Beyond The Abstracts: Language Teacher Autonomy in Action

Description

In this episode of Beyond the Abstracts I spoke with Leni Dam. From 1973 till 2007, Leni Dam practised language learner autonomy in her own English classes at a Danish comprehensive school near Copenhagen. From 1979 she was in addition employed by University College, Copenhagen, doing INSET and being in charge of innovative, pedagogic projects at school level. She has thus been personally involved in reforming language learning and teaching, not only for school children, but also for immigrants and refugees. Her specific interests are language learner autonomy and related issues such as evaluation, differentiation and inclusion. Together with Lienhard Legenhausen, Germany, she carried out the LAALE research project (Language Acquisition in an Autonomous Learning Environment) from 1992-1996. From 1993-1999, she was co-convenor of the AILA Learner Autonomy in Language Learning Scientific Commission, and from 2008-2016 she was co-coordinator of the IATEFL Learner Autonomy Special Interest Group. She has published widely. Especially her first book (Dam 1995) and her latest one together with David Little and Lienhard Legenhausen (2017) are landmarks in her publications. After her retirement in 2007, she has continued to publish, to give talks and to run work-shops - in this way continuing to increase her insights into the development of language learner autonomy and its related areas. And now, here is my conversation with Leni Dam:

https://youtu.be/JMusESKOf1w

In this conversation we cover chapter eight of her 2017 work dealing with autonomy for language teachers. We first discuss Leni’s idea of the autonomy classroom, the role of the teacher as action researcher within it, and why teacher training should be conducted in the target language. We also cover how early- or later-career teachers can be supported in developing their learners’ autonomy, and advice for teachers on working with required textbooks or curricula. Finally, Leni introduces the rationale and scalability of the three-part lesson structure recommended in the book, among other topics. This conversation is likely to be directly useful for language teachers or researchers alike.

Learn more:

Little, D., Dam, L., & Legenhausen, L. (2017). Language Learner Autonomy: Theory, Practice and Research. Multilingual Matters. https://doi.org/doi:10.21832/9781783098606