Jon Hird Author

Written by: Jon Hird divides his time between writing ELT materials and teaching in Oxford UK, where he has taught for about twenty years now. During this time Jon has also taught in Paris and FYR Macedonia. He has been involved in several ELT courses, including co-writing two levels of the Move coursebook series, writing and contributing to various components of Inside Out and New Inside out, including the Inside Out Grammar Companions, and writing resource material for the business course In Company. Jon has also written and contributed to a number of ELT grammar books, resource books and Internet-based writing projects. He enjoys the challenge, in both his writing and teaching, of trying to make classroom activities as meaningful, engaging and as enjoyable as possible. He particularly enjoys giving talks and workshops in different countries and meeting the teachers and students who may, or may not, use his books. Sue Kay studied at Birmingham University, unaware that it would later be the home of the prestigious Bank of English and one of the first places to carry out corpus-based research into the English language. Sue’s subject was French, and when she graduated, she didn't go straight into teaching. Sue did a post-graduate course at the Oxford College of F.E. and became a bilingual secretary on the Cote d'Azur in France. Sue married in Vallauris, within sight of Picasso's 'Man and Goat' statue, and her son William was born there too, giving him the double advantage of having a very glamorous place of birth (Cannes) and growing up bilingual. Sue moved to Lyon where she started teaching English after the customary four-week TEFL course at IH in London. She loved Lyon and worked alongside people who went on to set up one of the most impressive and innovative schools she knew - English International. After meeting fellow co-author Vaughan Jones, they began writing the Inside Out series together. Peter Maggs started out as a graphic designer and only got into ELT as a means to an end. He wanted to see more of the world and teaching English seemed a good way of doing that. He didn't expect to get hooked. But that was a long time ago and since then Peter has taught in France, Italy, Brazil, Japan and the UK. While he was in Japan Peter started up an English Language school, which proved to be an incredible experience.