analitical language

Third Edition Pearson Education 2001, 370 pp.,

£16.95

isbn: 0 582 40385 5

1. Revisiting the first and second editions

The first edition of Harmer’s The Practice of English

Language Teaching was published 20 years ago. It

quickly and deservedly became a much-used and

popular teacher training text on pre-service

courses, and a training guide for tutors. Its virtues

included comprehensiveness of content, clarity of

explanation, a wealth of illustration in the author’s

own examples and those taken for analysis from

contemporary coursebooks and, not least, a

confidence of style deriving from the author’s rich

experience as a teacher trainer.

The Preface to the first edition implied as audience

‘the teacher in training or the teacher recently

embarked on a career in ELT’ and it aimed, for

these categories of teacher, to ‘draw together many

of the theoretical insights of recent years’ and to

put these ‘at the service of a broad theoretical

approach, the balanced activities approach’. The

book did admirably through a three-part

discussion. Part A made accessible to novice

teachers key aspects of theory, looking in turn at

learners, at language, at curriculum, and at

language learning. Part B looked at the practice of

teaching, focusing largely on grammar and skills,

using the traditional division into receptive and

productive skills. Part C looked at the planning and

management of learning with sections on the

teacher’s roles, student groupings, discipline, and

lesson planning. There was no more

comprehensive book at the time which integrated

principle and practice in such useful and

appropriate ways for pre-service teachers. It

became an acclaimed and invaluable resource for

teachers and teacher trainers, and with a second

edition, a classic in the field. A younger colleague of

mine describes it as his introduction to TEFL, and

this must be true for many.

The second edition was published in 1991, with

audience and aims unchanged, and essentially the

same structure, but 44 pages longer. The additional

length allowed for inclusion of content which

reflected developing concerns within the previous

decade. Discourse and vocabulary found a place in

the consideration of language and in aspects of

curriculum design. Task-based learning,

humanistic approaches, and self-direction were

given space in the consideration of learning. A new

chapter was devoted to the teaching of vocabulary,

and readers also benefited from the appropriate, if

brief, mention of learner training, experiential

learning through projects, and discovery

techniques in teaching grammar.

2. Reviewing the third edition

The new edition is introduced as completely

revised and updated, and the Preface presents

several reasons for this, which predictably link to

changes within the field of ELT and, in e¤ect,

constitute the aims of the book. They thereby

provide a framework for review. It seems to be a

seven-point framework, and can be set out as:

1. changes in technology: the use of computers

and the Internet, and the development of

computer corpora

2. new areas of research and innovation

3. modifications in attitudes to language study,

with serious attempts to improve classroom

procedures

4. a growing realization that methodology needs to

be culture-specific

5. debate on the role of English in the modern

world6. acknowledgement that teacher development is a

key to the quality of student experience

7. the need to update and look with a fresh eye at

familiar topics.

2.1 Meeting the challenge of internal aims

In order to address these challenges, the third

edition follows a new format comprising nine parts,

in contrast to the three parts of the earlier editions.

In Part 1 the first chapter addresses point 5 above,

and gives an account of where English fits into the

world, dealing succinctly with issues of cultural

imperialism, language variety, and appropriate

models. These key issues of globalization provide

an appropriate precursor to a second chapter on

describing language which addresses points 1 and

2 above. New sections here introduce the grammar

of spoken English, the role of corpora in extending

our understanding of vocabulary, and recent

research on lexical phrases. The chapter provides

an up-to-date, refined, summary of exactly what it is

that learners need to learn when they set out on the

task of learning the English language.

Part 2 describes learners and teachers, the former

receiving more attention than previously,

particularly with regard to our growing knowledge

of learning styles, the e¤ect of individual

di¤erences, and di¤erent motivations. I would have

hoped for a little more on task motivation, given

that teachers can make a di¤erence there. Chapter

4, ‘Describing Teachers’, is a useful introduction to

those who have not experimented with a wide

range of roles in their classrooms, though I have to

confess to some disappointment that the author’s

style, which though fluent, lucid, and accessible as

always, slips into the modal verbs of prescription.

The rest of the book keeps to a style which is more

neutral, objective, and analytical.