Customer Reviews

Teaching Language In Context

5 star:		(11)
4 star:		(0)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

I think this is an excellent book for foreign language teachers of all levels. Omaggio gives a good overview of the theories driving language teaching--past and present-- and the basics of how second language is acquired. As there is no "magic formula" for creating effective lessons, learning how we learn a foreign language helps teachers to use their time in the classroom more efficiently. Rather than wasting time doing random substitution and grammar drills, the students can actually be learning the language in context.

No book can cover every aspect of language instruction, but by all means Hadley's work would be right up there with Ellis, Richards and Rodgers among others. This is a solid book, jam packed with historical facts and insights, and I feel has caught the full heart of the profession representing the current state of the profession. I could not disagree with the first reviewer more. I am reading this book through and I love this book. This is not a technique-y book at all but a serious treatise and contribution to educators who want to have a broader scope on theory and instruction. In my mind, the author answers the who, what, where, when, how, and why not just of one method but does it with several of the major methods. And this she does in Chapter three! This is a 512 page text and to my mind, the reading is coherent, smart, and digestable. This text is certainly one of the better foundational texts for comprehensive grasp of the field. This book is be a springboard to assist the reader to think through the past and present assumptionan about teaching language; it is an excellent choice! If I were to only have one text to me to read in this area, this would be a top contender. Thank you Alice Omaggio Haddley for the hard work and care you put into this wonderful book.

This book is aimed at explaining proficiency oriented language teaching, and has very valuable material on proficiency and its importance. This is something many teachers seem to overlook as too obvious to be of concern, but Hadley shows it to be a central issue in teaching. The criticism made by one reviewer that it's tilted too much toward communicative teaching is mistaken. There's a difference between communicative teaching and proficiency oriented teaching, although they are obviously related. This book, like any other, is not sufficient by itself, but needs to be read an compared to others in order to get a range of viewpoints. It is not of instantaneous practical use to classroom teachers, but rather deals with the ideas behind teaching methods. It is a very valuable addition to a teacher's bookshelf and I have no regrets about buying it.

A good text for foreign language teacher preparation or professional development for those who are not current on developments of the last ten years in theory and practice. The chapters are carefully organized and easily accessible. Many examples help the teacher understand how the concepts discussed in the book would "play out" in the classroom. Perhaps some more attention could be given to current trends in performance assessment, though there was a start on this in the second edition.

This was the required text for a 2008 college class entitled "Theory and Methods of Second Language Teaching." After a thorough discussion on various methods of language teaching, the author packs several chapters with actual examples of activities, quizzes, games, etc. that can be used in the classroom to reinforce one or more of the basic skills of reading, writing, speaking and listening. This is one of the most practical, useful textbooks I have ever seen, and I will refer to it again and again.

This text is chock full of relevant information for langauge educators and language educators to be. I especially enjoy the online workbook which is an amazing commplement to an informative text such as this. I appreciate the author's inclusion of numerous schools of thought for those who might be new to this information. Great tertiary level text

In this chapter, the author offers me the rational attitude toward error correction and the possible causes of errors from the study of CONTRAST ANALYSIS and ERROR ANALYSIS. I strongly recommend it to all the language teaching practioners

This book represents the material every language teacher should know. It is the Bible of language teaching as well as the book of Horwitz.

If you are a foreign language teacher who would like to understand more about second language acquisition, you will enjoy this book. Several methods are explored by the author and research to support some of the latest teaching methods. My Language Dept. uses it often, we are going to have to order additional copies because we enjoy it so much. It will change the way you teach.

It's a good book but it sort of dismisses anything other than the communicative method as ineffective. it doesn't address how to teach AP classes effectively and it seems to be geared more towards an esl teacher rather than a foreign language teacher. Sometimes the communicative method bypasses the brain and kind of dummies up instruction. There is an important gap in how to teach grammar rules, and AP type test problems also I am unsatisfied with the material on how to teach writing. But this is the only methods text any important university is using nowadays, that will change once the communicative method goes out of fashion in a year or two.