Page 329 - Beyond Methods

Afterword 317
never heard before, the creative use of the alphabet of pedagogic thought, I hope, will make it possible for you to design micro- strategies that you have never designed before.
The possibilities this book opens up are unlimited; they present you with challenges as well as opportunities. Just reading this book, even if you have done some of the reflective tasks and carried out some of the exploratory projects, may not be sufficient to make you a strategic thinker and a strategic teacher. What will make you a strategic thinker and teacher is a conscious, continual, and con- structive engagement that prompts you to reflect, review, and rein- vent what you do in the classroom. The macrostrategic framework, then, is not a body of knowledge to be learned to satisfy your intel- lectual curiosity; rather, it is a set of tools to be used to develop your own theory of practice.
Developing your own theory of practice requires patience and perseverance. It does not develop instantly before your eyes, as film develops in a Polaroid camera. It evolves over time, through deter- mined effort. It involves the development of a level of knowledge, skill, attitude, and autonomy that is necessary to give you the con- fidence and the competence to embrace a self-directed pedagogy. Above all, it involves the ability to critically engage your own beliefs and values, understandings and assumptions, and change them if necessary.
Paving the Path as You Walk It
This book does not represent a final product; rather, it represents a starting point, both for me and for you. For me, it represents my ini- tial attempt to come to grips with the limitations of a method-based pedagogy and with the challenges of a postmethod pedagogy. Much work remains to be done. This book does not give answers to many of the doubts and uncertainties that we all face in the practice of our everyday teaching. However, I would be happy and satisfied if your response to this book goes something like this: “Before I read this book, I had a lot of doubts and uncertainties about language learning and teaching. After reading this book, I still have those doubts and uncertainties, but on a much higher level of cognition!”
For you as well, this book is a starting point in the sense that all you have here are raw materials necessary to lay a solid foundation on which you can begin to construct a postmethod pedagogy. But,