CELS News

Korean New Year

2012-01-22T11:48:00.000-08:00

새해 복 많이 받으세요 to all in Korea!

Essential Statistics for Corpus Linguistics with R

2012-01-09T12:50:00.000-08:00

The British Association for Applied Linguistics Corpus SIG is very pleased to announce the following workshop event for Spring 2012:

Essential Statistics for Corpus Linguistics with R

14th – 17th March 2012

University of Birmingham, UK

The aims of this workshop are to provide a hands-on introduction to statistical methods relevant for corpus linguistic research, and at the same time to provide a hands-on introduction to the open source software and programming language R (http://www.r-project.org/). You should have some knowledge of basic concepts and methods in corpus linguistics, but no previous knowledge or experience of statistics or computer programming is required.

The workshop will be held over 4 full days, 14th – 17th March 2012, and will be hosted at Birmingham's Centre for Corpus Research (http://www.birmingham.ac.uk/research/activity/corpus/index.aspx).

We are especially pleased to announce that the workshop will be taught by one of the world's leading authorities in this field, Stefan Th. Gries, University of California, Santa Barbara (http://www.linguistics.ucsb.edu/faculty/stgries/).

The cost of the workshop is £150 for BAAL members, students (i.e. all you Bhammers out there) and the unwaged, and £170 for other participants.

Full details and an application form are available on request by sending me an email at my bham address (it's on my webpage).

Registration is now open, and is on a first-pay-first-served basis. The closing date for registrations is 31 January 2012, but please note that participant numbers are strictly limited to a maximum of 18, so you are strongly advised to register early in order to guarantee your place.

I appreciate that most of you will not be in a position to attend, but it would be fantastic to see at least some CELS distance MA/PhD students there.

All the best,

Nick

2011-11-23T01:48:00.000-08:00

Congratulations to CELS MA tutors and alumni, Theron Muller, Steve Herder, John Adamson and Philip Shigeo Brown on their new book: 'Innovating EFL Teaching in Asia', which is being published by Palgrave MacMillan. This book will make an outstanding original contribution to the field as it is the first to focus explicitly on EFL teaching in Asian contexts.

KOTESOL 2011 Nick Groom

2011-11-08T03:45:00.000-08:00

Campus MA Students' Welcome Party

2011-10-11T03:15:00.000-07:00

Nice weather and some unorthodox croquet technique.
Thanks to Kadek for the photos.

alumni event in Osaka

2011-09-23T01:06:00.001-07:00

All alumni living in the Osaka area are invited to an Alumni Reception hosted by Susan Hunston, Head of the School of English and formerly a member of staff in CELS. The reception will be held on Friday 25^th November 2011, starting at 7:30 pm. The place is the Reed bar in the Hotel New Hankyu Osaka.

While in Japan, Susan will be a speaker at the 40th anniversary conference of the JACET Kansai chapter on 27th November, and will also be giving a talk to the Japanese Association of English Corpus Studies on 26th November. The reception itself will be a social event, so if you would like to talk to Susan about future plans, such as PhD study, please email her in advance to arrange a better time. The address is s.e.hunston[at]bham.ac.uk

Summer Seminars in Korea and Japan

2011-09-12T05:37:00.000-07:00

We very much enjoyed delivering our summer seminars at Korea University in Seoul and Osaka Shoin University in Japan this year. We had an excellent turnout and as usual the intellectual level of the discussions was extremely high and we enjoyed an excellent ‘social programme’, including a very memorable celebratory drink in Osaka! The poster sessions, where you presented your ongoing work, were a real high point in both seminars so a big thank you to everyone who brought along a poster. Thanks also to Douglas, CK, Steve and Jason for making everything run so smoothly for us. And thanks all for coming. We’re both looking forward to it being our turn again!

Jeannette and Neil

CELS

Here are a few photos of the seminar:

More Summer Seminar Pics

2011-09-08T01:12:00.000-07:00

Congratulations Joe!

2011-08-16T05:36:00.000-07:00

Congratulations to Joe Bennett on the birth of his daughter Rose. Mother and baby (and father) are doing well.

New Administrator

2011-08-16T05:33:00.000-07:00

We'd like to welcome Michelle Cullen who has joined CELS as a new Senior Administrator. She'll be sharing her post with Alison who's now part-time. Alison works Monday to Wednesday, and Michelle on Thursday and Friday.

Birmingham Summer Seminar 2011

2011-07-18T02:52:00.000-07:00

CELS MA Graduates Summer 2011

2011-07-15T05:20:00.000-07:00

Congratulations to all the Distance MA students graduating this summer. They are:

Jacob Arntson TEFL/TESL
Donna Azzopardi Ferrando Applied Linguistics (Distinction)
Tyler Barrett Applied Linguistics (Merit)
Sirkku Carey Translation Studies (Merit)
Sung-Hee Choi Translation Studies (Merit)
David Clayton Applied Linguistics (Merit)
Jonathan Crewe TEFL/TESL (Merit)
George Damaskinidis Translation Studies (Distinction)
David Dodd TEFL/TESL (Merit)
Richard Dougherty TEFL/TESL
Shaun Dowling TEFL/TESL (Merit)
Eleanor Granek Applied Linguistics (Distinction)
Megan Green Applied Linguistics (Distinction)
Deborah Grossmann TEFL/TESL (Distinction)
Daniel Jenks TEFL/TESL (Merit)
Nicholas Jennings Applied Linguistics (Merit)
Sarah Jones TEFL/TESL (Merit)
Jeremy Kritt TEFL/TESL (Merit)
Masayo Kurokawa TEFL/TESL (Merit)
Steven Kurowski Applied Linguistics (Distinction)
Kevin Leeder Applied Linguistics
Chad Luff TEFL/TESL (Distinction)
John Angus MacCaull Applied Linguistics (Distinction)
Alan McCarthy Applied Linguistics (Distinction)
Josh McNicoll TEFL/TESL (Merit)
Harry Meyer TEFL/TESL
Ryan Moulton TEFL/TESL (Merit)
William Pearce Translation Studies
Christiano Robalinho Lima Translation Studies (Merit)
Michi Saki Applied Linguistics (Merit)
Edward Sarich Applied Linguistics (Merit)
Isabella Seeger TEFL/TESL (Distinction)
Kimberley Serle Applied Linguistics (Merit)
Corinna Smith TEFL/TESL (Distinction)
Colm Smyth Applied Linguistics (Merit)
Beverley Staley Translation Studies (Merit)
Jon Stoeckel Applied Linguistics (Merit)
Cilem Toygar TEFL/TESL
Richard Wilkinson TEFL/TESL (Distinction)

New book by members of CELS staff

2011-07-08T04:21:00.000-07:00

For details and access to the book's companion website see: http://www.routledge.com/books/details/9780415566421/

2011-05-24T07:45:00.000-07:00

Dear all,

This is to say that the Japan and Korea summer seminars will take place this August and that Neil Millar and I will be delivering them.

The Korea seminar will run from 8th-12th August and will take place at Korea University in Seoul.
The Japan seminar will run from 15th-19th August and will take place at Osaka Shoin Women’s University , in Osaka.

These seminars are optional and free of charge. We strongly recommend that you attend if you are living in the region as they provide a great opportunity to meet University of Birmingham staff and (perhaps more importantly) other students.

We will soon be sending out information about reserving places and booking hotels.

In one of the sessions we will be looking at SPSS statistical processing software. We strongly recommend that if you are interested in attending this session , it would be very useful for you to have obtained SPSS (details on how to get a massively discounted version from the university are available in the handbook) and installed it on your laptop before attending the seminar.

We recommend that you bring a laptop to the seminar if possible,

Looking forward very much indeed to seeing you at one of the seminars,

Jeannette and Neil
Centre for English Language Studies
University of Birmingham

New staff

2011-05-10T07:20:00.000-07:00

I’m Lucy Cooker, recently appointed as a Teaching Fellow to replace Nick Groom whilst he is on study leave. I have an MSc in Applied Linguistics from the University of Edinburgh, an MA in Educational Research Methods from The University of Nottingham, and I am currently completing my PhD, also at The University of Nottingham.

My research interests are in language learner autonomy, self-access language learning, alternative assessment, materials development, language learner identities, the application of socially based theories in applied linguistics, CALL, doctoral and academic writing, and research methodologies. Previously I have worked as a teacher and language learning advisor in Japan, where I established the self-access learning centre (the SALC) at Kanda University of International Studies. I have also taught research methods to postgraduate students at the University of Nottingham. I co-organised the Independent Learning Association 2007 conference in Japan, and the IATEFL Learner Autonomy SIG event ‘Beyond the Bandwagon’ at the University of Nottingham in 2008. I have published widely in academic journals and books, and I co-author a textbook based on BBC News for the Japanese market.

I'm looking forward to working with you all.

Selected publications

Benson, P. & Cooker, L. (Eds.). (forthcoming). The applied linguistic individual: Sociocultural approaches to autonomy, agency and identity. London: Equinox.

Cooker, L. (2011). Tech talk: Using collaborative writing tools for language learning and language learning research. Independence: The newsletter of the IATEFL Learner Autonomy Special Interest Group. Autumn 2010/50, 30-36.

Cooker, L. & Nix, M. (2010). On Q: An appropriate methodology for researching autonomy? Learning Learning, 17 (2), 24-30.

Cooker, L., & Pemberton, R. (2010). Self-access language learning in museums: A materials development project. Studies in Self-Access Learning Journal, 1 (2), 87-99.

Cooker, L. (2010). Some self-access principles. Studies in Self-Access Learning Journal, 1(1), 5-9.

Carroll, M., Castillo, D., Cooker, L., & Irie, K. (Eds.). (2009). Proceedings of the Independent Learning Association 2007 Japan Conference (online): Exploring theory, enhancing practice: Autonomy across the disciplines. Kanda University of International Studies, Chiba, Japan, October 2007. Retrieved March 23, 2010, from http://www.independentlearning.org/ILA/ila07/en/proceedings

Congratulations Gaby!

2011-05-10T02:00:00.000-07:00

Gaby Saldanha has had twin daughters, Rebeca and Martina. Mother and babies are doing well.

new staff in CELS

2011-05-10T01:24:00.001-07:00

Hello,
We're very pleased to welcome a new permanent member of staff, Joe Bennett. We're also very pleased to welcome Lucy Cooker who's standing in for Nick Groom while he's on study leave.
Joe has written something about his research interests. Will post the same from Lucy soon:

I’m Joe Bennett, recently appointed as Lecturer at the Centre for English Language Studies. I’ve worked with the Centre for a while, as a marker and in preparing materials. I’ve also taught English Language and Linguistics at Birmingham and at Aston University and the University of York.
My research interests are in discourse analysis and multimodality, in understanding the many modes of communication that we use in social interaction, and especially how these relate to the social and historical conditions in which we do so. For example, at the moment I’m looking at how language is used in personality tests, at how statements about the world come to be taken as indicators of personal traits – this is a very specific use of language and it’s related to the social purposes to which personality tests are put, the things that people have developed them to do.
I come from quite a theoretical linguistic background so I’m also interested in quite abstract, theoretical questions about language, especially when these come into contact with ideas about other modes of communication and other areas of social life.

Research leave

2011-04-28T08:12:00.000-07:00

I will be on extended research leave from 1st May 2011 to 23rd April 2012. Crayton Walker will be standing in for me as Coordinator of Distance Programmes during this time. I will continue to supervise research students as normal, however, so if you are being supervised by me (at MA or PhD level) please don't panic! I will also still be at the CELS summer seminar in Birmingham in July, and in Korea for the KOTESOL conference this coming October, so I look forward to meeting up with some of you at one of these events.

The kibbitzers are back

2011-03-21T06:24:00.000-07:00

Dear all,
We're leased to announce that Tim Johns' kibbitzers are back online at:
http://lexically.net/TimJohns/index.html
These are corpus-based worksheets designed to deal with common problems in academic writing.
They are designed to encourage data-driven language learning.
Jeannette

Message to all Birmingham students and staff in Japan

2011-03-13T09:40:00.000-07:00

Dear friends in Japan,

This is just to say that everyone here at CELS is thinking about you at this incredibly difficult time. We hope that you and all your loved ones are all okay and not too badly affected by the earthquake and tsunami. We're deeply grateful to those of you who have already been in touch to tell us you're safe and well, and we hope to be hearing positive news from or about everyone else in due course. If there is anything we can do to help, don't hesitate to ask.

Very best wishes in the meantime, and we sincerely hope that life will return to some semblance of normality for you as soon as possible.

Take care and keep safe,

Nick

PhD Study at Birmingham University - Administrative Information

2011-03-03T02:21:00.000-08:00

Dear all,
I've just been copied into this very helpful reply from the College of Arts and Law Graduate School about our PhD programmes. I thought it would be useful to circulate it round the whole list as a number of you may have the same questions.
I would like to add that the best approach is to contact the academic member of staff who you would most like to work with before starting the formal application process. When you apply, it is a good idea to make it clear that you are a graduate from our MA programme.
Jeannette

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
The two distance learning PhD programmes we have in English Language which are the Sandwich and modular programmes. The difference between the two are as follows:

SANDWICH PhD Structure - The sandwich programme requires a ‘traditional' 80,000 word thesis. The work is examined at the end of the programme, and as with other PhD programmes, it is not acceptable to publish chapters from the thesis exactly as they are until the thesis is finished (and examined). You may be able to use some of your research however to publish papers.

MODULAR PhD Structure - The modular programme is different to that of the sandwich programme, but has equally been designed for people who are working outside Britain but who wish to obtain a degree from the University of Birmingham. The modular programme requires 3 modules, with a final thesis of 50,000 words. The work is examined in three phases, at the end of each module. Unlike the sandwich programme you are encouraged to publish module 1 and 2 wherever possible.

The fee for each programme is 50% of the University fee for overseas students. So for 2011/2012 the full overseas fee quoted for English (Band E) is £11,340. So you would pay 50% of this. This fee is payable by students classed as 'overseas' or Home?EU for fee paying purposes. This fee increases each year and you would be required to be registered (fee paying) for four years. If after four years registration, you require an additional year to write up and submit your research for examination, you would be required to pay a £1,000 continuation fee.

If this is of interest to you and you wish to make an application you can do so online at: http://www.postgraduate.bham.ac.uk/apply/ In addition to the submission of this application you will also need to submit the following documents, so that the appropriate admissions tutor can assess your application more fully:

a personal statement, outlining why you wish to pursue a doctorate programme at Birmingham;

a copy of your research proposal which will help the admissions tutor identify the appropriate supervisor for your topic;

two academic reference statements in support of your application;

a transcript of your undergraduate and postgraduate degrees (if applicable);

evidence of your English Language proficiency (if applicable). The University accepts test results

such as an IELTS or TOEFL examination and the grades they expect can be found at this

website: http://www.postgraduate.bham.ac.uk/entry/international.shtml

Once we have received your online application, and your supporting documents, your application will then be considered. You will be informed by letter of the outcome.

I hope this information helps you make a full application and we look forward to considering it in due course.

The Graduate School Team

On behalf of

The College of Arts and Law Graduate School
University of Birmingham.

Email: artsandlawgraduateschool@contacts.bham.ac.uk
Website: http://www.alpg.bham.ac.uk/

PhDs by Distance Learning at the University of Birmingham

2011-02-28T09:35:00.001-08:00

Dear all,

I have two pieces of good news about Distance PhD Programmes in English Language and Applied Linguistics at the University of Birmingham:

There is no longer a formal residency requirement which means that if you and your supervisor are happy with the situation you don’t need to travel to Birmingham during your period of study.

The Head of College has agreed to subsidise one air fare to Birmingham for students who sign up on the sandwich or modular PhD Applied Linguistics from October 2011.

Details of all our PhD programmes can be found at:
http://www.english.bham.ac.uk/pg/language.shtml

More information about the academic side of things can be obtained from Dr Alison Sealey:
a.j.sealey[at]bham.ac.uk

And information about the administrative side of things, including fees and the application process, can be obtained from the Graduate School at:
artsandlawgraduateschool@contacts.bham.ac.uk

The best way to go about applying for a PhD is to contact the member of staff whose research interests are closest to your own. You would need to discuss your research proposal with them first, and when both of you are happy with it you would then apply officially, stating on your proposal that you have already discussed it with them.

In order to help you with this process, I’ve asked round the English Department and have got people to provide brief synopses of the sorts of things they’d be particularly interested in supervising. Please note that this isn’t an exhaustive list and we’re happy to talk about related ideas too.

I’m also providing the email address and staff information page URLs for everyone below so that you can find out as much as possible about us and then contact us directly. I hope this helps,

Jeannette Littlemore
(Centre for English Language Studies, University of Birmingham)

Members of staff and their research and PhD supervision interests:

Dr Nick Groom
I am interested in supervising PhD students who want to use the tools and methods of corpus linguistics to address problems, questions and issues in Discourse Analysis, Critical Discourse Analysis and Second Language Acquisition research. I am also interested in supervising PhD projects that focus on applications of corpus linguistics in TEFL/TESL.
n.w.groom[at]bham.ac.uk
http://www.cels.bham.ac.uk/staff/groom.shtml

Prof Susan Hunston
I have done work on mainly written discourse, especially evaluative language, and on corpus linguistics. I am interested in supervising topics that use discourse or corpus methods (or a mixture of the two). Previous and current students have researched topics such as: aspects of lexis and grammar in learner corpora; the representation of given people and situations in newspapers; the language of text messaging; the discourse of particular academic disciplines; assessing task-based learning in the classroom; business and academic job advertisements; language and visual communication in university websites; and many more. The topic that interests me particularly at the moment is the language of interdisciplinary academic fields, so I would be very happy to work out a research proposal with anyone keen to work in this area. But I am also happy to supervise other topics that relate to the methodologies I mentioned above.
s.e.hunston[at]bham.ac.uk
http://www.english.bham.ac.uk/staff/hunston.shtml

Dr Suganthi John
My main areas of research are in academic discourse and the teaching of academic writing. I am keen to supervise research which investigates aspects of academic discourse – for e.g. argumentation in academic discourse, comparative studies on the features of academic discourse in different disciplines, academic style etc. Of particular interest is research which aims to illuminate aspects of academic discourse which are challenging for second language writers. Equally, I would be keen on supervising research which evaluates classroom techniques for the teaching of academic writing and materials development for academic writing. I would also be happy to supervise writing (not academic but general or creative writing) for EFL learners.
s.p.john[at]bham.ac.uk
http://www.english.bham.ac.uk/staff/john.shtml

Dr Almut Koester
My research is on the analysis of spoken discourse in the workplace, so I am particularly interested in supervising research involving the collection and transcription of naturally-occurring spoken interactions in workplace, business and other institutional settings. In addition to studies investigating English native speaker discourse, I would welcome studies involving cross-cultural and cross-linguistic comparisons or Business English as a lingua franca.

Research methods I use include discourse analysis, conversation analysis, genre analysis and corpus research methods.

Areas of language and interaction I have investigated: spoken workplace genres, small talk, conflictual talk, modality, hedges, vague language, idioms, metaphor.

If you are interested in doing research in any of these areas, or in researching some other aspect of spoken discourse, or if you would like your research to involve some practical application to teaching, please do discuss your ideas with me.
a.j.koester[at]bham.ac.uk
http://www.english.bham.ac.uk/staff/koester.shtml

Dr Jeannette Littlemore
I am interested in supervising PhD theses on the acquisition and use of metaphor and other types of figurative language by second language learners. I would particularly welcome proposals that focus on the acquisition of metonymy, humour and irony, and the use of verbal and gestural metaphor in cross-linguistic communication or communication between members of different discourse communities. I am also interested in supervising research that explores other applications of cognitive linguistics (such as construal) to second language learning and teaching.
j.m.littlemore[at]bham.ac.uk
http://www.cels.bham.ac.uk/staff/littlemore.shtml

Dr Oliver Mason
I am interested in supervising PhD theses in (corpus-based) text and discourse analysis and aspects of natural language processing/computational linguistics, especially Text Analytics and related areas (including Sentiment Analysis). Apart from analysing texts I am also interested in phraseology and the use of multi-word units in grammatical description.
I am also happy to co-supervise theses which include computational/statistical elements outside those areas.
o.mason[at]bham.ac.uk
http://www.english.bham.ac.uk/staff/mason.shtml

Dr Neil Millar
I am interested in supervising PhD students in the following areas:
corpus data and theories of language learning/processing
the combination of corpus data and experimentation
investigating language using statistical approaches to collocation
recent language change
or in any area coherent with my research interests –
n.j.millar[at]bham.ac.uk
http://www.cels.bham.ac.uk/staff/neil-millar.shtml

Dr Rosamund Moon
My main research areas are lexis in general (including phraseology, collocation, and idioms), lexicography and dictionary-making, figurative language – also discourse and ideological aspects of language, particularly from a lexical point of view: my approaches are generally corpus-based or text-based. I’d be very interesting in supervising PhD topics in these and similar areas.
r.e.moon[at]bham.ac.uk
http://www.english.bham.ac.uk/staff/moon.shtml

Dr Gabriela Saldanha
My main research areas are 1) stylistics and translation, in particular the investigation of translator style, that is, stylistic features that can be attributed to the translator -- rather than the author. the source text or to linguistic constraints in language transfer -- and therefore can tell us something about the translators themselves as literary artists; 2) the reception of translated literature, including, for example, readers' attitudes towards translation within a particular literary system, the role of publishers and booksellers in disseminating foreign literature, translation policies, and 3) translation and gender, in particular the representation of gendered language and gender stereotypes across cultures.
g.saldanha[at]bham.ac.uk
http://www.cels.bham.ac.uk/staff/saldanha.shtml

Dr Alison Sealey
I welcome applications from postgraduate research students who are seeking supervision in the areas of:
The sociology of language and the links between language use and social processes. Students who are interested in any aspect of language and the realist social theory explored in a number of my recent publications are especially encouraged to contact me about their proposals for MPhil/PhD research.
Corpus linguistics:
As a method in discourse analysis
In first language learning and teaching
Language planning and policy
a.j.sealey[at]bham.ac.uk
http://www.english.bham.ac.uk/staff/sealey.shtml

Dr Paul Thompson
I have research interests in linguistic aspects of human-computer interaction, in uses of educational technologies in language learning, and in the exploitation of corpus resources and methodologies in learning about language. I have worked on large scale academic corpus development projects, and am keen to supervise doctoral research which explores specialised language use, particularly in academic discourse, through corpus analysis, or which develops innovative approaches to corpus studies.
p.thompson[at]bham.ac.uk
http://www.english.bham.ac.uk/staff/thompson.shtml

Prof Michael Toolan
I am interested in supervising PhDs in all areas of Stylistics, Narrative Analysis, and Sociolinguistics. My own current research interests include the role of repetition in verbal art, the textual construction of expectations and emotional immersion in written narratives, and the construction/performance of 'emergent identity' in personal narratives.
m.toolan[at]bham.ac.uk
http://www.english.bham.ac.uk/staff/toolan.shtml

Dr Crayton Walker
My own research interests are associated with the study of collocation and other phraseological aspects of English. I am currently using corpus-based techniques to investigate the phraseological behaviours of high frequency nouns and verbs and looking at how these are represented in mainstream EFL coursebooks.
I am particularly interested in supervising MA and PhD research in the areas of
collocation and other phraseological aspects of English
the pedagogic application of corpora
vocabulary and the teaching of vocabulary

c.p.walker[at]bham.ac.uk
http://www.cels.bham.ac.uk/staff/crayton-walker.shtml

Staff News

2011-02-04T06:32:00.000-08:00

We are very pleased to announce that Dan Malt has been promoted to the position of 'Teaching Fellow'. This means that he will now be more involved in the development and delivery of course content on both our distance and campus-based programmes.

online 'open day'

2011-01-27T03:08:00.000-08:00

The University’s holding online Q & A sessions which might be of interest if you’re thinking about PhD study or for people you know who might be interested in doing an MA at Birmingham. Information is here http://www.alpg.bham.ac.uk/virtual/ (click the blue text on the right which says ‘View the full schedule and book your place’). The session on English language research programmes is 01/02/2011 12:00 GMT, and the one on English language taught programmes 02/02/2011 12:00 GMT.

some admin info for current students: changes to module registration process

2011-01-27T01:09:00.000-08:00

You are no longer required to complete the module registration form when you complete your current module. CELS administration will now automatically register you for your next module upon receipt of your current module assignment. Please follow the instructions below:

For TEFL/TESL and Translation students

When you receive your confirmation of receipt of your assignment email from CELS you should: -

• Pay the fee for your next module
• Download the Payment Notification Form from the forms section of Web CT – always use a new form as this will always show the current cost per module
• Complete this form and email it to cels@bham.ac.uk
• You will then be registered for your next module by the CELS administration team

If you are submitting Module 5 then please also email your module six option choice so the administration team know which module to register you for.

For Applied Linguistics students

When you receive your confirmation of receipt of your assignment email from CELS you should: -

• Pay the fee for your next module
• Download the Payment Notification Form from the forms section of Web CT – always use a new form as this will always show the current cost per module
• Complete this form and email it to cels@bham.ac.uk
• You will then be registered for your next module by the CELS administration team

If you are submitting Module Four then please also email your Module Five and Six option choices so that the administration team know which modules to register you for.

New Year Greetings

2011-01-01T04:28:00.000-08:00

Happy New Year! We hope 2011 will be a prosperous and productive one for all of you. Enjoy your studies, and we look forward to meeting some of you at the Summer Seminar this July.

Very best regards on behalf of the whole CELS team,

Nick

2010-12-14T03:52:00.000-08:00

Congratulations to all the Distance MA students graduating this December. They are:

Marc Adnitt MA Applied Linguistics (Merit)
Joel Baker MA TEFL/TESL (Merit)
Elizabeth Borstad TEFL/TESL (Merit)
Ann Brix Applied Linguistics (Distinction)
Graham Burton Applied Linguistics (Distinction)
Seunghee Choi Applied Linguistics (Distinction)
Stewart Cooper Applied Linguistics (Merit)
Jane Dewhurst TEFL/TESL (Distinction)
Paul Dickinson Applied Linguistics (Distinction)
Brian Duff TEFL/TESL (Merit)
Colin Fraser TEFL/TESL (Merit)
Panagiota Frytzala TEFL/TESL (Merit)
Eric Halvorsen TEFL/TESL (Distinction)
Sharon Heduvan Translation Studies (Merit)
Eric Jego Applied Linguistics (Merit)
Sumiyoshi Kawabata Translation Studies (Distinction)
Jesse Khudoo Applied Linguistics (Merit)
Doreen Koh TEFL/TESL (Pass)
Haemi Lee TEFL/TESL (Merit)
Chiu-Hui Lu TEFL/TESL (Merit)
Fergus Mackinnon TEFL/TESL (Merit)
Peter McGill Applied Linguistics (Distinction)
Lynsey Mori TEFL/TESL (Merit)
Keiko Muto-Humphrey TEFL/TESL (Merit)
Diego Navarro Applied Linguistics (Distinction)
Michelle Oates TEFL/TESL (Distinction)
Susanne Oswald Applied Linguistics (Distinction)
Samuel Reid Applied Linguistics (Distinction)
Jeremy Sands Applied Linguistics (Merit)
Joanne Sato TEFL/TESL (Merit)
Bradley Serl Applied Linguistics (Merit)
Nozomu Sonda TEFL/TESL (Merit)
Benet Vincent Applied Linguistics (Distinction)
Clair Webb Applied Linguistics (Distinction)
Emily Williams Translation Studies (Merit)
Matthew Woodford TEFL/TESL (Merit)

JALT Conference

2010-11-29T08:40:00.000-08:00

I'd like to say a big thank you to all of you in Japan who gave me such a warm welcome at the JALT conference last week. It was good to see so many of you at the conference and I loved the presentations at the Birmingham Graduate Student Showcase.
Jeannette

Introduction to Bank of English handouts on WebCT

2010-11-10T06:35:00.000-08:00

In recent weeks I have had a number of emails from students who are finding it difficult to use the Bank of English telnet interface. In an attempt to address this, I’ve just uploaded to WebCT the three handouts that I use to introduce the BoE to Corpus Linguistics students on campus here at Birmingham. You can find them at:

Distance MA Programmes Course Materials > An Introduction to the Bank of English.

I hope you find them helpful!

Word Dominoes App for Learning Collocations

2010-11-09T04:11:00.000-08:00

Dr Crayton Walker of CELS has created a smart phone game to help learners of English avoid using awkward or implausible word combinations.

Crayton devised the game taking his inspiration from dominoes. The aim is to create a chain of hexagonal tiles showing likely combinations of words chosen from the Bank of English corpus.

‘As native speakers we’re constantly exposed to collocations but when learners of English are studying in their own countries they can be very difficult to pick up,’ he says.

Crayton’s original board game has now been transformed into a smart phone app which will go on sale soon.

His vision is for the game to be expanded into a suite of materials for interactive white-boards, smart-phones and 3D touch tables appropriate for teaching everyone from primary school pupils to business people studying a foreign language.

To find out more about the game, contact Crayton c.p.walker[at]bham.ac.uk.

online essay/dissertation bank

2010-11-01T07:34:00.000-07:00

Just a reminder that here http://www.cels.bham.ac.uk/resources/assignments.shtml you can find work by previous MA students. We're always looking to add more, so do please send us yours (to d.j.malt[at]bham.ac.uk).
Dan

Dates for Birmingham Summer Seminar 2011

2010-11-01T06:57:00.000-07:00

Dear all,

A note for your diaries: the next biennial Birmingham Summer Seminar week for distance students will be Monday 4th - Friday 8th July 2011. As in previous years, the seminar will take place at Westmere house (the home of CELS), and will be taught by CELS faculty and colleagues in the English department.

The summer seminar is not compulsory, but it does provide an excellent opportunity for you to meet and interact with staff and fellow students, so we do encourage you to attend if you possibly can. The seminar is free of charge for all registered distance students, but you will have to pay for your own accommodation. (Student accommodation on campus will be available.)

We'll be contacting you again with further details in due course, but in the meantime you can get some idea of what to expect from the following archive pages on the CELS blog:

http://celsnews.blogspot.com/2009/07/cels-birmingham-summer-seminar.html

http://celsnews.blogspot.com/2009/07/few-late-summer-seminar-pics.html

We look forward to welcoming you to Westmere next July!

A quick post to introduce myself..

2010-10-03T04:35:00.000-07:00

Hello!

A quick post to introduce myself...

My name is Neil Millar and I have recently joined CELS as a lecturer. On the campus-based MA programmes I will be teaching

psycholinguistics
corpus linguistics
SLA, and
language testing

And on distance programmes I will be convening the language testing and SLA courses.

My main research interests centre around the use of corpora in the following areas of linguistics:

Psycholinguistic- how do statistical patterns observed in corpora (e.g. collocation) impact on language processing?
Recent language change - how has the English language changed over the course of the twentieth century?
The language of biomedicine and health science - more on this here http://bmhlinguistics.org

From 2007 to 2010 I was doing a PhD and teaching at Lancaster University. Before Lancaster, I worked for many years in ELT in various countries - including ten years in Japan. I don't have a UoB staff page yet, but my Lancaster page is still active - http://www.lancs.ac.uk/postgrad/millarn/.

I look forward to working with everyone at CELS over the coming years.

Neil
n.j.millar[...]bham.ac.uk

Welcome to new students, hellos and goodbyes, and a materials update notice

2010-10-01T07:39:00.000-07:00

First of all, a warm welcome to all new students starting one of our three distance MA programmes today. We hope you enjoy studying with us. If you would like to see who we all are, please visit our staff pages at: http://www.cels.bham.ac.uk/staff/

As we begin this new academic year 2010-11, we are also very pleased to welcome the latest addition to the CELS team, Dr. Neil Millar. Neil's particular areas of expertise are in corpus linguistics, psycholinguistics, SLA and language testing, and his recently-completed doctoral research combines the first two of these interests in a highly innovative and exciting way. Neil is so new that he doesn't even have his own webpage yet; until this has been set up for him, you can read more about his work and interests at the following URL: http://www.lancs.ac.uk/postgrad/millarn/

It is also a great pleasure to welcome back Alison Stamps, our principal administrator, who has just returned to the office after maternity leave. It's great to have you back, Alison!

At the same time, we must also say goodbye to Mary Dowdeswell, who has been covering for Alison while she has been on leave. As all of you old hands out there will know, Mary has been a fantastic administrator, and we are very, very sad to see her go. The good news is that Mary is not leaving the university altogether - she will just be moving over to the Maths department. I'm sure you will want to join us in wishing Mary all the best as she takes up her new role.

Finally, we’re very pleased to announce that new and revised versions of two of our course modules have just been uploaded to WebCT. The changes are as follows:

Lexis: Updated version of the course materials;

Testing: Updated version of the course materials, with two entirely new units.

The other courses will remain the same this time round, but will be subject to review next year.

Here is a list of the module convenors for this semester (until 31st December 2009). These are the people to contact if you have any questions regarding the course materials that neither you nor your tutor can answer. These are also the people to contact if you identify any problems with the materials. We appreciate any feedback that you send to us about the materials as it helps us to improve them year on year.

Classroom Research & Research Methods:
Jeannette Littlemore
j.m.littlemore@bham.ac.uk

Corpus Linguistics:
Nicholas Groom
n.w.groom@bham.ac.uk

ELT Management:
Chris Kennedy
c.j.kennedy@bham.ac.uk

Functional Grammar:
Chris Kennedy
c.j.kennedy@bham.ac.uk

Introduction to Translation Studies:
Gaby Saldanha
g.saldanha@bham.ac.uk

Language Teaching Methodology:
Crayton Walker
c.p.walker@bham.ac.uk

Lexis:
Jeannette Littlemore
j.m.littlemore@bham.ac.uk

Pedagogic Grammar:
Crayton Walker
c.p.walker@bham.ac.uk

Professional Translation:
Gaby Saldanha
g.saldanha@bham.ac.uk

Second Language Acquisition:
Jeannette Littlemore
j.m.littlemore@bham.ac.uk

Sociolinguistics:
Bob Holland
r.l.holland@bham.ac.uk

Sociotranslation:
Gaby Saldanha
g.saldanha@bham.ac.uk

Spoken Discourse:
Nicholas Groom
n.w.groom@bham.ac.uk

Syllabus & Materials:
Crayton Walker
c.p.walker@bham.ac.uk

Teaching Young Learners:
Chris Kennedy
c.j.kennedy@bham.ac.uk

Testing:
Neil Millar
n.j.millar@bham.ac.uk

Translation and Discourse:
Gaby Saldanha
g.saldanha@bham.ac.uk

Written Discourse:
Carmen Caldas-Coulthard
c.r.caldas-coulthard@bham.ac.uk

Whichever module you are currently doing, we hope that you enjoy it and manage to apply what you learn to your current activity.

Best wishes for the forthcoming academic year,

The CELS team at Birmingham

Summer seminars in Korea and Japan

2010-09-23T02:31:00.000-07:00

This is just to let you know that we have some tentative dates for the summer seminars in Korea and Japan 2011. These are:

Seoul 8th - 12th August
Tokyo - 15th - 19th August

We are trying to get confirmation that the 15th-19th August will definitely be Obon week. When we have this confirmation, the dates will be fixed.

The venues have yet to be decided but the staff presenting the seminars wil be me (Jeannette Littlemore) and our new colleague, Dr Neil Millar, who has just started with us and who is an expert in Psycholinguistics and SLA.

We are looking forward to seeing as many people as possible at the seminars and will keep you posted when we have more news.

Jeannette

Birmingham Summer Seminar 2011

2010-09-06T01:47:00.000-07:00

Hello everyone,

In response to my recent CELS blog posting, a number of you have already been in touch to ask whether the dates for the 2011 Summer Seminar in Birmingham have been finalized yet. The answer is 'not yet', but they soon will be - the next distance team meeting will be on 21st Sept, and we will be fixing up the seminar dates then. We will announce the date on the CELS blog and the ma-cels list shortly afterwards. I hope that this will give you plenty of time to make arrangements if you are planning to attend.

Looking forward to welcoming you to Birmingham next summer,

Nick

More Summer Seminar Photos

2010-09-03T07:24:00.000-07:00

Message from Oliver Mason:

I have now selected some of my photos as well; they can be found here (both Hiroshima and Seoul).

CELS Japan and Korea Seminars August 2010

2010-09-01T05:11:00.000-07:00

Oliver Mason and I have just got back to Birmingham after teaching two week-long distance MA seminars in Hiroshima and Seoul. We'd like to thank all of the students in both Japan and Korea for welcoming us so warmly, for sharing their ideas and enthusiasm in the seminar sessions, and for taking us out on the town in the evening!

Here are some pictures of our visit:

Japan seminar (16-20 August)

Korea Seminar (22-26 August)

Next year two different members of staff will be coming to Japan and Korea, and we will also be having a week-long Summer Seminar here in Birmingham in July 2011 - we hope to see you then!

Nick

CELS academic staff research interests

2010-07-27T03:44:00.000-07:00

Robert Holland, CELS from Arts at Birmingham on Vimeo.

Professor Chris Kennedy, CELS from Arts at Birmingham on Vimeo.

Dr Crayton Walker, CELS from Arts at Birmingham on Vimeo.

Dr Jeannette Littlemore, CELS from Arts at Birmingham on Vimeo.

Dr Nicholas Groom, CELS from Arts at Birmingham on Vimeo.

Dr Gabriela Saldanha, CELS from Arts at Birmingham on Vimeo.

CELS Graduates summer 2010

2010-06-23T00:59:00.000-07:00

Congratulations to these Distance MA students who will be awarded their degrees this summer.

MA with Distinction:
Anabel Alves
Clare Anderson
Andrew Ferris
Benjamin Hecht
Timothy Main
Anthony Miles
Jason Peppard
Christopher Wharton

MA with Merit:
Wilhelmina Atitsogbi
James Caulfield
Seanan Clifford
Philip Girvan
Toby Hinton
Stephen Hodges
Susan Colleen Khallad
Jane Klem
Michael Massey
Hortense Mbea
Maria Antonia Morua Leyva
Sergun Ozdemir
Artin Petrosian
Gregory Reader
David Stewart
Eva Woronieka
Scott Zolner

MA Pass:
Davinia Hardwick
Kyungsik Lee
William Oscar Lewis

Guardian live Q&A session on professional development and career progression in TEFL

2010-04-06T14:23:00.000-07:00

I will be on the expert panel for a live Q&A session on professional development and career progression in TEFL, hosted on the Guardian newspaper's Careers website tomorrow (Wednesday April 7th), 1-4pm (British Summer Time).

The direct link to the discussion forum is:

http://tinyurl.com/y9bf9ce

and you can also get to it via the following:

http://careers.guardian.co.uk/forums

twitter.com/GuardianCareers

Whether you are relatively new to TEFL or an old hand, please do log on and join in!

Hope to see you there tomorrow,

Nick

Campus-based students looking for teachers

2010-03-24T03:44:00.000-07:00

We have two campus-based students working on dissertations that will involve interviews or questionnaires with English language teachers. If you can help either of these students, could you get in touch with them directly please?

Eric would like to talk to cram school teachers in Taiwan about their classroom management techniqies. If you can help him out, please email:

john5604@hotmail.com

Joe has a questionnaire for non-native English teachers about the the teaching of pronunciation. If you can help him out, please email:

meadyj22@hotmail.com

Thanks in advance!

Jeannette and the CELS team

New Handbooks

2010-03-23T04:39:00.001-07:00

New student handbooks for April 2010 are now available in WebCT.
Dan

New Feedback Process

2010-03-05T05:16:00.000-08:00

Hello All Students,
Next time you submit work (March onwards) you'll receive a link to an online feedback form. It's not long, and we'd be very grateful if you could fill it in.
Thanks
Dan

New applied linguistics resources on CUP website

2009-12-08T05:02:00.000-08:00

Here's a link to an excellent new applied linguistics resources area on the Cambridge University Press website:
http://www.cambridge.org/elt/resources/appliedlinguistics/
The home page contains links to three sections: 'Audio', which features "Podcasts and vodcasts from cutting-edge authors"; 'Reading Room', which includes "Free journal articles, sample chapters from new and established publications, and articles written by top authors and up-and-coming research students"; and 'Featured topic', which provides "a range of information about a particular area of applied linguistics", which changes every month. This month, the focus is on my own specialist area of corpus linguistics, and includes a podcast by Susan Hunston. Enjoy!

JALT 2009

2009-12-06T03:50:00.000-08:00

I'm back in Birmingham after a thoroughly enjoyable and productive visit to Japan for the JALT 2009 conference. It was great to meet up with so many old friends, and to come home having made so many new ones. One of the highlights of the trip was the Birmingham Graduate Student Showcase event on the Saturday afternoon of the conference. Six recent graduates gave 15-minute presentations about their dissertation projects to an open audience. The event was well attended and the audience was clearly impressed by the variety and quality the presenters' work and ideas. The presenters this year were:

• Michael Iwane-Salovaara

• Peter Macdonald

• Robert Murphy

• Jason Peppard

• Joanne Sato

• Chris Wharton

My thanks to them for making the event such a great success, and to the many Birmingham students and alumni in the audience for coming along and providing sterling support.

Here's a link to some photos of the Showcase event and of my conference visit more generally:

http://picasaweb.google.com/cdf1774/JALT2009?authkey=Gv1sRgCNT7oZu06YP7vQE#

The other big highlight of the trip was the Saturday night party organized by MASH human dynamos Mark de Boer and Steve Herder. Altogether over 70 people attended, including distinguished guests Scott Thornbury and Paul Nation, who had heard (quite correctly, of course) that ours was the coolest party in town. Many thanks to Steve and Mark, and to Christine at David English House for putting it all together and making it such a memorable evening. My only regret is that I left my camera in my hotel room on the Saturday evening and so don't have any pictures to share with with you, If anyone else has photos that they are happy to share please do send them on to me and I will post them to the blog on your behalf. Alternatively, if anyone has set up a Fickr album or similar do let me know and I will pass the link on.

Announcing a new corpus linguistics blog

2009-11-10T08:57:00.000-08:00

Oliver Mason and I have started a new blog, which focuses on using Unix text tools to do various kinds of corpus processing and analysis tasks, many of which cannot be done using standard corpus analysis software such as Wordsmith Tools or AntConc. If you are interested in learning how to use these tools, then please check us out from time to time at:

http://corpustools.blogspot.com/

Best,

Nick

Visit to KOTESOL

2009-10-28T08:27:00.000-07:00

I've just got back to my visit to KOTESOL in Korea where I had a fantastic time! Thanks to everyone who organised the social side of things; I particularly liked the Korean teashop on Sunday evening.

It's great to meet such a bright and motivated set of students who kept me on my toes all weekend!

Cheers,

Jeannette

Summer Seminar videos avaliable

2009-10-21T03:06:00.000-07:00

Hello All,
Some videos of talks given at this year's seminar in Birmingham are available in WebCT (within the Course Materials section).
These are very amateur productions (the clips, not the lectures), and some have had to be split into several parts, but I hope you'll find some of them interesting and useful.
We hope to make some more available soon.
Regards
Dan

Welcome to new students and materials update notice

2009-10-01T05:37:00.000-07:00

First of all, welcome to all new students starting the programme today. We hope you enjoy studying with us. If you would like to see who we all are, check out our staff pages at: http://www.cels.bham.ac.uk/staff/

We’ve just uploaded revised materials for some of the courses in WebCT. The changes are as follows:

Teaching Languages to Young Learners: New course
Written Discourse: Updated and modified version of the course materials with new units added
Spoken Discourse: Updated and modified version of the course materials
Testing: Updated and modified version of the course materials
Corpus Linguistics: Updated and modified version of the course materials
Pedagogic Grammar: New course materials

The other courses will remain the same this time round.

Here is a list of the course convenors for this term (until 31st December 2009). These are the people to contact if you have any questions regarding the course materials that neither you nor your tutor can answer. These are also the people to contact if you identify any problems with the materials. We appreciate you doing this at it allows us to iron out any problems that may arise.

Course title
Member of staff responsible
Language Teaching Methodology
Jeannette Littlemore
j.m.littlemore@bham.ac.uk
Classroom Research & Research Methods
Jeannette Littlemore
j.m.littlemore@bham.ac.uk
Second Language Acquisition
Jeannette Littlemore
j.m.littlemore@bham.ac.uk
Pedagogic Grammar
Jeannette Littlemore
j.m.littlemore@bham.ac.uk
Lexis
Murray Knowles
g.m.knowles@bham.ac.uk
Syllabus & Materials
Bob Holland
r.l.holland@bham.ac.uk
Spoken Discourse
Nick Groom
n.w.groom@bham.ac.uk
Written Discourse
Carmen Caldas-Coulthard
c.r.caldas-coulthard@bham.ac.uk
Sociolinguistics
Bob Holland
r.l.holland@bham.ac.uk
ELT Management
Chris Kennedy
c.j.kennedy@bham.ac.uk
Functional Grammar
Chris Kennedy
c.j.kennedy@bham.ac.uk
Corpus Linguistics
Nick Groom
n.w.groom@bham.ac.uk
Testing
Jeannette Littlemore
j.m.littlemore@bham.ac.uk
Introduction to Translation Studies
Gaby Saldanha
g.saldanha@bham.ac.uk
Translation and Discourse
Carmen Caldas-Coulthard
c.r.caldas-coulthard@bham.ac.uk
Contemporary theories in translation (sociotranslation)
Gaby Saldanha
g.saldanha@bham.ac.uk
Professional Translation
Gaby Saldanha
g.saldanha@bham.ac.uk
Research methods in translation
Gaby Saldanha
g.saldanha@bham.ac.uk
Teaching languages to young learners
Jeannette Littlemore
j.m.littlemore@bham.ac.uk

Whatever module you are on, we hope that you enjoy it and manage to apply what you learn to your current activity.

Best wishes,

The CELS team at Birmingham

No More Proxy Server

2009-10-01T04:07:00.000-07:00

Hello All,
Birmingham University sites such as the MyBham (http://www.my.bham.ac.uk/cp/home/loginf) and the eLibrary (http://www.elibrary.bham.ac.uk/) can now be accessed, using your University login, from off campus without using a proxy server.
Regards
Dan

degree ceremony attendance

2009-09-28T02:20:00.000-07:00

Hello All,
If you are due to graduate and wish to attend a degree congregation in Birmingham you’ll need to book a place before 15th October. Go to the www.my.bham.ac.uk portal to confirm your attendance.
Regards
Dan

ESP Materials for rural tourism

2009-09-24T02:23:00.000-07:00

Some of you may be interested in a set of free online downloadable ESP materials created by Maggie-Jo St John who has been involved in ESP course development for over twenty years (some of you may know her book Developments in ESP, with Tony Dudley-Evans) and Chris Johnson.

These materials arose from a project to teach English to tour guides in rural communities in Nicaragua but they are useful for other countries, particularly in Latin America.

Some of you may be interested in learning about the project and/or using the materials. If so, the link to them is as follows:

Link to the homepage of the project

One of Maggie Jo's aims is to make these materials available as widely as possible to people who would not normally be able to afford to buy published books so please pass the information on to as many people as possible!

Some of you may like to test out the materials in the context of your dissertation. This might involve, for example, investigating how they would need to be adapted to your own teaching contexts.

If you would like to talk to Maggie-Jo about your ideas you can email her at:

info@thenesttrust.org.uk

Jeannette

Teaching Languages to Young Learners

2009-09-23T01:45:00.000-07:00

Dear all,

We are pleased to offer the following new Module 6 options to TEFL and Applied Linguistics students:

Teaching Languages to Young Learners and Introduction to Translation Studies (available to MA TEFL/TESL students)
Teaching Languages to Young Learners and Testing (available to MA TEFL/TESL and Applied Linguistics students)
Teaching Languages to Young Learners and ELT Management (available to MA Applied Linguistics students)
Teaching Languages to Young Learners and Second Language Acquisition (available to MA Applied Linguistics students)
Teaching Languages to Young Learners and Pedagogic Grammar (available to MA Applied Linguistics students)

These have just been approved by the relevant University committees and we will be uploading the materials into Web C.T. over the next few days.

I hope you enjoy them and look forward to meeting some new people in the Teaching Languages to Young Learners discussion forum in Web C.T.

Best wishes,

Jeannette

Dr Jeannette Littlemore
Acting Director
Centre for English Language Studies
College of Arts and Law
Westmere
University of Birmingham
Birmingham
United Kingdom
B15 2TT
http://www.cels.bham.ac.uk/
http://celsnews.blogspot.com/

conference/research travel funding

2009-09-16T06:07:00.000-07:00

Hello All,
Birmingham CELS MA students are eligible to apply to the College of Arts and Law Graduate School Conference and Research Travel Support Competition. This provides small amounts of money (in pounds sterling only) to several Birmingham students each year.
There are two competitions each year. Applications for the first round (covering the period between 1 August 2009 and 31 January 2010) are due by 30 November 2009; applications for the second round (covering the period between 1 February and 31 July 2010) are due by 30 April 2010.
More information and an application form are available in the 'Forms' section of WebCT.

Dan

WebCT

2009-09-08T07:46:00.001-07:00

Dear all,
Slightly worryingly, it has come to my attention that some students are unaware of the fact that ALL of our course materials are permanently available in WebCT.
Details on how to access them are available in the student handbook.
Discussion lists for each of the courses are also there, as are copies of forms, the Guide to Independent Study and the most up-to-date versions of the handbooks.
Please do take a look!
Can I also remind you that each of the courses now has a course convenor who is there to help you with questions that your tutor is not sure about. A full list of course convenors is available in the student handbook.
I hope this helps,
Jeannette

October 09 student handbooks available in WebCT

2009-09-08T01:32:00.000-07:00

Hello All,
If you don't already have the most recent student handbook you can get it in WebCT in the 'Guides and Handbooks' section.
Dan

Updated materials

2009-09-01T09:21:00.000-07:00

Updated versions of the following courses will be available in WebCT on 1st October:

Written Discourse
Spoken Discourse
Testing
Pedagogic Grammar
Corpus Linguistics

There will also be a new optional half module on offer:

Teaching Languages to Young Learners

Some of these courses also have new assignment questions (available now in the latest edition of the handbook which can be found in WebCT). Details of all our courses are available in the course handbooks.

If you are currently working on one of these courses you can use the existing questions or one of the new ones. If you are feeling particularly 'attached' to the old materials, please make a back-up copy before 1st October as they will be replaced with the new ones on that date.

We will also be uploading an updated version of the Guide to Independent Study today.

Susan Hunston in Brazil

2009-08-27T07:36:00.000-07:00

Students in South America may like to take the opportunity to meet our Head of School, Prof Susan Hunston, who will be presenting a plenary paper at the Eighth Brazilian Corpus Linguistics Meeting in Rio de Janeiro 10th - 13th November this year.
http://www.corpuslg.org/elc/Inicial.html
If you're in the area please do go and say hello to Susan.
If you would like to arrange a time to meet Susan, please send her a quick email at:
s.e.hunston@bham.ac.uk

2009-08-21T05:55:00.000-07:00

Here are some pictures from the recent summer schools in Korea and Japan.

a few late summer seminar pics

2009-07-29T01:38:00.000-07:00

Pics from Westmere and the Prince of Wales (the pub where Tolkien did his courting) The influence of the pub on picture quality is pretty clear.

CELS Graduate Student Showcase at JALT 2009

2009-07-20T08:46:00.000-07:00

For the third year running, CELS has been awarded a prestigious Graduate Student Showcase slot at the annual Japan Association for Language Teaching (JALT) international conference (http://jalt.org/conference).

JALT 2009 runs from November 21st - 23rd, and our Showcase slot is scheduled for Saturday 21st at 16.35 - 18.10. The event will be hosted by Nick Groom.

Here is the line-up in full:

------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Michael J. Iwane-Salovaara
Opening a Heavy Door: A Sociocultural Case Study of a Learner's L2 in a One-to-one Learning Environment

By adapting Reuven Feuerstein’s “cognitive map”, this longitudinal microgenetic study uses qualitative and quantitative analyses to examine a learner's L2 development. This analysis is based on 3 samples over 18 months and focuses on sociocultural factors surrounding the learner’s L2 usage as well as data measuring fluency, accuracy, and complexity.

Peter McDonald
Creating a Pedagogical Dialogue for the Modern Classroom: An Active Mirror that That Reflects a Multi-Modal Society

This presentation will discuss why it is necessary to create a new multi-modal dialogue for the classroom. While modern texts often combine written language with other modes, especially visuals, our existing educational dialogue does not equip teachers and students with the means to talk about these complex multi-modal texts.

Robert S. Murphy
Connecting Neuroscience and Psychology to TEFL

Are there unique trends in the cognitive development of Japanese students? How does Neo-Confucianism affect TEFL? This paper presents the results of a pilot study attempting to answer these questions. The study is the basis for my doctoral work on Japanese cognitive development in relation to TEFL methodology.

Jason Peppard
Towards a functional-lexicogrammatical syllabus

The presenter will outline the development, implementation, and rationale for a functional-lexicogrammatical (FL) syllabus, and report on an experiment conducted to test its effectiveness. The FL syllabus is a discourse-driven lexicogrammatical syllabus realized through corpus-driven pattern grammar (Hunston and Francis, 1998, 2000) and data-driven learning (Johns, 1991, 1994) techniques.

Joanne Sato
From Collaborative Curriculum Design to Individual Classrooms in Action: Same Plan, Multiple Outcomes

This presentation focuses on teacher cognition and interactive decisions at a women’s junior college in Japan. I will discuss how to capture the reality of classrooms and individual teachers in action through a ‘classroom as culture’ approach.

Chris Wharton
The Reliability of Retrospective Interviews in Categorizing Word Associations

Word association tests are flawed and always have been. One major shortcoming is the categorization of response types. While one way of minimizing classification errors is through retrospective interviews, they should not be considered foolproof. The current study investigates the effect of test length on the reliability of retrospective interviews.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------

As you can see, we will be showcasing a diverse and fascinating range of topics presented by some of our brightest Japan-based graduates, so if you are planning to attend the conference please do come along and take part in what promises to be a memorable occasion.

I look forward to seeing you then!

Nick

Congratulations from Jeannette

2009-07-16T05:36:00.000-07:00

Congratulations to all of you - what a great set of results!

CELS graduates summer 2009

2009-07-16T01:53:00.000-07:00

Congratulations to the following Distance MA students who have been awarded their degrees this summer:

Barry Arnst MA TEFL/TESL (Distinction)
Iain Black TEFL/TESL (Merit)
Stephen Bland Applied Linguistics (Merit)
Philip Shigeo Brown TEFL/TESL (Distinction)
Paul Cunningham TEFL/TESL (Distinction)
Mark de Boer TEFL/TESL (Distinction)
Serena Dorey Translation Studies (Merit)
Fumitsugu Enokida Applied Linguistics (Merit)
Brett Ford Applied Linguistics (Merit)
Justin Foster TEFL/TESL (Merit)
Johnny Govea TEFL/TESL (Merit)
Tasha Hanson TEFL/TESL (Merit)
Steven Herder TEFL/TESL (Distinction)
Anthony Hollinghurst TEFL/TESL (Distinction)
Naomi Kunitake TEFL/TESL (Merit)
Bruce Lander TEFL/TESL (Merit)
Simone Levy Applied Linguistics (Distinction)
Peter McDonald TEFL/TESL (Distinction)
Alistair McNair Applied Linguistics (Distinction)
Robert Millie TEFL/TESL (Merit)
Robert Murphy TEFL/TESL (Merit)
Kishiko Nashimoto TEFL/TESL (Merit)
Sharon Oh TEFL/TESL (Merit)
Timothy Radnor Applied Linguistics (Merit)
Joshua Sargent TEFL/TESL (Merit)
Soon Jae Shin TEFL/TESL
Neela Shukla TEFL/TESL
David Stockdale TEFL/TESL (Distinction)

This is a tremendous set of results which reflects the consistently high standard of work produced by distance MA students. Well done to all!

CELS Birmingham Summer Seminar

2009-07-12T15:18:00.000-07:00

This is just a quick note to say that the CELS Birmingham Summer Seminar has just finished, and we've just waved goodbye to a fantastic group of students who have come from all over the world to study, share ideas and have fun with us this week. We'll be posting more details over the next few days, but in the meantime here is a photo collage to give you some idea of what we've been up to here at Westmere recently. (Click on the collage to get a full-screen view, or click here to view the photos as a web album.

job opportunities in Birmingham

2009-07-08T06:25:00.000-07:00

Listen & Learn are recruiting English teachers in Birmingham, see their message below, and good luck if you're applying!

Gaby

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Hello,
We are a language teaching company, and we are currently recruiting English teachers in Birmingham. You can find more information about our company at http://www.listenandlearn.org. We found your contact details at the University of Birmingham Website.

I am writing to ask if you might be able to help us out here. One of our clients in Oldbury (B69 4HF), would like to have one-to-one general English tuition for accent softening purposes. The client (adult, advances level) wishes to have classes any weekday form 7.30 AM to 9.30 AM – for a total of 60 hours. Lessons would start the soon as possible.

Salary and travel compensation are negotiable.

If you are interested in this offer, please send me your resume to carla@listenandlearn.org and we will gladly contact you for a phone interview. If you can´t accept this offer now, but know of someone who could be interested, we would appreciate your forwarding this email or sending us references.

Kind Regards

Carla Filippini
Teacher Recruitment Supervisor
email: carla@listenandlearn.org
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Listen & Learn
St John's House
54 St John's Square
London EC1V 4JL
United Kingdom

Tel (UK): +44 (0) 870 861 08 87
Tel (Ireland): +353 (0) 1 440 39 78
Fax (UK): +44 (0) 870 861 15 42

Opportunity for Freelance Translators

2009-07-06T06:36:00.000-07:00

Dear students, we received the following message from Louise Clegg at Orb Translations:

am writing to let you know that we are currently recruiting freelance translators at Orb Translations. We are very keen to work with translators at an early stage in their career as we understand how difficult it can be to start out as a freelancer therefore I would be grateful if you could pass this message on to your MA Translation students who may be interested in applying.

We are currently looking to recruit for all language combinations but are particularly interested in Arabic, Chinese (Simplified/Traditional), Danish, Dutch, Greek, Korean, Portuguese and Urdu. there is also an online application form on the website (http://www.orbtranslations.com/form.htm) that can be returned directly to me at this email address. Obviously as your students will just be starting out, they do not need to worry too much about giving 2 referees.

Thank you in advance for your help.

Kind regards,

Louise Clegg

--
Orb Translations
29 Otley Old Road, Leeds, LS16 6HB, UK
T: +44(0)1138154149
M: +44(0)7929207675
F: +44(0)1132987966
www.orbtranslations.com

Corpus conferences

2009-06-09T12:57:00.000-07:00

On 21st and 22nd May I gave invited talks at two linked events hosted by our friends and neighbours at Aston University. You can find a link to the abstract of one of these talks here:

http://acorn.aston.ac.uk/postgraduate_conference.html

and presentation slides and an audio file for the other talk here:

http://acorn.aston.ac.uk/Sym_Speakers09.html

The abstract for this latter talk is no longer on the symposium website, so I've reproduced it below, in case you are interested:

Closed-class keywords and corpus-driven discourse analysis

The advent of computer-assisted keyword analysis has opened up a range of exciting new possibilities for researchers interested in studying the meanings, values and attitudes associated with particular discourse communities. However, keyword lists extracted from corpora representing specialized discourses typically contain hundreds or even thousands of candidate items for analysis, even when extremely high statistical cut-off values are applied (e.g. p = .0000001). This being the case, the question arises as to how a principled and yet maximally useful selection of items for closer qualitative analysis might be made.

A simple and frequently applied solution is to focus exclusively on the words at the very top of the list, and to disregard anything that falls below an arbitrary cut-off point. Another commonly (and in practice often jointly) applied solution is to prioritise certain types of keyword over others, or even to discard some keyword types from the analysis altogether. Usually this involves discarding any keywords that belong to closed grammatical classes (i.e. conjunctions, determiners, prepositions and pronouns), on the grounds that they are not indicative of the semantic content of a corpus and thus not germane to the concerns of the discourse analyst.

In this talk, however, I will present a case for pursuing exactly the reverse strategy. That is, I will make a case for discarding all of the open-class items (i.e. the nouns, verbs, adjectives and adverbs) in a keywords list as a preliminary step, and focusing instead on the closed-class keywords that remain. My argument is divided into two parts. The first part argues why, contrary to conventional wisdom among discourse researchers, closed-class keywords constitute valid and productive objects of study. In the second part, a detailed rationale for focusing exclusively on closed-class keywords is provided. Throughout, the argument will be illustrated with examples from my own ongoing research into the academic discourses of history and literary criticism.

Papers based on both of my Aston talks have been accepted for publication, and one of these (the second language collocation paper) will be published later this year. In the meantime, if you are interested in reading draft versions of either of these papers just drop me a line and I'll be happy to mail them to you.

Dave Willis

2009-06-09T12:53:00.000-07:00

It is my very great pleasure to announce that Dave Willis has recently been made an Honorary Senior Research Fellow at CELS. Many if not most of you will already be well acquainted with Dave's work and ideas, either via the distance MA modules that you have been working through (many of which Dave either authored or co-authored), or through the innovative and award-winning published work that has made Dave one of the leading figures in ELT and applied linguistics over the last two decades.

We are absolutely delighted that Dave will be continuing his long and productive association with CELS into retirement, and that he will be representing us at the many conferences he continues to attend around the world. (Please see the website <http://www.willis-elt.co.uk/> for details of Dave's recent activities, and much more besides.)

Fittingly enough, Dave will be giving his first lecture in this new role at Westmere House (the home of CELS) on Wednesday 8th July, 11.30 - 13.00, as part of the ODL Birmingham Summer School (6-10 July 2009). The title of Dave's talk is: ‘English as a Lingua Franca and Task-Based Learning: Language variation in the language classroom’. For further details please contact Gaby Saldanha (g.saldanha@bham.ac.uk), who is organizing this exciting event.

library postal service reminder and update

2009-06-03T05:43:00.000-07:00

Just to remind you about this useful service (http://www.library.bham.ac.uk/using/borrowing/post.shtml) which is handy for items you can't get via the eJournals or eLibrary. The costs seem to have increased recently, but they're still very reasonable.
(Btw you can check what's available in the campus library by logging on to http://www.my.bham.ac.uk/cp/home/loginf, clicking the 'my.library' tab and then the 'library catalogue' link.)
Dan

new blogger!

2009-05-07T06:59:00.000-07:00

Hi all, this is my first attempt at blogging. Hope we can exchange some ideas in the areas of language and gender and discursive matters. Food for thought - do men blogg more than women? Cheers to all. Carmen Rosa

Carmen back from Brazil

2009-05-06T08:41:00.000-07:00

This is just to welcome Carmen back from Brazil. It's great to have her back. Very soon she will be telling you about IGALA (The International Language and Gender Association). Watch this space...

ACE 2009 conference Japan

2009-05-05T06:08:00.000-07:00

Looks an interesting conference http://ace.iafor.org/index.html in October this year. According to the organisers it's "organized by the International Academic Forum, an NGO based in Japan, as a platform to encourage academics across the Asian continent and beyond to share ideas".

Nick Groom back from study leave

2009-04-28T01:13:00.000-07:00

This is just to say that Nick is now back from study leave and has taken over as distance programmes academic co-ordinator again. I am still working on the distance team and I am also covering for Chris Kennedy as acting director of CELS for the summer. If you have any CELS-related questions, please send them to me (j.m.littlemore@bham.ac.uk), copying Chris in.

While Chris is away, Nick Groom (n.w.groom@bham.ac.uk) is acting as course convenor for the Functional Linguistics course and Bob Holland (r.l.holland@bham.ac.uk) is acting as course convenor for the ELT Management course. A full list of convenors can be found in the post below. Please feel free to contact the course convenor if you have any questions that are puzzling both you and your tutor.

Thanks,

Jeannette

Message from an in-house MA student

2009-04-28T01:11:00.000-07:00

One of our campus-based MA students has asked me to put this message out in the blog as students in Japan might be able to help him. Could you get back to him directly if you have any information?

Does anybody know any teachers who are working for or who have worked for the Westgate Corporation on their University programme? Have you heard good or bad things? I would genuinely appreciate any information. email address: petthai7@hotmail.com

Peter Richardson

new online TESOL resource

2009-04-16T02:38:00.000-07:00

www.TESOLacademic.org includes a number of useful talks on a variety of ELT topics including action research and world Englishes. It looks as though there will be more to follow as well.
Dan

Lapsing Birmingham logins

2009-04-03T05:25:00.000-07:00

Hello All,
A number of students have found their logins have stopped working if they haven't used them for a while. This is a matter of University online security, and though it can be a bit annoying, you can avoid it by logging in to http://www.my.bham.ac.uk/cp/home/loginf every month or so.
Dan

Message to new students

2009-04-01T10:17:00.000-07:00

Welcome to the M.A. programme in the Centre for English language studies at the University of Birmingham!

I hope you enjoy studying with us and that your work on our programme will provide you with plenty of professional development opportunities whether it be in the area of English Language Teaching, Applied Linguistics or Translation Studies.

By now you should have finished working through your Guide to Independent study and be ready to start working on the modules. You will find all our materials in Web CT and detailed information on how to gain access to Web CT can be found in the handbook that you should have already received.

You'll see that each module consists of one or two courses. Each course has its own discussion list in Web CT which is monitored by the course convener for that course. Here is a full list of the course conveners:

Course title
Course convener
Language Teaching Methodology
Crayton Walker
c.p.walker@bham.ac.uk
Classroom Research & Research Methods
Jeannette Littlemore
j.m.littlemore@bham.ac.uk
Second Language Acquisition
Jeannette Littlemore
j.m.littlemore@bham.ac.uk
Pedagogic Grammar
Crayton Walker
c.p.walker@bham.ac.uk
Lexis
Murray Knowles
g.m.knowles@bham.ac.uk
Syllabus & Materials
Crayton Walker
c.p.walker@bham.ac.uk
Spoken Discourse
Nick Groom
n.w.groom@bham.ac.uk
Written Discourse
Carmen Caldas-Coulthard
c.r.caldas-coulthard@bham.ac.uk
Sociolinguistics
Bob Holland
r.l.holland@bham.ac.uk
ELT Management
Chris Kennedy
c.j.kennedy@bham.ac.uk
(Bob Holland r.l.holland@bham.ac.uk will be covering this from 1st May to 1st October when Chris is on study leave)
Functional Grammar
Chris Kennedy
c.j.kennedy@bham.ac.uk
(Nick Groom n.w.groom@bham.ac.uk will be covering this from 1st May to 1st October when Chris is on study leave)
Corpus Linguistics
Nick Groom
n.w.groom@bham.ac.uk
Testing
Jeannette Littlemore
j.m.littlemore@bham.ac.uk
Introduction to Translation Studies
Gaby Saldanha
g.saldanha@bham.ac.uk
Translation and Discourse
Carmen Caldas-Coulthard
c.r.caldas-coulthard@bham.ac.uk
Contemporary theories in translation (sociotranslation)
Gaby Saldanha
g.saldanha@bham.ac.uk
Professional Translation
Gaby Saldanha
g.saldanha@bham.ac.uk
Research methods in translation
Gaby Saldanha
g.saldanha@bham.ac.uk
Teaching languages to young learners (Available as an option from 1st October 2009)
Jeannette Littlemore
j.m.littlemore@bham.ac.uk

Please make use of the discussion lists as well as your individual tutor, as it is much easier to take on board new ideas when you are able to talk them through with other people.

We have also put videos of campus-based lectures into some of the courses. To accompany the corpus linguistics course there is a lecture by Susan Hunston on ‘current issues in corpus linguistics’. There are two lectures on Sociolinguistics, one by Bob Holland and one by Chris Kennedy, which can be found in the Sociolinguistics course. There are four lectures on research methods which can be found in the classroom research and research methods course. These lectures cover quantitative and qualitative data collection and analysis. The lecture on quantitative data analysis looks at how to use the statistics software SPSS in your essay or dissertation. You can buy the SPSS software at a reduced rate through the University and details of how to do so are in the course handbooks.

There are a number of excellent student support and networking groups and I would recommend joining one of these groups early on so that you can share your ideas and learn from other students on the programme.

Check out these links:

‘MASH: Meet, Ask, Share and Greet’ a highly active professional development networking organization for language teachers who are interested in professional development
http://www.mash-collaboration-efl.com/node/30

Our highly active Birmingham MA Yahoo Group which organizes regular Skype sessions (contact Han at bhamkr@kyungwon.ac.kr for details)

I'm putting a copy of this message into the CELS Blog (http://celsnews.blogspot.com/) so that you have a permanent record of the links mentioned above. Please keep an eye on the blog (you can even ‘follow’ it electronically if you like) as it will contain various announcements about the programmes.

One more thing, very occasionally, in some of the units there is a mention of ‘EKTs’. Although these are no longer available electronically, you can obtain them from Gill Merker at CELS. Just send her an email at g.merker@bham.ac.uk

I think that’s it for now. I hope you enjoy the programme,

Jeannette

Dr Jeannette Littlemore
Acting Co-Ordinator for Distance MA Programmes
Centre for English Language Studies
College of Arts and Law
Westmere
University of Birmingham
Birmingham
United Kingdom
B15 2TT
http://www.cels.bham.ac.uk
http://celsnews.blogspot.com/

Updated materials - please read

2009-04-01T06:46:00.000-07:00

Dear all,

This is a copy of the message that I posted to the Cels-ma list today (1st April 2009). It contains information about the materials updates and the course conveners...

This is just to say that we have just finished uploading the updated materials into web CT. For those of you who are about to begin a module we recommend using these new materials and doing the corresponding new assignments which are detailed in the student Handbook. An up-to-date edition of the student Handbook can be found in web CT. For those of you who are halfway through a module you can either stick to the old materials and assignments or change to the new materials and assignments. It's up to you. The important thing is that you remember to put the right assignment code on your assignment when you hand it in. I'm outlining the exact nature of the updates in this e-mail. So that you have a permanent record of the changes I'm also posting this e-mail in the cells blog at: http://celsnews.blogspot.com/

The updates are as follows:

Syllabus and materials: this is a completely new course with new set texts and new assignment questions.

Language Teaching Methodology: we have added six new units on: methods and approaches; communicative approaches to language teaching; task-based learning and teaching; teaching speaking; teaching listening; and learner autonomy and language learning strategies. The remaining units have been updated with new set reading texts and assignment questions.

Second Language Acquisition: we have added four new units on: attitudes and motivation; complexity theory; bilingualism; and aptitude and learning styles. The remaining units have been updated. New set reading texts and new assignment questions have been provided.

Lexis: this course has been updated with new set reading texts.

Sociolinguistics: this course has been updated with new set reading texts.

Functional Grammar: this course has been updated with new set reading texts.

Translation Project: this has been updated.

Classroom Research and Research Methods: this course has been updated with new set reading texts and assignment questions. We have also added a new unit on preparing a dissertation proposal. For this unit we would like to thank Greg Hadley and Paul Moritoshi who wrote the unit. It provides an excellent source of information both for those of you who are thinking about writing a dissertation proposal and for those of you who are just beginning the programme and who will be doing small research projects for the first time.

We recommend that you start to think about possible dissertation topics right from the outset of the programme so that when the time comes for putting a proposal you are well prepared. When you have completed each module it is a good idea to think about the ways in which what you have learned in that module might be applied to your own teaching or translating context and think about possible areas that you might investigate the your dissertation. This new unit looks at how to find a good dissertation topic and at how to choose appropriate research methodologies to investigate that topic.

You'll notice that some of the courses now have short video extracts from the course convenor introducing the course. We plan to provide these for all courses over the next few weeks but as you can probably imagine, uploading videos into web CT is a challenging process and it is taking is a bit of time to get this right. Please bear with us!

We have also put videos of campus-based lectures into some of the courses. To accompany the corpus linguistics course there is a lecture by Susan Hunston on ‘current issues in corpus linguistics’. There are two lectures on Sociolinguistics, one by Bob Holland and one by Chris Kennedy, which can be found in the Sociolinguistics course. There are four lectures on research methods which can be found in the classroom research and research methods course. These lectures cover quantitative and qualitative data collection and analysis. The lecture on quantitative data analysis looks at how to use the statistics software SPSS in your dissertation. You can buy the SPSS software at a reduced rate through the University and details of how to do so are in the course handbooks.

We plan to update the remaining courses over the coming year. Course updates will take place on the first of October and the first of April. If you have any comments on these updated materials or indeed on any of the other materials in the programmes please can you get in touch with the appropriate course convenors, who are listed in the table below. These course conveners will also be monitoring the discussion lists in web CT. Please send your course evaluation forms direct to the course convenor each time you complete a course. We will use this information to continue to update the courses.

Course title
Member of staff responsible
Language Teaching Methodology
Crayton Walker
c.p.walker@bham.ac.uk
Classroom Research & Research Methods
Jeannette Littlemore
j.m.littlemore@bham.ac.uk
Second Language Acquisition
Jeannette Littlemore
j.m.littlemore@bham.ac.uk
Pedagogic Grammar
Crayton Walker
c.p.walker@bham.ac.uk
Lexis
Murray Knowles
g.m.knowles@bham.ac.uk
Syllabus & Materials
Crayton Walker
c.p.walker@bham.ac.uk
Spoken Discourse
Nick Groom
n.w.groom@bham.ac.uk
Written Discourse
Carmen Caldas-Coulthard
c.r.caldas-coulthard@bham.ac.uk
Sociolinguistics
Bob Holland
r.l.holland@bham.ac.uk
ELT Management
Chris Kennedy
c.j.kennedy@bham.ac.uk
Functional Grammar
Chris Kennedy
c.j.kennedy@bham.ac.uk
Corpus Linguistics
Nick Groom
n.w.groom@bham.ac.uk
Testing
Jeannette Littlemore
j.m.littlemore@bham.ac.uk
Introduction to Translation Studies
Gaby Saldanha
g.saldanha@bham.ac.uk
Translation and Discourse
Carmen Caldas-Coulthard
c.r.caldas-coulthard@bham.ac.uk
Contemporary theories in translation (sociotranslation)
Gaby Saldanha
g.saldanha@bham.ac.uk
Professional Translation
Gaby Saldanha
g.saldanha@bham.ac.uk
Research methods in translation
Gaby Saldanha
g.saldanha@bham.ac.uk
Teaching young learners
Jeannette Littlemore
j.m.littlemore@bham.ac.uk

I think that’s it for now. I hope you continue to enjoy the programme,

Jeannette

Dr Jeannette Littlemore
Acting Co-Ordinator for Distance MA Programmes
Centre for English Language Studies
College of Arts and Law
Westmere
University of Birmingham
Birmingham
United Kingdom
B15 2TT
http://www.cels.bham.ac.uk
http://celsnews.blogspot.com/

CELS Summer School - provisional programme now available

2009-03-26T08:24:00.000-07:00

This is just to let you know that provisional programme for the CELS summer school is now available. It has been distributed via our email list and it will be on our website shortly. As you will see, we have some star speakers lined up, including Dr Dave Willis, Professor Susan Hunston and Professor Wolfgang Teubert, so it's not to be missed if you can make it! And there are a few places left, so if you still haven't made up your mind, please contact Alison Stamps.
Looking forward to seeing you in Birmingham!
Gaby

reduced price software for Birmingham Uni students

2009-03-25T02:54:00.000-07:00

Just a reminder that the University offers very reduced prices on many useful and popular software packages (see http://www.softwaresales.bham.ac.uk/index.shtml). Details of how to order are here http://www.softwaresales.bham.ac.uk/order.shtml, though at present there's only a phone number. You can also order by emailing softwaresales@contacts.bham.ac.uk.

Another summer school in Translation Studies!

2009-03-23T11:15:00.000-07:00

And here you'll certainly get more summer to go with the school!
It's in Barcelona!

http://www.fti.uab.es/departament/escola-estiu-doctorat/eng/index.htm

Announcement from Jeannette (Acting co-ordinator Distance MA Programmes)

2009-03-18T06:21:00.000-07:00

Here is a copy of the announcement I made today on the CELS-MA list. I thought it would be helpful to have it here so that you have a permanent record of it:

Dear all,

As some of you may have gathered we’ve had a busy few months here in CELS. We have revised and/or updated our materials for eight of the courses and these will be made available in WebCT at midday (UK time) on 1st April. The courses are:

Language Teaching Methodology
Syllabus and Materials Design
Second Language Acquisition
Classroom Research and Research Methods
Sociolinguistics
Functional Grammar
Lexis
Translation Project

We will provide more details about the exact nature of the revisions on 1st April in the CELS blog at http://celsnews.blogspot.com/

Some of these courses have new essay questions. If you are half way through one of these courses you can choose to stick to the old questions or you can do one of the new questions. The important thing is that you put the correct essay code when you submit your essay.

We have also made a number of changes on the administrative front. We will continue to make changes over the next few months.

In order to keep everyone up-to-date with these changes we have decided to make a small change our policy on the handbook. Traditionally the handbook has only been updated twice a year (on 1st April and 1st October) but we now feel that in order to keep students abreast of the changes we need to update it as the changes are made. This means that as changes are made we will:

Inform all students via this email and the blog
Update the information in the WebCT version of the handbooks (The handbooks for TEFL/TESL, Applied Linguistics and Translation Studies can all be found in WebCT under the heading ‘Guides and Handbooks’

This means that when checking information about the programmes it is important that you always check the version of the handbook that is in WebCT as that is where the most up-to-date information will be.

In order to start the ball rolling, here are two changes that will be uploaded into the Web-CT versions of the handbooks this Friday:

The extensions policy now states that:

We strongly recommend that you do not go beyond three extensions. If you do request more than three extensions your situation will need to be reviewed very carefully by CELS

In the assignment deadlines section it now says:

April start:
YEAR 1
YEAR 2
Assignment Deadline
Module 1
Module 4 Ý
JULY 31
Module 2
Module 5 Ý
NOVEMBER 30
Module 3
Module 6
MARCH 31
Dissertation (Year 3)
SEPTEMBER 20

October start:
YEAR 1
YEAR 2
Assignment Deadline
Module 1
Module 4 Ý
JANUARY 31
Module 2
Module 5 Ý
MAY 31
Module 3
Module 6
SEPTEMBER 30
Dissertation (Year 3)
MARCH 20
Ý Submit your option choices with your Module 4 assignment.
Ý Submit your dissertation proposal form with your Module 5 assignment.
These changes will be uploaded into the WebCT versions of the handbooks this Friday (20th March 2009).

I think that’s it for now.

I hope you continue to enjoy the course.

Jeannette

Dr Jeannette Littlemore
Acting Co-Ordinator for Distance MA Programmes
Centre for English Language Studies
College of Arts and Law
Westmere
University of Birmingham
Birmingham
United Kingdom
B15 2TT
http://www.cels.bham.ac.uk
http://celsnews.blogspot.com/

PhD studentships

2009-03-16T13:33:00.000-07:00

Those of you who are thinking of doing a PhD may be interested in applying for one of these scholarships. These things are like gold dust - well worth considering.

The Department of English and Language Studies, Canterbury Christ Church University offers 3-year full-time PhD scholarships in Applied Linguistics.These will include an annual stipend of £11,250 with free tuition. The closing date for applications is 15th April 2009. Start date: 1st October 2009.Information regarding areas of research and supervision can be found at:http://www.canterbury.ac.uk/arts-humanities/english-language-studies/LanguageStudies/AppliedLinguistics.aspxApplication details are available from Helen Potter, helen.potter@canterbury.ac.ukDr Adrian HollidayProfessor of Applied LinguisticsDepartment of English and Language StudiesHead of the Graduate School and Research OfficeCanterbury Christ Church UniversityTelephone: +1227 782700Website: http://www.canterbury.ac.uk/arts-humanities/english-language-studies/staff-profiles/a-holliday/about.asp

ILAC Conference Hong Kong June 09

2009-03-13T04:45:00.000-07:00

The Independent Learning Association Conference 2009 (ILAC 2009) will be held at the Hong Kong Polytechnic University, from 3 to 5 June 2009. The overall conference theme is Independent Learning: Building on experience, seeking new perspectives.

There will be paper presentations, workshops and a poster exhibition on the following themes:
• assessment in self-directed learning
• autonomy and teacher education
• autonomy in the classroom
• developing life-long learners
• e-learning initiatives
• learner and teacher experiences
• managing independent learning centres
• self-directed and self-access learning
plus a tour of Self-Access Centres (SACs) on 2 June 2009.

For details of the Conference, registration and the Independent Learning Association, please go to the Conference website: http://ilac2009.elc.polyu.edu.hk/

A trainee programme that may be of interest to Translation Studies students

2009-02-27T05:28:00.000-08:00

Subject: Trainee Programme - Osborne Translations

To whom it may concern,

Good German-into-English translators are hard to find. As a result Osborne Translation Services Ltd., and two major translation firms, Matrix Communications (based in Munich, Germany) and beo Gesellschaft für Sprachen und Technologie mbH (based in Stuttgart, Germany), are currently working in collaboration on an exciting new Trainee Programme for Graduate and Post Graduates (who have ideally studied translation), to allow them to strengthen their skills and gain experience by working with a translator with over 20 years experience.

Could you please circulate the attached files amongst your students?
Applicants should complete the attached questionnaire and at least 1 of the 2 test translations, ideally both and they should bear in mind that the more information we receive, the stronger their application will be.
A Flyer containing more information about the three cities will follow in the next few days.

If this email has not arrived with the appropriate person, we would appreciate it if you could send a short reply to inform us who we should contact, to allow us to pass this opportunity on to your students.

If you have any feedback, or further questions regarding the Trainee Programme, please contact us.

Best Regards

Aimee Ingman

beo Gesellschaft für Sprachen und Technologie mbH Kupferstraße 36
70565 Stuttgart

A great blog by one of our students

2009-02-27T01:36:00.000-08:00

Serena Dorey, who's just finishing her MA in Translation, has created a great blog on the topic of translation for marketing. The url is www.marketingtranslationblog.com Check it out!

More funding opportunities for those thinking of doing a PhD

2009-02-19T01:46:00.000-08:00

The University of Manchester offers funding for postgraduate students wishing to start PhD programmes in translation, interpreting and intercultural studies in September 2009. Funding includes:

* Full scholarships

* Fee bursaries

* Graduate teaching fellowships (teaching Polish or Portuguese alongside PhD study)

* Other awards for specific projects/areas of research

See: http://www.llc.manchester.ac.uk/ctis/postgraduate/funding/ for full details, application forms, etc.

Please note that the deadline for most schemes is 1 April 2009.

Funding opportunity for Translation Research Summer School

2009-02-16T08:04:00.000-08:00

This would be a great opportunity for anyone thinking of undertaking research in Translation Studies. The lecturers and tutors are all very high calibre and, best of all, you could combine it with our own CELS summer school since it's just before ours!! (Edinburgh is only 4 hours by train) If you are going to apply and need advice on the application, please contact me.

Announcing a funding opportunity for the Translation Research Summer School UK 2009:
One full scholarship (covering fees, travel and accommodation) is now available for current or future PhD students to participate in the 2009 Translation Research Summer School UK which will take place in Edinburgh, UK, from 15 to 26 June.

The Translation Research Summer School UK offers intensive research training in translation and intercultural studies for prospective researchers in the field, over a two-week period. The units collaborating in the Summer School are the Centre for Translation and Intercultural Studies at the University of Manchester, the Centre for Intercultural Studies at University College London (UCL), and the Translation Studies Graduate Programme, School of Literatures, Languages and Cultures, University of Edinburgh.

The deadline for scholarship applications is 06 March.

These scholarships are specifically designed to provide assistance to from countries with lower GDPs. For further details and an application form please consult the Translation Research Summer School website: www.researchschool.org

Statistics videos in research methods module

2009-02-05T05:35:00.000-08:00

This is just to let you know that I've put a couple of videos (plus handouts) into the Research Methods module in WebCT. One is on collecting quantitatitive data and the other is on analysing it using SPSS (which you can purchase at a reduced rate through the university). I'm afraid they aren't 'polished performances' (they were both at 9 a.m. and you'll see that I'm not exactly at my best at that time of day!) but they should give you an idea of how to collect data using questionnaires and then analyse it statistically. They're probably more useful for people who are about to start their dissertations than for people who are just starting the programme.

In the next couple of weeks I'll be adding videos about qualitative data collection and analysis.

Jeannette

Campus-based MA students working hard on their essays...

2009-02-04T10:27:00.000-08:00

Greetings from a snowy Birmingham!

Message from Kirsten Anderson

2009-02-04T10:24:00.001-08:00

It's really good to hear from Birmingham alumni. Here's a message from one of our 'Class of 2008' students, Kirsten Anderson, who is doing some great TEFL work in India:

Greetings Fellow Bhamers,After completing my dissertation in August, I left for a 10 month fellowship in Chennai, South India. Living in Chennai as an American white woman is a daily adventure, at times challenging and often comical. However, my ten-month fellowship in Chennai is primarily defined by my projects and work at AID India (https://ex1.bham.ac.uk/exchweb/bin/redir.asp?URL=http://www.eurekachild.org).
AID India is dedicated to improving the quality of government education by introducing new programs, creative materials, and innovative curriculum. Immediately I was excited by this placement because during my visits and long-term stays in Madurai, Tamil Nadu (since 1998), I've volunteered with an after school education center in a slum. While the students and volunteers are incredible, the education system they struggle with is frustrating at best. As a result of my work with this center, I decided to write my graduate thesis on English education in Tamil Nadu. Consequently, I was immediately assigned to work with the English Action Research Team of AID India. This team is responsible for testing and trying English language modules in government schools, which typically serve the economic and socially disadvantaged populations.
Essentially, the dual-education system in India is comprised of privately funded English-medium education and public government funded schools teaching in the mother tongue language. This division is often, but not always, along the lines of urban and rural; wealthy and poor; and high-caste and low-caste, exemplifying the idea that language, culture and ideology are inextricably linked with power and social inequality. Furthermore, at the university level across India, English is the standard medium of education for the sciences and professional subjects, presenting a huge linguistic gap for students who have attended vernacular-medium schools.
In theory, the English language could be the language that unifies India, but it has become a medium used to maintain inequalities in society based on economics, caste or both. Even if English education is a path towards social uplift and does not threaten local languages, without adequate access to English, specifically trained teachers and quality materials, the education system is likely contributing to the social divide in Tamil Nadu and in India. The AID India English Action Research Team is seeking ways to lessen the linguistic divide between the dual education systems. Specifically the two main projects I am focused on include:
1) Developing and Testing a Phonetic Reading Module
Several months ago, the English team and I attended a phonics reading methodology training at a model school in Auroville. Adapting this model for large government classrooms, my colleague and I have been running a focus class at a local government school and preliminary mid-evaluation results are positive. We have also conducted teacher training and have begun monitoring those classes. After an evaluation period, the team and I will develop a new model by infusing best practices. This new model will continue to be tried and tested in local Chennai schools after which it will be revised and if successful the goal is to promote it on a larger scale.2) Analyzing the Activity-Based Learning Methodology
Recently, the state of Tamil Nadu adopted a new primary school curriculum and methodology called ABL (activity-based learning). Essentially, the government textbooks have been converted into flashcards, or activity cards. These activity cards allow students to work at their own pace, drastically altering the classroom environment and student -teacher relationship. Within the new ABL system, students sit on the floor and are grouped together according to their level. As students complete activity cards, they move up the level ladder at their own pace. Other students within the same group can help them, although it is not known if any peer teaching is actually occurring. This method has drastically reduced 'teacher-talk' time in front of the class. Instead, the teacher must move around helping different groups. This revolutionary methodology is being looked at by many other states in India. However, the success and quality of ABL has not yet been critically evaluated or analyzed.
My ABL research is three-fold: classroom observation, materials analysis and student evaluation. By using this triangulated approach, we are hoping to gain insight into the potential successes as well as challenges this new methodology has for English language teaching. Additionally, the more we know about ABL, the better we can ensure our programs help students and teachers succeed within the existing structure.
I also have a few other non-official projects: converting story books to movies, editing the AID India Eureka Book catalog, and I recently started teaching spoken English in the office. In theory everyday is a busy day and there are a lot of different things going on at any given time. Thankfully it's also a pretty relaxed working environment. And between the cyclones, national holidays, rain days, exam prep, and exams…projects with schools are constantly delayed and deadlines pushed back. What was supposed to happen last month will only start after the New Year and so on. Some days and months are more productive than others, and while things move a little slower than I would like, my work and projects are coming to fruition and finally gaining momentum.
Recognizing the limited scope and reach of my work, I have no idea what the long-term impact (if any) will be of my small contribution to English education, but I'm thankful to be working with dedicated staff and teaching bright enthusiastic children who inspire me to think about new and creative solutions.When I'm not at work, teaching or visiting schools, I like to roam the streets of Chennai looking for signs with creative and interesting English expressions. I'll continue to post them to my flickr accout: https://ex1.bham.ac.uk/exchweb/bin/redir.asp?URL=http://www.flickr.com/photos/94801434@N00/--Kirsten

CELS alumni on Japanese tv

2009-01-28T03:23:00.000-08:00

Rachel Smith and Ian Wilson are regulars on an NHK show on English pronunciation. It's on on Tuesday from 23.10 to 23.30.

Thinking of doing a PhD?

2009-01-27T11:20:00.001-08:00

If that's the case, you may want to check The International Research Foundation for English Language Education (TIRF) website. They've just published a Call for Proposals for the 2009 Doctoral Dissertation Grants.

The International Research Foundation for English Language Education invites doctoral students to submit applications for TIRF doctoral dissertation grants. Up to US$5,000 may be awarded for successful proposals.

Information on TIRF, the Doctoral Dissertation Grant program, and a detailed call for proposals are available on TIRF's website: www.tirfonline.org

Jobs: Chinese, Mandarin & Lexicography: Translator, Meaningful Machines

2009-01-27T10:50:00.000-08:00

University or Organization: Meaningful Machines
Job Location: New York, USA (Telecommute)
Web Address: http://www.meaningfulmachines.com

Job Rank: Translator
Specialty Areas: Lexicography; Translation
Required Language(s): Chinese, Mandarin (cmn)

Description:
Seeking person with excellent Chinese-English translation, lexicography, and linguistic skills. Must be in the U.S. (and be a U.S. citizen or have a valid work permit). Work involves intensive building of a high-quality Chinese-to-English dictionary, including parts of speech, syntactic patterns, and translation into English. Positions open now.
Application Deadline: (Open until filled)
Email Address for Applications: mike@meaningfulmachines.com
Contact Information:
Chief Operating Officer Mike Steinbaum
Email: mike@meaningfulmachines.com

Two more lectures available

2009-01-26T09:25:00.001-08:00

We have made two more lectures available in WebCT in the Sociolinguistics module of the Applied Linguistics and TEFL MA programmes.

We have Chris Kennedy talking about Global English and Bob Holland talking about Language and the Media.

Both of these lectures were given at the last Birmingham summer school (see below).

Hope you enjoy them!

Internships for Translators

2009-01-26T08:41:00.000-08:00

We received the following ad from Goranka Mis-Cak at MANNHEIMER SPRACHENDIENST. They are offering internships for translations:

MANNHEIMER SPRACHENDIENST is a fast-expanding international language and communication service provider based in Mannheim, Germany, which specialises in translation and interpreting.

For 2009/2010 we have vacancies for INTERNSHIPS IN TRANSLATION, offering prospective translators the chance to gain valuable experience in the translation industry.

If you would like to know more about the internship we offer, please do not hesitate to contact us.

Best wishes,

Mis-Cak

MANNHEIMER SPRACHENDIENST
Lange Rötterstr. 52
D-68167 Mannheim

Tel. +49 (0)621 / 39 74 78-0
Fax +49 (0)621 / 39 74 78-10

Email: goranka.mis-cak@mannheimer-sprachendienst.de
Internet: www.mannheimer-sprachendienst.de

Sitz der Gesellschaft: Mannheim
Geschäftsführung: Goranka Mis-Cak
REG-Nr.: PR 21, Mannheim
Ust-Id-Nr. DE 221992348

Birmingham Summer School

2009-01-26T08:22:00.000-08:00

This is a little update on the summer school. We have received many expressions of interests and over 15 students have booked a place, so it's definetly going ahead! Those of you who haven't confirmed their bookings may want to do as soon as possible, since there are limited places available. Below are some key details for those who are still thinking about it:

dates: 6-10 July 2009.

What it involves? A week of intensive study, with over 20 hours of lectures plus one-to-one tutorials. The lectures are delivered by staff from the University of Birmingham and they cover a range of subjects, so you can be sure there will be something for everybody. This is also an opportunity to meet CELS staff and other students in a relaxed and informal atmosphere; evening social activities are also included in the programme to make sure that happens!

Who can attend? All students are welcome!

Price: attendance is FREE!

Accommodation: You will be able to book accommodation on campus (for enquiries regarding availability of rooms and prices you can contact the Conference Park).

Programme: We will circulate the programme as soon as it is ready; in the meantime, if you have any questions or want to book a place please contact Gaby Saldanha.

Part 2 of Susan Hunston video available

2009-01-22T08:25:00.000-08:00

This is just to let you know that Part 2 of the Susan Hunston video is now available in the Corpus Linguistics Module of the Applied Linguistics WebCT materials.

Jeannette

Campus-based MA student looking for research collaboration

2009-01-22T03:37:00.000-08:00

One of our campus-based MA students, Peter Mathias, is keen to contact members of the distance learning group to see if they can help make contact with older people who are learning English and/or their tutors.

His email address is petercmathias@btinternet.com

His general area of research is the characteristics of learning in older age and the implications for tutors and teachers. More specific questions and a narrower focus will emerge over the next few weeks. Older people are thought of as 50+ and their involvement could be through universities and colleges or private language schools.

If you can help Peter, or are interested in colloborating with him, please could you contact him directly by email,

Thanks,

Jeannette