Job Discussion Forums

[fluffyhamster]

What's the most ambitious teaching-related project you've ever undertaken, or are planning to undertake?

For me, few things have been as exhausting as the guide to Chinese characters (hanzi) I'm currently writing - there's been lots of eye-straining detail, manual cutting pasting and jiggling of variant characters, proof-reading etc etc required.

Next up might be compiling a dictionary that will allow one to find words not only by spelling but also purely by sound - could save everyone a fair bit of time, help attune learners to sounds, etc. But could be a bit of a white elephant ultimately though, this one!

My ultimate goal though is to one day write a pedagogical grammar and/or coursebook for my own use at least - the glossy but flimsy stuff available from most publishers just doesn't cut it IMHO!

[rusmeister]

Having and raising four children in a foreign country and trying to pass on as much of what is good in America and the Anglo-world as possible. It's humongous - overwhelming in fact - 'me against the world' in a very real sense.

Seriously, I dream about taking on projects like those you mentioned - but with my particular "project" it seems improbable that I will be able to settle down and write books or whatever in the next decade or two. So I envy you your ambitions (although you may someday envy me my children!).

[naturegirl321]

My thesis was a nightmare. I've put together a FAQ website called TEFL Tips which I'm proud of, given workshops at intl conferences, but never really done something super difficult.

[Glenski]

Building a corpus of scientific terms... can you say "hands FULL"?!

[fluffyhamster]

Thanks for the replies so far!

The good thing with kids is that they talk back (even if it's often in a bad way), whereas academic "babies" just sit there gathering dust, increasingly unread after printing (publication?), so I may indeed one day envy you your children, rusmeister! Just wish I could afford to pop some myself and provide what would be more than crumbs for them. Might consider starting a family eventually though, if I can get a job milking a bit from Gordon Brown's bloated public-sector teats (by e.g. doing a PGCE in MFL), not that I really really want to (I'd prefer it if the private sector were still providing enough options), and there probably won't be quite the public funds for anything too "ambitious" much longer anyway (one might just about qualify but then be unable to find a longer-term actual job proper).

I've browsed your site a couple of times, naturegirl. It's nice, concise and to the point (the latter attributes are ones that I often lack!).

Glenski, did you build your corpus slowly and somewhat selectively on citation slips (i.e. by taking notes on vocab items you'd seen over the years), or from scanning and converting lots of raw-ish data? (I'm guessing the latter!). Either way, it sounds an ambitious undertaking for sure!

[Glenski]

Fluffy,
Have not yet built a corpus. Am in the prelim stages to see if there is anything out there already (not reinvent the wheel), and to see how it can be done properly.

[fluffyhamster]

Heh, the ambiguity of just 'Building..' by itself, without a finite verb! Let us know how it develops, Glenski - there seem to be quite a few who frequent or have frequented the forums who are interested in corpus linguistics (including me ).

[Blingcosa]

We are currently working on an Afaric dictionary. A partial dictionary was completed in 1977, but a lot has changed since then. Loan words are a real problem - do we use the Arabic, French, English, Somali or Amharic? Or do we make up a new Afar word?????? Lots of arguments, laughter and frustration, I can assure you. Another problem is that the population is 98% illiterate in their own language.

I try to remind myself we are making history and preserving a culture. Without a written language, Afar will continue to require education in a non-native tongue.

[santi84]

Sadly, not much compared to the rest of you Prior to teaching, I was a 911 dispatcher (I still am, part-time). I have created a comprehensive unit on emergency services (ranging from basic phone skills/"what is a crime?" to knowledge/awareness of specific disaster services in our local area. It has a lot of authentic videos, pamphlets (including translated ones for their family members, as nearly all of my students are Korean). It is based entirely on the local area (I am in an ESL not EFL context) so when I move in June, it will need to be drastically redone! I know some students ended up using the materials and contacts so I'd say it was my most significant work so far (pre-MA or long-term teaching experience).