Skip navigation

Introduction

In the modern world useful foreign language skills have become an absolute necessity for most people: effective and creative language use is of utmost importance for everybody’s life and career.  The ability to speak and use foreign languages in a variety of situations is of special importance for sports teachers and students of sports science, because many of them need to be successful in an increasingly international learning and work environment.

Consequently, in our fast-paced world  it has become increasingly important for sports teachers and students to learn languages effectively, with the ideas of lifelong learning and meaningful specialist language use in mind.

The teaching material, entitled English for Sports Teachers focuses on a wide range of sports topics and vocabulary, combined with relevant practice material. Thus the teaching material integrates content and context into language learning.

The teaching material comprises 15 units. The first unit is a language test. Its results serve as guidelines for further work and language development. Language learners with lower scores are advised to supplement thse units with additional grammar and Use of English materials.  Two units offer materials for teaching sports skills, while two other units introduce learners to the basics of sports anatomy, sports psychology and the physiology of sports. Units V- XIV offer an overview of different types of sports, sports venues, sports organizations and sports events.  The last unit is an end-of-the-course comprehensive test, which serves to assess language improvement. By doing it learners can check how successfully they have acquired the individual vocabulary items and have improved their language skills. Vocabulary acquisiton is assited by a  useful specialized vocabulary of words printed in bold throughout the reading materials.

The lessons themselves are literally colourful and they feature a lot of pictures and photos; they all serve as prompts to compare and contrast, or, simply, to discuss a topic. Quizzes and mini-tests serve the purposes of revision or self-check.

All the learning materials have been digitalized in order to offer a more enjoyable learning experience and to make it possible for learners to work on their own as well. On the other hand, all the topics and tasks can be used in the classroom as well, and all the materials can be adapted by teachers to pair work or group work.

By compiling these materials and offering them to sports teachers, students of sports science,  other specialists of this discipline and all those who are interested in this area of studies, the authors would like to wish  an enjoyable and successful language learning experience.

Szeged, 2015

The Authors