![\"food-parsnip-800px\"](\"https:\/\/i1.wp.com\/bravelearning.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/11\/food-parsnip-800px.png?ssl=1\")
<\/a><\/p>\nIt\u2019s been a while since I did one of those \u2013 an\u00a0#ELTChat<\/a>\u00a0summary is always such a great post to write. If you\u2019re an English teacher and still don\u2019t know what these chats are about, joining other ELT pros and fans is easy \u2013 every Wednesday evening look out for the hashtagged conversation on a topic close to language teachers\u2019 (and learners\u2019) hearts.<\/span><\/p>\n <\/p>\n PARSNIP is a handy acronym for taboo topics in English language teaching. It\u2019s not always advisable, according to those who coined the term, to discuss the following: politics, alcohol, religion, sex, narcotics, -isms, pork. The recent #ELTChat decided to boldly go where few teachers went before \u2013 and discuss teaching PARSNIPS.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n (disclosure: I work for an ELT publisher but not via this blog)<\/p>\n A big portion of the chat was devoted to the idea of taboo subjects in print materials. The participants commented on strengths and weaknesses of published work when it comes to these:<\/p>\n @teflgeek There\u2019s a difference between exams\/books where u don\u2019t know who\u2019ll read them, and lessons where u do<\/p>\n @Wiktor_K PARSNIPS obviously a big topic in publishing, but I won\u2019t say it restricts things in classroom \u2013 u don\u2019t need 2 follow blindly<\/p>\n @ESOLLiz In exams I write for no alcohol, religion, death, sex, politics etc. So candidates are on a level playing field. The bland is King!<\/p>\n @Marisa_C In general i feel that much of what is in CBs may be very worthy but it\u2019s often highly forgettable<\/p>\n @teflgeek If publishers weren\u2019t so worried about cost to market ratio, they could include more interesting ideas<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Another interesting section of the chat focused on what ELT teachers can actually do in class with a taboo topic. Here, opinions and ideas on thorny issues ranged from \u201cavoid\u201d to \u201cembrace,\u201d delightfully:<\/p>\n @ELTWriter Let\u2019s call it localisation and empowering teachers to make decisions rather than \u2018vanilla\u2019 materials \u2026 Imho<\/p>\n @iatefl_ltsig [I] think a good teacher can breathe life into bland material\u2026<\/p>\n @Noreen_Lam [H]ere in Spain the original parsnips are quite normal in class, except sex. Ss didn\u2019t mind any of them!<\/p>\n @Priscilamateini I reckon when we work with this kind of material, we need to be prepared for our sts reaction. We\u2019ll face good or bad perceptions<\/p>\n <\/p>\n We spent some time talking about the reasons why taboo topics can help make a great class happen. We also discussed some less obvious issues behind those types of classes. This was my favourite part of that #ELTChat \u2013 hearing how these things actually play out with teachers! Here are some good insights:<\/p>\n @EdLaur The problem is schools that tell you \u2018use this book and only this book\u2019.<\/p>\n @Priscilamateini There are some students who are not ready for those topics mainly alcohol. E.g: alcohol isn\u2019t a problem.<\/p>\n @Marisa_C Child psychologists suggest avoiding ANY negative concepts \u2013 remember a book full of draculas and small graves<\/p>\n @Wiktor_K Problem: an A2 level student won\u2019t necessarily find the lg to tell you \u201cTeacher, I\u2019m uncomfortable with this.\u201d<\/p>\n <\/p>\n If you\u2019re an ELT professional, these links will be of immediate use to you. But even for language learners, they may be inspiring \u2013 would you try to build your own materials \/ lessons \/ projects around such \u201ctricky\u201d topics?<\/p>\n \u201cEmbrace the parsnip\u201d \u2013\u00a0Luke Medding\u2019s article in the Guardian<\/a>, definitely pro-taboo in teaching. http:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/education\/2006\/jan\/20\/tefl4<\/p>\n \u201cT is for Taboo\u201d \u2013 Scott Thornbury\u2019s blog entry,<\/a>\u00a0explaining how taboo topics are treated in teaching and material design.<\/p>\n Addressing taboo subjects in the classroom \u2013 we had an #ELTChat on this back in 2010,\u00a0this is a great summary,<\/a>\u00a0and a good idea to compare how things changed\u00a0🙂<\/p>\n If you\u2019re looking to re-live the chat I\u2019ve summarized here, you can always do this by\u00a0reading the full transcript<\/a>. I hope you enjoy this, and look forward to chatting with you in the future.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n POST written by Brave Learning\u00a0\u00a0<\/a> <\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Welcome back! It\u2019s been a while since I did one of those \u2013 an\u00a0#ELTChat\u00a0summary is always such a great post to write. If you\u2019re an English teacher and still don\u2019t know what these chats are about, joining other ELT pros and fans is easy \u2013 every Wednesday evening look out for the hashtagged conversation on… Like\u2026parsnips?<\/h2>\n
Taboos in print \u2013 perspectives on ELT publishing<\/h2>\n
Teaching a PARSNIP: from the spicy to the bland<\/h2>\n
The problems (and solutions) of PARSNIP teaching<\/h2>\n
Good PARSNIP resources for language teaching \/ learning<\/h2>\n
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Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[12],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-7978","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-summary"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/eltchat.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7978","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/eltchat.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/eltchat.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/eltchat.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/eltchat.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7978"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/eltchat.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7978\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/eltchat.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7978"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/eltchat.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7978"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/eltchat.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7978"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}