Michael! Another beautiful book!

Teach English through global tales of lore
Life lessons and course content: a winning formula

In a Faraway Land
By Michael Berman
O-Books
ISBN: 978 1 84694 302 7

Ireceive mountains of books. Some I keep but never use; others I merrily give away after reading and reviewing. Every now and then, though, a title drops through my letter box which I review, recommend to colleagues and then firmly promise myself never to lend (because teachers are dreadful at returning anything… but don’t tell anyone I said that).
In a Faraway Land easily falls into the latter category: it’s one I know I’ll use and return to. Why? Unlike many ELT titles, which come in different sizes and colours but all say the same things, or teach grammar in an allegedly ‘revolutionary’ way, Michael Berman has put together a gem – one that provides lessons in life as well as teaching English. Who would deny that we all need a bit of that from time to time?
In a Faraway Land is written for teachers who, like most of us, have better things to do with their lives than pore over resource books. Berman knows that teachers often find it difficult to justify using material he creates; to combat this he has packaged this book of folk tales and fables in an order that should match themes being covered in the classroom.
It assists by giving a history of storytelling, along with reasons for its continued existence. As Berman explains, ‘Storytelling engages the imagination, promotes language development, encourages reading, teaches about other cultures and helps people understand themselves and others’ – words worth writing on the backs of the hands of all trainee teachers. And yet how often do trainers still see teachers battling away, trying to explain arcane grammar points related to the tense of the week?
As you work through the sixty tales in this book, you’ll soon spot the difference between each genre; you might ask your learners to help you with that quest, too. Texts are often quite short. ‘Carrying and Leaving’, a Buddhist parable, for example, runs only to about 150 words. As is the case with all texts in this title, it is exposed to students as either a reading passage or as read by the teacher, and is preceded by activities or related background comments. To satisfy your curiosity, ‘Carrying and Leaving’ is about two monks, one of whom is able to get over an awkward episode in his life, while the other is left with restless nights. There’s certainly a lesson in that for us all, as well as various vocabulary and ordering tasks for eager learners.
Stories have been collated by Berman from all over the world. To give you a flavour, there’s ‘The monkey who could not sleep’ from the Philippines; ‘Why kangaroos have pouches’, an Aboriginal Australian tale; ‘The enchanted water hole’, from India; and ‘The toad bridegroom’ from Korea. This is certainly a book you’ll wish to dip into, either to back up a theme, to support a skill-based course or just to provide your class with something interesting to start or end the day.
See www.o-books.net   for more on this book and others by Michael Berman.