Students need to speak to learn a language and the more students talk, the more they learn. Not according to Professor Stephen Krashen. For 40 years he has championed the concept that what students should be doing in class is reading (and listening), not speaking. In this episode, Stephen tells Ross some of the arguments against forcing students to speak, something which might not just be inefficient, but in some cases counterproductive.

Professor Brian Tomlinson from University of Anaheim wrote his first coursebook with Rod Ellis in the 1960’s and has been involved in materials design since. We ask him: how do you write a great coursebook?

Paul Nation tells us about the importance of fluency and how to develop it with students at all levels. Paul Nation is one of the world’s leading researchers on and writers on vocabulary, reading and fluency, has written dozens of books and been publishing research on these topics since 1970. 

Letterland teacher trainer Lesley White tells Ross about phonics. We touch on the history, the advantages of phonics over other approaches, different options to teachers within the phonics system and some of the differences between learning to read in your first language and in your second language.

We break our record for the most guests on one show ever! Hear experts from the TEFL industry with over 200 years of collective experience share their favorite language learning activities. We speak with Edmund Dudley, John Hughes, Matt Courtois, Brian Tomlinson, Ben Beaumont, Dave Weller, Wendy Arnold, Debbie Hepplewhite, Ray Davila and Diederik Van Gorp and ask them all the same question: “What’s your favorite language teaching activity?”

Ross interviews phonics expert, Debbie Hepplewhite MBE about what phonics is and why it’s so important. Debbie tells us about vocabulary enrichment, the importance of recycling, why English is so difficult to read, and much more. Debbie has worked as an adviser to the British Government for the parliamentary inquiry ‘Teaching Children to Read’ (March 2005) and she helped to inform Sir Jim Rose’s ‘Independent review of the teaching of early reading’ (Final Report, Jim Rose, March 2006) and in 2012 was awarded an MBE from the Queen for services to education.

What stages do students pass through in learning a language? Stephen Krashen, Professor Emeritus at the University of California, tells us about the conduit hypothesis. We discuss the role of reading, the growing importance of listening and how to encourage students to read and acquire more through comprehensible input.

Why both writing a lesson aim? Are they not printed in the coursebook? Ross and regular guest Dave Weller discuss why it’s a good idea to write a lesson aim, what a good lesson aim looks like, and what are the drawbacks to lesson aims…

How is technology influencing language testing and assessment? Should AI replace language test examiners? How can we use bots in dialogues? How can technology make testing more affordable to students around the world? The answers to all these questions and more in this week's podcast...

Does  grammar have a public relations problem? Grammar gets a reputation for being boring, unnecessary and uncool but at the same time is also seen by many experts as the most fundamental part of language and language learning. We discuss this love/hate relationship with our friend, Matt Courtois.