Marcos Benevides

 

Marcos is the publisher and series editor of Atama-ii Books. He is also the author of Immortal Empire, an upcoming title in the series. His previous projects have included co-authoring the critically acclaimed coursebook Widgets: A task-based course in practical English (Pearson, 2008), and the multiple award-winning reading coursebook Fiction in Action: Whodunit (Abax, 2010).

Whodunit was awarded the ESU Duke of Edinburgh English Book Award in 2010 and the British Council “ELTon” Award for Innovation in 2011. In the ELT biz, that’s a bit like winning the Academy Award and the Golden Globe for best picture!

Marcos is also the series editor for the Choose Your Own Adventure graded reader series from McGraw-Hill Education Asia.

Marcos is an assistant professor and coordinator of the reading and writing curriculum at J.F. Oberlin University’s English Language Program in Tokyo. His research and professional interests include task-based language learning, content-based learning, teaching literature in EFL contexts, materials writing, and extensive reading. He has presented on these topics in Japan and internationally, often as a featured or keynote speaker.

Once upon a time, Marcos was an ESL learner himself. His family moved from Brazil to Canada when he was eleven years old, which is when he started to learn English. He did this largely through reading ‘fun’ literature, such as comic books, the original Choose Your Own Adventure series, and science fiction classics, as well as through role-playing games such as Dungeons and Dragons. He eventually moved on to study more ‘serious’ things at university, but those early influences have had a deep impact in his teaching and writing career.

Marcos passionately believes that successful learners must first have fun learning; this is very much reflected in the types of materials that he creates. The Atama-ii Books series is another logical extension of this philosophy.

Marcos currently lives in Tokyo with his family.