I am an applied linguist, specializing in language teacher education and TESOL.
- Profile
- Homepage
-
English as a lingua franca: Selected readings
Summary of a debate about ELF, involving Sowden, Cogo, Sewell, Sung and Dewey.
-
After Schools: Project conclusion
Tomorrow the After Schools Project team will present their final report on evaluation of the After School extra-curricular clubs that were piloted at the 2nd Model Experimental Primary School of Ioannina. Report The submission of this report concludes my collaboration with the school. I would like to take this opportunity to express my sincere appreciation…
-
Understanding the Bottleneck Hypothesis in Language Learning
This post revisits Slabakova’s Bottleneck Hypothesis, which identifies functional morphology as the hardest part of second language acquisition. It critiques early communicative approaches, contrasts drilling with modern practices, and highlights plurilingual competence. Updated 2025 reflections connect research, pedagogy, and AI tools, showing why “easy” and “hard” in language learning depend on context.
-
Some Thoughts on Student Evaluation in Greek ELT
This post critically discusses a proposed evaluation frame for language education in Greek schools, and points at issues where additional thought is required.
-
Matters of the Mind: Psychology of Language Learning
Update (June 2018) Following the success of this conference and its followup (PLL2), the way was paved for the creation of the International Association for the Psychology of Language Learning. You can read more details about the conference (link no longer active, sorry!) in the website of the Association.
-
Teaching English to Very Young Learners in Greece: When research findings don’t align
In this post I compare a small-study I conducted with the findings of the Greek TEYL project. Various explanations are considered, regarding the differences in our findings.
-
Greek Model Experimental Schools: Some reflections
Last Saturday, I had the pleasure of presenting a paper, along with my colleague Ioanna Gkourogianni, at the 1st National Conference for Model-Experimental Schools (link now defunct) in Thessaloniki (Greece). In our presentation, we problematised the function of Model-Experimental schools. At present, it seems that these schools function primarily as Models in a top-down system,…
-
Call for Papers: Classroom-oriented research: Reconciling Theory and Practice
Classroom-oriented research: Reconciling theory and practice The 3rd International Conference on classroom-oriented research will be organised by the Institute of Modern Languages, State School of Higher Professional Education (Konin), the Department of English Studies, Adam Mickiewicz University (Poznań) and the Institute of English Studies, University of Łódź, in collaboration with IATEFL Research SIG. The conference, titled Classroom-oriented research: Reconciling theory and practice, will look…
-
Richard Fay named The University of Manchester Teacher of the Year 2013 !
Like everybody who knows Richard or has worked with him, I think that this is an overdue and very well deserved award.