David C Williams
Director,
GLOBAL LISTENING CENTRE
Mr Williams is a famous name among students in Asia for teaching English language & Listening Skills. Mr Williams is currently employed as a full-time lecturer in EAP (English for Academic Purposes) at the University of Wales Trinity Saint David (UWTSD), Swansea campus, SW Wales, UK.
Mr Williams well-qualified, highly experienced, and accomplished English language professional. Qualifications include two postgraduate awards, MA (TEFL) and RSA Diploma (TEFL). A 30 year career, involving the testing and teaching of 1000’s of students.
Mr Williams provides English language and study skills support for international students.
Research areas include the following:-
– Corpus linguistics
– Collocation
– The AWL (Academic Word List).
Innovations introduced at UWTSD Swansea have included the creation of the following
– An Independent Study Area (ISA) on Moodle to help both home and international students via a one-stop shop available 24/7 of more than 20,000 resources.
– An English Language testing instrument called SMELTAR (Swansea Metropolitan English Language Test of Academic Readiness) that ran successfully from 2011 -2015. UWTSD Swansea campus was formerly known as Swansea Metropolitan University.
– Inclusion of collocation as a measurement of lexical depth in the SMELTAR (not included in the industry standard IELTS exam) – IELTS is the International English Language Testing System
– Inclusion of AWL as a measurement of receptive academic lexis in the SMELTAR (not included in the industry standard IELTS exam)
– Creation of faculty specific corpora (unique language databases)
– Creation of the Student Essays corpus (SEC) is an ongoing project as I am involved in testing students every academic year so accumulate more and more essays. Each essay is a standard IELTS task 2 type so only 250 words in length and is assessed using the IELTS guidelines. To date, I have roughly 200,000 words and about 600 essays. The corpus is ideal for creating lists of student written errors.
– Creation of a corpus of spoken errors. This is an ongoing project as I am involved in testing students every academic year leading to the accumulation of an increasing number of SKYPE interviews. Each interview follows the IELTS protocol and is assessed using IEELTS guidelines. To date, I have errors logged from roughly 300 interviews so the corpus is ideal for creating lists of student spoken errors.
Main duties include the following
– Provision of English Language support and Study Skills lectures for international students
– Provision of 1-1 tutorials with extra support for internationals student on a PhD
– Online support for home as well as international students via my ISA on Moodle
– Teaching TEFL skills to home students
– Testing international students speaking skills online (using IELTS protocols) via SKYPE
– 2011 – 2015: Marking SMELTAR essays (using IELTS assessment protocols)
– 2011 – 2015: Collating and sending all marks for the 4 language skills to Academic Registry
Have worked overseas (Hong Kong) for the following organisations:
– The British Council (Operates in over 100 countries, HK being the largest centre)
– HKMA (Hong Kong Management Association)
– CSTDI (Civil Service Training and Development Institute)
Have trained staff from the following clientele
– HKPF (Hong Kong Police Force)
– BAT (British and American Tobacco)
– Cathay Pacific
– Marks and Spencer.
Summary of types of English language courses written and directed over 30 years
– English for Academic Purposes (EAP) international students at UWTSD at all 4 campuses of Swansea campus, Carmarthen, Lampeter, and London
– Pre-sessionals at UWTSD Swansea
– Business Communication (undergraduate degree module) at UWTSD Carmarthen campus
– Discourse Analysis (undergraduate degree module) at UWTSD Carmarthen campus
– TEFL training for…
…postgraduate home students at UWTSD Swansea campus
…undergraduate home students at UWTSD Carmarthen and Lampeter campuses (which constitutes 3 undergraduate degree modules as explained above)
– Corporate English (to staff from BAT, Cathay Pacific, Marks & Spencer)
– General English (with the British Council)
– Exams English (with the British Council)
– Phonology (as a stand-alone course) with HKMA students
Additional information
Member of BALEAP (The British Association of Lecturers in English for Academic Purposes)
Member of SWWCC (South West Wales Chamber of Commerce)
Musician, singer-songwriter, composer, arranger and producer
– Partner in a music recording studio in Hong Kong (MEGATRACK STUDIOS), producing jingles for TV and Radio from 1995 – 1997
– Produced original music for the British Council for their in-house Audio Visual Production Unit (AVPU) from 1991-1995
– Member of ISA (International Songwriters Association)