About this ebook
The popularization of L2 teaching brought with it a need to find efficient teaching methods. Debates have hinged mainly around the alleged advantages of communicative vs. traditional methods. However, most approaches have their roots in linguistic and psychological theories that have been questioned by language researchers. Some language teachers are probably unaware of these advances and to that extent, continue to adhere to teaching approaches mainly based on intuitions. Consequently, evaluating materials may be often performed in rather uninformed circumstances.
The book contains chapters on relevant issues by leading researchers, classified into three main areas. The editors contribute a chapter to each of these sections about the implications for second language teaching.
This book facilitates an approximation between researchers in the theoretical and experimental fields of language and those responsible for innovation in language teaching. It is designed so that L2 teachers can adopt and adjust the knowledge drawn from the book to their particular environment and group of students.
About the author
José Manuel Igoa holds a PhD in Psychology. He teaches Psycholinguistics and related subjects, like Cognitive Psychology, Bilingualism and Second Language Acquisition, to undergraduate and graduate students at the Universidad Autónoma de Madrid, Spain. He co-authored a Spanish handbook on the psychology of language and has published book chapters and journal articles on word and sentence comprehension and production, figurative language understanding and bilingual language processing. His research interests cover various topics in cognitive psychology and psycholinguistics.
