TSL 3131 Developing and Using

Resources for the Primary ESL

Classroom

Discuss additional criteria to evaluate teaching
materials

Group 5

Ain Fatihah bt Mohd Kasim
Ashrafuqal b. Ahmad
Farah Mudrikah bt Zaimy
Fatin Daratul Ain bt Johari

External factors
Are the materials to be used as the main core course or
to be supplementary to it? (main or supporting)
This will help to evaluate their effectiveness in a given context as
well as the total cost. It may be that sheer economics will
dissuade the evaluator from selecting these particular materials,
especially if they are not going to be the core part of the course.

Is a teachers book in print and locally available?
It is also worth considering whether it is sufficiently clear for non-
native speaker teachers to use. Some teachers books offer
general teaching hints while others have very prescribed
programmes of how to teach the materials including lesson
plans. Non-availability of the teachers book may make the
student edition difficult to work with.
Is a vocabulary list/index included?
Having these included in the materials may prove to be very useful for
learners in some contexts, particularly where the learner might be doing
a lot of individualized and/or out-of class work.
Some material explicitly state that they are offering this : students book
with an introductory unit, 40 double-page units, 4 self-check units, .... an
interaction appendix, a vocabulary appendix with phonetic spelling, a list
of irregular verbs, and a listening appendix, and the claims made are
worthy of investigation.
The table of content may sometimes be seen as a bridge between the
external and internal stages of the evaluation and can be often reveal
useful information about the organization of the materials, giving
information about vocabulary study, skill to covered, additional
interactive digital materials and so on, possibly with some indication as
to how much class time the author thinks should be devoted to a
particular unit. Consequently, it is often useful to see how explicit it is.

What visual material does the book contain (photographs, charts, diagrams)
and is it there for cosmetic value only or is it integrated into the text?
Glossy prints in the published materials seem to make the book appear more
attractive. It is worth examining if the visual material serves any learning purpose
(see Hill, 2003 for an example of an evaluation of visual materials); that is, in the
case of a photograph or a diagram, is it incorporated into a task so that the
learner has to comment on it / interpret it in some way?
Is the layout and presentation clear or cluttered?
Some textbooks are researched and written well, but are so cluttered with
information on every page that teachers/learners find them practically unusable.
Hence a judicious balance between the two needs to be found. Tomlinson
(2003c) suggest that we also include clarity of instructions and stipulate which
activity goes with which instruction as part of the overall concept of the layout of
the materials. The potential durability of the materials is another important factor
in teaching contexts where 43 materials may be selected for several groups over
a period of years. Factors such as paper quality and binding need to be
assessed.

Is the material too culturally biased or specific?
Do the materials represent minority groups and / or women in
negative way? do they present a balanced picture of a particular
country / society?
It is possible that he content of some materials will cause offence to
some learners. The investigation by Bao (2006) into teaching materials
shows how textbooks may be biased in subtle, and in some cases not
so subtle, ways in their representation of ethnic background.

What is the cost of the inclusion of digital materials (e.g. CD, DVD,
interactive games, quizzes and downloadable materials from the
web?) how essential are they to ensure language acquisition and
development?

The inclusion of tests in the teaching materials (diagnostic,
progress, achievement); would they be useful for your particular
learner?
Overall factors
The usability factor.
How far the materials could be integrated into a particular syllabus as core or
supplementary.
For example, we may need to select materials that suit a particular syllabus or set of
objectives that we have to work to. The materials may or may not be able to do this.

The generalizability factors.
Is there a restricted use of core features that make the materials more generally useful?
Perhaps not all the material will be useful for a given individual or group but some parts
might be. This factor can in turn lead us to consider the next point.

The adaptability factor.
Can parts be added/extracted/ used in another context/modified for local circumstances?
There may be judged the listening material or the reading passage to be unsuitable and in
need of modification. If we think that adaption is feasible, we may choose to do this.

The flexibility factor.
How rigid is the sequencing and grading? Can the materials be entered at different points or
used in different ways?
In some cases, materials that are not so steeply graded offer a measure of flexibility that
permits them to be integrated easily into various types of syllabus

Conclusion
It all goes back to the purpose the
evaluator has in evaluating the materials
inthe first place.
Materials evaluation is one part of a
complex process and those materials,
once selected, can only be judge
successful after classroom implementation
and feedback.
References
McGrath, I. (2002): Materials Evaluation
and Design for LanguageTeaching
Mukundan, J. & Ahour, T. (2010).
A review of textbook evaluationchecklist
across four decades
Tomlinson, B. (2003). Material evaluation
http://www.scribd.com/doc/229710103/Tsl-
3111-Module