6.3 Why Teachers Consult Resources: Corpora, Sites & Colleagues

The testing focus: range and reasons

Cambridge's TKT Module 2 syllabus for this area is not a trivia quiz about software brand names. It tests two things together: the range of reference resources teachers can name, and the reasons they consult them while preparing. Items are usually a matching pattern: teacher problem or need → resource. If you only memorize a list of book types, you will stall when the stem describes a reason instead of a title. If you only memorize reasons, you will stall when two resources could look plausible until you match the job.

OpenExamPrep independent study drills that matching habit with original pairings. They are not copied from any trainer worksheet. Learn the reason in the left column, then the resource type that actually answers it.

Reasons teachers consult reference resources

These reasons appear again and again in paraphrase. Put them in your own words, then keep the pairing.

That table is the whole game in compact form. The rest of this section unpacks the resources that often sit on the right: corpora, sites, portals, forums, and colleagues — and the traps that swap a right reason for a wrong tool.

Language corpora

A language corpus (plural corpora) is a large, searchable collection of real spoken and/or written texts. Teachers consult corpora to:

• See how a word or structure is actually used
• Compare frequency (which form is more common in the data you searched)
• Gather collocation evidence (commit a crime versus do a crime)
• Pull authentic examples for an advanced class

A corpus is not a lesson plan and not a worksheet. You still decide what is teachable at B1. Frequency can tell you that a form is rare; it cannot tell you that your elementary group should see it tomorrow.

Classroom scenario: Lina is unsure whether I am liking appears in informal speech. She searches a spoken corpus, finds it is rare and marked, and decides not to teach it as a B1 target. That is a frequency / authentic use reason. She did not “find an activity.” She checked real use.

Trap: Googling present perfect and taking the first worksheet as a corpus. A worksheet is teaching material. A corpus is attested language data. Search-engine hits mix blogs, PDFs, ads, and unpaid activity dumps. They do not give you a designed sample of the language, frequency counts you can trust, or collocation evidence. If the stem says the teacher wants authentic examples or frequency, choose a corpus (or a corpus-based dictionary), not a random download.

A second, quieter trap is treating a coursebook reading text as if it were a balanced corpus. Coursebook texts are written to teach. They can still be useful models; they are not frequency evidence.

ELT websites and publisher portals

An ELT website (activity banks, teacher magazines, professional blogs) is useful when the need is an activity, a worksheet, a recording, or a story — not when the need is to establish the form. Quality varies. Prefer sites that name a source or come from a known publisher, then still check language facts in a grammar or dictionary if you will teach them as targets.

A publisher portal often provides audio, extra worksheets, and keys tied to a coursebook. Teachers consult portals to find a recording or find a worksheet that matches the unit they are already teaching.

Classroom scenario: Ben needs the Unit 4 listening file for homework catch-up and one extra worksheet on the same functional language. He logs into the publisher portal for that course. That is a recording / worksheet reason. He does not use the portal as a corpus, and he does not use it as a pedagogical grammar.

Classroom scenario: Farah teaches young learners and needs a short story for a 20-minute slot on clothes vocabulary. She uses the publisher's young-learner story bank (or a graded-reader extract the school owns), not a corpus search for the word jacket, and not Wikipedia's article on textiles.

Professional forums and colleagues

A colleague is the right resource when you need a second opinion: would you teach both uses tomorrow, or only result-now? Is this roleplay too face-threatening for this class? Did last term already cover Have you ever…? Colleagues also share local knowledge the books cannot see.

Trap: Asking a colleague instead of checking a reliable grammar when the question is form. If you cannot remember whether news is uncountable, a colleague's shrug is slower and less reliable than a pedagogical grammar or a learners' dictionary. Matching rule: form or use → grammar reference; second opinion on a lesson decision → colleague.

Professional forums sit between websites and colleagues: many opinions, uneven reliability. Use them for ideas and shared problems, then verify language facts in a grammar or dictionary. A forum thread is not a corpus and not a pedagogical grammar.

Classroom scenario: Ines has a complaints roleplay that asks students to criticise a named local shop. She asks a colleague whether that will embarrass regulars in this small town. That is a second opinion on appropriacy of the task, not a form check. Separately, she still looks up make a complaint in a collocation dictionary. Two reasons, two resources.

Wikipedia is not a pedagogical grammar

Trap: Treating Wikipedia as a pedagogical grammar. An encyclopedia article on “perfect aspect” may be written for general readers or for people who already know linguistic terms. It will not reliably give you typical learner problems, graded marker sentences, or practice ideas. For form and use in class, open a pedagogical grammar. For a content fact (what a public holiday is) a general site may be fine — that is background knowledge, still not “grammar for teachers.”

The same trap appears with random blogs titled Everything about the present perfect. A blog can be a useful activity source if that is your reason. It is a poor form source unless you verify the explanation.

Typical L1 errors, stories, recordings: keep the reasons separate

It is easy to flatten every problem into “look it up.” TKT items punish that flattening.

• Typical L1 error: Diego's I have 25 years is not solved by a corpus frequency list of have. He needs error notes or a teacher's-grammar usage note on be for age, perhaps plus a colleague who teaches the same L1 group.
• Stories for young learners: Farah's clothes story is not a pronunciation check and not a corpus job. She needs a YL story source.
• Recording or worksheet: Ben's portal visit is logistics for this course, not authentic-frequency research.
• Activities for a weak area: If the class cannot ask Have you ever…? after the book exercise, a resource pack or ELT activity bank is the reason-matched tool — after you have already checked the form in a grammar if you were unsure.

Original trainer-style matching set

Use this set as practice. Cover the right column and name the resource from the need.

None of those eight lines is a copied trainer-worksheet item. They exist so you can feel the need → resource click the module wants.

The diagram below is the same matching logic as a flow: start from the need, not from the tool you happen to have open in a browser tab.

Exam-day discipline

1. Underline the reason in the stem (form, pronunciation, authentic examples, activities, L1 error, stories, second opinion, recording/worksheet).
2. Eliminate any resource that answers a different reason. A corpus does not give you a YL story. A colleague is a weak form authority. Wikipedia is not a pedagogical grammar. A worksheet dump is not a corpus.
3. If two resources both look possible, pick the one that matches the job in the stem, not the one that is “more modern.”

OpenExamPrep publishes this as independent teacher-training study for TKT Module 2. Use official Cambridge pages for registration and the current module overview; use this chapter to practise the matching pattern itself.

Reading the diagram against the traps

Start at Teacher need, not at the browser. If the need is form, the arrow goes to a pedagogical grammar, even if a colleague is sitting next to you and even if Wikipedia has a long page on the structure. If the need is authentic examples or frequency, the arrow goes to a corpus, even if the first Google worksheet looks convenient. If the need is a second opinion about timing or face-threatening roleplay, the arrow goes to a colleague, not to a frequency list. If the need is a story for seven-year-olds, the arrow goes to a YL source, not to a corpus concordance of once upon a time. The diagram is a matching key. The traps are what happens when you skip the question in the middle diamond.