Teaching in the last few years has challenged us to adapt quickly and learn on the go! But how much time have you spent on your own professional development, and how prepared do you feel for the start of next term? As the holidays approach there is a sense of relief as we get to have a well-deserved break, but it is also a chance to get ready for the new term, whatever it may bring. To help you prepare for every scenario, we’ve created an essential reading list with English language teachers in mind! Explore the pros and cons and get practical tips for teaching online, prepare to assess your students in new ways, and learn to prioritise your own wellbeing. We’ve got you covered with best-sellers and the latest professional development books and papers written by ELT experts.
Our Professional Development Book Of The Year
Teachers… have the power in their own hands to make things better and to nurture and enhance their own wellbeing. This is a welcome message at any time, but perhaps most of all now when there is so much uncertainty in the world.
– English Teaching Professional
Our book of the year serves as a practical guide to help individual teachers promote and nurture their well-being. Discover effective tips and strategies to help you meet your needs, and improve your well-being by finding techniques that work for you. You’ll also find tips to help you maintain a healthy work-life balance, and nurture your personal and professional relationships.
Three Professional Development Best Sellers
- Exploring Psychology in Language Learning and Teaching: This award-winning book explores key areas of educational and social psychology and considers their relevance to language teaching. Learn learners’ and teachers’ beliefs about how a subject should be learned and taught, relationships with others, the role of emotions in learning, and more…
- How Languages are Learned 4th edition: Prize-winning How Languages are Learned shares how language learning theory works in the classroom and provides you with practical techniques and activities developed from research. Perfect for new and experienced practising teachers.
- Teaching Young Language Learners 2nd edition: A clear introduction to teaching young learners. It covers child development, L1 and L2 learning, vocabulary and grammar, and more by combining theory and practice in an accessible way. It draws on up-to-date international research and classroom practice.
Support For Teaching Online
- Mobile Learning: Get clear guidance and essential support for using mobile devices in and outside the language classroom. Full of practical ideas and activities, it emphasizes the power of the mobile device as a tool for language learning.
- Learning Technology: Learning Technology provides a clear guide to how teachers can introduce learning technology to the classroom. Explore different ways of putting it into practice, including virtual learning environments, social learning platforms, blended learning and the flipped classroom, mobile learning, and adaptive learning.
Recommended Assessment Books
- Language Assessment for Classroom Teachers: This book presents a new approach to developing and using classroom-based language assessments. The approach is based on current theory and practice in the field of language assessment and on an understanding of the assessment needs of teachers. Split into four parts, this book is the ultimate practical guide to classroom-based language assessment, with advice that can be applied in any classroom setting – both real and virtual! A professional development must-read!
- Focus on Assessment: This book develops your ability to design, implement, and evaluate language assessment in your classroom, helping you relate the latest research and pedagogy to your own teaching context. Explore the multiple roles teachers play in language assessment such as ensuring a positive assessment experience and promoting learner autonomy, and improving your assessment competence with activities that help you to apply assessment theory to your own classroom.
Recommended Vocabulary Books
- How Vocabulary is Learned: How Vocabulary Is Learned discusses the major issues that relate to the teaching and learning of vocabulary. Written by leading voices in the field of second language acquisition, the book evaluates a wide range of practical activities designed to help boost students’ vocabulary learning, starting with ‘Which words should be learned?’…
- Focus on Vocabulary Learning: Explore teaching vocabulary to language learners aged 5-18. Discover the considerable challenges of learning the vocabulary of a new language from a range of perspectives, and become equipped to teach with practical solutions. Find a rich variety of useful activities and examples from real classrooms, and ‘spotlight studies’ of important research, that link theory to practice.
ELT Position Papers
Our position papers provide expert advice and guidance on the burning issues shaping English Language Teaching today. Download them for free and you’ll also receive exclusive training and resources for your classroom.
- Global Skills: Creating Empowered 21st Century Learners: Help every learner develop the skills they need for success in a fast-changing modern world! Get expert advice and discover the five global skills clusters that prepare learners for lifelong success and fulfilment.
- Oxford 3000 and Oxford 5000: The Most Important Words to Learn in English: Interested in expanding your learners’ vocabulary? Discover our core wordlist of all the most important words for learners to know! Deliver a well-founded vocabulary syllabus with confidence, and encourage independent vocabulary learning at home.
- Inclusive Practices in English Language Teaching: Create an inclusive classroom, and make learning a positive experience for each and every learner. Discover expert advice to help you identify and support students with special educational needs, and pick up practical solutions for building an inclusive classroom environment.
Professional Development On The Go!
Download our free focus papers to access bite-sized insights and practical tips for the ELT classroom! Each paper is easy to use, and immediately useful, covering topics like:
- Online Teaching
- Project-Based Learning
- Mediation
- Oracy Skills
- Managing Online Learning
- And more!
Which new teaching skills are you trying this year? Let us know in the comments below!
Trust me ,I wish to go beyond the syllabi and teach them the art of living.In the present world scenario the first thing that a student needs to learn is the art of living.Higher education and better qualifications are of little use if a student can’ cope with the pressures and stress of the surroundings that make life miserable .?
During my MA TESOL that I studied at the University of Nottingham I used many of these books. Certainly they are very insightful. I would also recommend Richards and Rodgers’s, Approaches and Methods in Language Teaching. This is a really good overview of all the different ways of teaching English from the past and to the present. It is a great way to get a better understanding of the different ways we can teach and I personally find that many teachers adopt an eclectic combination of many of these approaches and methods in language teaching.
Also thank you for the link to your free focus papers! I am really interested in learning more about Online Teaching so that will be very useful for me.
Check out my blog at englishasaforeignlanguageeducation.wordpress.com as I will be reflecting a lot on my MA TESOL course and the materials I used while studying including many of the books highlighted in this blog.
Thanks for sharing!
[…] The Complete Professional Development Guide: Books You Need To Read In 2020 […]
Developing children’s analytical skills are vital to give solutions to their own problems. Just like how adults are actively engaged in reading books by identifying patterns, children also wonder. They will start asking questions and solve problems with their minds, predicting how the story will end.
I prefer teaching wellbeing for my favorite book instead other books. Depend also for various professions and skills to develop.