Cliff Parry, Academic Manager, British Council Greece, (BSc, MSc (TEYL), RSA DTEFA) has been living and teaching in Greece since 1986. Cliff has a wide range of teaching experience across all course types and ages, he has extensive training experience, has written many articles for professional journals and ELT publications and has co-authored a number of English language teaching titles. He has also worked in social respect and anti-bullying projects for a number of years. “I came to Greece in 1986. I started my teaching career in Enossi (a chain of foreign language schools) at the Piraeus branch and then I was moved to their branch in Athens. I was not a qualified teacher at that time. My university degree was in engineering – mining engineering. I come from a family of miners. But here I was...in Athens...following my heart (in love with a Greek girl I’d met at university)...teaching English.”

●Did you know how to teach?

“No. I had no idea. My first perception on entering the classroom was ‘this is not a job, it’s an experience.’ I could remember things quite easily at that time –no longer. I remembered the coursebook, the grammar book etc but I didn’t know how to teach. My teaching approach was of the kind... ‘avoid any kind of explanation if possible’. I would generally adopt two or three tactics; for instance if I was to write on the board I would try to write very unclearly so the students would spend too much time trying to understand my handwriting.”

●Were you trying to confuse your students?

“Not really – just trying to avoid having to answer questions I couldn’t answer. The main principle was if they couldn’t understand what I’d written, they wouldn’t ask me any questions.”

●Were you afraid of making mistakes?

“It was a matter of saving face. I realised that although I didn’t think it was a serious job, it had its demands. I didn’t want to appear inadequate in front of the students. So I either spoke too fast or used a kind of language which was beyond their level. So the students thought ‘WOW’. The strategy didn’t work though. The students slowly-slowly left my classes but the school owners for some reason had faith in me. They told me ‘look, if you want to be serious, get a qualification.’ They pushed me in the right direction and I am very grateful to them for that.”

●What were your students -adults or children?

“They were adults. But during the last ten or so years the number of adults in most FL Schools has shrunk so I found myself repositioning to teach children.”

●When did you start thinking that you could make a career in teaching?

“Almost from the beginning. So I went back to the UK to obtain a teaching qualification and came back to Greece again. For me Greece is a good place to be. The social life...the people...I do not know what it really is...I am attached to the country. So after a while I was offered an opportunity with the British Council and when I say opportunity I don’t only mean a teaching post but also development opportunities.”

●So you have come to like teaching...

“I like teaching but for me teaching is not limited to grammar and structure. There are so many things we can do and talk about and not just grammar and structure...life skills for instance, or critical thinking, or teaching how to present yourself, things that shape human beings. I would say that I have a major issue with language driven teaching...I’d rather deal with social cognitive areas than with pure linguistic ones.”

●I agree with you but on the other hand teachers have a certain material to cover and prepare students for language exams and they all want them to pass the exams so they really have no free hand to do what they want. Exam Boards ‘dictate’ the material they need to cover...

“You’ve mentioned materials and exams and I think that we have all fallen into a trap. We need to think of the backwash effect and the use of focusing on exam preparation from B1 level upwards and practicing exam tasks all the time...”

●Doesn’t practice make perfect?

“Well, it does but language learning should not be limited to acquiring skills which will help someone to pass the exams. You’ve just said that exams dictate language learning and certainly the skills but they do not necessarily dictate the tasks. OK, an exam demonstrates knowledge and candidates’ efforts and achievements and it is true that some exams open far more doors than some others. Some test types are far more accessible and easier than some others. In an ideal world I would like to organise a huge conference and talk to all students and their parents and to all teachers of English explaining how language is taught and learnt. I would tell parents to have faith in the teachers and make the right investment for their children. Learning a language is not easy. I would say to students ‘learn the language well and then take the exam of your choice and not learn the language for the exams’. I suppose that’s one of the roles teachers and educational institutions should play.”

●The British Council has a close relationship with certain exams however...

“The British Council promotes excellence in both teaching and testing. We offer first-choice language exams but through the numerous seminars we organise, we support teaching, not just exam preparation. For instance we organise seminars and provide online support for teachers, irrespective of what language exam their students take. We help students improve their English through our free LearnEnglish websites and have recently created a new Candidate Support Website for students registering for exams with us.”

●Do people know the wide range of services you offer?

“We do a lot of activities not necessarily on our own but largely with partners. I think the way we work now probably ensures that more people know about what we do than in the past. We value people.”

●Are you having thoughts of regrets for having stayed in Greece?

“No, not at all. I’ve made many mistakes in my life but I wouldn’t change anything precisely because my daughter is the way she is. You can’t change one thing without changing the other. That’s because of the environment which allows us to be the way we are. I find the financial situation we are in –I say we because I am part of this country- tragic but sooner or later it will be over. Let’s be optimistic. And you know in which part of Greece I want to settle when I retire? In Chios. I love Greece...there are many beautiful places around but for me Chios is the best.”

Anastasia Spyropoulou,( [email protected])