Job Discussion Forums

[jonney]

anyone know anything about the callan method of teaching english.
sounds like a bit of a skive. is it any good or just a cheap way of dong a hard job?

[sperling]

Hi Jonney -

I'm not fammiliar with it, but I did find theit website at:

http://www.callan.co.uk/

I also found a thread on this at:

http://www.efcafe.com/wwwboard/messages/2227.html

All the best,

Dave Sperling
Founder
* * * * * * * * * * * *
Dave's ESL Cafe
http://www.eslcafe.com

[Chris]

Hi there,

I taught Callan for 1 semester in Poland, and really didn't like it at all. For beginners to intermediate, it seems to work alright, because the students are forced to speak the entire class. However, once they got over that level, they wanted to talk normally.

It's a question/answer method mostly, and students are required to repeat the words exactly as they are told to. Some questions really bothered me, for example, and this is pre-World Trade Center:

(Teacher) If you fell from the top of a very high building, what would happen? (repeat)
(Student) If I fell from the top of a very high building I would die.

Also, they teach some really archaic words, ie "wireless" for "radio". I didn't like the method, so I was happy it was only for a semester.

As a teacher, it was also frustrating because you had to follow their method and books exactly, so no getting to know your students. That was really hard on me.

Anyway, any more questions just let me know.

Chris

[scot47]

Avoıd these and other systems where the teacher ıs gıven no flexibity.
Callan just adopted some methods from Berlıtz. Look at the lousy repuattıon they have - worldwıde

[naturegirl321]

So do the students simply read the answer to the question without knowing what they are saying>?

[grahamb]

Ah yes, in the 1970s there was a TV series in the UK about him!

[leeroy]

Hey Dave, how many 'm's in familiar?

I've heard the Callan Method is a Direct Method type thing, a la Audiolingualism and all that jazz. Personally I think such methods can be kind of cool - but not all the time (which I think is what Callan entails). It can be useful for the shier Asian students to warm up with - as basic repetition and substitution drilling isn't as 'scary' as "chatting about your weekend".

[crispintp]

I taught the Callan Method for 5 months. It is largely frowned upon by the teaching community, and it certainly isn't for the teaching purist.

However, in my opinion, there is a lot of things going for it.

From the teachers perspective, there is very minimal lesson preparation required. Since you are reading directly from a book, all it is necessary to do is to familiarise yourself with the questions and answers. It takes a lot of pressure off the teacher. As it is largely controlled practice, it is perfect for correcting pronouncation and grammar structures. It obviously removes the onus on the teacher to be creative, and teachers who find it important to have an individual style, or whom value the quality of their teaching are not going to take to it very well. Me? I appreciated the extra hours that were freed up from lesson preparation. So, it's all horses for courses as far as I'm concerned, depending on your philosophy towards teaching.

From the students perspective, Student talk time is extremely high. They are constantly concentrating, and cram a lot into a single lesson.

I agree with Leeroy though. It is probably most effective when combined with other types of lesson, in contract to the strict mantra that the Callan Method texts suggests you follow.

[Dr.J]

Checked out the website - looks dodgy to me.

There were no samples of the books - a little strange - and although they are quite cheap there are lots of them so I suppose the total cost would be expensive.

Most of it was just a really long spiel about how great the method was. To be honest I was reminded of certain junk mail I receive about enlarging body parts...anyone that claims that level of success is a liar by default.

These kinds of thing annoy me because clearly the author thinks, or would have us believe that they have discovered 'the secret of learning English' like a holy grail or something. Whatever value this method has is only partial, and depends on a hundred other factors vastly more influential than choice of coursebook.

That said, I agree in principle that language often seems like a reflex rather than a conscious process...

[khmerhit]

Here are some articles about stuff----

http://education.guardian.co.uk/tefl/story/0,5500,1083493,00.html

[Dr.J]

khermit: - off topic, but I keep reading your location as:

Reverse Culture - Shock Unit

Instead of "reverse culture shock unit"

As if it's an elite military unit, and I start wondering what "reverse culture" could possibly be.