“We don’t see things as they are, we see things as we are” ~ Anaïs Nin

It’s 2019. I am a second-year PhD student. I walk into a graduate course in Methods and Curriculum in TESOL (Teaching English to Students of Other Languages). This time I am not the student. I stand at the front of the classroom as the instructor. I say the following:

“Your languages and life experiences are welcome in this space—they all count! You are the experts in your own contexts. I am not here to lecture to you at the front of the classroom or to tell you what you must and must not do. I will present the current research in TESOL, and we will discuss the realities of taking up these concepts in your workspace. This will be a conversation.”

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