Some first steps towards training teachers to use literature

This article is based on the opening plenary of the IATEFL Literature and Cultural Studies SIG and Teacher Trainers SIG Conference 'Literature in the ELT Classroom: Training the Trainers' in Budapest, May 1998 given by the author. It suggests the key principles to consider when training teachers to use literary texts with their learners by providing a paradigm of a possible training session drawing on the notions of reflective practice and the reflective cycle (Wallace 1991). Teachers engage in the training tasks suggested, which facilitates their own language development, and then reflect on and interrogate these with reference to their own teaching contexts. The tasks aim to provide a paradigm for critique, reflection on past beliefs in the light of new input, links with theory and generalisable strategies.