Author Archives: roycross

1. Two from the ECML (European Centre for Modern Languages) in Graz: a poll, Why learn a language?, which asks for your top three reasons for doing sohttps://edl.ecml.at/Activities/Poll/tabid/3229/Default.aspx and a (fun but quite challenging!) game based on pictures with language … Continue reading →

1. Two short, different introductions by David Bellos of Princeton University to his book, Is That a Fish in Your Ear?: an animation from Penguin Books https://youtu.be/GyTYbHMdvE0 and a talking head one from Big Think https://bigthink.com/videos/linguistic-diversity-is-language-2/ Bellos has made a … Continue reading →

1. Here’s two ways of saying the same thing about How Living Abroad Helps You Develop a Clearer Sense of Self: one a Harvard Business Review article https://hbr.org/2018/05/how-living-abroad-helps-you-develop-a-clearer-sense-of-self and the other a favourite Philip Larkin poem of mine that many … Continue reading →

1. Here’s David Edgerton’s review of retired diplomat Arthur Snell’s book, How Britain Broke the World: War, Greed and Blunders from Kosovo to Afghanistan, 1997-2021 for The New Statesman https://www.newstatesman.com/culture/books/book-of-the-day/2022/08/british-diplomacy-in-the-dock There are alternative points of view, one ought to point … Continue reading →

1. I reckon you need to be brave to write three articles on Humor (sic) in ELT, which is what John Rucynski has done for TESOL Connections. See what you think; PDFs below. #1 http://newsmanager.commpartners.com/tesolc/issues/2022-05-01/email.html #2 http://newsmanager.commpartners.com/tesolc/issues/2022-06-01/email.html #3 http://newsmanager.commpartners.com/tesolc/issues/2022-08-01/email.html 2. … Continue reading →

1. Our Brain Acts the Same Whatever the Language, apparently, new research with speakers of languages other than English suggests https://www.languagemagazine.com/2022/08/12/brain-acts-the-same-whatever-the-language/ “The researchers decided to use Alice in Wonderland as the text that everyone would listen to, because it is … Continue reading →

1. Another good piece from Language Magazine (thanks, Melanie!) on translanguaging, Breaking down Barriers, from Jacob Huckle https://www.languagemagazine.com/2022/08/15/breaking-down-barriers/ Huckle explains that his article “will outline some potential barriers in the domains of policy, practice, and personal belief and end with … Continue reading →

1. The Global Citizenship and Multilingual Competences (GCMC) toolkit project https://gcmc.global/ which aims to “provide online teacher development resources for secondary teachers of all subjects about how to integrate global citizenship goals and multilingual pedagogies into their practices in a … Continue reading →

1. I missed a trick on Tuesday. It was the centenary of the birth of Philip Larkin. There’s been a lot of media coverage, much of it playing on the disjunct between his sublime poetry and his less-than-sublime character. Simon … Continue reading →

1. The Edinburgh International Book Festival, where I’ve spent many happy summers over the years, begins next Saturday, 13th August. Watch for free or pay as much as you can afford. Full list of events here: https://www.edbookfest.co.uk/the-festival/events Here’s a baker’s … Continue reading →