would benefit from reading about them. Still, I acknowledge that possible shortcoming and hope people will be willing to accept it. If you can’t, perhaps writing a book about teachers in your context is a route to consider. You would certainly find a willing audience in me.

2) Managers Management, like government, strikes many as something of a necessary evil and certainly few people go into management to be liked (and if you have then you really should have known better). As already mentioned, managers are busy people with little free time on their hands. I hope they will use some of that free time to look at the thoughts of those they manage and keep them in mind when they are planning their next steps. The chapter on teaching contexts and teaching in general will likely be the most useful in these cases.

3) Teacher Trainers I would not be exaggerating if I said all the teacher trainers I have ever met have been some of the smartest people I know. Of course, you can know everything in the world and still miss an important aspect: at the end of the day, we are training people. By offering some insight into teachers’ thoughts and feelings about training and professional development, perhaps trainers will be able to tailor their approaches more effectively.

4) Students A book about teachers that students can read?! It doesn’t make much sense on the surface, but students are curious people (in every sense of that adjective!). Why else would they take the time to learn a language and ask questions about it? Students do wonder what teachers do and what they think about. Perhaps by sharing some of this with them, teachers can become more relatable and students can become more engaged with the learning process. It is perhaps a distant dream in the minds of many, but if we do not try to encourage students to understand their teachers, we will never know. With this in mind, I have tried to make the conversations as clear as possible for those who do not speak English as a first language. Of course, if you cannot understand everything it’s possible to use a dictionary… or pay an English teacher to help you!

5) The Ever-Curious Public Everyone has an opinion on education. Everyone. My least favourite opinion is when people tell me (and it is always “telling”, never “saying”) how easy my job must be. It’s all, “Repeat after me, please!” and drinking vodka with the locals. My favourite opinion is when people assume I know everything about English. While I do know more than the average person, I wouldn’t claim a perfect knowledge (though it does provide a nice ego boost!).

I hope the insights shared by the teachers in this book will help enlighten the public about what we do and how we work. We might be teachers but we are still people and, as in any job, we face many issues and garner numerous rewards from our work. Perhaps, through deeper understanding, non-teachers will be able to appreciate our work more fully and appreciate us as people.

I have made the book as open in language as possible. There are a lot of abbreviations and acronyms in ELT – English Language Teaching – and I have added notes where I feel this would help. However, if anything is unclear, I would refer to the glossary at the start of the book and then to the TKT (Teacher Knowledge Test) glossary which was designed for a teaching exam but written in very clear language by Cambridge Assessment English. It is online and free. Also, Scott Thornbury’s A-Z of ELT which is online and free.

The Nature of the Book

I have structured the book by dividing it into chapters broadly based around key questions with explanations as to why this is my focus. I hope I have chosen wisely. I have then provided the transcripts of teachers’ answers to these questions. These have been edited for relevance and succinctness I had no intention of boring readers with every “um” and “ah” – even though we all do it! Furthermore, my audio recording and transcribing software has been far from accurate in places. Speaking is a notoriously less accurate skill than writing, so I have also had the transcripts edited by a professional editor to keep the contributions understandable for readers by making minor changes to the tenses used etc. but with the original meaning kept intact.

At the end of the book there is a conclusion with my own ideas and beliefs as a commentary, and some questions for readers to consider. I have done so to draw the chapters to a close, not with the intention of encouraging readers to believe everything I have written. Indeed, I would be appalled if that happened; life would be very boring if we all had the same opinions.

I’ve kept some of my interviewees anonymous on request. English teaching is a wonderful job, but some aspects of business and educational culture do not lend themselves to open and honest dialogue with a name attached.

Similarly, I have kept the use of the names of specific institutions to a minimum.

The views of 35 people speaking in 2019 have been recorded here and it’s possible they may have changed their ideas since then. Most of the interviewees are teaching in Moscow, though many have international experience which they have also contributed. Some contributors may express what seem to be mutually exclusive viewpoints. I think this is something the vast majority of people do, such is the nature of humanity. Read the book both critically and with an open mind.