Systems Approach to Language Pedagogy

Akira Tajino, Ph.D., Professor Emeritus at Kyoto University, is currently a Professor of Educational Linguistics at Nagoya University of Foreign Studies, Japan. His research interests include EAP, classroom research, and pedagogical grammar. He is a former Director of International Academic Research and of the Resource Center for Language Education at Kyoto University, and is a recipient of the JACET (Japan Association of College English Teachers) Award for excellence in teaching (2011) and the JACET Award for excellence in academic publication (2014). He is the author/editor of more than 20 books, including Researching Language Teaching and Learning: An Integration of Practice and Theory (Peter Lang, 2009), Team Teaching and Team Learning in the Language Classroom: Collaboration for Innovation in ELT (Routledge, 2016), and A New Approach to English Pedagogical Grammar: The Order of Meanings (Routledge, 2018). He has served on the editorial boards of severaljournals, including ELT Journal (Oxford University Press).

• Chapter 1: Toward Managing Language Pedagogy and Language Teaching Research.- Chapter 2: Language Acquisition: A Systemic View from Cognitive Linguistics.- Chapter 3: Teaching English Grammar for Communicative Purposes: A Systems Approach.- Chapter 4: Vocabulary Teaching: A Systemic Perspective.-  Chapter 5: Surveying the Landscape of Second Language Classroom Research.- Chapter 6: A Soft Systems Approach to Lifelong Learning.- Chapter 7: A “Softer” Instructional Systems Design for Language Pedagogy.- Chapter 8: Team Teaching and Team Learning: SSM applied to the team-taught classroom.- Chapter 9: Interaction in the Language Classroom: A Systems Approach.- Chapter 10: Systems Thinking: An ESP Genre Approach.

“A genre approach not only explains English learning goals, but also prepares students ‘with the skills to analyze genre text and to make sense of complex [dialog] realities.’ Most of the assumptions stated here should be valuable for … curriculum creators, teachers, and students in the liberal arts. It also presents a new vocabulary in language pedagogy and creates a new platform for language pedagogy theory. It should be recommended reading that university libraries have on their shelves.” (F. J. Ruzic, Computing Reviews, August 13, 2021)