NEWSLETTER OF THE AILA SCIENTIFIC COMMISSION ON LEARNER AUTONOMY IN LANGUAGE LEARNING

 

Issue 9: July 2003

 

Edited by Andy Barfield (Chuo University, Japan) & Richard Pemberton (Hong Kong University of Science & Technology)

 

Message from the Editors

Message from Terry Lamb


Message from the Editors

 

Welcome to the 2003 Newsletter for the AILA SC on Learner Autonomy in Language Learning!

 

In this newsletter we have encouraged people to share networking news about their interests and work in developing learner autonomy. We would like to thank everybody who has contributed to this newsletter, and Carra Kee for getting it all onto the web. We hope that you enjoy reading such an international issue!

 

Best wishes

 

Andy and Richard

 

andyb@tamacc.chuo-u.ac.jp                   lcrpem@ust.hk

 

 

Message from Terry Lamb

 

Dear colleagues around the world,

 

The last few months since AILA 2002 have been busy ones as we have been organising our responsibilities as convenors of the Scientific Commission as well as bringing new faces onto the team. You will remember that the new convenors elected at the AILA Conference in Singapore are Ana Maria Barcelos (Universidade Federal de Viçosa, Brazil), Richard Pemberton (Hong Kong University of Science and Technology) and myself (Terry Lamb, University of Sheffield, UK). However, we are now able to update you so that you all know what's going on and who to contact about the different areas of work.

 

In no particular order, these are the various aspects of work:

 

  1. Maintaining an updated membership list - this will be done by Ana Maria Barcelos. Please contact Ana Maria at scautonomy@ufv.br if there are any changes to your email address or location. Also, if you meet anyone who might be interested in joining the SC, please let them know how.
  2. Newsletter - we shall be taking this in turn over the next three years. Richard Pemberton and Andy Barfield have put the first one together. This will be a good way of disseminating your activities, and one of our aims is to encourage sharing of more localised activity on an international level.
  3. AUTO-L - Many thanks to Anita Wenden for her work on this over the years. I hope she will still remain an active contributor to discussions. Phil Benson (English Center, University of Hong Kong) and I will be putting together a programme soon, starting with further discussion on the symposium theme from Singapore. If anyone has any suggestions for discussions, please let me and Phil know: T.Lamb@sheffield.ac.uk or pbenson@hkucc.hku.hk.
  4. SC website - If you have visited the website recently, you'll have noticed that it's moved from New Zealand to Hong Kong and can be found at the following address: http://lc.ust.hk/~ailasc/ . Again, many thanks to colleagues in New Zealand for hosting this over the years. At the moment the website is being redesigned by Jonathan Shaw from the Asian Institute of Technology in Bangkok with the site being locally managed by Richard Pemberton from the Language Center at the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology.
  5. LAPI (Learner Autonomy Project Inventory) - Hayo Reinders from the University of Auckland, New Zealand, has very kindly offered to take over this aspect of SC work, and to find new ways of encouraging greater sharing of research projects and theses. Contact Hayo at hayo@hayo.nl with details of your research project or thesis.
  6. Publishing papers - William Savage and I will be editing the papers presented in the SC Symposium in Singapore. We hope also to include responses to these papers both from the symposium itself and from AUTO-L discussions. We also hope to publish a second set of papers from AILA, taken from the many contributions on the theme of learner autonomy. If you presented a paper in Singapore and would like to have it included, please let me know: T.Lamb@sheffield.ac.uk
  7. Liaison with AILA will be shared between the three of us, as will plans to make closer links with learner autonomy organisations around the world and to support local activity.
  8. AILA Symposium 2005 - Ana, Richard and I will all work on this and will be consulting members on possible themes in the near future.

 

That's about all for now. There will be further mailings relating to individual aspects of the above, but we would appreciate any initial feedback or suggestions on any of the areas.

 

Many thanks to those of you who have offered to work with us. Any further offers of help are always appreciated!

 

All the best

Terry, Ana and Richard