following tips concentrate on what the class teacher can do to support learners’
effective use of the self-access centre.
1 Talk about the role of the centre throughout the course. Learners who
have not had access to such a centre before will be unsure how to use it and
may even be suspicious, if they think it is intended to replace ‘proper’
teaching. You can help them to see it as a valuable complement to the taught
course, and an excellent opportunity to develop independent learning skills.
2 Organize a proper introductory session. Many self-access centres have
orientation sheets which take learners around the different areas of the
centre, introducing them to various activities on offer. If your centre does not
have one, write one which is suitable for your particular class.
3 Encourage frequent use of the self-access centre. The best way to do this
is to make sure you know what’s in there. You can then guide learners to
appropriate—often short—activities, in response to issues arising in lessons.
4 Integrate self-access and class work. At appropriate intervals, ask learners
to do self-access work to support what is happening in class. Give them a
chance to feed back on what they did in the next lesson. In this way, you can
continually demonstrate what is available in the self-access centre, and give
the message that you find it of value.
5 Hold occasional classes in the centre. Many centres have a group work
room, and this can be an ideal base for a project-oriented lesson where
learners need to use the resources of the centre to find information for the
project and then present it appropriately. Such a lesson gives you the chance
to observe your learners using the centre, and to help them if they ask you to.
6 Encourage independent self-access use. When your learners are
comfortable with the centre, they will be in a strong position to use it to
follow individual learning agendas. You can help them to start to plan by
means of informal questionnaires about interests and perceived areas of
weakness, leading to suggestions for activities.
7 Give learners the opportunity to report back on independent use. One
good way of doing this is a learner diary, where they might mention, among
other things, what they did in the self-access centre. You can respond with
encouragement, and perhaps suggestions. This is a good way of helping
learners feel supported in their efforts.
8 Get learners to write reviews of self-access activities. These can then be
displayed in the classroom. They act as information for other class
members, and as continuing publicity for the centre. For example, to
encourage extended reading you could ask learners to choose from the
graded readers in the centre and to write comments on those they have read
for other learners in the class.
9 Encourage leisure activities, too. Many self-access centres include
magazines, videoed films and light reading, which could be seen by more
advanced learners as relaxation rather than work. Reaching the stage where58 IMPLEMENTING SELF-ACCESS