Comments on: Six communist textbooks to learn English

By: esol courses in london

esol courses in london — Wed, 29 Jun 2011 13:50:17 +0000

This is really good im going to collect some old english and other stuff. i love it really.

By: silverfinger

silverfinger — Wed, 30 Mar 2011 10:26:16 +0000

6 Armed Forces English Broadcast (Republic of China 1965) is NOT a Communist book. This is a book from Taiwan

By: Maciek

Maciek — Tue, 21 Dec 2010 20:00:44 +0000

This is brilliant! I collect old English textbooks and dictionaries: I have some Polish handbooks and phrasebooks from the 1950s and 1960s which praise the Polish industry and encourage the reader to talk to English speakers about the joys of communism. “We Learn English” vol. 3 suggests that racism is rampant in Britain (as opposed to Poland, of course). By the way, I’ve also met Dr Śpiewak – his workshops are fascinating.

By: lclandfield

lclandfield — Sun, 05 Sep 2010 06:22:07 +0000

Wow. What a great poem! Loved it. Thanks for sharing. Would go very well with the first page of “English for the Small” above I think

By: Ekaterina

Ekaterina — Sat, 04 Sep 2010 06:10:23 +0000

Another Hello from Russia!
Lindsay, great collection! I also remember Starkov’s books though I didn’t use them for a long time – in early 90s teachers rather quickly switched to some more appropriate materials.
But I’ve got some pages from a soviet period book (dunno the name and the title unfortunately). It’s the part of the book with poems and songs – most of them are great for children (about animals, seasons etc.), but the first poem… Check it out:

http://picasaweb.google.ru/pazyaba/PortraitOfLenin?authkey=Gv1sRgCO_cneXCqOS-Vw#

I believe it perfectly demonstrates the spirit those children should have had…

By: Gordon Lewis

Gordon Lewis — Wed, 25 Aug 2010 04:09:56 +0000

I have a well preserved copy of English 5 as well as English 1-4. My favorite reading has to be “Lenin’s Birthday”, but C\”Cllective Fram” is a close second.

By: Eric Roth

Eric Roth — Tue, 27 Jul 2010 19:44:22 +0000

Inspiring examples of ideology in practice.

While I’ve seen some wonderful cartoons for teaching prepositions from an old Soviet Union, I don’t know the name or could never locate the entire book. Next time I visit Vietnam I will also hunt for some books. Thanks for the tip!

By: lclandfield

lclandfield — Fri, 09 Jul 2010 22:57:55 +0000

Hi there Blade,

I’m pretty sure that yes I will be coming through Prague. It would be good to catch up, I agree. Let’s get in touch closer to the date!

By: Blade

Blade — Fri, 09 Jul 2010 14:31:09 +0000

Hi Lindsay,

I see you’re coming to Czech in september so hope to see you when you are over here in Usti nad Labem though haven’t actually booked a place for the conference. Will you be coming through Prague?

By: Alexey

Alexey — Wed, 07 Jul 2010 10:26:40 +0000

Lindsay,
at school I studied English by Starkov’s textbook. It’s one and only good point for me was that the reading rules were explained really well for that time, and there was a decent system of language-oriented (as opposed to speech-oriented) exercises. The main EFL goal of those times was to teach students to read and understand written texts, but other forms of communication were not really considered necessary. However, the texts in Starkov’s textbook can now be read as one large comic strip. I think I still have two or three Starkov textbooks somewhere, different grades, as well as a couple of other old textbooks.
For seome reason the texts there remind me of London Linguaphone Course (God knows when it was made, but I had to listen to it at the university as recently as in early 1990-s), in which they said; “I am a man. My wife is a woman” and presented other wonderful scientific discoveries of the kind.
Alexey.