CELTA: Essential books?

rosie383

I have just started the CELTA course and am wondering if anyone has done it, and which books did you buy?

I have been hunting all day to find the best prices and, of the books on the reading list, which did you think were actually essential, and would you recommend?

I have managed to find a few of them on Amazon for around £25 for 3 of them, but David Riddell's Teaching English as a Foreign/ Second Language is very, very expensive. On eBay it is £128!!!! The cheapest I could find was £70. This was one that the tutor told us we really should get.

I have checked in the library where I live, but in the whole county, there are only one of each copy with 6 people in the reserve list before me. I also looked in every charity shop in the town today.

I have also looked at bookboon.com, but it isn't available there for download either.

I would really appreciate any helpful suggestions on this. I can't really afford to pay out over £100 for books on top of the fees, childcare, travel costs etc.

rosie383

Anyone? Please?

briona

Having done the CELTA and bought a great number of books from my school's reading list (these vary from school to school), I can tell you that (a) none of them are essential, and (b) the school where you take the CELTA will have at least one copy of everything they've recommended. Be advised that if you are doing the four/five-week intensive course you won't have time for reading books anyway.

In terms of methodology books I'd hazard a guess that Jeremy Harmer's The Practice of English Language Teaching and Jim Scrivener's Learning Teaching are on the list. I bought both, barely referred to them on the course and have never referred to them since.

It's useful to have a good grammar book though as you will continue to use this after the course. I'm guessing they've recommended Parrott or Swan. Having bought both I would recommend Parrott as it's far more palatable than Swan.

I honestly wouldn't stress about the reading list of spending hundreds of pounds on books you'll never use again. I have to say that NOT reading these books didn't harm my chances as I came out with a Pass A.

EDIT: If you buy the most recent edition (2010) of David Riddell's book, it's MUCH cheaper than the older editions (2001 and 2003). See: http://www.amazon.co.uk/Teach-English-Foreign-Language-Yourself/dp/1444105930/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1316811430&sr=1-1 If you particularly want the older edition (2003), buy from Amazon marketplace – the cheapest copy is £6.50 plus £2.80 P&P. See: http://www.amazon.co.uk/Teaching-English-Foreign-Language-Yourself/dp/0340868562/ref=sr_1_3?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1316812327&sr=1-3

ohreally

Ask library to order book.

If you are a trade union member, the local branch often has a book bursary available.

rosie383

ohreally The local library has at least one copy of each book, but they are out on loan and have a list of at least 6 people on the reserve list. Say 3 weeks each person, that's 18 weeks, so I wouldn't get it until the end of the course which is 21 wks. So not really an option. The college library has a couple of copies, but we can just borrow them for 1 week. There are 18 of us on the course, so there's a queue there too.
Briona Thank you so much for the info. That Riddell book- I wasn't sure that the one in the link was the right one. It's very different from the one at £128.....I didn't even know you could pay that much for a book unless it was a rare first edition! The Scrivener book doesn't appeal to me....one of the girls had borrowed it and it looked like it would put me to sleep after about 5 mins!!
The librarian recommended http://www.amazon.co.uk/English-Grammar-Use-Answers-Intermediate/dp/052143680X/ref=sr_1_7?ie=UTF8&qid=1316865652&sr=8-7 and it gets very good reviews on Amazon.
I really want to get this one too, http://www.amazon.co.uk/How-Teach-ultimately-irreverent-classroom/dp/1845903935/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1316865808&sr=1-1. Again, not on our list, but the librarian said it was great and the reviews are very positive.
I was going to go for the Swann for the grammar side, but will follow your recommendation, and get the Parrott instead.
The only good thing seems to be that some of them may be useful to use when teaching, and if not, they seem to sell for pretty high prices, so I could just get my money back on them at the end by flogging them again!

BTW, I seriously couldn't do the 4 week course! As a mum of 2, and doing another course and with other commitments, if I did that, I would literally have no time to sleep or eat!
Well done for getting a Pass A. The tutor really scared all of us even at interview stage, saying we would find that we wouldn't even have time for lunch, it would take all of our time and massive commitment to be able to complete the course.

Another question.....do we have to be able to teach students the names of all the types of verbs? That is the bit that I can't get a handle on at all. The rest of it I'm fairly okay with, but all those different tenses just throw me and the rest of the students that I have spoken to. Do they expect us to label everything?

briona

Hi again,

The English Grammar in Use series is fantastic – it's clearly laid out, has great explanations and can even be used in class with pre-intermediate/intermediate students. I'd recommend getting the most up-to-date version though: http://www.amazon.co.uk/English-Grammar-Use-Answers-ROM/dp/0521537622/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1316874845&sr=1-1

I'm not sure about the How To Teach book. It's aimed at primary/secondary school teachers rather than EFL teachers. I've bought a couple of books like that and found it hard to apply the methodology to an EFL classroom.

rosie383 wrote: »

Another question.....do we have to be able to teach students the names of all the types of verbs? That is the bit that I can't get a handle on at all. The rest of it I'm fairly okay with, but all those different tenses just throw me and the rest of the students that I have spoken to. Do they expect us to label everything?

It's important to know all of the grammar when teaching, but how in depth you go in lessons depends very much on who and where you are teaching (some schools are ridiculously grammar-focussed!). Don't worry about the tenses – you'll get to grips with the names and functions fairly quickly. I used to have a tenses table but can't find it at the moment. For a fairly verbose view, have a look at http://www.englisch-hilfen.de/en/grammar/english_tenses.htm

Whilst on the course it's important to be able to identify elements of sentences such as pronouns, nouns, verbs, adverbs, adjectives, conjunctions, etc, all of which comes with time. There's no point in trying to learn all the grammar at once. Instead, as soon as you know what you'll be teaching that day/week, I'd advise brushing on the relevant grammar. Basically take it one lesson at a time.

If you've got any more questions, please don't hesitate to ask.

Briona

rosie383

Thanks so much Briona. My dh was able to download English language for dummies and also an interactive version of the English Grammar in usage as you mention above.

I'm now having fun (not!) trying to do a rough lesson plan for my first teaching practice next week. My problem is that my first class is Upper/ Inter and I have no clue what they will already know!

top_drawer_2

Thank you MSE'ers again, I am hoping to start a CELTA/TESOL course soon and am beginning to study as I will be doing the cram course.
TD