Betty Azar:
Grammar series author journeys from teaching to writing

Betty Azar, best-selling author of the Azar Grammar Series (published by Pearson Longman), reaches nearly a million people every year throughout the world. Her work is known as the first grammar "series" in the field of English as a Second Language (ESL).

Like many textbook authors, Azar is a teacher who evolved into a materials writer. The first edition of Understanding and Using English Grammar (UUEG), a text she worked on for seven years while teaching, was published in 1981. Within two years, she left teaching to devote her days to writing full time.

Following her first edition of UUEG, Basic English Grammar was published in 1984 and Fundamentals of English Grammar appeared in 1985. Two editions for each of her three books followed in the coming years, and she continues to work on creating new editions. Azar's student textbooks also have ancillaries, including self-study workbooks, chartbooks, test banks, a test generator on CD, teacher's guides, and a companion website, which includes The Grammar Exchange, where anyone can ask questions about grammar.

Along the way, she's learned a lot about being in business and the publishing industry. She formed a company, Azar Associates, a team of people to assist her in creating ESL grammar teaching materials for the classroom. Azar had a "eureka moment at the dentist's office" in December 1991, when she thought that if her dentist could afford an assistant that she could too.

"That's when I realized that I wasn't 'just an author' - that authors are in business," Azar said. "That was a turning point. Without help, I would have burned out. I think it's important for authors to realize the business side of their enterprise and hire help when they can."

It's also important for authors to re-invest in their "work," or as a publisher would call it, their "product," Azar said. "It took me years to get used to hearing my books called 'product.' At first I was incensed that someone thought my educational materials were crassly commercial. But I've learned a whole lot about the publishing industry since then."

Before she began writing textbooks, she spent the first half of her career - 16 years - as an ESL teacher. She began teaching ESL in 1965 at Iowa State University when available teaching materials in total could fit on two medium-length bookshelves. Forty years ago, ESL was just beginning to develop as a professional field, and publishers weren't paying much attention to that area of education.

"My ESL career has been largely focused on the creation of grammar-based materials, starting from the first day I taught. I had to answer provocative and insightful questions my students asked about how English works," Azar said. "A pattern began that first week of teaching that continued: I found out what my students wanted from their English class and provided materials and activities to meet their needs as best as I could.

"I have always said that I am most indebted to all of my students, that they had the greatest influence on my development as a teacher and a writer. I was constantly in search of what it was they needed from me to help them achieve their goals. And I was constantly inventing materials, as many ESL teachers do."

The materials she created for the classrooms became part of her textbooks, which were originally written to help prepare non-native speakers for academic work in American colleges and universities. Today they're also used in high schools and adult education programs, as well as English language classes in schools worldwide.

"Prior to my series, there was no grammar-based developmental skills series for beginning through upper-level ESL students," Azar said. "Teachers seem to like the books as much as the students, especially the clear explanations of how English works. In a way, my books have taught ESL grammar to a whole generation of teachers, since grammar has, unfortunately, largely disappeared from curricula for native speakers of English in U.S. school systems."

Azar's venture into textbooks wasn't based on a single decision; it was a process that evolved over time.

"Back in the 1970s, I kept hoping someone would publish the grammar materials I needed for my own classes," Azar said. "But it didn't happen, so year after year I kept writing new materials, almost always showing up for class with purple ditto ink on my chin or nose."

In 1977, a publisher's representative stopped by the English Department at St. Louis University, where she taught at the time. He had heard that she wrote a lot of her own materials, and asked her if she was interested in publication. She said, "But I'm just a teacher." And the rep said, "That's who writes textbooks."

With some trepidation, Azar agreed to try to write an actual textbook.

When she was working on her first book and teaching full time, she wrote from 4 or 5 a.m. until she had to go to work at 8 a.m. After she returned home from the university, she wrote from 5 to 10 p.m. "I had two full-time jobs - teaching and writing," she said. "Plus, I wrote on weekends. I loved it. I did that for more than two years. I poured everything I had into writing that first textbook."

Azar has been planning for retirement for several years, by getting her team in place. Currently, Azar, who lives on Whidbey Island, Washington, works only in the mornings and enjoys ample vacation time with her husband. After the current round of revisions, all of the textbooks will have an audio CD, a CD-ROM and PowerPoints for classroom use. A new website, independent of the publisher's site, is designed almost exclusively as a teacher-support site. Later, a student support section will be included. This new site will debut in March 2007.

— reported by Kim Seidel, 2006