No chains!: case study in teaching advanced English in higher education
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abstract
As a higher education professor of millennials, I have been often assailed by the haunting feeling
of hopelessness and of time waste. From my perspective, it seems that my students belong to a
different group and that little makes them focus on academic issues. In a personal attempt to find
an answer, after many lively discussions with colleagues, I presented two papers at an international
conference which delved, on the one hand, on the wrongs of current Portuguese education (e.g. lack
of freedom, excess of bureaucracy, appeal of and dependence on coursebooks) and, on the other,
on the future of education in the 21st century: whether it is doomed to failure. This has been the
underlying motivation to decide to change my teaching practice and conduct an experiment, in the
second semester of the previous academic year, with a group of C2 learners of English as a Foreign
Language, students of the bachelor’s degree in Languages for International Relations offered at my
institution. The experiment was based on three assumptions: the first to obliterate the coursebook
in the classroom; instead, an array of audiovisual materials – songs (with or without video clips),
trailers, shorties, talks, newspaper articles and audioreports – were the starting point for all work
and the basic materials throughout; at last, grammar books were avoided and vocabulary ones used
only when necessary. Other resources were eventually taken into class to cater for any specific needs.
Technology did have a saying, as other resources, but under no circumstances did it become the drive
for running the classes. The course began with the negotiation of topics to be focussed with students
and the elicitation of class dynamics. Students were always invited to participate, not only throughout
the whole class (preventing the typical absent-minded attitude), but also by writing, in turn, class
minutes, as well as class reviews. My initial intention also included setting up a course log, where I
made notes of the lessons, with personal comments, and students’ accounts and feedback. Therefore, I
aim at thoroughly presenting this case study (illustrated with examples) and reaching some tentative
conclusions about teaching advanced English at higher education without a coursebook and from a
student-centred approach.
