Teaching English as a Foreign Language (EFL) in a tertiary-level context has recently faced the necessity of innovating and reorienting the tasks, focusing on essential language and content-related aspects. Such innovation has been reflected in the type of tasks proposed in previous research in BA degrees such as Early Childhood Education, whose language needs are mostly oriented toward the school context and the acquisition of specific vocabulary and critical thinking skills. In a recent study (Garcés-Manzanera, 2021a), a new type of education-oriented Reading-into-Speaking (RiS) task was proposed, framed within the concept of integrated tasks. The connection between these two skills favors the activation of previous linguistic structures and the further development of higher-level cognitive skills such as critical thinking. Additionally, the educational component included within this RiS task ensures that future preschool teachers are fully cognizant of the different challenges of their profession (e.g. learning about how gardening with very young EFL learners may help develop mathematical skills). Thus, the present paper intends to shed light on how the implementation of RiS tasks may be perceived by undergraduate students. To achieve this, an EFL group of Early Childhood Education undergraduates received practical lessons where these RiS tasks were on a bi-weekly basis during a nine-month period. Afterward, their perceptions were gathered in a survey which was further analyzed. In summary, findings indicated that undergraduate students regarded the task as a positive tool for expanding their vocabulary in education, and for developing cooperative learning skills. Nevertheless, differing views were expressed on the efficiency of RiS tasks for speaking skills.

Authentic audio-visual materials have been stated to be a highly helpful resource when teaching English as a foreign language (EFL) since they allow English students to enhance their linguistic and intercultural competences while stimulating them to learn. Nonetheless, academic production on this field is fragmentary since researchers have mainly examined the University context and they have centred on learners’ production. Indeed, this parallels its presence in the classroom because EFL instructors hardly use audio-visual materials. As revealed by several scholars, the major reason for this is EFL teachers’ lack of pedagogical training and expertise on the use of audio-visual tools. Consequently, the aim of this study is twofold: (i) to fill in research gaps by studying the high school context and by focusing on teachers, and (ii) to provide pedagogical training on the exploitation of audio-visual resources. Thus, a qualitative case-study was carried out, and the following procedures were followed. Firstly, an active secondary school EFL instructor was interviewed in order to examine her use of authentic audio-visual materials and her views on this tool. Afterwards, she was asked to analyse a film-based teaching unit which reflects the advantages of these materials and which shows how to properly introduce audio-visual resources into the English classroom. Finally, the teacher was interviewed again, discussing the film-based teaching unit she had examined. In the initial interview, the participant described a minimal and vague use of audio-visual materials whereas, in the final interview, she displayed a more holistic understanding of these resources and a willingness to update her teaching practices in this respect, which highlights the vital role teacher training plays on the path towards a more innovative and effective education.

Torrano-Guillamón, Cascales-Martínes, and Carrillo-García (2019) argue in favor of the use of literature as a resource for the teaching of a foreign language. One of the reasons behind this is that literature is authentic material that provides students with cultural and language enrichment, as well as personal involvement. Different kinds of texts can help the teacher when implementing didactic proposals, and among the different types of written texts, literary texts are an alternative resource to the classic textbook, since they can be used to plan different innovative activities that serve to practice the oral and written language in a balanced way, which contributes to foster students' communicative competence. A didactic proposal is presented, based on the book The Halloween Tree written by Ray Bradbury, implemented in the subject “Inglés para la Educación Infantil” a subject that is taken in the “Doble Grado de Educación Infantil y Primaria” of the University of Murcia. In this proposal, the undergraduate students carried out activities related to a literature workshop in English, in which they had to read the proposed work, write creatively, and listen to the audiobook of the work and the podcasts created by their classmates while working on vocabulary about Halloween and past tenses.

The European Portfolio for Student Teachers of Languages (EPOSTL; Newby et al., 2007) “is a tool for reflection and self-assessment of the didactic knowledge and skills necessary to teach languages” (https://www.ecml.at/ECML-Programme/Programme2008-2011/UsingtheEuropeanPortfolioforStudentTeachersofLanguages/tabid/4374/Default.aspx). The Methodology section corresponds to the syllabus of the 4295 course of the English as a Foreign Language (EFL) branch in the Teacher Training Master at the University of Murcia, Spain: how to teach the four skills (listening, reading, speaking and writing) and culture. Accordingly, the EPOSTL was used in an exploratory, innovative didactic proposal aimed at developing student teachers’ reflection about the teacher competences related to such syllabus that they will need to develop in their future teaching praxis. A mixed-method research design was implemented in the three-week intensive 4295 course of January 2020. Nine student teachers took part in the full cycle of data collection. It comprised the completion of an initial and a final questionnaire, respectively before the beginning and at the end of the course. Both of them asked the student teachers to write with their own words which teacher competences they believed that in-service EFL teachers must master concerning the teaching of the four skills and culture. The final questionnaire also included two sections with Likert-scale questions, where the student teachers had to rank the usefulness of the EPOSTL for their training. The open-ended answers were analysed through content analysis. Descriptive statistics were computed for the Likert-scale responses. Results show that the student teachers wrote more distinct EPOSTL competences in the final questionnaire, which somehow reveals a certain pattern of augmented awareness of such competences as mediated by the development of the 4295 course. This explanation seems to be supported by the quantitative data. The results are encouraging and point to the EPOSTL as a useful tool to attain the aims of this exploratory proposal and to pursue further improved didactic innovative actions.