Foreign Language Courses:

The Callan Method teaches English in a quarter of the normal time

Brief Outline of the Callan Method

Questions and answers

The classes revolve around quick-fire oral question and answer work based on a course book. Each question practises a particular word, expression or grammatical item. The teacher will ask a question at high speed and then help the student to make a sentence in response to the question by prompting and ‘feeding’ the answer. Teachers correct the students when errors are made. Callan lessons are highly focused as the students are listening to the teacher at all times, speaking as much as possible and the atmosphere is busy and demanding.

Speed

Speed is important in the classroom. We want the student to break the habit of translating into their mother tongue before speaking and speed denies them the time to do so. This method also exposes students to the speed of natural native speech. The prompting and feeding is, again, to prevent translation and maintain fluency of speech.

Correction

All errors are corrected in the Callan method. Correction is at the moment of error rather than delayed feedback. Students must repeat the correct form before continuing with their sentence.

Not answering questions

We are not teaching people to answer questions, but to make full sentences, to practise target words and expressions in a structured controlled way. We aim to develop accuracy, fluency, and the ability to understand and think in English.