Francoise Grellet
Writing for Advanced Learners of English
Cambridge University Press

Ronald Carter & Michael McCarthy
Exploring Spoken English
Cambridge University Press

Seth Lindstromberg
The Standby Book
Cambridge University Press

Ian MacKenzie
English for Business Studies: a course for Business Studies and Economics students
Cambridge University Press

New Writing 5
Editors Christopher Hope & Peter Porter
New Writing 6
Editors A.S.Byatt & Peter Porter
The British Council

Stephanie Martin & Lyn Darnley
Teaching Voice
Whurr Publishers and the British Voice Association ISBN l-897635 19-2

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Francoise Grellet
Writing for Advanced Learners of English
Cambridge University Press

For those teachers who've been wanting to explore different writing activities but needed an impetus to get them going, this book could be just what you've been waiting for.

It focuses on freer/creative writing, assuming that students are already familiar with oft-taught text types such as letters, discursives, newspaper articles, etc. So it seems ideal for advanced non-exam-oriented classes or for one-off classes with a change of focus.

It doesn't throw you in at the deep end, but guides you through four well-organised stages, which are reflected in the four sections of the book. These are: Manipulation (focusing on ambiguity, accuracy and editing), Imitation (based on model texts), Variations (encouraging media transfer) and Invention (attempting more open-ended tasks). This all makes for a very user-friendly package.

The real joy of the book, however, comes from the varied and innovative selection of authentic texts and visuals (sadly in black and white) included to inspire and stimulate students. These cover poetry from Sylvia Plath to Auden to William Carlos Williams, writing from The Bible to Monty Python and excerpts from novels, short stories, plays, newspapers, ads, blurbs and many more.

There's surely something here to get even the most reluctant student putting pen to paper.

Michelle Parrington
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Ronald Carter & Michael McCarthy
Exploring Spoken English
Cambridge University Press

I have to start this review by stating that my initial excitement at seeing the title of this book in a Cambrige University Press catalogue turned to disappointment upon actually opening a copy. Why? Because whilst the book is strong on the description of Spoken English, it is weak as a pedagogic resource for those trying to improve students' spoken English.

The core of the book consists of twenty units, each of which is based around an authentic example of spoken English. Each unit starts with an activity, essentially a short pre-listening activity, which includes tasks such as predicting a feature of the extract. This is followed by a description of the speakers/social setting and a transcript of the spoken material, a general commentary, a line-by-line commentary and further reading. The extracts themselves are on a cassette. The twenty examples are divided into eight sections, such as narrative, language-in-action, service encounters, etc.

Most of the recordings are reproduced on the accompanying cassette in their original form, with only a few re-recorded by actors (though in these cases the original is also present). Although the authors state that "it is one of the paradoxes of spoken data collection that the more interesting and valuable the data, the more difficult they are to obtain" (p.7) I am not sure that students would find that reason enough to forgive the difficulty of following some of the recordings. In fact, the intended audience of the book is "teachers and teacher trainers (both native and non-native speakers of English), undergraduates and postgraduate students of language and linguistics, advanced learners of English as a second or foreign language, materials developers, language researchers, esepecially in the fields of grammar, vocabulary and discourse analysis and A-Level English language students" (p. 12).

Basically, the book is worthwhile for those interested in spoken English as a linguistic system - a valuable book for a teacher who wants to know more about the linguistic features of spoken English - but not for students interested in just speaking English.

David Hardisty
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Seth Lindstromberg
The Standby Book
Cambridge University Press

This is a fairly ambitious 'recipe' book edited by Lindstromberg, containing I 10 activities contributed by 33 teachers (including Mario Rinvolucri, Tessa Woodward, Peter Grundy and David Cranmer). It is aimed primarily at adults and older teenagers, from beginner to advanced, although it is suggested that some of the activities may also be suitable for young learners. According to Lindstromberg, it "is intended to be a bank of activities which can be used to supplement a coursebook on a longish non-intensive course, regardless of whether the course is exam-orientated, specialised (e.g. for business people or literature students) or not".

The book is divided into 12 theme-based chapters, including: reviewing, working with a coursebook, using magazines and newspapers, language through literature, music and imagination, and grammar and register. The activities, which are all 'broadly communicative' in nature, range in length from 5-minute warmers and pace-changers to whole-lesson ideas. They range in style from the 'wacky' (literally, in the case of the "Newspaper bash!" activity in the first section) to the more 'traditional' (error analysis and information gap tasks, for example) and each come with a list of required ingredients and a suggested aim, procedure, extension exercise and/or variation. Although there are some thinly disguised old favourites, most of the ideas appear to be new or at least contain a new twist. As with all recipes books, the standard of the activities ranges from the seemingly cringe-worthy to the enviously good (then again, what looks good on paper is not necessarily good in class, and vice versa). I believe it would also be fair to say that, in trying to make the activities universally usable, a few have become 'woolly' to say the least.

Overall, Lindstromberg's book is impressive both in terms of scale and content. I do, however, have two reservations, one major and one more personal. Despite the fact that the sheer number and range of activities should guarantee that there is something for everyone, it is extremely difficult to find anything quickly. The contents page gives the teacher little clue as to what the focus of a particular activity is and although there is an index, this too is fairly sketchy. One therefore has to trawl laboriously through the book looking for suitable activities - this is not a book for teachers in a hurry! The other problem I have with it concerns the methodology. Perhaps unsurprisingly (considering the contributors), there are a lot of extremely 'touchy-feely' type ideas, so this is possibly not the book to buy if, like me, you are wary of or uncomfortable with this kind of approach at the best, let alone the worst, of times.

Tim Bacon
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Ian MacKenzie
English for Business Studies: a course for Business Studies and Economics tudents
Cambridge University Press

This consists of a Student's Book, Teacher's Book and Cassette Set. The introduction to the learner in the Student's Book says: "English for Business Studies is a reading, speaking, listening and writing course for learners with at least an upper-intermediate level of English who need to understand and express the key concepts of business and economics. It covers the most important areas of management, production, marketing, finance and macroeconomics."

Who would need to do that, i.e. use this book? The Teacher's Book mentions "business school students or practising business professionals" (page ix) so it seems to be a Business/Financial English coursebook, either for a university course or for teaching students already working in the area of business and finance.

The general format consists of an informative reading text to introduce the topic and vocabulary followed by comprehension and vocabulary exercises. After discussion work, there is either an authentic listening or reading passage, with related tasks.

Could this book be used as the author claims? I'm not sure. Firstly, because if it is primarily a skills book, learners are not provided with strategies or process orientated work to learn the skills involved, let alone develop and extend them.

For example, with no model to analyse, no work on intended audience, appropriacy or style, no revision of linkers or tips on avoiding redundancy, students are asked to "summarize . . . . arguments in a short paragraph of 50 words." (Unit 2) Or to "write a short text (about 200 words) giving advice to a foreign business person coming to your country to negotiate with local companies" with no input on modals for making suggestions, or cohesive devices. In any case, the Teacher's Book often suggests the writing tasks be set for homework.

Similarly, 99% of the listenings are for specific information and both they (using non-didactic material: non-standard accents) and the tasks are quite difficult. Equally, discussions are blithely launched into with no time to consider the niceties of turn taking, using fillers (apart from a brief comment on the use of "really"), paraphrasing, etc. How should discussions be structured and assessed? What feedback or error correction could be given, for students to assess their progress?

Is this book then merely practice opportunities for advanced students to keep their hand in with the English language? That would presuppose that the whole class were of a uniformly high standard - unusual in university or off-site teaching.

Used straight as a course book, English for Business Studies would need supplementing heavily. The appendix of word stress and verb constructions are extremely condensed and not terribly clear, (although the appendix of numbers is quite a good reference.) The Teacher's Book is little or no help in suggesting how to exploit ideas or material. Sometimes it's touchingly naive, e.g. "It should be pointed out to German speakers that a warehouse in English is not the same as Warenhaus (department store) in German" and "It might be useful to stress the following points: The past tense of lend is lent (not lended)." In addition to supplementing, the book surely needs pruning as no class would need to study the full range of topic areas.

Could the units be used as they are laid out? It is tricky to set up debates and discussion in higher education classrooms with 30 plus students, although easier when teaching a group of business people. The readings are very 'meaty' and take up a lot of class time although the author assures us that the preparatory 'preliminary discussion activity can easily be extended to last for much of a lesson, . . . (...the reading passages could also be assigned as homework.)' I'm not sure how practical that would be.

Having said all that, the book is excellent for dipping into, and the majority of the units could easily be used as varied one-offs with business students or to introduce or supplement related topics in conjunction with other material or coursebooks, thus by-passing any difficulties thrown up by the repetitive format.

Rebecca Baker
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New Writing 5
Editors Christopher Hope & Peter Porter
New Writing 6
Editors A.S.Byatt & Peter Porter
The British Council

Two excellent samplers of what's going on in British writing. They are annual anthologies designed by the British Council "to provide an outlet for new short stories, work in progress, poetry and essays".

The volumes include short stories from best selling authors such as Louis de Bernieres, A.S. Byatt, Candia McWilliams and Marina Warner alongside lesser known writers, well established poets such as Dannie Abse and Fleur Adcock alongside newer ones, extracts from novels in progress and essays from Timothy MO and Miroslav Holub amongst others.

There's something to suit all tastes and moods in each of these anthologies and they can be dipped into time and time again. New Writing 5 came out in 1996, whilst volume 6 dates from March 97. New Writing 7 should be out any time.

Michelle Parrington
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Stephanie Martin & Lyn Darnley
Teaching Voice
Whurr Publishers and the British Voice Association ISBN l-897635 19-2

Whatever our teaching situation, preferred methodology, type of students, equipment available, all teachers share the need to have a voice in good working order. This book, written by a speech therapist and a voice coach, aims to help teachers understand, develop and maintain their voices.

An introductory chapter sets out the need for voice training for teachers and talks about practical aspects of voice in the classroom. This is followed by chapters which look at the effects of teaching on the voice, how the voice works and voice health. The latter includes such aspects as teachers' posture, our dietary habits and liquid intake, smoking, colds, classroom acoustics and voice-warming exercises. A practical chapter gives exercises for the neck, breathing, articulation, etc. and a final chapter looks at voice projection.

I would strongly recommend this book to any teacher who has had or could have problems with their voice during their teaching career. As it is not generally available in Portugal, I have included the ISBN in the book's information, for those who may wish to order it. If you are connected to the Internet and have a credit card, it can also be ordered at http://www.bookshop.co.uk.

Acknowledgement: I would like to thank Marta, a former students of mine at the British Council, and a student of speech therapy, for bringing this book to my attention.

David Hardisty
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