Behind the Scenes

Callan's ESL books are currently used in hundreds of schools across Canada and the United States and a few schools outside of North America. To find out what other teachers think about the books, click here. 

 

Nancy Callan has been teaching English as a Second Language in Vancouver, Canada for the past 20 years and writing books for the past 8 years.

She has taken language, linguistics and education courses at: Carleton University in Ottawa, Mount St. Vincent University in Halifax, University of Winnipeg, University of Mannheim (Germany), University of Manitoba and University of Western Ontario. Her degrees include B.A., B.Ed., and a PostBac.Certificate in Education(TESL).

Nancy is fluent in English, French and German and has conversational ability in Mandarin and beginner competency in Spanish and Russian.  Her knowledge of Canada comes from having traveled across Canada twice by car, worked in tourism in Nova Scotia, and lived in these Canadian cities: Halifax, Montreal, Ottawa, London, Winnipeg and Vancouver. 

What you see above is Nancy testing out one of the jigsaws from her books. Each book is also thoroughly field tested by a number of other experienced instructors, in classes ranging from CLBA benchmark 1-7. If you would like to be one of Nancy's field testers, please send her an email. 

The teacher's role is more that of a facilitator in these student-centred jigsaw lessons, as she circulates among groups to check comprehension and assist with pronunciation and intonation. With 5 minutes prep on the part of the teacher, students have up to 3 hours of 4-skills based materials that transform the classroom into a hub of communicative, cooperative activity.

This is David Callan, Nancy's father. If you recognize him, you might be surprised to learn that he's not actually a publisher's rep! He's a real estate agent in Ottawa, Canada in his regular 24/7 job, but he occasionally helps out at conference publisher displays for ESL Jigsaws.