Meet our Plenary Speakers

Carol Griffiths

Biodata

Carol Griffiths has been a teacher, manager and teacher trainer of ELT for many years. She completed a PhD on the subject of learning strategies at the University of Auckland. She has taught in New Zealand, Indonesia, Japan, China, North Korea, UK, and is currently Associate Professor at Faith University in Istanbul, Turkey. She has published widely, including her books ‘Lessons from Good Language Learners’, and ‘The Strategy Factor in Successful Language Learning’ and presented at many conferences around the world. In addition to learning strategies, her current research interests include the use of narrative/literature in language teaching and learning, individual differences and teacher issues. 

Plenary Presentation

Using narrative as a strategy to teach language

Stories are universal and enjoyed across all ages and cultures. For this reason, narrative is invaluable in the language classroom because of its intrinsic motivational potential and its power to engage attention across a range of learning styles. With careful planning, narrative can be used to develop both receptive skills (listening and reading) to utilize the input, and productive skills (speaking and writing), thereby providing output opportunities. In addition, narratives can be used to develop underlying linguistic knowledge (vocabulary, grammar, pronunciation). Following a brief discussion of related theoretical issues (such as motivation, attention, learning style, input, output), this plenary will illustrate how this development can be achieved by using an original story and suggesting an instructional sequence for using the story. The plenary will conclude by considering issues of authenticity and identity which may arise in the course of using narrative in the language classroom.