TEFL Mythodology #3 - The Sexical Approach

The Sexical Approach is popularly believed to be a cunning method for both teaching foreign languages and seducing students, and was developed by an unemployed EFL teacher called Michael Lewdis in the 1990s. This technique has enjoyed great popularity in EFL schools all over the world, and was thought to have been responsible for the large increase in sexually-transmitted diseases that swamped Europe in the later years of the decade.

The basic concept on which this approach rests is the idea that EFL teachers enjoy shagging more than teaching, so if the latter can be exploited as a route to the former, all will be well in the classroom. Therefore, in the Sexical Approach, instruction focuses on carefully chosen fixed expressions that occur frequently in dialogues, and which Lewdis claims often result in a legover. The teaching of chunks and set phrases are therefore cunningly skewed to be able to reflect a sexual agenda, and then become common in the student's English, resulting in frequent sexual encounters for EFL teachers, both male and female.

In his review of the approach, Dieter Kranz wrote "The Sexical Approach can be summarized in a few words: bunk-ups and blow-jobs. The language consists not merely of traditional grammar and vocabulary, but often of multi-word prefabricated chunks that can be employed in a wide range of sexual situations." For example, the simple question 'Where is your toilet?' can be given a sexual purpose, especially if the speaker wishes to 'clean up' after a steamy session on the couch. Equally, the word 'toilet' can be replaced with 'bedroom' or 'condom', and a whole range of legover opportunities arise for the fortunate EFL teacher.