HEBA ADEL SALEH

OFQUAL REGULATED LEVEL TEFL

UNIT 7 ASSIGNMENT 2/
The word authentic is used to distinguish any natural communication context. It refers to any
written or spoken texts were written by native speakers. Authentic materials could be
newspapers, magazine articles, videos, television programs, songs, web pages, radio, leaflets,
posters, and any other target language source to encourage language use in the classroom
different from textbooks. Authentic materials help students to fill the gaps between the
classroom and the world outside.
Authentic materials could be divided into :
Audio:tv shows-radio-movies- phone messages.
Visual:pictures-art work-signs and symbols-postcards.
Printed: maps-traffic tickets-greeting cards-report cards-magazines.
It is imperative to consider that authentic materials are not designed for teaching purposes, so
the teacher should be conscientious before giving the students articles or newspapers and
ensuring that they are compatible with their levels.
For beginners, teachers can give the students leaflets, timetables, menus, or advertisements.
The activities should be at their level and not too tricky.
For the intermediate level, the teacher can use articles, news reports, and tv programs.
They can use medical articles and reports, political articles, and more challenging materials at
the advanced level than beginners and intermediate.
There is another very essential thing to consider, which is the amount of learning the students
can get from these materials. The teacher should always check the vocabulary and the
structures, ensuring it is not too easy or too difficult.
Utilizing authentic materials in the classroom has some advantages, such as:
-boost the students’ confidence and expose them to actual life language.
-when using authentic materials, students will experience new words and grammar they cant
find in class textbooks.
-audio authentic materials will help students better concentrate to understand what is being said
in the background.
-authentic materials reveal students to the culture, so the teacher can explore the context, not
just looking at it.
-using authentic materials will increase student’s motivation and using English in real life.
The disadvantage of using authentic materials:
-authentic materials contain complex vocabulary and unfamiliar language, which could be
challenging for students to understand.
-authentic materials are often too culturally, which is difficult to understand.
-contains too many structures, so lower levels have problems decoding the texts.
To start integrating authentic materials in the classroom, the teacher should first specify his
goals and his students’ needs. This way, he could choose suitable materials for them. This
considers the most crucial step then come second, collecting the materials and matching them
with the students’ level of the target language. Finally, the teacher will turn these materials into a
lesson plan and prepare the activities to help the students understand better and improve their
vocabulary.
Examples of some activities:
The weather report is one of the best authentic materials the teacher can use with his students,
and the students can read the weather report or listen to a video clip about the weather.

Job search
The teacher can give the student the chance to find a job by directing them to some websites
that have available jobs and ask them to read the jobs’ description and write down three of
them, in the classroom the teacher ask the students some questions which they should know
their answers:
-what is the job, and what are your duties?
-why did you pick this job?
-what keywords did you use to search for this job?

Many activities use authentic materials the teacher can create to help his students achieve their
goals and develop their target language.

REFERENCES
http://www.cambridge.org/elt/authentic-materials-classroom-advantages.
http://www.fluentu.com/educators/authentic-materials
http://www.fluentu.com/educators/authentic-materials-for-teaching-english.
http://www.teachingenglish.org.uk/article/using-authentic-materials.