Hi there and welcome to my site .
I started my working life as a lecturer in further education where I had to teach, amongst other things:
- Italian for musicians ;
- French for secretaries and caterers;
- German for businessmen;
- Russian for Post A level;
- English for non-anglophone student.And guess what? There were no suitable courses available so I had to start writing my own.
On my first day at work I sat beside a professor at lunch and was told he had just published a book about South America. I said how amazing it must have been to go to South America to do the research, and he said, ”Oh, I’ve never been there.” Not being the best at hiding my feelings I must have shown my disapproval as he never spoke to me again, but I vowed then and there that if I ever wrote anything I would make sure I would go in person and do my own research, which is why I have travelled so extensively.
Three children later I went into school teaching where I found that the existing courses did not cater for my pupils either, so I started writing my own again, but this time other people started showing an interest and eventually I ended up getting them published. I sat in a school desk in France and Germany when I was writing children’s books to hear the language people of the same age were actually hearing and speaking. I went to French speaking Canada, Guadeloupe and Réunion when I was writing about francophone countries. I went as a tourist to China when I was writing the Easy Learning Audio Mandarin course so that I would know what people said and what you would need to know and I tried to learn Greek to find out just how hard it is to be a learner again.
Over the years I have written lots of language learning materials, books, audio courses, videos and interactive courses for all levels and all age groups, and I am still writing and learning. In the course of my research I have also travelled widely and am happy to share with you some of my travel diaries and photos.