The image in ELT : an introduction

Abstract

The vast majority of language teachers use images in their classroom. In today’s increasingly visual world, it is difficult to imagine the language classroom without coursebook images, photographs, paintings, cartoons, picture books, comics, "flashcards, wallcharts, YouTube videos, films, student-created artwork and media, and so on. However, despite the ubiquity of images in language teaching, we need to ask whether images are being approached merely as an aid or support, or as a significant component of communicating in a foreign language, and as a means of fostering students’ communicative competence and creativity. In order to answer this question, we need to examine how images have been approached in resource books and coursebooks.