A presentation on how to help EFL teachers growth and develop professionally using the postmethod pedagogy.

1. Postmethod pedagogy:
Teacher growth and
proffesional
opportunities
Yamith José Fandiño Parra
October 2020

2. INTRODUCTION
 How do you interpret these two mindsets? What do they say
about teacher growth?
 Based on these mindsets, how do you think teacher education in
ELT should prepare student teachers?

3. TEACHER GROWTH AND NEW OPPORTUNITIES 1
Traditional pedagogy focuses on the adoption of new teaching approaches and
methods, which emerge in order to meet the learner’s needs in different periods.
In other words, the solution to problems in ELT throughout the history has been
seen in new methods approaches that resulted in the search for generalizable
and applicable solutions across various contexts.
Fixed mindset= One-size-fits-all method + Problem-oriented method
Teachers = Users or followers.
Postmethod pedagogy can be defined as the construction of classroom
procedures and principles by the teacher himself/herself based on his/her prior
and experiential knowledge and/or certain strategies. In other words, ELT is
about helping and encourage practitioners to construct “classroom-oriented”
theories of practice.
Growth mindset = Differentiated methods + Process-oriented methods
Teachers = Creators and leaders.

4. TEACHER GROWTH AND NEW OPPORTUNITIES 1
 Postmethod pedagogy puts the teacher at the center of language learning
and teaching and values his/her beliefs, experiences and knowledge.
 Postmethod teachers are autonomous analysts, strategic researchers and
critical decision-makers.
 Postmethod teachers comply by with particularity (programs and plans that
address particular needs, interests, and wants), practicality (activities and
resources that can be applied or implemented in practice), and possibility
(actions and decisions that are socially, culturally, and politically possible).
 Postmethod teachers do not have total freedom as they need to follow
parameters, strategies, and frameworks that allow them to create and teach
relevant, congruent, and effective classes and courses.

5. TEACHER GROWTH AND NEW OPPORTUNITIES 1
Developing
teachers’
growth
mindset.

6. TEACHER GROWTH AND NEW OPPORTUNITIES 1
Kumaravadivelu’s parameters and
macrostrategies
Stern’s three-dimensional
framework
o The intra-lingual and cross-lingual
dimension.
o The analytic-experiential dimension.
o The explicit-implicit dimension.

7. TEACHER GROWTH AND NEW OPPORTUNITIES 1
Stern’s three-dimensional
Framework to develop teachers’ growth mindset
Language
• The intra-lingual
strategy involves
keeping L1 and L2
separate.
• Cross-lingual strategy
suggests that L2 is
acquired and known
through an integrative
use of L1.
Strategy
• The analytic strategy
involves explicit focus
on forms of language
such as grammar,
vocabulary, and
functions with
emphasis on accuracy.
• The experiential
strategy is message-
oriented and involves
interaction in
communicative
contexts with
emphasis on fluency.
Teaching
• Teachers can teach
language explicitly
through conscious
learning = Direct
instruction.
• Teachers can teach
language implicitly
through subconscious
acquisition =
Discovery learning.

8. TEACHER GROWTH AND NEW OPPORTUNITIES 2
Diana Katerine Martínez Rodríguez
Teacher at Silveria Espinosa of Rendón school in Bogota
Candidate for the master degree in foreign language teaching at Universidad Pedagógica y
Tecnológica De Colombia.
 The rise of Globalization and the emergence of new technologies are having a great
impact on language education in terms of what we teach and how we teach it. For
these reasons, contemporary teachers are required to enroll in professional
development programs and to be a reflective.
 However, this reflection is mainly focused on the method we use and the results we
get, that is to say, the effectiveness of our practice. Generally methods contain detailed
specifications such as teaching procedures, techniques as well as roles; this makes
them strict and static.
 Today, there is a growing necessity of searching for an unconventional option that
allows teachers to plan and shape the way they teach by “themselves” and not by
following a range of artificial principles, which are commonly far away from their own
context. Reflection, then, takes the traditional concept of ‘method’ towards a
“Postmethod pedagogy”.

9. TEACHER GROWTH AND NEW OPPORTUNITIES 2
 Based on my experience as language teacher, I can say that method is a tool that
can show us how theory about language learning becomes tangible and useful in
language teaching. Nevertheless, the realities within the classrooms I have guided
indicate that a specific method cannot satisfy all my students’ pedagogical needs
(Martínez, 2011, p. 120).
 I consider that methods could be better defined within the Postmethod as the
conceptualization and actualization process carry out by practitioners… I think
that what happens to me and probably to the majority of language teachers is
that there is a lack of compatibility between the method or methods we adopt
and the specific characteristics of the context in which it or they are applied
(Martínez, 2011, p. 121).
 I think that this macro-strategic framework does not pretend to replace methods.
From the language teaching point of view, this framework presents a solution to
cover all the students needs that methods cannot. Since I become aware about it,
I started to include some of these macrostrategies into my pedagogical practice
(Martínez, 2011, p. 122).

10. TEACHER GROWTH AND NEW OPPORTUNITIES 2
 In order to maximize learning opportunities, facilitate negotiated interaction and
promote learner autonomy, I often engage my students in a project at the end of
each term. This project also attempts to integrate skills, as well as activate my
students’ creativity, self-expression and language consolidation (Martínez, 2011, p.
123).
 Within class activities, I tend to use different macrostrategies: I give clear
instructions to minimize perceptual mismatches; students make predictions about
pictures by using the related vocabulary to promote learner autonomy and
facilitate negotiated interaction; also students use critical thinking to analyze and
state their position about lesson topics to raise cultural consciousness and finally,
they have to read, write, listen and speak to integrate language skills (Martínez,
2011, p. 123).
 I consider that culture plays an important role. In order to contextualize linguistic
input, I often apply easy and fast activities in order to identify some cultural
similarities and differences (Martínez, 2011, p. 123).

11. TEACHER GROWTH AND NEW OPPORTUNITIES 2
 Using macrostrategies have helped me to start thinking about my
assumptions, constraints and approaches related to language learning. For
instance, I wonder about aspects such as:
- What is my “personality” as a teacher?
- How are these personal characteristics reflected in my classes?
- What of the traditional methods or drills do I employ the most?
- What are my learners’ aims regarding their English development? How could
I find the aims out?
- In which ways do the school rules and requirements influence what happens
in my classroom in terms of time and resources?
- Am I reflecting about my teaching practices? Why?
- Which activities could I apply to take advantage of some macrostrategies?
(Martinez, 2011, p. 124).

12. TEACHER GROWTH AND NEW OPPORTUNITIES 2
 Conclusions
A “new era” could become true if ELT teachers attempt to formulate their own
methods of teaching based on their classroom situations and on other approaches or
methods, they consider relevant. The idea is that these new methods reflect the
teachers’ beliefs, values, and experiences (Martínez, 2011, p. 125).
There is not a perfect method; as teachers gain experiences, they will understand or
conceive a particular method in a different way (Martínez, 2011, p. 126).
The Postmethod is not a method itself; it is the linking of diverse solutions to
language teaching difficulties. These solutions are not static but dynamic (Martínez,
2011, p. 126).
I think that the Postmethod pedagogy is a good option for teaching. It is also an
instrument to contribute in the process of linguistic decolonization, as well as the
vehicle to “colonize” our context and culture perspectives (Martínez, 2011, p. 127).

13. TEACHER EDUCATION AND POSTMETHOD PEDAGOGY
To what extent do you agree or disagree with these statements? Why?
Teachers who are really interested in becoming Postmethod teachers should
hold some principles which are important for them such as trusting their
intuition, relying on their experience, never stop learning, taking into account
the input of specialists, but being their own guide and looking objectively at
their own teaching practice and do not be afraid of change (Martínez, 2011, p.
126).
It is important to bear in mind that the real change depends on us, on our
capacity and capability to transform and to develop our profession in the best
way possible by doing an everyday effort to promote and foster a really “new
pedagogy era.” (Martínez, 2011, p. 127).

14. References
Can, N. (2008). Post-Method Pedagogy: Teacher Growth behind Walls.
Proceedings of the 10th METU ELT Convention, May 22nd-23rd, Turkey.
http://dbe.metu.edu.tr/convention/proceedingsweb/Pedagogy.pdf
Kamali, J. (2014). Post method survival. Procedia – Social and behavioral
sciences, 98, 824-829.
Martinez, D. (2011). The postmethod condition, an opportunity for going into a
“New pedagogical era”. Educación y ciudad, 20, 118-128.
https://revistas.idep.edu.co/index.php/educacion-y-ciudad/article/view/100/89