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Beyond Methods: Macrostrategies for Language Teaching
In this original book, B. Kumaravadivelu presents a macrostrategic framework designed to help both beginning and experienced teachers develop a systematic, coherent, and personal theory of practice. His book provides the tools a teacher needs in order to self-observe, self-analyze, and self-evaluate his or her own teaching acts.
The framework consists of ten macrostrategies based on current theoretical, empirical, and experiential knowledge of second language and foreign language teaching. These strategies enable teachers to evaluate classroom practices and to generate techniques and activities for realizing teaching goals. With checklists, surveys, projects, and reflective tasks to encourage critical thinking, the book is both practical and accessible. Teachers and future teachers, researchers, and teacher educators will find the volume indispensable.
The framework consists of ten macrostrategies based on current theoretical, empirical, and experiential knowledge of second language and foreign language teaching. These strategies enable teachers to evaluate classroom practices and to generate techniques and activities for realizing teaching goals. With checklists, surveys, projects, and reflective tasks to encourage critical thinking, the book is both practical and accessible. Teachers and future teachers, researchers, and teacher educators will find the volume indispensable.
352 pages, Paperback
First published December 1, 2002
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Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews
June 10, 2013
Incredible book for educators, especially educators for English language learners. By far the best book I have ever read when it comes to practical application of conceptual theories of teaching. Kumaravadivelu has become one of my favorite authors. His work is inspiring and empowering.
September 20, 2022
BOOK REVIEW
BEYOND METHODS – MACROSTRATEGIES FOR LANGUAGE TEACHING
B. KUMARAVADIVELU
Name of the book: Beyond Methods: Macrostrategies for Language Teaching
Writer: B. Kumaravadivelu
Category: Education – Post Method Pedagogy
Edition: 2003
Publisher: Mary Jane Peluso for Yale University Press
Pages: 352 (inclusive of 9 initial pages before introduction)
Eka Dev Adhikari
Kathmandu University, Nepal
“The truth of the matter is that about 99 percent of teaching is making the students feel interested in the material. Then the other 1 percent has to do with your methods. And that's not just true of languages. It's true of every subject.” Chomsky (1988, 181).
Noam Chomsky aptly claims it when he talks about the effect of methods in the language classroom as well as other classrooms. This is the concern that Dr B. Kumaravadivelu addresses in his book Beyond Methods – Macrostrategies for Language Teaching. In his introduction to the book, he claims that the book is “about language teaching in a postmethod era.” He further claims that the book “reflects the heightened awareness” that the second language teaching profession experienced during the late twentieth century. Kumaravadivelu (2003, 2). This is true that second language teachers have been trying their best with this method and that method in their classroom. They have finally come to realize that none of the methods are perfect for every classroom activity they devise in their language classes, and neither will there be any innovation in the field that we can claim as the perfect language teaching method. The very distinction between the theory and practice that has ever been proposed or recommended so far has been criticized in the history of language teaching. Hence, after several years of practice, the language teachers will realize that the methods they used in their classrooms have not been able to bring the expected results in their classes. Then, they may feel for the emergence of the postmethod era, and that the teachers can always adapt their strategies and bring changes to the existing methods and expected results in their teaching-learning activities.
Dr B. Kumaravadivelu was born in India and was educated at universities in India, England, and the USA. As a writer, Dr B. Kumaravadivelu has been contributing his strains of thoughts in the field of postmethod pedagogy. In addition to postmethod pedagogy, he has also specialized in language teaching methods, teacher education, classroom discourse analysis, and teaching culture. He has written several books in the field of language teaching. They are Language Teacher Education for a Global Society (2012), Cultural Globalization and Language Education (2008), Understanding Language Teaching: From Method to Postmethod (2006), and Beyond Methods: Macrostrategies for Language Teaching (2003). In addition to these books, he has published over thirty research papers and delivered keynote and plenary addresses at several international conferences held in various countries. He has first-hand experience serving on the Editorial Board of reputed journals including TESOL Quarterly. He has also served the U.S. State Department as an English Language Specialist.
The book is an organization of thirteen chapters kept under two broad categories. The first category deals with the concept of teaching and teaching methods that language teachers have been using in their classrooms. The first category consists of two chapters. The first chapter of the book deals with the concept of teaching in general and the second chapter deals with the concept of postmethod pedagogy in particular. These two chapters that begin the book lays out the philosophical and conceptual foundation of teaching-learning activities used in second language acquisition. These two chapters also set the background for the writer to discuss what he is going to do in the second part of the book. The second part of the book contains ten different chapters in which he discusses ten different macrostrategies for teaching learning activities designed by various microstrategies to support those macrostrategies. Each of these ten chapters focuses on individual macrostrategies. They all follow the same format with three broad sections: macrostrategy, microstrategies, and exploratory projects. First, the macrostrategy section of the chapters provides a theoretical, empirical, and experiential rationale that makes up the macrostrategy. Second, the microstrategies section provides sample microstrategies that illustrate how to realize the goals of the particular macrostrategy in a classroom situation. Finally, the exploratory projects section provides detailed guidelines for teachers to conduct their situated teacher research aimed at generating new ideas for realizing the goals of a particular macrostrategy in their specific learning and teaching context. The ten macrostrategies that he proposes in the book are (i) Maximizing learning opportunities, (ii) Minimizing perceptual mismatches, (iii) Facilitating negotiated interaction, (iv) Promoting learner autonomy, (v) Fostering language awareness, (vi) Activating intuitive heuristics, (vii) Contextualizing linguistic input, (viii) Integrating language skills, (ix) Ensuring social relevance, and (x) Raising cultural consciousness. The final thirteenth chapter of the book pulls together ideas from different chapters and offers a classroom observational scheme that can be used by teachers to monitor how well they theorize what they practice.
When looking into the book closely in Chapter 10 in his book he looks into the macrostrategy – integrating language skills. While introducing integrating language skills, he goes into detail to talk about the need of integrating language skills like listening, speaking, reading in writing in our classroom activities. He makes an observation that the teachers have to face “the predetermined curricula and prescribed textbooks” forcing the teachers and learners to “do the inevitable, namely, follow an integrated approach.” (Kumaravadivelu, 226). Then he goes into detail in discussing the history of separation of language skills, and the need for integration. Then he comes up with the microstrategies for integrating language skills – “10.1 A Matter of Money and Motherhood” (ibid, 231), “A matter of Reality and Falsehood” (233). Then he comes up with Exploratory projects – “Project 10.1 Comic Situations” (235), and “Project 10.2 Radio Days” (237) concluding that “integration of language skills is natural to language communication.” (ibid, 238)
To sum up, the book is a must-read book for the people who have a keen interest in postmethod pedagogy for making their classroom into a language lab in which they bring up their ideas, plan and design microstrategies related to any of the macrostrategies that the writer has suggested and support the second language learners in their acquisition of language thereby getting the desired results.
References:
Chomsky, Noam. Language and Problems of Knowledge. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press,
1988
Kumaravadivelu, B. Beyond Methods: Macrostrategies for Language Teaching. Yale University Press, 2003
BEYOND METHODS – MACROSTRATEGIES FOR LANGUAGE TEACHING
B. KUMARAVADIVELU
Name of the book: Beyond Methods: Macrostrategies for Language Teaching
Writer: B. Kumaravadivelu
Category: Education – Post Method Pedagogy
Edition: 2003
Publisher: Mary Jane Peluso for Yale University Press
Pages: 352 (inclusive of 9 initial pages before introduction)
Eka Dev Adhikari
Kathmandu University, Nepal
“The truth of the matter is that about 99 percent of teaching is making the students feel interested in the material. Then the other 1 percent has to do with your methods. And that's not just true of languages. It's true of every subject.” Chomsky (1988, 181).
Noam Chomsky aptly claims it when he talks about the effect of methods in the language classroom as well as other classrooms. This is the concern that Dr B. Kumaravadivelu addresses in his book Beyond Methods – Macrostrategies for Language Teaching. In his introduction to the book, he claims that the book is “about language teaching in a postmethod era.” He further claims that the book “reflects the heightened awareness” that the second language teaching profession experienced during the late twentieth century. Kumaravadivelu (2003, 2). This is true that second language teachers have been trying their best with this method and that method in their classroom. They have finally come to realize that none of the methods are perfect for every classroom activity they devise in their language classes, and neither will there be any innovation in the field that we can claim as the perfect language teaching method. The very distinction between the theory and practice that has ever been proposed or recommended so far has been criticized in the history of language teaching. Hence, after several years of practice, the language teachers will realize that the methods they used in their classrooms have not been able to bring the expected results in their classes. Then, they may feel for the emergence of the postmethod era, and that the teachers can always adapt their strategies and bring changes to the existing methods and expected results in their teaching-learning activities.
Dr B. Kumaravadivelu was born in India and was educated at universities in India, England, and the USA. As a writer, Dr B. Kumaravadivelu has been contributing his strains of thoughts in the field of postmethod pedagogy. In addition to postmethod pedagogy, he has also specialized in language teaching methods, teacher education, classroom discourse analysis, and teaching culture. He has written several books in the field of language teaching. They are Language Teacher Education for a Global Society (2012), Cultural Globalization and Language Education (2008), Understanding Language Teaching: From Method to Postmethod (2006), and Beyond Methods: Macrostrategies for Language Teaching (2003). In addition to these books, he has published over thirty research papers and delivered keynote and plenary addresses at several international conferences held in various countries. He has first-hand experience serving on the Editorial Board of reputed journals including TESOL Quarterly. He has also served the U.S. State Department as an English Language Specialist.
The book is an organization of thirteen chapters kept under two broad categories. The first category deals with the concept of teaching and teaching methods that language teachers have been using in their classrooms. The first category consists of two chapters. The first chapter of the book deals with the concept of teaching in general and the second chapter deals with the concept of postmethod pedagogy in particular. These two chapters that begin the book lays out the philosophical and conceptual foundation of teaching-learning activities used in second language acquisition. These two chapters also set the background for the writer to discuss what he is going to do in the second part of the book. The second part of the book contains ten different chapters in which he discusses ten different macrostrategies for teaching learning activities designed by various microstrategies to support those macrostrategies. Each of these ten chapters focuses on individual macrostrategies. They all follow the same format with three broad sections: macrostrategy, microstrategies, and exploratory projects. First, the macrostrategy section of the chapters provides a theoretical, empirical, and experiential rationale that makes up the macrostrategy. Second, the microstrategies section provides sample microstrategies that illustrate how to realize the goals of the particular macrostrategy in a classroom situation. Finally, the exploratory projects section provides detailed guidelines for teachers to conduct their situated teacher research aimed at generating new ideas for realizing the goals of a particular macrostrategy in their specific learning and teaching context. The ten macrostrategies that he proposes in the book are (i) Maximizing learning opportunities, (ii) Minimizing perceptual mismatches, (iii) Facilitating negotiated interaction, (iv) Promoting learner autonomy, (v) Fostering language awareness, (vi) Activating intuitive heuristics, (vii) Contextualizing linguistic input, (viii) Integrating language skills, (ix) Ensuring social relevance, and (x) Raising cultural consciousness. The final thirteenth chapter of the book pulls together ideas from different chapters and offers a classroom observational scheme that can be used by teachers to monitor how well they theorize what they practice.
When looking into the book closely in Chapter 10 in his book he looks into the macrostrategy – integrating language skills. While introducing integrating language skills, he goes into detail to talk about the need of integrating language skills like listening, speaking, reading in writing in our classroom activities. He makes an observation that the teachers have to face “the predetermined curricula and prescribed textbooks” forcing the teachers and learners to “do the inevitable, namely, follow an integrated approach.” (Kumaravadivelu, 226). Then he goes into detail in discussing the history of separation of language skills, and the need for integration. Then he comes up with the microstrategies for integrating language skills – “10.1 A Matter of Money and Motherhood” (ibid, 231), “A matter of Reality and Falsehood” (233). Then he comes up with Exploratory projects – “Project 10.1 Comic Situations” (235), and “Project 10.2 Radio Days” (237) concluding that “integration of language skills is natural to language communication.” (ibid, 238)
To sum up, the book is a must-read book for the people who have a keen interest in postmethod pedagogy for making their classroom into a language lab in which they bring up their ideas, plan and design microstrategies related to any of the macrostrategies that the writer has suggested and support the second language learners in their acquisition of language thereby getting the desired results.
References:
Chomsky, Noam. Language and Problems of Knowledge. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press,
1988
Kumaravadivelu, B. Beyond Methods: Macrostrategies for Language Teaching. Yale University Press, 2003
July 10, 2010
I re-read this book after working through it in Grad. School. It is enlightening and reminds me why I want to be a teacher for life.
October 24, 2018
This is the GO-TO book in language teaching in the 21st century. A must-read for anyone who wants to get a grasp of what years of academic research in applied linguistics and education have given us.
Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews