This presentation will show two distinctive methods implemented since 2010 in the Anglophone literature subjects in the EFL teacher training programme at Universidad Austral de Chile: the "Literature Class Projects" (LCP), and the diagnosis of trainees' use of language and bodies for teaching (their CIC).
LCPs train pre-service teachers to include non-graded literary texts based on learner-centred teaching, literature-based instruction, scaffolding, and communicative, text, task and project-based approaches, among others. In LCPs trainees work in groups (3-4 students[1]) in a series of simulated co-teaching sessions based on one (of the ten) readings that comprise the course which is also built upon a semiotic perspective; therefore, students are provided with texts in different formats: videos, songs, short stories, poems, etc.
Thanks to the LCPs, the literature subjects in our training programme changed from lectures to student-teacher collaboration: interpersonal relationships strengthened; grades (from first to the second term) significantly increased; soft skills and pedagogical abilities related to lesson planning, classroom management, assessment and performance in front of an audience bettered; motivation to read and critically analyse the texts improved. By exploring the literary pieces through the eyes of a teacher and finding ways to design their LCPs, they have drawn closer to the target culture, considerably expanding their knowledge and understanding of the anglophone countries.
By combining the LCP's methodology and Multimodal Conversation Analysis we study the trainee teachers' verbal and embodied practices. This allows us to reflect on interaction including all bodily resources: voice, body, gestures and gaze. This way, we can diagnose their CIC when performing the LCPs to give them feedback and develop training workshops tailored to their particular needs.
In short, throughout the 10 years of LCPs, we have corroborated their validity and reliability as a methodology that can be applied globally regardless of the country, culture, language and modality.
References
Abrahams, M. J. & Farías, M. (2010). Struggling for Change in Chilean EFL Teacher Education. Colombian Applied Linguistic Journal. 12(2). 110-118
Barahona, M. (2014). Pre-service teachers' beliefs in the activity of learning to teach English in the Chilean context. Cultural-Historical Psychology. 10(2). 116-122
Richard-Amato, P. (2010). Making it Happen, New York, NY: Longman.
Paran, A. (2008). The role of literature in instructed foreign language learning and teaching: An evidence-based survey. Language Teaching,41(4), 465-496. doi:10.1017/S026144480800520X
Tsang, A. and Paran, A. (2021), Learners' views of literature in EFL education from curricular and assessment perspectives. The Curriculum Journal, 32: 459-474. https://doi.org/10.1002/curj.102
Walsh, S. (2013) Classroom discourse and teacher development. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press.
[1] We have an average of 30 to 40 students per class.
