Publishing your first article in a Colombian ELT journal

Most English teachers in Colombia have already done the hard part. They have designed something, tried it with real students, watched it work or fail, and adjusted. What they have not done is write it down in a form a journal can publish.

This is a map of that gap and how to cross it.

First: you do not need a doctorate

Journals in our field publish work by classroom teachers, teacher educators, teachers in training and novice researchers. HOW Journal describes itself as a publication by and for teachers of English — that is not a slogan, it is an editorial policy.

What journals need is not credentials. It is a manuscript that meets three conditions:

1. It says something the field does not already know, or knows only from other contexts.
2. It shows evidence for what it claims.
3. It is written so another teacher can follow the reasoning.

Everything below is about meeting those three conditions.

Choose the type of article before you write

This is the decision that saves the most rewriting. Colombian ELT journals typically publish several article types, and they are judged by different standards:

• Research article — a study with a question, a method, data and findings.
• Reflective article — a theoretically grounded argument about an issue in the field. Not "my opinion", but a position built on literature.
• Review article — a systematic look at what has been published on a topic.
• Pedagogical experience — a documented account of something you implemented, with evidence of what happened.

If you ran a six-week strategy with one group and kept students' work, you have a pedagogical experience — and possibly a research article, if you collected data systematically. If you read forty studies on translanguaging and noticed a pattern, you have a review article. Naming the type early tells you what the manuscript needs.

What a first draft actually contains

Working backwards from what reviewers look for:

A title that says what the paper is about. Not clever. Clear. Include the population and the focus.

An abstract that stands alone. Context, purpose, method, findings, implication. Around 150–250 words, depending on the journal.

An introduction that names the gap. Three moves: this is the area, this is what has been done, this is what has not. Your study lives in that third sentence.

A literature review that argues. The most common weakness in first submissions is a list: "Author A says… Author B says… Author C says…". A literature review should group, compare and take a position. Which authors agree? Where do they conflict? What has nobody looked at in a Colombian context?

A method section a stranger could repeat. Participants, setting, how long, what you collected, how you analysed it, and how you handled consent. Reviewers will ask about ethics — anticipate it.

Findings supported by data. Quote students. Show the artefact. Include the number that surprised you. Claims without evidence get cut.

A discussion that connects back. Return to the literature from your introduction: does your finding confirm it, complicate it, or contradict it in your context?

Limitations, honestly. A paper that admits its boundaries is more credible, not less.

Understand what peer review is

Colombian ELT journals generally use double-blind peer review: reviewers do not know who you are, and you do not know who they are. Two or more specialists read your manuscript and recommend acceptance, revision or rejection.

Expect one of four outcomes:

• Accept as is — rare, at any career stage.
• Minor revisions — a good result. Fix and resubmit.
• Major revisions — also a good result. It means the work is publishable and the reviewers are telling you how.
• Reject — sometimes about fit, not quality. Read the reasons, revise, and send it to a journal whose scope matches better.

Review takes months. Plan for it. Submitting in April does not mean publishing in June.

Respond to reviewers properly

When revisions come back, write a response letter: a table or list with every comment, what you changed, and where. If you disagree with a comment, say so respectfully and explain your reasoning — editors accept disagreement when it is argued.

Do not take reviewer bluntness personally. Reviewers are colleagues doing unpaid work at speed. A harsh comment usually means "I could not follow this", which is information you can use.

Practical details for Colombia

Language. Several Colombian journals in the field publish in Spanish, English, Portuguese and French. Write in the language you argue best in, then have it read by someone else.

Cost. Many Colombian journals are open access with no fees for authors — the "diamond" model, financed by the university or association behind them. Enletawa states this explicitly. Never assume you need to pay to publish; check the journal's own page, and be suspicious of any journal that solicits you by email and quotes a price.

Deadlines. Cohort closings matter. HOW Journal closes cohorts on April 1st and October 1st. GiST closes on April 30th and October 30th. Folios closes in February and August. Working backwards from those dates is the difference between publishing this year and next.

Where to send it. Match your manuscript to the journal's scope, not to its prestige. A well-matched paper in the right journal beats a mismatched paper in a famous one — the second one usually gets desk-rejected.

The smallest possible first step

Open a document. Write three sentences: what you did, with whom, and what happened. That is the seed of an abstract, and the abstract is the seed of the paper.

Then set the date of the next cohort closing as a calendar reminder six weeks earlier.

Keep going

• See the journals in the Colombian Language Journals Network and their scopes and deadlines.
• Read about HOW Journal, its indexing and its submission windows.
• Watch the recorded webinars on research and academic writing in the webinar library.