A very Brief CV of Rakesh Bhanot
BA Philosophy & Literature, University of Warwick
PGCE TEFL, Institute of Education, University of London
MA English Studies , Institute of Education, University of London.
Since 1972, he has been involved in various aspects of ELT, teacher education, inspection, publishing et al in over 30 countries throughout the world. On behalf of, several British Further and Higher Education institutions, he has delivered workshops for The British Council, Pilgrims Language Courses and SEDA (Staff and Education Development Association, UK), in Europe, Asia, Africa and both N and S America.
More recently, 2009-2014 he has participated in and/or delivered workshops/seminars/debates at IATEFL and TESOL conferences: Germany (HELTA) 2012, TESOL Spain 2011, TESOL Greece 2012/13, TESOL France 2011/12, ISTEK Turkey 2010/11/13, Yildiz University Turkey 2012/13/14, IATEFL Poland 2012, Moscow 2012 In August 2014, he trained teachers from (mainly) East European countries in Serbia.
He is the Founder Editor of Language Issues – the journal of NATECLA, UK (1986) and continues to serve on the editorial board. He is also the co-editor of The Best of Language Issues, and has co-edited several books on ICT and Higher Education (published by Routledge). Plus articles, book reviews in THES, TES, The EL Gazette et al.
As Manager of a Postgraduate Programme for new and experienced university teachers (from all subject areas) for over ten years (Coventry University), he used to deliver a one-year course covering all aspects of teaching, learning and assessment to his colleagues in HE. In addition, he has been External Examiner for such courses at several British universities.
One of his main interests is the development of teachers beyond the initial stage and how they can be encouraged to become true ‘reflective practitioners’ (Donald Schön); in other words: how to enhance the professional skills of teachers.
He also has run numerous workshops on Diversity and Inclusion – (e.g. the British Council has an explicit policy on Equal Opportunities and Diversity; what does this mean for what goes on in the classroom?) Thus, he has run workshops on what he calls Teaching More Than Just English. Over the years, he has run workshops on Humanistic Approaches to Language Teaching – what he refers to as teaching below the neck! His latest offering is a workshop called DITOW – Do It The Other Way. This is based on reversing many traditional classroom activities in order to achieve greater interest and also, possibly, enhanced learning.
However, one of his main/standard workshops is what he calls: A Dance Around Teaching and Learning; this is a re-evaluation of what we mean by learning and teaching using a number of activities, and is useful for both language learners and teachers, as well as teacher-trainers.
