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Abstract

The ELF-awareness framework for ELT pedagogy and teacher education has been put forward as a comprehensive plan for incorporating ELF-related concerns within different teaching and learning contexts. The framework’s orientation is context-dependent and prioritises a critical reflective approach to the use, teaching and learning of English. This paper aims to elucidate the critical reflective component of the ELF awareness framework. We begin by situating the notion of reflection along the four distinct levels of reflection proposed by adult education theorist Jack Mezirow. These levels extend from non-reflective mechanical thinking to thoughtful action on what is experienced by individuals, to a more analytical assessment of experience (what Mezirow calls content and process reflection), and finally to critical reflection of underlying assumptions and convictions (or premise reflection, according to Mezirow). We argue that ELF aware reflection is identified as premise reflection and go on to discuss examples of teachers’ reflective perspectives, as submitted in an online ELF awareness teacher education programme, with reference to the above levels of reflection. Finally, we argue that understanding the different forms and levels of reflection is particularly useful not only for raising teachers’ (and other stakeholders’) ELF awareness, but also for prompting them to develop autonomy and agency in their teaching practice.
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https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/tesq.3284
... Such an endeavour, however, is anything but straightforward. It requires rethinking our perceptions and current practices (Dewey, 2012) which, in turn, entails identifying why the ways in which English is typically taught and learned are problematic and how our own deeply held assumptions have been influencing not only us (e.g., concerning our professional identity; Dewey, 2012), but also our learners as users (e.g., in terms of the extent to which we foster their communicative capability; Seidlhofer and Widdowson, 2019) and as individuals (e.g., as regards their selfimage as non-native speakers; Sifakis and Kordia, 2023). Then, of course, it requires experimenting with ELF in the classroom, for example, through action research , to see how exactly insights from ELF sociolinguistic research can be integrated in our teaching (e.g., by enriching our courseware, as Lopriore and Vettorel, 2019, suggest, or by helping our learners create their own version of English, according to Kohn's, 2018, MY English approach). ...
... Then, of course, it requires experimenting with ELF in the classroom, for example, through action research , to see how exactly insights from ELF sociolinguistic research can be integrated in our teaching (e.g., by enriching our courseware, as Lopriore and Vettorel, 2019, suggest, or by helping our learners create their own version of English, according to Kohn's, 2018, MY English approach). That complex process is fundamentally transformative and, in essence, refers to what Sifakis (2014Sifakis ( , 2019Sifakis ( , 2023 has termed as ELF awareness. ...
... In this special issue, we showcase four articles that bear the fruits of such collaborative efforts. Sifakis and Kordia (2023) emphasize the need for collaboration between researchers and teachers to effectively integrate ELF principles into teaching practices. This partnership approach ensures that research findings are practically applied in real classroom settings. ...
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This chapter provides a state-of-the-art discussion of the ways in which transformative learning could be fostered in teacher education. It focuses on programmes which aim at raising English language teachers’ awareness of the implications of the current role of English as a lingua franca (ELF), namely as an international contact language. After presenting the challenges which the ELF phenomenon poses nowadays, the transformative model for ELF-aware teacher education put forward by Sifakis is discussed, with reference to its relevance for Mezirow’s transformation theory. The transformative experiences of Kordia during her participation in an ELF-aware teacher education programme are afterwards presented, illustrating the phases of transformation she went through in her attempt to integrate ELF in her teaching practices.
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The paper proposes a framework for integrating ELF (English as a Lingua Franca) research in English language teaching (ELT), predominantly pedagogy, but also teacher education, materials development and evaluation, policy design and planning, assessment and testing. The main concept here is ELF awareness, which orientates a set of principles that refer to the knowledge, attitudes and skillset of ELT stakeholders and ELT products with regard to issues and concerns raised in the ELF (and, by extension, the English as an international language and the World Englishes) research literature, and the extent to which they have relevance for local ELT contexts. The paper makes the case that ELF awareness does not characterise a unique instructional approach to teaching and learning, but integrates the learner- and learning- centred “ESP approach” put forward by ESP (English for specific purposes) scholars in the 1980s and widely accepted subsequently in ELT. Furthermore, ELF awareness is viewed as a continuum that depicts the gradual transformation of stakeholders’ attitudes, to the extent that local contexts, and stakeholders’ needs and wants allow.
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The paper discusses the challenges and opportunities that the English as a lingua franca (ELF) paradigm raises for ESOL teacher education. I argue that one of the prominent implications of the ELF paradigm for ESOL teachers is the need to review and ultimately change their convictions about key aspects of foreign language teaching, such as normativity, the role of native/non-native speakers, and the function of teacher feedback in the foreign language classroom. I review evidence from the ELF literature that supports such a perspective and discuss the kind of reflective reviewing that teachers need to engage in. I argue that, while the critical approach is certainly the right way to go, it is not enough. What is necessary is a more rigorous approach that would go beyond merely exposing teachers to the principles and criteria of ELF and prompt them to critically consider and ultimately transform their deeper convictions about these issues. I present a framework for such a transformative perspective that aims at educating the ELF-aware teacher.
Book
This Element examines the concept of reflective practice in language teaching. It includes a brief description of what reflective practice is and how it is operationalized by two of its main protagonists, John Dewey and Donald Schön, as well as some of the limitations of their conceptions. This is used as an introduction to how the author further developed their conceptions when operationalizing reflective practice for language teachers through a five-stage framework for reflecting on practice for language teachers. The author then presents an in-depth case study of the reflections of an English as a Foreign Language (EFL) teacher working in Costa Rica as he moved through the five stages of the framework for reflecting on practice. The author then goes on to outline and discuss how reflective practice may be moved forward and calls attention to the importance of emotions in the process of reflection for language teachers.
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The growing relevance of research in English as a lingua franca (ELF) for ELT has led to a need to rethink the way we approach English in the language classroom and to reassess how we configure knowledge about language in teacher education. This article reports on a joint project initiated in 2017 at King’s College London (UK) and the University of Malaga (Spain), exploring the value of perceptions towards language and ELF among language teachers. Our goal was to promote reflective attitudes towards linguistic diversity, language change and the potential impact of ELF on developments in ELT. We present here the results of an online survey that participants took after only two sessions into their training. Our findings link ELT practitioners’ teaching priorities to an ELF orientation because there was a higher number of participants who aligned with statements about pedagogic approaches where successful communication is emphasized above accuracy (42/72), and statements that favour fostering experimentation with linguistic forms (53/72) and promoting students’ L1 sociocultural identity (54/72).
Chapter
There have been two particularly prominent areas of research into the significance of ELF, both of which are relevant to the themes of this book. One explores how the study of ELF raises theoretical issues in sociolinguistics and pragmatics about the nature of communication, issues that have to do with such concepts as culture, identity, and creativity in the use of linguistic resources. The other area enquires into the implications of ELF for the concerns of language pedagogy and the extent to which it is desirable, or feasible, to realize these implications as implementations in the form of practical proposals for a different approach to the teaching of English. Although ELF research has tended to focus separately on these two areas, what is emerging is a close implicational relationship between them with each reciprocally informing the other. This indicates the need to think again about taken-for-granted pragmatic and pedagogic assumptions, and the “mono- and multilingual” practices based upon them, and in particular challenges the validity of the conventional distinction between language users and language learners.
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My mother arrived in Canada in 1948 to marry a Canadian soldier whom she had met when the Canadian army participated in the liberation of the Netherlands. My mother grew up in Amsterdam where she was a part of a large musical and artistic family.