Developing English Workbook

for Early Childhood Education

Presented in National Seminar

by
Enis Fitriani, S.Pd, M.Pd

3rd Floor Hall of Campus C IKIP Budi Utomo

Malang, 22 April 2017
 Early childhood is defined as the period from birth to
eight years old. (en.unesco.org/themes/early-childhood-
care-and-education)
Early childhood education (ECE; also nursery
education) is a branch of education theory which relates to
the teaching of young children (formally and informally)
up until the age of about eight.
Infant/toddler education, a subset of early
childhood education, denotes the education of children
from birth to age two.
(en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Early_childhood_education)
Piaget (1969) states there are four stages of
children development:
• Sensory motor stage, birth to 2 years old
• Preoperational stage, aged 2-8 years old
• Concrete operational stage, aged 8-11 years old
• Formal stage, aged 11-15 years old or more
 Young Learners = elementary school children
aged 6-12 years old

Younger group Older group

(6-8 years old) (9-12 years old)
Based on grades or classes:

Lower classes Upper classes

(class 1, 2, & 3) (class 4, 5, & 6)

(Suyanto, 2oo7)
Scott dan Ytreberg (1990) divide
young learners into groups:

Level One Level Two

(5-7 years old) (8-10 years old)

preschool or kindergarten children who study

English are grouped into Very Young Learners
Teaching Material is anything which can be
used by teachers to their students in order to
get the particular competences or skills which
have been planned.
Teaching material is one of the curriculum
components which is also called the content of
curriculum.

(Suyanto, 2oo7)
Teaching material sources:
• Text books (student books)
• Teacher books
• Cassettes, CDs, DVDs, music or videos from internet
• Flash cards
• Experience records which are relevant to the lesson taught
• Scientific articles and conceptual writings
• Teacher’s experience notes
• Brochure, manual, and other relevant materials
• Posters
• Research results
 What should teachers do to the
teaching materials?
1. Select the available materials
2. Consider the contents (true or not)
3. Consider whether the material is updated or
not (depend on the type and characteristics
of the materials)
• The type of EYL materials which will be
developed depend on the purpose and type of
language skills which will be taught.
• The four language skills (listening, speaking,
reading, and writing) and three language
components (structure, vocabulary, and
pronunciation) determine the teaching
materials which are appropriate to the needs.
• Simple structure
• Vocabulary must be presented
• Vocabulary is limited around 500 words
• Full of pictures
• Drill for pronunciation practice
• Easy to understand and vary
• Vocabulary chosen is used in daily life and easy to use for
communication
• Easy to get
EYL Teaching Material
Characteristics
Examples of EYL teaching materials
skills materials types
Pronunciation drills, songs, pattern practices, Recorded
Listening
news, dialogs, report, texts, stories, etc. Tape script
- Dialogs (daily activity)
- Reports (event, activity with friends) Recorded and
Speaking - News (natural disaster, feast day) written
- Songs (popular/favorite songs)
- Texts or passages (text with interesting
contents)
Reading - Articles (tourism articles) Written
- Stories (fable, folklores)
- Poems (nature, daily activity)
- Letters (invitation)
- Poems (excitement expression, natural
Writing beauty) Written
- Stories (fairytale, legend, fable)
- Posters (mother’s day, living environment)
Teaching Material Development
• Richard, 2001: … write the teaching materials which
are similar to the process contained in planning
and teaching the lesson.
• Gebhard, 2000: … materials are composed by four
groups—publishers, government institutions,
curriculum development team, and teachers.
• Tomlinson and Hitomi, 2004: … the process covers
evaluation, adaptation, writing, and teaching
material use.
Some Ways to Develop Teaching Materials
(Suyanto, 2007)

1. Adoption
a. Collect the teaching material books or references which are
relevant to the lessons
b. Evaluate the materials, whether they are appropriate with
the learning objectives or not
c. Choose the materials from the available sources, whether
they are appropriate with the language program/class
taught
d. Manage the material order in accordance with the
themes/topics planned to the learning activities
2. Adaptation

Adjust to the needs, teachers can adapt the

teaching materials by adding, cutting, changing,
or omitting some parts of the materials
considered irrelevant
The essence is teachers adjust the students’ needs
and objectives determined so that all materials
are relevant with the needs and learning
objectives
3. Writing
Teaching materials are usually completed by clear
objectives, vocabularies, and structures based on
flexible learning in accordance with the needs and
having sufficient tasks and exercises, content
summary, and way to study the materials.
Before developing or writing materials usually
teachers start to collect, choose, and have collection
of books, references, and other materials, then
teachers make the themes in accordance with the
students’ language development level or class.
Teaching Material Development Steps
(Suyanto, 2007):
• Formulate the learning objectives
• Determine the appropriate approach or
development model of materials
• Determine the order of contents or subjects with the
themes, topics, or language functions
• Apply the development activities such as adoption,
adaptation, or modification for particular parts
• Conduct the field testing (try out)
• Carry out reflection and revision of materials
• Write or finish the product as a teaching material
What should we take into account about EYL
teaching materials?
• Materials should be contextual, suitable with daily
life
• Material contents can improve communication skills
• Materials introduce various discourse
• Tasks and exercises can improve students’ language
competence and involve active student learning
• Material use creates fun learning activities
• Material contents can be correlated to the students’
daily life and the real world
Model of Developing Material proposed by
Borg, Gall, and Gall (1983):
 Adapted Model of Developing
Materials from Borg, Gall, and Gall
proposed by Winarti (2012):
1) need analysis and reference study
2) material development
3) expert validation
4) revision 1
5) limited field testing
6) revision 2
7) final product
 1. need analysis and reference study

The data were collected from the preliminary

study, by conducting interview with the
principle and English teacher, also distributing
questionnaire to students, the students were
guided by their class teacher in filling out the
questionnaire sheet.
 2. material development
• The first draft of the materials developed
based on kindergarten class B syllabus which is
represented on the materials in Belajar Bahasa
Inggris book.
• The very first step to develop is arranging the
content of the workbook based on the school’s
syllabus which determines what chapter, topic,
vocabulary focus, English skill focus,
competence, and activities are.
• The next step is determining the approach of
applying materials. The approach chosen is
communicative since based on need analysis.
• The writer selected authentic materials from
many sources.
• The last step is making layout, this means that
the researcher arranged pictures, colors, space,
and print size so that look attractive for the
users i.e. students of kindergarten
 3. expert validation
a workbook development may need validation from
experts in curriculum, classroom instruction,
assessment, illustration, content, language,
activities, and design
The result of quantitative data were gained from
the expert evaluation for the draft in the checklist
ranging from 1 to 5. Whereas, for the qualitative
data was gained from the general comments and
suggestions on the questionnaire.
 4. revision 1
Revision is needed to be done for the draft
of developed materials since comments and
suggestions from the experts’ validation
were given to the researcher in order to
make the workbook more useful, effective,
attractive, and appropriate for the students’
need.
 5. limited field testing or try out
The revised draft of developed materials were
tried out to get feedback whether the
developed material met or needed revision
according the students’ opinion.
• Observe the teaching and learning process
• Questionnaire for the English teacher and
students
6. revision 2
 7. Final product
Finally, the product i.e. English Workbook for
Kindergarten B is ready to use after completing the
procedures of material development. The product
includes a student workbook and set of teaching
media for the teacher.
“Then which of the favors of your Lord will you deny?”
(Ar-Rahmaan: 13)

Thank You
Thank You