Professor Marcos Benevides wins prestigious British Council award
Jun 17, 2019
Benevides (second from left) and Valvona (right) (Photo by James Gifford-Mead)
Professor Marcos Benevides, of J. F. Oberlin University’s College of Arts and Sciences, and his co-author Chris Valvona, of Okinawa Christian University, were awarded the British Council’s 2019 Course Innovation prize at a ceremony in London on June 10. The pair received the award for their task-based English textbook, "Widgets Inc." The Course Innovation prize is one of five “ELTon awards,” given out annually for achievements in English Language Teaching, or ELT. Sometimes referred to as “the Academy Awards of English Language Teaching,” the ELTons this year attracted some 150 nominations from 45 countries.
“Just to be nominated was an honor,” said Benevides after returning to Japan, “so we were really surprised when we actually won.”
Benevides and Valvona started collaborating on educational materials more than a decade ago, when both were teaching in Okinawa. Their prize-winning "Widgets Inc." has students imagining themselves in a start-up, first as interns and finally as interviewees for full-time jobs. Along the way, they design products, organize focus groups, and plan marketing campaigns, all using English. Because the text focuses on tasks rather than on specific English structures and phrases, it can be used by students of all levels of ability, and it’s the first task-based textbook to win an ELTon award.
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