A teacher standing next to a chalkboard.

Thorn Learning designed, updated and produced a comprehensive suite of companion workbooks for the British Council’s TeachingEnglish open learning programme, creating reflective learning resources that help teachers extend, apply and personalise their professional development.

Project overview

TeachingEnglish open learning courses are supported by downloadable workbooks that encourage reflection, action planning and deeper engagement with course content. Between 2024 and 2026, Thorn Learning developed, refreshed and expanded this workbook library, supporting both established and newly commissioned courses, professional practice themes and evergreen themes.

The workbooks function as guided reflective journals, helping participants connect self-study course content with classroom practice, live events, community discussions and further professional reading. Each workbook includes practical activities, reflection tasks, action-planning opportunities and curated collections of supplementary resources.

The project also involved reviewing workbook formats, improving accessibility, refining templates and ensuring resources remained suitable for self-access learners, community participants and teachers working in low-bandwidth contexts.

How we worked with the client

Chris Thorn worked closely with the TeachingEnglish Open Learning team to evaluate existing workbook content, develop new workbook templates and curate additional learning resources for each course and theme. Jenny Bedwell supported proofreading and quality assurance activities, while additional design support was provided across the wider Thorn Learning team as required.

The project involved:

  • Reviewing and updating existing workbook content.
  • Developing completely new workbooks for newly commissioned courses.
  • Designing and maintaining workbook templates.
  • Curating additional reading, viewing and listening resources.
  • Aligning workbook content with course learning outcomes.
  • Supporting accessibility and EDI requirements.
  • Proofreading and quality assurance.
  • Publishing print-friendly, mobile-friendly and low-data PDF resources.
  • Supporting ongoing updates as courses evolved.

Services and standards

Workbook design and production, instructional design, educational content development, resource curation, proofreading, quality assurance and accessibility review.

Workbooks were developed to:

  • Support both self-study and tutored learning journeys.
  • Promote reflective professional development.
  • Be printer-friendly and mobile-friendly.
  • Function effectively in low-data environments.
  • Reflect EDI principles and diverse global teaching contexts.

Main outputs

TeachingEnglish course workbooks

  1. TeachingEnglish: Motivating activities for primary
  2. TeachingEnglish: Motivating learners
  3. TeachingEnglish: Classroom research
  4. TeachingEnglish: Inclusive classrooms
  5. TeachingEnglish: Gender in language education
  6. TeachingEnglish: Integrating digital technologies
  7. TeachingEnglish: How to teach speaking
  8. TeachingEnglish: How to teach grammar
  9. Teaching English to refugees and displaced learners
  10. TeachingEnglish: Helping teachers to learn
  11. TeachingEnglish: Assessing learning
  12. Teaching English in primary
  13. Teaching English through literature
  14. TeachingEnglish: Planning courses
  15. TeachingEnglish: Planning lessons
  16. TeachingEnglish: Managing learning
  17. TeachingEnglish: Digital competences for teaching English
  18. TeachingEnglish: English in the multilingual classroom
  19. TeachingEnglish: Climate action in language education
  20. TeachingEnglish: How to teach writing
  21. TeachingEnglish: How to teach vocabulary
  22. TeachingEnglish: Organising the classroom
  23. TeachingEnglish: Managing learners and resources
  24. TeachingEnglish: Classroom management for primary
  25. TeachingEnglish: Communication skills
  26. TeachingEnglish: How to teach listening
  27. TeachingEnglish: How to teach pronunciation
  28. TeachingEnglish: Understanding language systems
  29. TeachingEnglish: Focus on professional development
  30. TeachingEnglish: Building understanding through dialogue
  31. TeachingEnglish: How to teach reading
  32. TeachingEnglish: Digital citizenship and online skills
  33. TeachingEnglish: Creative resources for primary
  34. TeachingEnglish: How to adapt resources
  35. TeachingEnglish: Feedback and error correction
  36. TeachingEnglish: Project-based learning
  37. TeachingEnglish: Communicative tasks
  38. TeachingEnglish: Including learners’ languages
  39. TeachingEnglish: Climate action workbook

Professional practice workbooks

  1. Understanding my learners
  2. Assessing learning
  3. Planning lessons and courses
  4. Managing the lesson
  5. Understanding my context
  6. Understanding my professional identity

Evergreen theme workbooks

  1. Using multilingual practices
  2. Using inclusive practices
  3. Using 21st century / core skills
  4. Using digital technologies
  5. Knowing the subject

Learn more

Explore TeachingEnglish training courses.

Team and contributors

  • Workbook design, development, resource curation and production: Chris Thorn
  • Proofreading and quality assurance: Jenny Bedwell