Over the last decade ELF research has extensively investigated the implications ELF findings can have for ELT, from a number of different perspectives and in many cases intersecting views with other recent waves of innovative research, such as multilingualism, translanguaging and decolonization of English.
Several areas have been identified as crucial for ELF research findings to have an impact on language education, and ELT in particular: Teacher Education has been shown to be an essential moment in this process of change, where awareness of the ways and contexts in which English is increasingly used as a lingua franca of communication is to be accompanied by transformative actions and practice to be localised in the specificity of each educational context (e.g. Sifakis 2019; Sifakis et al. 2018). Materials development, both at an institutional and at a local level, is another relevant area in which new viewpoints need to be taken into account to respond to the skills that are needed to effectively and flexibly communicate in English nowadays, with the inclusion of strategic and intercultural competence. Last but not least, within this perspective teacher and learner agency should be given due prominence, both as to their experiences as ELF users, and in terms of their needs and aims in teaching and learning English (e.g. Seidlhofer 2011; Widdowson 2015).
Findings from ELF research in several domains, from language use to transcultural communication and language teaching, can greatly contribute to promote pedagogic actions in ELT that take account of the aforementioned points. First of all, informing Language Teacher Education programmes, with thorough discussions of and reflection upon the issues ELF raises, to move towards transformative actions in actual teaching and learning practices – for example, overtly including awareness of the relevance of communication strategies in ELT syllabuses. Materials development, and ways of broadening the use of existing published materials in an ELF-aware perspective, is another important area where ELF research could significantly impact ELT, indicating ways and directions that are locally suited, actively involving teachers and learners, within a decolonizing perspective.
ELF, together with the developments of other research areas in Applied Linguistics (multilingualism and translanguaging, for example) can certainly provide further significant contributions to language education and ELT, continuing the important work that has been developed over the last decade in TEd, and setting up Action Research projects with teachers, practitioners as well as students to work towards the integration of ELF-oriented pedagogy in teaching practices.
References
Seidlhofer, Barbara. 2011. Understanding English as a Lingua Franca. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Sifakis, Nicos C. 2019. ELF awareness in English Language Teaching. Principles and processes. Applied Linguistics 40(2). 285–306.
Sifakis, Nicos C., Lucilla Lopriore, Martin Dewey, Yasemin Bayyurt, Lili Cavalheiro, D. Savio P. Siqueira & Stefania Kordia. 2018. ELF-awareness in ELT: Bringing together theory and practice. Journal of English as a Lingua Franca 7(1). 155–209.
Widdowson, Henry G. 2015. Frontiers of English and the challenge of change. In Paola Vettorel (ed.), New frontiers in teaching and learning English, 227–232. Newcastle-upon-Tyne: Cambridge Scholars.
