1. In my first week at university reading English (in my own case, a much more appropriate verb than studying or writing), along with all my friends from school, we went to hear Jeremy Prynne lecture: one of our group, more au courant than me, had heard he was ‘the best lecturer ever’. And his lecture was indeed spectacular, a firework of a thing – all the more extraordinary because he’d forgotten his lecture notes. He turned his briefcase upside down but couldn’t find them, so gave the lecture “as best I can” from memory, pitch- and word-perfectly. I went every week to his lecture – a rare excursion of that kind for me – and enjoyed the series so much that I was there in good time for his first lecture the following year. For which he had forgotten his lecture notes …. That’s by way of long introduction to this extraordinary online collection of his guidance for students, Mr Prynne’s Notes and Materials for English Students https://www.cai.cam.ac.uk/documents/jhp13

PDFs of his Tips on Essays, Tips on Lectures and Tips on Reading below, to give you a taste.

2. Thanks to Dave Allan for bringing The Versatile ELT Blog to my attention. The author, James Thomas, modestly describes it as “a space for short articles about topics ​of interest to language teachers”. This week’s post, The mighty power of the asterisk, is typically eclectic https://www.versatile.pub/blog

3. English Medium Education in a multilingual francophone context: Primary school learning in Cameroon by Kuchah (Harry) Kuchah, Lizzi O. Milligan & Valentine N. Ubanako is a new ELTRA report, with a wider geographical and language relevance than its title might suggest: https://www.teachingenglish.org.uk/publications/case-studies-insights-and-research/english-medium-education-multilingual-francophone

PDF below.

4. Time for our bi- (tri-?) monthly visit to the UKFIET blog, I reckon  Here’s three thought-provoking pieces from towards the end of last year:

Sustainability, Linguistic and Cultural Diversity and Decoloniality in European Schools by Rachel Bowden & Denise Hornig https://www.ukfiet.org/2023/sustainability-linguistic-and-cultural-diversity-and-decoloniality-in-european-schools/

The Gem Report is More Than Just a Report by Manos Antoninis https://www.ukfiet.org/2023/the-gem-report-is-more-than-just-a-report/

“Good Buys” Bought and Shelved – Reviving Unused Structured Teacher Guides in Afghanistan by Siddharth Pillai & Sarfaraz Sahebzada https://www.ukfiet.org/2023/good-buys-bought-and-shelved-reviving-unused-structured-teacher-guides-in-afghanistan/

5. And, finally, a reminder of Carol Rumens’s long-running ‘poem of the week’ – well into its seventeenth year! – in The Guardian https://www.theguardian.com/books/series/poemoftheweek

Try Slow Waker by Thom Gunn https://www.theguardian.com/books/2022/may/16/poem-of-the-week-slow-waker-by-thom-gunn

or Llyn Gwynant by Elizabeth-Jane Burnett https://www.theguardian.com/books/booksblog/2022/jun/27/poem-of-the-week-llyn-gwynant-by-elizabeth-jane-burnett

That second one’s for MS!