In the name of God

Textbook evaluation

Introduction

Nowadays language teaching approaches focusing on thinking-involving processes are trying to concentrate on

the methodology of the teacher more than the textbook content. As it is said an efficient teacher can make a “dead”

text “alive” and an inefficient teacher can make an alive text “dead”. With this regard I personally believe it is better

to have an analysis of our mentalities regarding language teaching than have an evaluation of an English book which

the government educational policies have made it “down from heaven inspiration”.

English textbook which is supposed to be based on audio-lingual method should be reviewed both in content and

form. The following is an analysis trying to point out some of the shortcomings of this textbook.

Part A: Goals of the course

The textbook doesn’t accomplish the course goals immediately because:

In Audio lingual method listening and speaking are primary skills for which there are not the least equipments as

laboratories in our schools. Moreover the book demands fluent as well as accurate teachers but unfortunately most

of the teachers are not competent in this regard and most of the time they sacrifice oral skills for written ones.

-The Audio lingual is a method with far-reaching goals and it takes a long time and needs a large amount of teaching

aids to make student gain the rudiments of speaking ability most of which they forget because of small number of

opportunities to speak outside the classroom.

-Audio lingual is a product-based not a process-based approach. It enforces the student to parrot-liked activities not

thinking-based and meaning-making processes.

-The orientations in the textbook and in the tests are not the same. The textbook is based on Audio lingual and oral

activities but the tests advocate written activities with a grammar-translation inclination.

This makes the teachers insist on testing-based teaching or teaching-to-test activities.

-Audio lingual is suitable for the classes with population of about fifteen students but our classes are more

populated.

-There is no chance for the students to be exposed to out of the class situations so that they can apply their

knowledge in real and natural conditions. In other words the most important part of the language which is “the

ability to understand the language in real situations” is ignored.

PART B: Background of the students

With the emergence of different sciences and development of new technology, new needs in the society are felt. These changes affect the students’ needs and change their mentalities creating a new background for language learning. Unfortunately as far as I know it is for about two decades that this English book has been remained untouched. Thus; it is felt that it no longer matches the new generation needs and expectations

A. Age

In the textbook we see some reading comprehension text about which the students don’t have a suitable background. Some topics are not according to the age of the students and some topics are completely out of date. Are there any word referring to computer, its equipments, the net, etc.?

B.Native language and culture

Audio lingual is a method which gains insights from contrastive analysis and comparative linguistics two of the trends which are felt to be disregarded or misapplied while writing this book.

Because we live in a Muslim country and we have rigid beliefs and opinions regarding our culture, it is not only difficult for the teacher to try to inject a foreign culture into the students’ native culture but also it is more difficult for the students to accept or to be understood what is now happening outside abroad.

Students have habits and attitudes of their own native and local language.

These habits and attitudes will interfere with their target language learning.Unfortunatly; no smart attempt (except using some Islamic name) has been made to use native language and culture accompanied with English language and culture.

Part c: language skills

A. Listening

Listening is a skill which should come first in audio lingual.Unfortunatly; not only it does not come first but also does not come last.

In other word since there is no opportunity to work on improving listening comprehension this skill nowadays is a forgotten skill in classroom language learning situations. In the textbook there is no advocate focus on listening.

There are no certain tasks in oral exchanges to involve the students in subsequent follow-up activities out of the class so that the students can improve their listening ability.

B.Speaking

The textbook doesn’t have attractive and effective drills of speaking to be expanded and applied in different situations. Most of the speaking is in the form of patterns and practices and there is rarely a place for speaking in real situations, which is now stressed by language teaching specialists.

Nearly all drills are boring and confusing and sometimes irritating. On the whole, if the class is a dynamic place the drills and tasks should be lively, varied, and worth doing.

C.Reading

The texts are not enjoyable and exciting. They don’t help the students to learn efficiently and enjoyably. In addition, it is better to present the language in a text for a purpose other than language itself so that it could motivate the interests of the students. The student who is interested in learning about the details of football will be more motivated to work with a text about football rather than a text which presents some example of modal auxiliaries.

Most language skills can be divided into sub-skills. This refers to long texts that are boring and confusing for the students. In this way they should be broken down into smaller and more detailed tasks.

-In the textbook all the reading comprehension texts don’t have headings. In addition, they don’t illustrate the topics more concretely by real and clear pictures.

D.Writing

Since the textbook is based on audio lingual there is no suitable focus on writing. In contrast with speaking, writing is an individual practice. More than using writing as homework, there should be some simple in class writing drills in the book so that the students participate in this productive process.

Part D: General contents

A. Authenticity

Authentic English is from life English with purposeful activities. Unfortunately, in the textbook the sentences are almost the translations of Persian sentences. In this way the students are learning Persian patterns through sentences in English. So they don’t have a real sense of learning English and they don’t feel themselves in authentic situations of English.

Teachers also don’t have enough information about the public culture of people who use the target language. They are not informed of least social changes and developments of the target language societies so as to operationalize their knowledge of the different varied situations.

B.Appropriateness and currency of topics, situations and contexts

Some contexts don’t match the dialogs. I think it is better that the passages and dialogs have the same subjects so that the learners follow them easily and effectively. In one word, there is rarely a current, appropriate topic which rightly symbolizes the situation.

Part E: Sequencing

According to new theories of language teaching three factors mark a demarcation line between an efficient and an inefficient teaching one of which is sequencing (the other are grouping and task). None of the factors above has been considered while preparing this book. Needless to say that this book has been written while its writers did not have suitable pieces of information about sequencing, task and grouping.

A. By grammatical structure

Structuring should be from easy to difficult. But this has been neglected in the textbook. Furthermore, we don’t see some ordinary grammatical points such as exclamation sentences in the dialogs.

B.By situation

The situations do not cover the skills as much as possible. In other word, the situations are not as proper as we need and they cannot be put into action.

C.By skills

Listening, speaking, reading and writing are the best sequence. In general, there is no absolute rule for presentation of skills. When spelling is confusing the sequence above is best but this sequence in the book is not considered.

In addition, the four skills are not considered symmetrically, for example listening is not as noticeable as it is important.

Conclusion:

Although the teacher is responsible for teaching the students not teaching the book it is inevitable that the textbook be reviewed and renewed in a suitable way. It is sensible a good book is that the teacher uses it as a support for a course which is centered on students needs. If the textbook, which is being taught now, is going to be unchanged it is clear the teacher and the book will go in different directions as before, and student will be confused and their learning faces difficulties.