I was very happy to speak to Michael Swan at the JALT conference in Nagoya last month, and now you can listen to what he had to say too! We discussed grammar and how it should be approached by teachers, ELF and errors, and changes in methodology over the years he has been involved in teaching.
Scott was giving a plenary at the Japan Association of Language Teachers national conference in Shizuoka this weekend, as well as a couple of presentations, but was kind enough to spare me half an hour or so for a chat. We talked a grammar, Vygotsky and socio-linguistics (inspired by James Lantolf, who was also speaking at the conference), technology, textbooks, testing and, of course, dogme. Like his fellow Kiwi Paul Nation, he is a thoroughly nice chap. If you want to pick up some of Scott’s books (and I really recommend that you do – he has a great talent for bringing complex concepts to life) you can get them through my store and contribute a few pennies towards the running of this site at the same time….
