Self-Paced Learning Module: Diffun Campus

QUIRINO STATE UNIVERSITY
DIFFUN CAMPUS
Diffun, 3401 Quirino
COLLEGE OF TEACHER EDUCATION
SELF-PACED LEARNING MODULE
IN
ENG 106 (LANGUAGE LEARNING MATERIALS DEVELOPMENT)
BY:
DIVINA GRACIA S. SABIO, PhD

Faculty
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The leading center for academic and technological excellence Develop competent and morally upright professionals and generate
and prime catalyst for a progressive and sustainable Quirino appropriate knowledge and technologies to meet the needs of Quirino
Province and Southern Cagayan Valley. Province and Southern Cagayan Valley.
“Molding Minds, Shaping Future”

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Module 1 Introduction to Language Learning Materials Development

Competencies Develop current methodologies and language learning materials for the teaching of the
four language skills (reading, writing, speaking, and listening) plus culture.
Discussion What is materials development?
Materials development is both a field of study and a practical undertaking. As a field it studies the principles
and procedures of the design, implementation and evaluation of language teaching materials. As an
undertaking it involves the production, evaluation and adaptation of language teaching materials, by
teachers for their own classrooms and by materials writers for sale or distribution. Ideally these two aspects
of materials development are interactive in that the theoretical studies inform and are informed by the
development and use of classroom materials. (Tomlinson, 2001, p. 66)
Material development refers to anything which is done by writers or learners to provide sources of language
input and to exploit those sources in ways which maximize the likelihood of intake: in other words the
supplying of information and or/about experience of language in ways designed to promote language
learning (Tomlinson, 1998). Developers of materials may us advertisement, write textbook/ workbook, use
poster and the like just to be able to promote language learning as effective as possible.
What are materials?
‘Materials’ ‘include anything which can be used to facilitate the learning of a language.
They can be linguistic, visual, auditory or kinaesthetic, and they can be presented in
print, through live performance or display, or on cassette, CD-ROM, DVD or the internet’
(Tomlinson, 2001, p. 66). They can be instructional, experiential, elicitative or
exploratory, in that they can inform learners about the language, they can provide
experience of the language in use, they can stimulate language use or they can help
learners to make discoveries about the language for themselves.
Who should develop the materials?
These days most commercial materials are written by professional materials writers
writing to a brief determined by the publishers from an analysis of market needs. These
writers are usually very experienced and competent, they are familiar with the realities
of publishing and the potential of the new technologies and they write full-time for a
living. The books they write are usually systematic, well designed, teacher-friendly and
thorough. But they often lack energy and imagination (how can the writers be
imaginative all day and every day?) and are sometimes insufficiently relevant and
appealing to the actual learners who use them. Dudley Evans and St John (1998, p.
173) state that ‘only a small proportion of good teachers are also good designers of
course materials’. Teachers throughout the world only need a little training, experience
and support to become materials writers who can produce imaginative materials of
relevance and appeal to their learners.
The Roles of Materials
Every instructional material is anchored to a certain instructional objectives. It is

important to design the instructional materials due to its central role to facilitate the
achievement of the instructional objectives.
In the utilization of the instructional materials, the teacher must always be based it on
the level of proficiency of the learners. Richards (2001 cited from Manurung 2017)
argued that instructional materials are a key component in most language programs.
He further argues that instructional materials generally serve as the basis for much 89
of the language input learners receive and the language practice that occurs in the
classroom whether the teacher uses textbook, institutionally prepared materials, or his
or her own materials. In this case, the role of instructional materials and its
development must be well planned, designed and prepared.
Cunningsworth (1995.7) summarizes the role of materials (particularly course books) in

language teaching as:
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• A resource for presentation materials (spoken and written)

• A resource of activities for learner practice and communicative interaction
• A reference source for learners on grammar, vocabulary, pronunciation, and so
on
• A source of stimulation and ideas for classroom activities
• A syllabus (where they reflect learning objectives that have already been
determined)
• A support for less experienced teachers who have yet to gain in confidence
Should texts be authentic?
Materials aiming at explicit learning usually contrive examples of the language which
focus on the feature being taught. Usually these examples are presented in short, easy,
specially written or simplified texts or dialogues, and it is argued that they help the
learners by focusing their attention on the target feature. The counterargument is that
such texts overprotect learners, deprive them of the opportunities for acquisition
provided by rich texts and do not prepare them for the reality of language use, whereas
authentic texts (i.e. texts not written especially for language teaching) can provide
exposure to language as it is typically used. A similar debate continues in relation to
materials for the teaching of reading and listening skills and materials for extensive
reading and listening. One side argues that simplification and contrivance can facilitate
learning; the other side argues that they can lead to faulty learning and that they deny
the learners opportunities for informal learning and the development of self-esteem.
Most researchers argue for authenticity and stress its motivating effect on learners (e.g.
Bacon and Finneman, 1990; Kuo, 1993; Little et al., 1994; Mishan, 2005; Gilmore,
2007; Rilling and Dantas-Whitney, 2009). However, Widdowson (1984, p. 218) says that
‘pedagogic presentation of language . . . necessarily involves methodological contrivance
which isolates features from their natural surroundings’; Day and Bamford (1998, pp.
54–62) attack the ‘cult of authenticity’ and advocate simplified reading texts which have
the ‘natural properties of authenticity’, Ellis (1999, p. 68) argues for ‘enriched input’
which provides learners with input which has been flooded with exemplars of the target
structure in the context of meaning focused activities and Day (2003) claims there is no
evidence that authenticity facilitates acquisition but that there is evidence that learners
find authentic texts more difficult.
Some researchers have challenged the conventional view of authenticity and redefined
it, for example, in relation to the learners culture (Prodromou, 1992; Trabelsi, 2010), to
the learners’ interaction with a text or task (Widdowson, 1978), to the ‘authenticity of
the learner’s own interpretation’ (Breen, 1985, p. 61) and to the personal engagement
of the learner (van Lier, 1996). For discussion of the issues raised above see Widdowson
(2000), Mishan (2005), Trabelsi (2010) and Tomlinson (2012b: 161–2), as well as
Chapters 2 (Saraceni), 16 (Stranks) and 18 (Masuhara) in this volume.
For me the most useful definition of an authentic text is ‘one which is produced in order
to communicate rather than to teach’ (Tomlinson, 2012b, p. 162) and the most useful
definition of an authentic task is ‘one which involves the learners in communicating to
achieve an outcome, rather than to practice the language’ (ibid.).
All texts and tasks should be authentic in these ways, otherwise the learners are not
being prepared for the realities of language use. Meaningful engagement with authentic
texts is a prerequisite for the development of communicative and strategic competence
but that authentic texts can be created by interactive negotiation between learners as
well as presented to. It is also useful for learners to sometimes pay discrete attention to
linguistic or discoursal features of authentic texts which they have previously been
engaged by.
Enrichment a. Instruction: In the word web below, place key terms or vocabulary words related to
Activities the word given and then come up with its definition.
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A. Materials are
____________________________________________________________________________________
____________________________________________________________________________________
______________________
B. Given your definition of materials, what do you think is material development

and what is it for?
____________________________________________________________________________________
____________________________________________________________________________________
____________________________________________________________________________________
____________________________________________________________________________________
_____________________
b. Instruction: In 300 words, answer the following question and use separate sheet/s
as needed.
Discuss the possible materials and its roles that the teachers should develop to help
make the teaching and learning process effective during this global pandemic.
____________________________________________________________________________________
____________________________________________________________________________________
Comprehension Reflection Paper

Check
Instruction: In 300 words, share your experience using instructional materials in a
language class. Use separate sheet/s as needed.
____________________________________________________________________________________
____________________________________________________________________________________
____________________________________________________________________________________
____________________________________________________________________________________
____________________________________________________________________________________
____________________________________________________________________________________
____________________________________________________________________________________
____________________________________________________________.
References Tomlinson, B., Developing Materials for Language Teaching.2013.
Blumsburry: London.
file:///C:/Users/Asus/Desktop/2nd%20sem,%2020-21-
Tload/Developing_Materials_for_Language_Teachi.pdf
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Module 2 Principles and Procedures of Materials Development for Language Learning

Competencies Apply the knowledge of principles, methods and approaches of language learning
materials development.
Discussion Introduction
Creative intuition in materials development
There have been a number of accounts in the literature by materials developers of the process they follow
when developing materials. Rather surprisingly, many of them describe processes which are ad hoc and
spontaneous and which rely on an intuitive feel for activities which are likely to ‘work’. Prowse (1998)
reports the responses of ‘ELT materials writers from all over the world’ who ‘met in Oxford in April 1994
for a British Council Specialist Course with UK-based writers and publishers’ (p. 130). When asked to say
how they wrote their materials, many of them focused on the creative process of writing (e.g. ‘writing is
fun, because it’s creative’; ‘writing can be frustrating, when ideas don’t come’; ‘writing is absorbing – the
best materials are written in “trances”’ (p. 136)) and Prowse concludes that ‘most of the writers quoted here
appear to rely heavily on their own intuitions, viewing textbook writing in the same way as writing fiction,
while at the same time emphasizing the constraints of the syllabus. The unstated assumption is that the
syllabus precedes the creation’ (p. 137). Most of the writers focus on what starts and keeps them writing
and they say such things as, ‘writing brings joy, when inspiration comes, when your hand cannot keep up
with the speed of your thoughts’ (p. 136) and ‘In materials writing mood – engendered by peace, light, etc.
– is particularly important’ (p. 137). However, they say very little about any principles of learning and
teaching which guide their writing or about any frameworks which they use to facilitate coherence and
consistency. This is largely true also of materials writers who Philip Prowse asked about their writing
process for Prowse (2011) and of some of the writers talking about writing in Hidalgo et al. (1995), of some
of the writers describing their writing processes in Tomlinson (1998c), of some of the writing processes
reported in Richards (2001) and of experienced materials writers who were asked to develop a language
learning task in Johnson (2003). For example, in Hidalgo et al. (1995) Cochingo-Ballesteros (1995, p. 54)
says, ‘some of them (drills) are deeply expressive of my own beliefs and give me aesthetic fulfilment’ and
Maley (1995, p. 221) says that writing instructional materials ‘is best seen as a form of operationalized tacit
knowledge’ which involves ‘trusting our intuitions and beliefs. If a unit of material does not “feel” right,
no amount of rational persuasion will usually change my mind about it’. Richards (1995, p. 105), however,
while referring to his need to listen to the local classical music station when writing, concludes that the
process of materials writing is ‘10 per cent inspiration and 90 per cent perspiration’. In Johnson (2003, pp.
57–65) an experienced materials writer conducts a concurrent verbalization while designing a task. He
creates a ‘new’ activity for the specified target learners by making use of ideas from his repertoire and
while doing so concerns himself mainly with predicting and solving practical problems (e.g. the language
content might be too difficult; the task might be too easy). He does develop a framework but it is driven by
practical considerations of what the learners are likely to do rather than by any considerations of language
acquisition principles.
Frameworks for materials development
There are exceptions to the focus on creativity reported above. A number of writers in
the books mentioned above focus on the need to establish and be driven by unit outlines
or frameworks. For example, Rozul (1995, p. 213) reports a lesson format (based on
Hutchinson and Waters, 1984) which includes the following key components:
 Starter
 Input
 General Information
 Language Focus
 Tasks
Fortez (1995, p. 74) describes a framework (also based on Hutchinson and Waters,
1994) which has eight sequential ‘features’, Richards (1995, pp. 102–3) describes the
process of designing a ‘design or frame for a unit in a textbook’ which can ‘serve as
a formulae which the author can use in writing the book’ and Flores (1995, pp. 60–2)
outlines a lesson format with the following basic stages:
 Listening with Understanding
 Using Grammar in Oral Interaction
 Reading for Understanding
 Writing
 Literature
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In Prowse (2011, pp. 159–61) one of the materials writers outlines ‘a not untypical writing process which
involves researching . . . gaps in the market/weaknesses of other materials’ prior to drafting a ‘basic
rationale’ which includes ‘book and unit structure and a draft grammar syllabus’.
Jolly and Bolitho (2011, p. 113) have an interestingly different approach to frameworks and focus not on a
unit framework but on a framework for developing materials which involves the following procedures:
 Identification of need for materials
 Exploration of need
 Contextual realization of materials
 Pedagogical realization of materials
 Production of materials
 Student use of materials
 Evaluation of materials against agreed objectives
Principles in materials development Most writers on the process of materials development focus on needs
analysis as their starting point (e.g. Rozul, 1995, p. 210; Luzares, 1995, pp. 26–7; Fortez, 1995, pp. 69–70).
However, there are some writers who report starting by articulating their principles. For example Bell and
Gower (2011, pp. 142–6) started by articulating the following principles which they wanted to guide their
writing:
 Flexibility
 From text to language
 Engaging content
 Natural language
 Analytic approaches
 Emphasis on review
 Personalized practice
 Integrated skills
 Balance of approaches
 Learning to learn
 Professional respect
Flores (1995, pp. 58–9) lists five assumptions and principles which were articulated after initial brainstorm
sessions prior to the writing of a textbook in the Philippines, Tomlinson (1998c, pp. 5–22) proposes 15
principles for materials development which derive from SLA research and theory, Tomlinson (1999b)
describes a principled and flexible framework designed to help teachers to develop materials efficiently
and effectively and Penaflorida (1995, pp. 172–9) reports her use of the six principles of materials design
identified by Nunan (1988):
1. Materials should be clearly linked to the curriculum they serve.

2. Materials should be authentic in terms of text and task.
3. Materials should stimulate interaction.
4. Materials should allow learners to focus on formal aspects of the language.
5. Materials should encourage learners to develop learning skills, and skills in learning.
6. Materials should encourage learners to apply their developing skills to the world beyond the classroom.
And, most emphatically, Hall (in Hidalgo et al., 1995, p. 8) insists that: Before planning or writing materials
for language teaching, there is one crucial question we need to ask ourselves. The question should be the
first item on the agenda at the first planning meeting. The question is this: How do we think people learn
language?
Hall then goes on to discuss the following theoretical principles which he thinks should ‘underpin
everything else which we do in planning and writing our materials’ (p. 8):
 The need to communicate

 The need for long-term goals
 The need for authenticity
 The need for student-centeredness
More recently Ellis (2010) discusses how ‘second language acquisition (SLA) research has informed
language teaching materials’ (p. 33) with particular reference to the design of tasks and Tomlinson (2010)
develops thirty principles of materials development from six principles of language acquisition and four
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principles of language teaching. Tomlinson (2013) argues that second language acquisition is facilitated
by:
 A rich and meaningful exposure to language in use.
 Affective and cognitive engagement.
 Making use of those mental resources typically used in communication in the L1.
 Noticing how the L2 is used.
 Being given opportunities for contextualized and purposeful communication in the L2.
 Being encouraged to interact.
 Being allowed to focus on meaning.
He makes use of these principles to develop criteria for the development and evaluation of materials and
then makes use of these criteria to evaluate six currently used global coursebooks. Similar principled
evaluations are reported in Tomlinson et al. (2001), Masuhara et al. (2008) and Tomlinson and Masuhara
(2013) and one conclusion made by all of them is that coursebooks are not typically driven by principled
frameworks but by considerations of what is likely to sell. What I am going to do in this chapter is to outline
two frameworks for materials development which aim to be principled, flexible and coherent, and which
have developed from my answers to the question about how we think people learn language. One is text-
driven and ideal for developing coursebooks and supplementary classroom materials. The other is task-
driven and ideal for localizing and personalizing classroom materials, and for autonomous learning.
A Text-driven Approach to Materials Development
The Framework
This is a framework which is used on materials writing not only to write principled and coherent
materials quickly, effectively and consistently but also to articulate and develop theories of language
learning and language teaching at the same time. The framework follows the stages outlined below.
1 Text collection
You come across and/or create texts (written or spoken) with the potential for engagement. By
engagement, it means a willing investment of energy and attention in experiencing the text in such a way
as to achieve interaction between the text and the senses, feelings, views and intuitions of the reader/listener.
Such texts can help the reader/listener to achieve a personal multidimensional representation in which inner
speech, sensory images and affective stimuli combine to make the text meaningful (Tomlinson, 1998d,
2000c, 2010, 2011, 2013). And sometimes they can help the reader/ listener to achieve the sort of aesthetic
response described by Rosenblatt (1968, 1978) in which ultimately the reader enters the text and lives in it.
Such a representation can achieve the affective impact and the deep processing which can facilitate
language acquisition. It can also help the learners to develop the confidence and skills which can give them
access to valuable input outside and after their course (Tomlinson, 1999c, p. 62).
Such texts are those which first of all engage ourselves in the ways described above and they can come,
for example, from literature, from songs, from newspapers and magazines, from non-fiction books, from
radio and television programmes and from films. Obviously, such texts cannot be easily found and certainly
cannot be found quickly in order to illustrate teaching points (as Bell and Gower (2011) found out when
they tried to find engaging, authentic texts to illustrate predetermined teaching points in their intermediate-
level coursebook). It is much easier and much more useful to build up a library of potentially engaging
texts and then to let the texts eventually selected for target levels determine the teaching points. And it is
obviously much more effective to teach language features which have first been experienced by the learners
in engaging texts than to impose ‘unengaging’ texts on learners just because they illustrate predetermined
teaching points. This library development stage is ongoing and context free. Its purpose is to create a
resource with the potential for subsequent matching to particular contexts of learning.
2 Text selection
In this stage you select from your library of potentially engaging texts (either one text for a particular
lesson or a number of texts for a set of materials or a textbook). As the materials are going to be driven by
the text(s) this stage is very important and should be criterion-referenced. Initially, it is a good idea to apply
the criteria explicitly; but eventually this can be done intuitively.
The criteria which I have found help to achieve effective selection are:
 Does the text engage me cognitively and affectively?
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 Is the text likely to engage most of the target learners cognitively and
effectively?
 Are the target learners likely to be able to connect the text to their lives?
 Are the target learners likely to be able to connect the text to their
knowledge of the world?
 Are most of the target learners likely to be able to achieve multidimensional mental representation
of the text?
 Is the text likely to stimulate divergent personal responses from the target learners?
 Is the linguistic level of the text likely to present an achievable challenge to the target learners?
 Is the cognitive level of the text likely to present an achievable challenge to the target learners?
 Is the emotional level of the text suitable for the age and maturity of the target learners?
 Is the text likely to contribute to the personal development of the learners?
 Does the text contribute to the ultimate exposure of the learners to a range of genres (e.g. short
stories, poems, novels, songs, newspaper articles, brochures, advertisements, etc.)?
 Does the text contribute to the ultimate exposure of the learners to a range of text types (e.g.
narrative, description, persuasion, information, justification, etc.)?
3 Text experience
In this stage you experience the selected text again. That is, you read or listen to it again experientially
in order to re-engage with the text. You then reflect on your experience and try to work out what was
happening in your mind during it. This re-engagement and reflection is essential so that you can design
activities which help the target learners to achieve similar engagement. Without this stage there is a danger
that you study the text as a sample of language and end up designing activities which focus the learners on
linguistic features of the text. Of course, if you fail to re-engage with the text you should reconsider your
decision to select it to drive your materials.
4 Readiness activities
As soon as you have re-engaged with the text, you start to devise activities which could help the learners
to experience the text in similar multidimensional ways. First of all, you devise readiness activities which
get the learners ready for the reading experience. You are aiming at helping the learners to achieve the
mental readiness which readers take to L1 texts and to inhibit the word fixation and apprehension which
L2 readers typically take to texts (Tomlinson, 2000b). ‘The activities aim to stimulate mental activity
relevant to the content of the text by activating connections, by arousing attention, by generating relevant
visual images and by getting the learner to use inner speech to discuss relevant topics with themselves.
What is important is that all the learners open and activate their minds not that they answer questions
correctly’ (Tomlinson, 1999c, p. 63). These activities are different from ‘warmers’ in that they are not
necessarily getting the learners to talk but are aiming primarily to get the learners to think. They could ask
the learners to visualize, to draw, to think of connections, to mime, to articulate their views, to recount
episodes from their lives, to share their knowledge, to make predictions: anything which gets them to
activate connections in their minds which will help them when they start to experience the text. For
example, if the text is about an embarrassing moment, they can be asked to visualize embarrassing moments
in their own lives to help them to empathize with the sufferer in the text. If the text is about tourists, they
can be asked to think about and then act out in groups typical tourist scenarios in their region. If the text is
about a child’s first day at school they can be asked to think about and then share with a partner their first
day at school. And, because the activities aim at mental readiness rather than language practice, any activity
involving talking to others can be done in the L1 in monolingual lower-level groups. The important point
is that the lesson starts in the learners’ minds and not in the text and that the activities help the learners to
gain a personal experience of the text which connects it to their lives.
5 Experiential activities
These are activities which are designed to help the learners to represent the text in their minds as they
read it or listen to it and to do so in multidimensional ways which facilitate personal engagement. They are
things they are encouraged to do while reading or listening and should therefore be mental activities which
contribute to the representation of the text and which do not interrupt the processing of it nor add difficulty
or complexity to the task. They could include, for example, trying to visualize a politician as they read
about him, using inner speech to give their responses to provocative points in a text, trying to follow a
description of a journey on a mental map or thinking of examples from their own lives to illustrate or
contradict points made in a text. The activities should not involve writing answers to questions nor
discussing things in pairs or groups, as this can interrupt the experience and make representation more
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difficult. These activities need to be given to the learners just before they start to read or listen to the text
and should be given through concise and simple instructions which are easy to remember and apply. For
example:
“You’re going to listen to a poem about a child’s first day at school. Imagine that you are that child
and that you are standing alone in the playground at the beginning of your first day at school.
As you listen to the poem, try to see in your mind what the child could see in the playground”.
Experiential activities can be either related to a given text, as in the example above, or they can be part of
a process approach which involves the learners in participating in the creation of the text, as in the examples
below:
 The teacher reads aloud a text and pauses at salient points while learners shout out predictions of
the next word or phrase.
 The teacher dictates a text and then pauses at salient points while learners compare what they have
written with their partners and then write the next line (an approach which can be particularly
effective with poetry).
 The teacher reads aloud a text while the learners act it out (an approach which can be particularly
effective if each group of learners plays a different character in a story together).
 The teacher reads aloud most of a text and then gets groups of learners to write their own endings.
 The teacher gives the learners draft texts on which an ‘editor’ has written suggested changes in
the wording and then gets them to write out a final version of their own.
6 Intake response activities
These are activities which help the learners to develop and articulate what they have taken in from the
text. They focus on the mental representation which the learners have achieved from their initial reading of
the text and they invite the learners to reflect on this representation rather than return to the text. Unlike
conventional comprehension questions, these activities do not test learners on their comprehension of the
text. Instead they give the learners a positive start to their post-reading/listening responses by inviting them
to share with others what the text means to them. They cannot be wrong because they are not being asked
about the text but about their personal representation of it. However, it is possible that their representation
is only partial (or even superficial) and the process of sharing of it with others can help to extend and deepen
it. Intake response activities could ask the learners to think about and then articulate their feelings and
opinions about what was said or done in the text.
They could ask them to visualize, to draw or to mime what they can remember from the text. Or they
could ask them to summarize the text to someone who has not read it or to ask clarification questions of the
teacher or of someone else who knows the text well. These activities should not be graded or criticized but
the teacher can help the learners to deepen their initial responses by asking questions, by guiding them to
think back to particular sections of the text or by ‘feeding’ them extracts from the text to stimulate further
thought and discussion.
7 Development activities
‘These are activities which provide opportunities for meaningful language production based on the learners’
representations of the text’ (Tomlinson, 1999c, p. 63). They involve the learners (usually in pairs or small
groups) going back to the text before going forward to produce something new. So, for example, after
experiencing a story called ‘Sentence of Death’ about a man in Liverpool being told that he has four hours
to live, the learners in groups rewrite the story so that it is based in their own town. Or, after experiencing
a story called, ‘They Came from the Sea: Part 1’, they sit in a circle and take it in turns to suggest the next
sentence of ‘They Came from the Sea: Part 2’. Or, after working out from an advertisement the good and
bad points of a vehicle called the C5, they design an improved C6 and then write an advertisement. The
point is that they can base their language production both on what they have already understood from the
text and on connections with their own lives. While talking or writing they will gain opportunities to learn
new language and develop new skills and, if they are affectively engaged in an achievable challenge, they
will learn a lot from each other and from the teacher (if she/he moves around the room helping learners
when they ask for assistance).
8 Input response activities
These are activities which take the learners back to the text and which involve them in studial reading
or listening tasks aimed at helping them to make discoveries about the purposes and language of the text.
Interpretation tasks These are input response tasks which involve the learners thinking more deeply about
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the text in order to make discoveries about the author’s intentions in creating it. They are aimed at helping
learners to develop critical and creative thinking skills in the target language and they make use of such
task types as:
 Deep questions (e.g. What points about society do you think the writer is making in his modern
version of Little Red Riding Hood?)
 Debates about issues in the text
 Critical reviews of the text for a journal
 Interviews with the characters
 Interviews with the author
Awareness tasks
These are input response activities which provide opportunities for the learners to gain awareness from
a focused study of the text (by awareness I mean a gradually developing apprehension which is different
from knowledge in that it is internal, personal, dynamic and variable). The awareness could be of language
use (Bolitho and Tomlinson, 1995, 2005), of communication strategies (Tomlinson, 1994b), of discourse
features, of genre characteristics or of text-type features. The awareness tasks usually involve investigation
of a particular feature of a text plus ‘research’ involving checking the typicality of the investigated feature
by analysing the same feature in use in other, equivalent texts. So, for example, you could ask the learners
to work out generalizations about the form and function of ‘in case of’ from the poem by Roger McGough
called ‘In Case of Fire’, and then get the learners to find and compare examples of ‘in case of’ in notices
and instruction manuals. Or you could ask learners to make generalizations about a character’s use of the
imperative when talking to his father in a scene from a novel; or ask them to work out typical features of
the genre of advertisement from examining a number of advertisements in a magazine. The important point
is that evidence is provided in a text which the learners have already experienced holistically and then they
are helped to make focused discoveries through discrete attention to a specified feature of the text. That
way they invest cognitive and affective energy and attention in the learning process and they are likely to
increase their readiness for acquisition (Pienemann, 1985; Tomlinson, 1994b, 2013).
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Enrichment Instruction: Perform the following tasks:

Activities
1. Research at least 5 methods or techniques in developing language learning
materials which you can use to teach your class in the future. Compile a softcopy
of the materials you will find.
2. Following the ‘text-driven approach in material development’ framework, develop a
an instructional material appropriate to the topic: Tree
Use this (https://eltplanning.com/2017/05/06/blessing-imtiaz-dharker/) as your

reference/sample.
Check
Instructions: Reflect on the discussion about the Text-Driven Approach Framework.
How could a framework help you as future teacher in preparing your lessons in
language? Write your answer on writing paper/s (long size).
Blumsburry: London.
https://eltplanning.com/2017/05/06/blessing-imtiaz-dharker/
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Module 3 Material Design and Current Trends

Competencies 1. Develop strategies around communicative competences in developing a language.
Discussion Why English Language Teachers May Choose to Design their own Materials
Advantages
Discussions about the advantages and disadvantages of teacher-designed materials usually centre on a
comparison with using text or coursebooks. Rather than focusing on coursebooks, we have turned our focus
to teacher-produced materials and consider that the disadvantages of coursebooks can become advantages
for teacher-produced materials. The key reasons why teachers may wish to produce their own teaching
materials can be linked to four themes distilled from recent literature on this topic (e.g., Altan, 1995; Block,
1991; Harmer, 2001; Podromou, 2002; Thornbury & Meddings, 2001, 2002). An important advantage of
teacher-produced materials is contextualisation (Block, 1991). A key criticism of commercial materials,
particularly those produced for the world-wide EFL market is that they are necessarily generic and not
aimed at any specific group of learners or any particular cultural or educational context. The possible lack
of ‘fit’ between teaching context and coursebook has been expressed thus: “Our modern coursebooks are
full of speech acts and functions based on situations which most foreign-language students will never
encounter… ‘Globally’ designed coursebooks have continued to be stubbornly Anglo-centric. Appealing
to the world market as they do, they cannot by definition draw on local varieties of English and have not
gone very far in recognising English as an international language, either.” (Altan, 1995, p. 59). For many
teachers, designing or adapting their own teaching materials, enables them to take into account their
particular learning environment and to overcome the lack of ‘fit’ of the coursebook. Another aspect of
context is the resources available. Some teaching contexts will be rich in resources such as coursebooks,
supplementary texts, readers, computers, audio-visual equipment and consumables such as paper, pens and
so on. Other contexts may be extremely impoverished, with little more than an old blackboard and a few
pieces of chalk. A lack of commercial materials forces teachers to fall back on their own resources and
designing their own teaching materials can enable them to make best use of the resources available in their
teaching context. A further aspect that is not often mentioned in the literature is the cost of commercially
produced resources. For many schools, teacher-produced materials can be the best option in terms of both
school and student budget. A second area in which teacher-designed materials are an advantage is that of
individual needs. Modern teaching methodology increasingly emphasises the importance of identifying
and teaching to the individual needs of learners. English language classrooms are diverse places not only
in terms of where they are situated, but also in terms of the individual learners within each context. Teacher-
designed materials can be responsive to the heterogeneity inherent in the classroom. This approach
encompasses the learners’ first languages and cultures, their learning needs and their experiences. Few
coursebooks deliberately incorporate opportunities for learners to build on the first language skills already
acquired, despite research suggesting that bilingual approaches are most successful in developing second
language competence (Thomas & Collier, 1997). A teacher can develop materials that incorporate elements
of the learners’ first language and culture, or at least provide opportunities for acknowledgement and use
alongside English. In addition, teacher-prepared materials provide the opportunity to select texts and
activities at exactly the right level for particular learners, to ensure appropriate challenge and levels of
success. In designing their own materials teachers can also make decisions about the most appropriate
organising principle or focus for the materials and activities. And this can be changed over the course of
the programme if necessary. Most coursebooks remain organised around grammar elements and the PPP
(presentation, practice, production) model of teaching, often with an “unrelenting format” which can be
“deeply unengaging” (Harmer, 2001, p. 6). By taking more control over materials production, teachers can
choose from the range of possibilities, including topics, situations, notions, functions, skills etc, or a
combination of these principles, as starting points to develop a variety of materials that focus on the
developing needs of their particular group of learners.
Personalisation is another advantage of teacher-designed materials. In his 1991 article, Block argues in
favour of ‘home-made’ materials saying that they add a personal touch to teaching that students appreciate.
Tapping into the interests and taking account of the learning styles of students is likely to increase
motivation and engagement in learning. Podromou (2002) further suggests that there is also greater choice,
freedom and scope for spontaneity when teachers develop their own materials. A further advantage of
teacher-designed materials is timeliness (Block, 1991). Teachers designing their own materials can respond
to local and international events with up-to-date, relevant and high interest topics and tasks. The teachable
moment can be more readily seized. In conclusion, the advantages of teacher-designed materials can be
summed up in the idea that they avoid the ‘one-size-fits-all’ approach of most commercial materials.
Disadvantages
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There are a number of potential pitfalls for teachers who would be materials designers. These can be
considered under three headings, the first of which is organisation. Coursebooks are usually organised
around an identifiable principle and follow a discernible pattern throughout. While this can be rather dull
and boring (or ‘unrelenting’) it does provide both teachers and students with some security and a “coherent
body of work to remember and revise from” (Harmer, 2001, p. 7). In contrast, teacher-designed materials
may lack overall coherence and a clear progression. Without some overall organising principle, materials
may be piecemeal and can result in poorly focused activities lacking clear direction. This is frustrating and
confusing for learners who may not be able to see how their English is developing. A further aspect of
organisation relates to the physical organisation and storage of materials. Without a clearly thought through
and well-organised system, teacher-produced materials may be difficult to locate for ongoing use, or may
end up damaged or with parts missing.
Possibly the most common criticism levelled against teacher-made materials is to do with their quality. At
the surface level, teacher-made materials may “seem ragged and unprofessional next to those produced by
professionals.” (Block, 1991, p. 212, emphasis in original). They may contain errors, be poorly constructed,
lack clarity in layout and print and lack durability. Harmer probably speaks for many when he says, “If the
alternative is a collection of scruffy photocopies, give me a well-produced coursebook any time.” (2001, p.
7). In addition, a lack of experience and understanding on the part of the teacher may result in important
elements being left out or inadequately covered. Teacher-made materials may be produced to take
advantage of authentic text. However, if not guided by clear criteria and some experience, teachers may
make inconsistent or poor choices of texts. A further problem may be a lack of clear instructions about how
to make effective use of the materials – particularly instructions designed for students. Yet another
disadvantage of teacher-made materials, and perhaps the key factor inhibiting many teachers from
producing their own teaching materials, is time. However passionately one may believe in the advantages
of teacher-designed materials, the reality is that for many teachers, it is simply not viable – at least not all
the time.
Factors to Consider When Designing Materials
We turn now to consider six key factors that teachers need to take into account when embarking on the
design of teaching materials for their learners. These relate to, and refer back to some of the advantages
and disadvantages. Some will also be expanded further in the guidelines which follow. The first and most
important factor to be considered is the learners. If the point of teacher-created materials is relevance,
interest, motivation and meeting specific individual needs, then clearly teachers must ensure they know
their learners well. Any consideration of syllabus or materials design must begin with a needs analysis.
This should reveal learning needs with regard to English language skills in listening, speaking, reading,
writing, vocabulary knowledge and grammar; as well as individual student’s learning preferences. It is not
just learning needs that are relevant to the teacher as materials designer, however. Equally important is
knowledge about students’ experiences (life and educational), their first language and levels of literacy in
it, their aspirations, their interests and their purposes for learning English.
The curriculum and the context are variables that will significantly impact on decisions about teaching
materials. Many teachers are bound by a mandated curriculum defining the content, skills and values to be
taught. Whether imposed at school or state level, a curriculum outlines the goals and objectives for the
learners and the course of study. Whatever the curriculum, it is the teacher’s responsibility to ensure that
the goals and objectives of the overarching curriculum are kept close at hand when designing materials
(Nunan, 1988). As noted earlier, the context in which the teaching and learning occurs will impact on the
types of materials that may need to be designed. For example, a primary-level mainstream, English-
speaking setting, with a set curriculum and access to native speakers may require materials that facilitate
interaction about subject content, and develop cognitive academic language proficiency. However, refugee
adults may need teaching materials that focus on meeting immediate survival needs and gaining
employment.
The resources and facilities available to the teacher-designer are also mentioned above as an element of
context. Clearly teachers must be realistic about what they can achieve in terms of materials design and
production within the limitations of available resources and facilities. Access to resources such as
computers (with or without Internet access), a video player and TV, radio, cassette recorder, CD player,
photocopier, language lab., digital camera, whiteboard, OHP, scissors, cardboard, laminator etc will impact
on decisions in materials design. Hadfield and Hadfield (2003) offer some useful suggestions for
‘resourceless’ teaching which address the impoverished reality of some teaching contexts.
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Personal confidence and competence are factors that will determine an individual teacher’s willingness
to embark on materials development. This will be influenced by the teacher’s level of teaching experience
and his or her perceived creativity or artistic skills and overall understanding of the principles of materials
design and production. In reality, most teachers undertake materials design to modify, adapt or supplement
a coursebook, rather than starting from scratch, and this is probably the most realistic option for most
teachers. Decisions available to teachers include the following (adapted from Harmer, 2001 and Lamie,
1999): 1. Add activities to those already suggested. 2. Leave out activities that do not meet your learners’
needs. 3. Replace or adapt activities or materials with: - supplementary materials from other commercial
texts - authentic materials (newspapers, radio reports, films etc) - teacher-created supplementary materials.
4. Change the organisational structure of the activities, for example, pairs, small groups or whole class.
Modern technology provides teachers with access to tools that enable professional results in materials
production. Computers with Clipart, Internet access and digital pictures offer unprecedented means for
publishing high quality teaching materials.
Modern technology provides teachers with access to tools that enable professional results in materials
production. Computers with Clipart, Internet access and digital pictures offer unprecedented means for
publishing high quality teaching materials. A less exciting, but nevertheless important factor to consider in
designing materials is copyright compliance. Teachers need to be aware of the restrictions that copyright
laws place on the copying of authentic materials, published materials and materials downloaded from the
Internet for use in the classroom. This is particularly important when creating course materials that will be
used by a large number of classes over time. Copyright law has implications when creating materials that
include excerpts from published works. An example of this would be creating a worksheet that uses a
picture or exercise from a commercial text, alongside teacher-created activities. While an idea cannot be
copyright, the expression of the idea can be and teachers need to be mindful of this.
Time was discussed earlier as a disadvantage for teachers who wish to design their own materials. It is
thus, important to consider ways to make this aspect manageable. Block (1991) suggests a number of ways
in which teachers can lighten the load, including sharing materials with other teachers, working in a team
to take turns to design and produce materials, and organising central storage so materials are available to
everyone.
Guidelines for Designing Effective English Teaching Materials
Teacher designed materials may range from one-off, single use items to extensive programmes of work
where the tasks and activities build on each other to create a coherent progression of skills, concepts and
language items. The guidelines that follow may act as a useful framework for teachers as they navigate the
range of factors and variables to develop materials for their own teaching situations. The guidelines are
offered as just that – guidelines – not rules to be rigidly applied or adhered to. While not all the guidelines
will be relevant or applicable in all materials design scenarios, overall they provide for coherent design and
materials which enhance the learning experience.
Guideline 1: English language teaching materials should be contextualised
Firstly, the materials should be contextualised to the curriculum they are intended to address (Nunan,
1988, pp. 1–2). It is essential during the design stages that the objectives of the curriculum, syllabus or
scheme within the designer’s institution are kept to the fore. This is not to suggest that materials design
should be solely determined by a list of course specifications or by large inventories of vocabulary that
need to be imparted, but these are certainly among the initial considerations. Materials should also be
contextualised to the experiences, realities and first languages of the learners. An important part of this
involves an awareness on the part of the teacher-designer of the “socio-cultural appropriacy” (Jolly &
Bolitho, 1998, p. 111) of things such as the designer’s own style of presenting material, of arranging groups,
and so on. It is essential the materials designer is informed about the culture-specific learning processes of
the intended learners, and for many groups this may mean adjusting the intended balance of what teachers
may regard as more enjoyable activities and those of a more serious nature. Materials should link explicitly
to what the learners already know, to their first languages and cultures, and very importantly, should alert
learners to any areas of significant cultural difference.
In addition, materials should be contextualised to topics and themes that provide meaningful,
purposeful uses for the target language. Wherever possible, these should be chosen on the basis of their
relevance and appropriateness for the intended learners, to ensure personal engagement and to provide
motivation for dipping further into the materials. For some ages and stages the topics may well be ‘old
faithfuls’, such as money, family and holidays. Part of the mission for the materials designer is “to find new
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angles on those topics” (Bell & Gower, 1998, p. 123) and having done that, to develop activities which will
ensure purposeful production of the target language or skills. When producing materials for one-off use
with smaller groups, additional student engagement can be achieved by allowing students to ‘star’ in the
passages and texts that have been designed specifically for them.
Guideline 2: Materials should stimulate interaction and be generative in terms of language
Hall (1995) states that “most people who learn to communicate fluently in a language which is not their L1
do so by spending a lot of time in situations where they have to use the language for some real
communicative purpose” (p. 9). Ideally, language-teaching materials should provide situations that demand
the same; situations where learners need to interact with each other regularly in a manner that reflects the
type of interactions they will engage in outside of the classroom. Hall outlines three conditions he believes
are necessary to stimulate real communication: these are the need to “have something we want to
communicate”, “someone to communicate with”, and, perhaps most importantly, “some interest in the
outcome of the communication” (p. 9). Nunan (1988) refers to this as the “learning by doing philosophy”
(p. 8), and suggests procedures such as information gap and information transfer activities, which can be
used to ensure that interaction is necessary.
Language learning will be maximally enhanced if materials designers are able to acknowledge the
communication challenges inherent in an interactive teaching approach and address the different norms of
interaction, such as preferred personal space, for example, directly within their teaching materials.
Effective learning frequently involves learners in explorations of new linguistic terrain, and interaction can
often be the medium for providing the ‘stretch’ that is necessary for ongoing language development.
Materials designers should ensure their materials allow sufficient scope for their learners to be ‘stretched’
at least some of the time, to build on from what is provided to generate new language, and to progress
beyond surface fluency to proficiency and confidence.
Guideline 3: English language teaching materials should encourage learners to develop learning skills
and strategies
It is impossible for teachers to teach their learners all the language they need to know in the short time that
they are in the classroom. In addition to teaching valuable new language skills, it is essential that language
teaching materials also teach their target learners how to learn, and that they help them to take advantage
of language learning opportunities outside the classroom. Hall (1995) stresses the importance of providing
learners with the confidence to persist in their attempts to find solutions when they have initial difficulties
in communicating. To this end, strategies such as rewording and using facial expressions and body language
effectively can be fine-tuned with well-designed materials. In addition, materials can provide valuable
opportunities for self-evaluation by providing the necessary metalanguage and incorporating activities
which encourage learners to assess their own learning and language development. This can utilise the
learners’ first language as well as English. Some EFL course books, such as Ellis & Sinclair (1989), also
build in exercises for students to explore their own learning styles and strategies.
Guideline 4: English language teaching materials should allow for a focus on form as well as function
Frequently, the initial motivation for designing materials stems from practitioners’ desires to make
activities more communicative—often as “an antidote to the profusion of skillsbased activities and
artificial language use pervasive in the field of ESL instruction” (Demetrion, 1997, p. 5). Sometimes,
though, in the desire to steer a wide berth around this more traditional approach, materials are developed
which allow absolutely no scope for a focus on language form.
The aim of Guideline 3 is to develop active, independent language learners. To help meet this goal,
materials also need to encourage learners to take an analytical approach to the language in front of and
around them, and to form and test their own hypotheses about how language works (Nunan, 1988). Well-
designed materials can help considerably with this by alerting learners to underlying forms and by providing
opportunities for regulated practice in addition to independent and creative expression.
Guideline 5: English language teaching materials should offer opportunities for integrated language
use
Language teaching materials can tend to focus on one particular skill in a somewhat unnatural manner.
Some courses have a major focus on productive skills, and in these reading and listening become second-
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rate skills. With other materials, reading or writing may dominate. Bell & Gower (1998) point out that, “at
the very least we listen and speak together, and read and write together” (p. 125). Ideally, materials
produced should give learners opportunities to integrate all the language skills in an authentic manner and
to become competent at integrating extra-linguistic factors also.
Guideline 6: English language teaching materials should be authentic
Much space has been devoted in language teaching literature to debating the desirability (and otherwise) of
using authentic materials in language teaching classrooms and, indeed, to defining exactly what constitutes
genuine versus simulated texts (e.g., Harmer, 1998; Hedge, 2000; Nunan, 1988, 1991). It is the authors’
view that it is imperative for second language learners to be regularly exposed in the classroom to real,
unscripted language—to passages that have not been produced specifically for language learning purposes.
As Nunan points out, “texts written specifically for the classroom generally distort the language in some
way” (1988, p. 6). When the aim for authenticity in terms of the texts presented to learners is discussed, a
common tendency is to immediately think of written material such as newspapers and magazines. Materials
designers should also aim for authentic spoken and visual texts. Learners need to hear, see and read the
way native speakers communicate with each other naturally. Arguably more important than the provision
of authentic texts, is authenticity in terms of the tasks which students are required to perform with them.
Consideration of the types of real world tasks specific groups of learners commonly need to perform will
allow designers to generate materials where both the texts and the things learners are required to do with
them reflect the language and behaviours required of them in the world outside the classroom.
Guideline 7: English language teaching materials should link to each other to develop a progression
of skills, understandings and language items
One potential pitfall for teacher-designed materials mentioned in the first part of this article relates to the
organisation within and between individual tasks. There is a very real danger with self-designed and
adapted materials that the result can be a hotchpotch of unconnected activities. Clearly stated objectives at
the outset of the design process will help ensure that the resultant materials have coherence, and that they
clearly progress specific learning goals while also giving opportunities for repetition and reinforcement of
earlier learning.
Guideline 8: English language teaching materials should be attractive
Criteria for evaluating English language teaching materials and course books frequently include reference
to the ‘look’ and the ‘feel’ of the product (see, for example, Harmer, 1998; Nunan, 1991). Some aspects of
these criteria that are particularly pertinent to materials designers are discussed below. Physical appearance:
Initial impressions can be as important in the language classroom as they are in many other aspects of life.
Put simply, language-teaching materials should be good to look at! Factors to consider include the density
of the text on the page, the type size, and the cohesiveness and consistency of the layout. User-friendliness:
Materials should also be attractive in terms of their ‘usability’. Some simple examples: if the activity is a
gap-fill exercise, is there enough space for learners to handwrite their responses? If an oral response is
required during a tape or video exercise, is the silence long enough to allow for both thinking and
responding? Durabilty: If materials need to be used more than once, or if they are to be used by many
different students, consideration needs to be given to how they can be made robust enough to last the
required distance. Ability to be reproduced: Language teaching institutions are not renowned for giving
their staff unlimited access to colour copying facilities, yet many do-it-yourself materials designers
continue to produce eye-catching multi-coloured originals, and suffer frustration and disappointment when
what emerges from the photocopier is a class-set of grey blurs.
Guideline 9: English language teaching materials should have appropriate instructions
This guideline applies as much to the instructions that are provided for other teachers who may use the
materials, as it does for the intended learners. It seems to be stating the obvious to say that instructions
should be clear, but, often, excellent materials fail in their “pedagogical realisation” (Jolly & Bolitho, 1998,
p. 93) because of a lack of clarity in their instructions. For instructions to be effective, they should be written
in language that is appropriate for the target learners, and the use of the correct metalanguage can assist
with making instructions more concise and efficient.
Guideline 10: English language teaching materials should be flexible
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This final guideline is directed primarily at longer series of materials rather than at one off tasks, but has
pertinence to both. Prabhu (cited in Cook, c. 1998) maintains that much of a student’s language learning is
“mediated by the materials and course books the teacher uses in terms of both language content and teaching
technique” (p. 3). He proposes constructing materials that allow teachers and students to make choices—at
least some of the time. He suggests the materials designer may offer flexibility in terms of content by
providing “a range of possible inputs . . . [that] are not themselves organised into lesson units” (cited in
Maley, 1998, p. 284), and that teachers or, indeed, students, could then choose which of these to use and
which “procedure” (e.g. comprehension exercise, grammar awareness exercise, role play, etc) to apply to
them.
Maley (2003) takes this idea a stage further, acknowledging the benefits of diversity in the areas of content,
roles and procedures for both teachers and students, and proposing that flexibility is also possible in
approach, level, methodology, logistics, technology, teaching style, evaluation procedures and expected
outcomes. He concludes with this challenge for materials designers: “Those involved . . . could greatly
extend and diversify the range of what is offered to students with relatively little effort. Will they make that
effort?” (p. 7).
Enrichment Instruction: Perform the following task. Use separate sheet/s for your answer.
Activities
1. Outline the Guidelines for Designing Effective English Teaching Materials using tables.
2. Do you think the Factors to Consider When Designing Materials are effective and
feasible to perform? Why or why not?
Check
Instructions: Why should teachers prepare, design and choose their own language
learning and teaching materials? Write your answer on writing paper/s (long size).
Blumsburry: London.
Guidelines for Designing Effective English Language Teaching.pdf
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Module 4 Language Learning Materials

Competencies 1. Create appropriate language learning materials for specific target groups.
Discussion Introduction
Instructional or teaching material is as important as teaching and learning, hence its relevance in the field
of education cannot be overemphasized. It stimulates learners’ interest, make teaching and learning more
productive, provide meaningful sources of information, extend human experience, makes learning more
concrete, real and immediate; to mention but a few. The quality of teaching material goes a long way in
enhancing or inhibiting teaching and learning and it is therefore necessary to evaluate a material to ascertain
its suitability and relevance to achieving the objectives of the lesson for which it is designed. In the case of
human resource, evaluation is also conducted to ascertain how well the person knows the content of the
lesson to be taught before he or she goes to teach the learners.
Concept of Instructional Materials
Teaching materials are both human and non-human instructional resources which teachers use in the course
of teaching. Some are factory-made and some are improvised by the teacher but they all serve the same
purpose (Iorliam, 2013, p.57). Also, Udom (2013) sees instructional material as “a list of all equipment and
materials needed for that particular lesson which the teacher will provide.” As educators guide students’
learning, they must consider the goals and outcomes of the curricula; the backgrounds, abilities, interests,
and learning styles of individual students; and, the learning resources available. Instructional resources and
materials cover what a teacher uses to teach so as to involve the five senses of sight, hearing, touch, smell
and taste while presenting his lessons. Resources could be human or non-human. Instructional materials
are very important in language teaching, especially foreign language. Hence, they facilitate the direct
relationship between the sounds and their symbols and also words and the objects they represent. The use
of instructional material reduces the problem associated with learning by making teaching and learning
concrete rather than abstract. Instructional materials help to clearly illustrate abstract concepts in a language
class. The teacher of language is responsible for the selection of adequate teaching materials. Although the
school authority is responsible for the purchase and installation of instructional materials, it is the
responsibility of the teacher who knows the content of his lessons to select adequate and relevant
instructional materials. The teacher henceforth improvises any teaching material that is not available.
The provision and effective use of high-quality learning resources facilitate students’ construction of
understanding through inquiry so they are better able to explore, question, identify, organise, analyse,
synthesize, and evaluate information. Azikiwe (2007) sees instructional or teaching materials, as the objects
and substances that are used by teachers to enable them to teach efficiently and concretely. In other words,
instructional materials or resources are the teaching aids which teachers employ to enhance the quality and
efficiency of teaching for easy and effective understanding of the learning. While materials are strictly non-
human aids, teaching resources may even refer to human beings that may be used for the purpose of
teaching. The selection of instructional material is solely the responsibility of the teacher.
Learning resources are generally understood to be texts, videos, software, and other materials that assist
students to meet the expectations for learning, as defined by provincial or local curricula. Before a learning
resource is used in a classroom, it must be evaluated to ensure that criteria such as those for curriculum
match, social considerations and age or developmental appropriateness are met. Learning resources such
as newspapers or periodicals that support current events or “the teachable moment” also need to be
evaluated for suitability before use in a classroom. Usually, the evaluation of this type of resource relies on
the professional expertise and judgement of the classroom teacher.
Classification of Teaching Materials
According to Azikwe (2007), there are three broad types of grouping of instructional materials:
1. Visual
2. Audio
3. Audio –visual Visuals
These are resource materials that appeal to the sense of sight and touch as well as the sense of smell. They
consist of:
1. Non – projected materials: chalk board, adhesives
2. Pictorial materials : charts, pictures
3. Mobile materials
4. Three – dimensional aids and materials
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5. Projected materials
6. Film - striped and slide projector
7. Laboratory equipment, chemicals and apparatus
8. Books.
Audio
The aural materials are instructional materials that appeal to the senses of hearing and touch. They are:
1. Records and record players
2. Tapes and tape recorders
3. Language laboratories
4. Radio
Audio-Visuals Learning materials that fall under audio-visuals appeal to the senses of sight, hearing and
touch. They are:
1. Sound-stripe projector
2. Television
3. Video-tape recorder
Importance of Instructional Materials
Instructional materials cover whatever the teacher uses to involve all the senses of sight, hearing, touch,
smell and taste while presenting his lessons (Oyinloye, 2007). They are very important in language
teaching, especially the foreign languages, because they facilitate the direct association between sounds
and their symbols and also words and the objects they represent. The use of aids reduces to the minimum,
the problems of interference and translation. They also help to vividly illustrate meanings of entities
because they are associated with materials used by the teacher to improve the quality of his teaching.
Instructional Materials’ Relevance
Tomlinson (1998) says that the teaching materials have a crucial role in developing quality of education.
(Ijert 2015). It is important to remember, however that there has been a moment to make learners the centre
of language instruction since 1960’s, it’s probably best to view teaching materials as resources in achieving
aims and objectives that have already been set in terms of learner needs because teaching materials should
always be at the service of the teachers and learners (Brown, 1994).Consequently , teachers need to make
every necessary effort to establish and apply a wide variety of relevant and contextually appropriate criteria
for the evaluation of the materials that they use in their language class rooms in order to accommodate the
needs of learners and `` the aims , methods and values of the teaching program.”
Criteria for the selection of Instructional materials
Instructional material to be used by any language teacher must meet the following criteria as suggested by
Azikiwe (2007):
1. Relevance: It must be relevant to the topic or the content to be taught. An instructional material or
resource is usually evaluated before selection in order to ascertain its relevance in the topic to be taught. It
is worthy of note that any material that must be used to teach a particular topic must be related to be topic
in order to give an expected result or lead to the achievement of the learning objectives. The instructional
or resource materials to be selected must be relevant to the objectives as well as to the target population
(i.e. the learners) for whom the materials are to be used. This is important because the objectives that the
materials are designed to achieve should be similar to those that the teacher and the learners are trying to
achieve. Being relevant to the learner means that the characteristics of the learner such, as age, level of
attainment or maturation, ability, aptitude and capability, should all be borne in mind to enable the teacher
select relevant materials to their need, interests and aspirations.
2. Usability: It must be previewed and gotten used to by the teacher that would make use of it. A teacher
should be able to use any instructional material he or she is taking to the classroom. On the other hand, any
material that is designed for the learners must be what they can use. Evaluation therefore, helps to ascertain
the usability of the material.
3. Acceptability: According to Azikiwe (2007), it must be acceptable in other places for the same lesson
or topic. A teaching material to be used by a teacher to teach is what other teachers in another place can
also use to teach the same or similar topic. However, a teaching material to be selected should also be what
is acceptable in the learning environment.
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4. Suitability: teaching resources or materials must be suitable for the age and intellectual level of the
learners. Based on this, the learner’s age is one of the most important factors to consider while selecting or
evaluating teaching materials. This is very important because any material beyond the scope and intellectual
level of the learners will yield little or no result when used to teach them. For examples, a teacher of primary
six cannot use teaching material designed for secondary or university students to teach primary six. The
material may be complex for the young learners.
5. Availability: An important criterion for selection and use of resource materials availability of the needed
materials .In other words, before the teacher decides on materials to use, he must be certain that they are
available as well as accessible to him and the learners. More often than not, the best materials to be used
are not available due to lack of fund. Herein, lays the need for every teacher to avail himself of the skills
for improvisation of “Instructional materials. If the need arises the materials could be improvised. The
teacher does not decide to use any materials just because it has been theoretically stated that the materials
are effective for teaching a particular topic whereas they are not physically available. Rather, the availability
of the materials should be ascertained before the decision to use them. Availability implies, therefore, that
the resources to be used must be physically provided and made accessible both to teachers and learners as
when needed. Secondly, consideration should be given to the possibility of having enough for members of
the class to be equitably involved in the class activities. Furthermore, materials might require other special
facilities such as recorder, socket, adaptors, electricity, etc. before they could be used. The teacher should
therefore ascertain that everything needed for the use of a material is available and within easy reach to him
and to the learners before it is selected. The question form for this criterion is: are the needed instructional
materials available and accessible to teachers and learners?
6. Practicability: a teaching material must be easily understood and practicable for the learners. In the case
of selection of reading texts, the texts should be what the learners can use even without the supervision of
the teacher. Learning resources play a significant role in shaping students’ views about themselves and the
world. Therefore, it is important that these resources portray respect and dignity for both genders, for those
in specific cultural groups, for people with varying physical and intellectual abilities, for people of various
ages, and for people of differing sexual orientation.
The Following General Principles serve as guidelines throughout the Learning Resources Evaluation
Process as outlines by Adeosun (2007):
1. Learning resources that address current curriculum priorities and educational policies are to be included,
where appropriate and available, on all lists of learning resources.
2. Where numerous resources are available on a particular topic, only resources of the highest quality are
recommended.
3. Resources on controversial issues are necessary to support student achievement of particular curriculum
outcomes.
4. Learning resources are evaluated on their overall merit.
5. Resource-based learning is advisable therefore it is necessary that several media formats including fiction
and non-fiction print, audio-visual resources, electronic resources both online and those in physical formats,
multi-resource packages, manipulative, and games.
Material Evaluation
Material evaluation tries to ascertain the appropriateness of a teaching material to teach a specific course.
Material evaluation is very crucial. Wrongly designed teaching materials can cripple the academic and
career competence of students unless they are developed carefully and evaluated periodically. It is pertinent
to up-date the content of teaching materials. Clarity of instruction is a useful starting point in material
evaluation; often teachers’ book gives supporting grammar advice, but the real working of materials lies in
students’ instruction. Firstly, activities and tasks need to be understandable, something that will be clear to
learners. This moves onto the next most important and intertwine factor which is task-achievability, if tasks
materials provided cannot be realised, they need to be decisively removed. Tasks need to be evaluated for
content. The following questions may be asked in doing that:
i. Is it culturally acceptable?
ii. Are the materials practical?
iii. Are the materials teachable?
iv. Are the materials flexible?
v. Do the materials build confidence to achieve students’ independence?
Materials can be systematically evaluated to make daily teaching organised and rewarding. For example:
when choosing a course book, it can be evaluated by looking at all the task within a unit and check if they
are offering students a variety of task types, genres, inputs, outputs, skills and a variety of factors that add
to the effectiveness of the unit’s content. Course books can be evaluated as a whole, considering other
factors such as: cohesion of units and recycling of language to ascertain if a book would be a helpful
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addition to a school’s syllabus. A useful question to evaluation to consider necessary and desirable features
of proposed materials, desirable features should be classified as extremely desirable, very desirable and
quite desirable. More general questions can be asked about teaching contexts in which material will be
used. Other important factors in the evaluation process are the time available to students, age, students’
interests, students’ background, class size and students’ level. Course books offer “a coherent syllabus,
satisfactory language control, motivating text, audio, CDs and other accessories such as video, DVD
material, CD ROMs and extra resource material.” According to Ur (2012) course books may be the most
“powerful device” in relation to methodological innovations and revolutions in syllabus design. Choosing
the right the right course book can therefore have countless rewarding effects in the classroom. The revision
will open the door to incorporate newly emerged thoughts to the contents, methodology and social issues
included in the teaching materials. In addition, a teaching material needs to be evaluated or revised from
time to time in order to ascertain its suitability and relevance to teaching in the growing trends in education.
In doing this, recent thoughts and findings in the area of language can be incorporated.
General Criteria for the Evaluation of Language

Learning Resources Evaluation criteria focus on curriculum fit, content, instructional design, technical
considerations, and social considerations. (Please note the evaluation forms that follow within this section.)
1. Physical quality
Learning resources offer durability and high quality physical and technical quality. They are appealing to
the intended audience.
2. Content:
Learning resources are well organized and of high quality. They offer content that is current, accurate, and
authentic.
3. Social consideration:
Learning resources are fair and equitable concerning age, ability, culture, gender, socio- economic status,
religion, occupation, and sexual orientation. They as free from bias as reasonably possible, and they are
appropriate for the general age and maturity level of the audience. Also, learning resources are free of
intrusive advertising.
4. Instructional design:
Learning resources are user-friendly. Learning resources foster deeper understanding of the subject being
addressed. They relate to the curriculum and are consistent with its philosophy. They are reasonable
regarding expected classroom time commitments. For example, lengthy sequential programmes that must
be taught from beginning to end to be effective tend to tack time away from teaching the curriculum and
are not recommended.
5. Qualification of developer: Learning resources should be developed and validated by qualified and
reputable people.
Summary
The role of instructional materials in classroom teaching and learning activities cannot be overemphasized.
Instructional material evaluation is formative. It is a systematic process that needs to be carefully done; as
this will to a large extent foster or hinder effective teaching and learning. Evaluation as a process will help
a teacher to know the most suitable and relevant instructional material to select. It will also make the teacher
know how well the students learnt with a material previously used. It is neither likely nor expected that one
evaluation system can be used successfully to evaluate all English Language instructional materials. There
will be differences in systems designed for materials intended for different grade bands and/or for different
English Language disciplines. The guidelines described above provide guidance for developing rigorous
and consistent evaluation systems. These guidelines show that the tools and processes must work together
to gather evidence for the quality of the materials, provide opportunities for evaluators to discuss and build
consensus, and provide a neutral, equal platform to compare the strengths and limitations of the various
instructional materials used in English Language education.
Enrichment Instruction: Given the different types of language teaching-learning materials, criteria
Activities of effective language materials, etc., given in the discussion part, research on different
language teaching-learning materials and review them based on the criteria for
evaluation. Compile the materials (at least 10) with your encoded review per material
(100 points).
Check
Instructions: What kind of language learning and teaching materials do you think is the
most effective? Why? Write your answer on writing paper/s (long size).
Blumsburry: London.
Instructional_Materials_and_English_Lang.pdf
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Guidelines for Designing Effective English Language Teaching.pdf
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QUIRINO STATE UNIVERSITY

COLLEGE OF TEACHER EDUCATION