John Hughes is a materials writer and teacher trainer. Currently he is writing a course book and he has also just launched a new project with author Kath Bilsborough. It’s a training course for teachers in how to write their own materials. In this article, he reflects on the motivation to start such a course and how it has developed. You can contact John at info@writingeltmaterials.com and visit the course website at www.writingeltmaterials.com.

When you survey the many ELT methodology books that list the skills a new teacher needs to develop, you’ll come across terms like classroom management, ability to plan a lesson, and knowledge of English, of course. Surprisingly few titles, if any, mention the importance of being able to write materials or the skills needed to do it. And yet, creating materials is a core skill for any teacher. Even those who are using a published course book will need to supplement it from time to time. Maybe they’ll have to write a progress test for the class, or find a suitable picture to discuss, or perhaps they have discovered all the students love a new pop song so - to add some fun and relevance - the teacher turns the lyrics into a worksheet.

As Jeremy Harmer says, “We all start writing because we want to provide interesting content and activities for our students. We do it because it feels great and makes us better teachers!” (Clandfield & Hughes, 2017, p.13) Given that most (though not all) teachers enjoy writing and have to create their own materials, it’s always surprised me how little attention is paid on teacher training courses to developing this skill. Initial courses such as the CELTA seem to expect trainees will create materials, but they are not formally ‘trained’. For more experienced teachers, various MA courses exist with optional courses in materials development; but notice the wording here – materials development as opposed to materials writing. ‘Development’ implies a focus on theory rather the practice, analysis and evaluation over and above creativity.

So how are teachers supposed to learn how to write? In reality, most probably learn on-the-job and through a trial-and-error approach based on the idea that you have to get it wrong before you get it right (Norton and Buchanan, 2022, p511). This has always struck me as unnecessarily unfair to teachers, and especially those just starting out in their career. As a result, Kath Bilsborough and myself decided to develop an online training course in materials writing. As experienced teachers and trainers, with many published course books, we wanted to pass on our knowledge and help teachers to avoid the basic pitfalls of writing as well as develop their skills further.

For our first course, which was run over ten weeks with one (90 minute) zoom session per week and further asynchronous study, we divided the content into two halves: Part one of the course (the first five weeks) concentrated on certain technical skills such as the basic principles of writing a worksheet, or creating a reading text at the appropriate level with comprehension questions. This is the kind of content that could be taught on initial training courses to support teachers but rarely is. Part two of the course (the next five weeks) started to introduce the idea of creativity in the materials writing process and explore specific contexts such as materials for CLIL and Young Learners.

In the past, I have run full-time intensive courses in materials writing lasting a week. This format has worked well but it always lacked the time for trainees to actually create materials and try them out. Instead, our ten-week format allowed time for trainees to go back to their classes in between the sessions and apply what they have learned. It also meant that we – the tutors – were able to give individual feedback on their materials during the course. Amongst the positive post-course comments from our first cohort of trainees, receiving feedback like this was one of the most useful aspects of the course.

As for the question every reflective trainer asks themselves after a course: What will we change next time? (Because we are offering the course again in autumn of 2023 and spring of 2024) A course like this has to reflect the fast-changing realities of writing for digital and awareness of issues such as diversity and inclusion in classroom materials. We’ll also try to increase the amount of access trainees have to asynchronous content as well as maintaining ongoing communities of practice with our trainees long after their course has ended.

References and further reading

Clandfield, L. & Hughes, J. 2017 ETpedia Materials Writing, Pavilion ELT

Norton, J. and Buchanan, H. 2022, The Routledge Handbook of Materials Development for Language Teaching Routledge