Welcome to Issue 33!

As you may have noticed, in 2012 we have been celebrating 50 years of teacher training at International House.  The first IH Teacher Training programme was launched by John and Brita Haycraft at International House London in June 1962. The Haycrafts’ vision was of a language learning experience which focused on communication and encouraged cultural exchange. IH teachers were taught to use social situations and drama to facilitate learning in a fun and interactive way. This initial course spearheaded the direction of English language teaching, and shaped the current Cambridge ESOL CELTA qualification.  Fifty years on, hundreds of thousands of EFL teachers as well as teachers of other languages have now trained with International House all over the world.

As part of the 50th anniversary year, IHWO launched the IH Award Scheme. International House schools around the network, supported by Cambridge ESOL and Trinity TESOL, generously donated places on over 50 teacher training courses to those struggling to find work in these difficult economic times.  The scheme has been an enormous success and has enabled many who would not have otherwise had this opportunity to start a new exciting career in language teaching.

This issue of the IH Journal has also continued the 50th TT anniversary theme and we are delighted to have such a varied selection of teacher training articles covering a wide range of topics from teacher trainers around the network.  We are very lucky to have so many experts in the field who were happy to contribute and to share their views and ideas.

We have continued with the Special Interest columns as feedback on the previous issue proved they were very popular.  We have also added a column on Technology and also for the first time we are very pleased an article to include in French for teachers of FLE from Estelle Huxley in our Modern Languages section which we are hoping to expand in the future which contributions in other languages.

On a final note, our Journal begins with a very special tribute to John Soars who sadly passed away earlier this year.  We would like to thank our trustee, Simon Greenall with the help of those from the ELT world for putting together such a thoughtful and fitting tribute.  Many IH colleagues and IH Journal readers will have been saddened by the news and I am sure, as I was myself, you were all touched in some way by the enormous contribution John Soars made to the ELT world.

Elizabeth Arbuthnott

IH Journal Editor