John Haycraft - Pioneering English Teacher

by Read Listen Learn

If you had been in Cordoba, Spain, in 1953, you could have witnessed the birth of a new global organisation and, it's not too much to say, a new philosophy in language teaching that took in not just radical new methodologies and approaches but came with a message of international peace and co-operation - starting from the simple idea that if more people around the world could speak each other's language, they could communicate their feelings and ideas to people from other cultures and countries, understand each other better and, so, live together on this planet without fighting.

The idea was John Haycraft's, a young upper-class Englishman. He had come to Spain to write a novel and was doing a little private English language teaching to help with his rent and bills. Cordoba, at that time, was very much a backwater city in a backwater country. Very few foreigners went there; which was hardly surprising when one recalls that Spain had had a terrible civil war from 1936 until 1939 and had then faded into obscurity and marginalisation when the Second World War began only a few months later. At the time Haycraft was in Cordoba, Spain was in the grip of a military dictator.

Haycraft found that there was a very strong demand, especially from young adults, for English classes and conversation. His time at boarding school and, then, as an army officer had left him with strong organisational abilities. He was also a man of considerable personal charm who could, in his early twenties, already speak fluent French, German and Italian, and he was rapidly picking up good Spanish.

He rented a small building and started the first truly modern language school. Naturally, there were still group and one-to-one classes and conversation circles but Haycraft added certain social assets to the school. There was now a lively cafe, a lending library and regular social events.

At the same time, Haycraft was doing some really innovative thinking about how to teach English (or practically any modern language) to speakers of other languages. Just one example of his new ideas was putting students in a class into pairs or small groups to speak to each other in English or work together on a written or listening exercise.

This new style of school and teaching methods was destined to take off and is, nowadays, almost universal. And this happened, mostly, because John Haycraft's vision became a reality and the little school in Cordoba, called 'International House', grew into a complex, global organisation with branches in at least forty countries and an unequalled reputation for the development of new teaching methodologies. Lots of people were involved in this success story but no-one really doubts that it was the creative thinking, high ideals, and sheer ability to organise people and things that John Haycraft lent to the project that made it all possible. He was a singular person, that's clear, but how had he become so? And, what had shaped his peace-loving internationalism?

John Stacpoole Haycraft was born in India on 11th December, 1926, the son of a British Indian Army officer. He didn't know his father long. Whilst training, one of the Indian soldiers shot Captain Haycraft dead. It is unsure whether the killing was a personal matter, a political act or just the result of mental problems. Whatever the reason may have been, John was left without a father and his mother was widowed.

The family returned to England but did not stay long, as the military widow's pension they depended on was too small. John's mother decided to move to the French and Italian Riviera. It was warmer and cheaper than England and, as a very good tennis player, she could add to the pension money by picking up cash prizes on the semi-professional tennis circuit, supplemented by some paid coaching.

And it was this lifestyle that made Haycraft a linguist and fervent internationalist from childhood on. He had German-speaking relatives in Switzerland, close by, and he learned the language well during summer visits. He lived in France and Italy and went to local schools so he soon spoke French and Italian perfectly. When he turned fourteen, his mother sent him and his brother, Colin, to a famous boarding school in England where the whole family had returned when the Second World War started.

When he finished school aged eighteen, the war was just ending and he was called up to the army where he was made a lieutenant.

His first assignment, just after the war had finished, was to guard German prisoners of war. He had been specially chosen for this work because of his fluent German. He noticed the many different reactions of the prisoners to their defeat and exchanged views with them.

Next, he was sent to Palestine, a British U.N. protectorate at the time, where, like most British servicemen there, he sympathised with the native Arabs in the face of growing persecution by Jewish colonists who, ironically, often came there to escape their own terrible persecution in Europe. All the more, he felt that greater understanding between different peoples was the key to world peace.

He was then sent to India, at that time just getting its independence from Britain. There was to be a Hindu Republic of India and an Islamic Republic of Pakistan but this caused dreadful race riots and ethnic cleansing between the Muslims and the Hindus in which about one million people were killed. Once again, the young John Haycraft saw with his own eyes how hatred and misunderstanding between peoples must be stopped.

After the army, he went to Oxford University and afterwards spent a year in the U.S.A. travelling and studying. And then, he found himself wondering what to do next. He wasn't really sure, but he knew that he wanted to continue living in foreign countries and he hoped to write a novel. Spain offered a low cost of living and the chance to learn a major, world language: Spanish, bringing the number of languages he could speak to five, including his native English.

After the school he set up in Cordoba had become quite a success, he went back to London (with his new wife) to set up a school there, which, in its turn, was also very successful. From this point on, building a solid team around him, Haycraft went on to set up 'International House' schools in cities around the world. And that process continues even today.

Haycraft also saw that, up until then, English as a foreign language had often been badly taught, either by opportunist 'world travellers' looking to pay for their overseas tours as they went (like Haycraft himself, at first). Or, by bored and boring retired school teachers turning the pages of dry text books in Victorian-style classrooms. So, he started he started a four-week, intensive teacher training course that became an engine for professionalism, innovation and experimentation, and remains the model on which almost all EFL teaching courses are still based today.

While all this was going on, Haycraft had started a family. His wife was Swedish and, of course, he soon became a very able speaker of the language - his sixth. He was also asked to teach the Finnish president 'good English' in a matter of weeks so that he could give a speech at the U.N. in New York. It is not clear whether the president learned really 'good' English in such a short time but the speech, at least, was seen as a political and linguistic triumph.

As Haycraft neared retirement age, he continued to travel the world, setting up new schools but also preparing to hand over the management of International House as his working life drew to a close. Not long after he had finally stopped working, he died of cancer in 1996. He was seventy years old. He left behind three children, his wife of more than fifty years, and a half-written autobiography which his son later completed and published.

Gifted linguist and teacher, man of international peace and understanding, writer, but, above all, a bringer together of people in friendship and co-operation, John Haycraft more than any other person, has made the teaching of English to foreign language students what it is today.