The role of intuition and the part it plays in effective pedagogical responses has barely been recognised in the field of English language teaching, or indeed in education more generally. This is likely to be because intuition is a slippery concept difficult to define, understand and investigate. With this challenge in mind, through narrative…

The diversity of learning needs within the TESOL field creates inherent tensions between the need for targeted professional learning for TESOL teachers, the more generalist nature of tertiary TESOL courses, and the varied research interests of teacher educators. This article describes a collaborative research project between university-based…

When an endangered or minority language is spoken by children and taught in schools, both oral and literacy skills are crucial for continued language maintenance. In school settings, literacy skills are often prioritised to support the transition to second language literacy, and rich oral language development is overlooked. This paper presents a…

Action research has enjoyed phenomenal growth in the field of education as a catalyst for teacher professional learning with a view to school improvement, but it is commonly remodelled across various local settings. Adopting a Schatzkian perspective, this study investigates the experiences of a range of teachers engaging in an action research…

This paper presents the outcome of an action research project designed to develop a new pedagogical approach named Curriculum 2.0, after DiNucci's Web 2.0. The project was motivated by recent developments in translation and interpreting (T/I) teaching methods and by a vision to promote a genuine student-centred pedagogy based on the crowd creation…

This article provides an overview of what is considered best practice in professional development in English language teaching by researchers and professional bodies. It then presents a research project investigating how satisfied English language teachers are with their own PD. The qualitative study involved a background survey of 92 teachers and…

Language teachers constantly create, adapt and evaluate classroom materials to develop new curricula and meet their learners' needs. It has long been argued (e.g. by Stenhouse, L. [1975]. "An Introduction to Curriculum Research and Development." London: Heinemann) that teachers themselves, as opposed to managers or course book writers,…

Language teacher education is widely identified as one of the most important areas that needs addressing in order to improve early language instruction, yet research into teacher education for early language teachers remains relatively sparse. This volume responds to this gap by compiling studies with diverse methodological tenets from a wide…

This article explores one teacher/researcher's development of a drama-language unit and the learners' responses to it. The work is underpinned by a model of intercultural language learning which also acknowledges the pluricultural and plurilingual contexts in which foreign languages are taught in Australia. As part of a…

This paper elaborates on a number of key criticisms of Mezirow's transformative learning theory as well as providing arguments that validate it. Our paper exemplifies how Mezirow's theory can help adult educators and prospective school teachers understand that social structures and belief systems can influence student learning, that learners make…

On entering school, rural Australian children from Indigenous backgrounds are thrown into an unfamiliar environment, linguistically and culturally, which sets them up for failure. The author, working closely with elders and community in Alice Springs, has drawn on her considerable experience in both Indigenous education and TESOL to address this…

Action Research (AR) is recognised as an effective way for language teachers to extend teaching skills and gain more understanding of teaching, learning and the classroom environment (Burns, 2010). It can also be a useful but challenging experience for trainee language teachers. This paper reports on the experiences of Malaysian trainee primary…

This paper describes part of an action research study that was designed to explore the outcomes of an ongoing program in which the participants, a group of domestic and international pre-service teachers and lecturers, worked together in reflective writing workshops. While the primary long-term goal of the program was to develop the intercultural…

The action research project entitled "Engaging pre-service TESOL teachers in authentic workplace learning" aimed to enhance the TESOL practicum experience of pre-service teachers in the Graduate Diploma of Education at Edith Cowan University in Perth, Western Australia. Integrated into the relevant TESOL curriculum unit was the…

Using an action research framework, research was conducted to gauge how a group of English-as-a-Second-Language students (ESL) would react to a taboo English class being conducted as part of their intensive English program. The investigation took place at an English Language Intensive Courses for Overseas Students (ELICOS) center located in a…