Course Instructors
The methods course features twelve faculty representing different foreign languages (Arabic, ESL, French, German, Hebrew, Russian, Spanish). They focus on best practices and innovative methods in three major areas of language teaching:
| Skills | Language | Classroom |
|---|---|---|
| Listening Dr. Mahmoud al-Batal |
Vocabulary Dr. Nancy Guilloteau |
The Language Learner Dr. Elaine Horwitz |
| Speaking Dr. Carl Blyth |
Grammar Dr. Rafael Salaberry |
Classroom Management Dr. Esther Raizen |
| Reading Dr. Janet Swaffar Dr. Katie Arens |
Pragmatics Dr. Dale Koike |
Technology Dr. Orlando Kelm |
| Writing Dr. Zsuzsanna Abrams |
Culture Dr. Thomas Garza |
Assessment Dr. Lia Plakans |
Instructor Biographies
Dr. Zsuzsanna Abrams (Writing) is Associate Professor in the Department of Germanic Studies at the Univeristy of Texas at Austin. In addition to teaching language courses and graduate courses on foreign language pedagogy, she has been the language program director in Germanic Studies.
Dr. Mahmoud Al-Batal (Listening) is an Associate professor of Arabic in the Department of Middle Eastern Studies at the University of Texas at Austin, and Director of the UT Arabic Flagship Program. He is specialized in Teaching Arabic as a Foreign Language (TAFL) and is developer of Aswaat Arabiyya, Arabic web-based materials for listening.
Dr. Katherine Arens (Reading) is Professor of Germanic Studies at the University of Texas at Austin. Arens has co-authored two books on reading in a second language: Remapping the Foreign Language Curriculum: A Multiple Literacies Approach and Reading for Meaning: An Integrated Approach to Language Learning.
Dr. Carl Blyth (Speaking) is Associate Professor of French Linguistics in the Department of French and Italian and the Director of the Texas Language Technology Center (TLTC) at the University of Texas at Austin. Together with colleagues, he developed an online reference grammar of French (Tex's French Grammar), and a multimedia-based first year French program (Français interactif).
Dr. Thomas Jesús Garza (Culture) is a University Distinguished Teaching Associate Professor in the Department of Slavic and Eurasian Studies and the Director of the Texas Language Center at the University of Texas at Austin. He teaches Russian language at all levels, applied linguistics and pedagogy, and courses on contemporary Russian culture.
Dr. Nancy Guilloteau (Vocabulary) is the Language Program Director in the Department of French and Italian at the University of Texas at Austin. She specializes in curriculum development and graduate instructor training and supervision.
Dr. Elaine Horwitz (The Language Learner) is Professor of Curriculum and Instruction and director of the Graduate Program in Foreign Language Education at the University of Texas at Austin. She specializes in Second Language Acquisition and Teacher Education, and is widely published in the areas of foreign language anxiety, learner beliefs about language learning, and language learning strategies.
Dr. Orlando R. Kelm (Technology) is Associate Professor of Spanish and Portuguese Linguistics in the Department of Spanish and Portuguese. A pioneer in foreign language technology, Dr. Kelm is the head content developer for Spanish Proficiency Exercises and Tá Falado: Brazilian Portuguese for Speakers of Portuguese.
Dr. Dale Koike (Pragmatics) is Professor of Spanish and Portuguese Linguistics at the University of Texas at Austin, and specializes in pragmatics and discourse analysis, and second language acquisition.
Dr. Lia Plakans (Assessment) is an Assistant Professor of Foreign Language and ESL Education in the College of Education at the University of Texas at Austin. Her specialization is language assessment and second language reading and writing.
Dr. Esther Raizen (Classroom Management) is an Associate Professor of Middle Eastern Studies at UT Austin. She specializes in Hebrew language pedagogy and computer assisted language instruction.
Dr. Rafael Salaberry (Grammar) is Professor of Spanish Applied Linguistics and Second Language Aquisition at the University of Texas at Austin. Since 2006 he has been the Director of the Language Progam in the Department of Spanish and Portuguese.
Dr. Janet Swaffar (Reading) is a Professor of Germanic Studies at the University of Texas at Austin, with a dual specialization in German literature (nineteenth and twentieth centuries) and applied linguistics, especially reading theory. Swaffar has coauthored two books on reading in a second language: Remapping the Foreign Language Curriculum: A Multiple Literacies Approach and Reading for Meaning: An Integrated Approach to Language Learning.