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Aklan Catholic College

Archbishop Gabriel M. Reyes St.
5600 Kalibo, Aklan, Philippines
Tel. Nos.: (036)268-4152; 268-9171
Fax No.: (036)268-4010
Website: http://www.acc.edu.ph
E-mail Add: [email protected]

Language Instructional Materials

Lecture Note – Lesson 2

In the previous lesson, we were introduced to materials development and the context in which they are
developed. As review, consider these questions.

1. In the Philippines, what is one of our main bases in developing English language learning materials?
2. What makes the development of language learning materials development principled?
3. In world Englishes, where does Filipino English lie? What are some of its implication in developing
materials for language teaching?

In this lesson we will tackle how we can make decisions which materials to use in teaching and what factors are to
be considered in making these decisions. Before we can make the any decision, the initial step is always to evaluate
materials.

We may not be aware of it, but as students and teachers, we are evaluating teaching and learning materials all the
time. A simple study of the cover page of a book, browsing of the table of contents, or skipping through a video clip
before consider these materials for studying are is a form of materials evaluation.

To open this lesson, let us examine two materials and make quick but informed decisions about them. Please
study material A and material B and reflect on the questions that follow. You can discuss your thoughts on
these questions with your peers.

Here are the questions.

1. Which material is suitable for junior high school students? Why?

2. Which material will be more meaningful to the learners? Why?
3. Which material needs more improvement? What do you think should be done to improve it?

Material A
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Extract from New Headway Intermediate Student’s Book (Soars and Soars 2009, p.14)

Material B
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Extract from New English File: Upper Intermediate Student’s Book (Oxenden and Latham-Koenig 2008, p. 15)

Materials Evaluation
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Materials evaluation is the process of “measuring the value” of the language learning materials (Tomlinson,
2013) by judging the effect the materials have on the users. According to Tomlinson materials evaluation tries
to measure the following:
● the appeal of the materials to the learners;
● the credibility of the materials to learners, teachers and administrators;
● the validity of the materials (i.e. Is what they teach worth teaching?);
● the reliability of the materials (i.e. Would they have the same effect with different groups of target
learners?);
● the ability of the materials to interest the learners and the teachers;
● the ability of the materials to motivate the learners;
● the value of the materials in terms of short-term learning (important, for example, for performance on
tests and examinations);
● the value of the materials in terms of long-term learning (of both language and of communication
skills);
● the learners’ perceptions of the value of the materials;
● the teachers’ perceptions of the value of the materials;
● the assistance given to the teachers in terms of preparation, delivery and assessment;
● the flexibility of the materials (e.g. the extent to which it is easy for a teacher to adapt the materials to
suit a particular context);
● the contribution made by the materials to teacher development;
● the match with administrative requirements (e.g. standardization across classes, coverage of a
syllabus, preparation for an examination).

It is important to note that as the objective of materials evaluation is to measure the effect of the materials
have on the users, the process and results will vary because the same materials will have varying effects on
different users (Tomlinson, 2013). Furthermore, Materials evaluation can vary along four dimensions (Mishan
and Timmis, 2015, p. 58).

● What is being evaluated?

● When is the evaluation carried out?
● How is the evaluation carried out?
● Who carries out the evaluation?

While material evaluation measures effects on users, materials analysis looks at the objectives of the
materials and how the content, structure, and strategies meet these objectives, materials (Tomlinson, 2013).

Principles of Materials Evaluation

Materials development should be guided by principles. For Tomlinson (2013), the evaluator should form the
principles of evaluation from the following.

1. The evaluator or teacher’s theory of learning and teaching.

Teacher develop their own theories about learning and teaching whether they are aware of it or not.
Identifying one’s theories on teaching and learning improves teaching practices. One useful exercise in
articulating one’s theories is to reflect on one’s teaching practices and writing down the teachers
prevailing view on teaching and learning based on the prevailing teaching practices.

Tomlinson (2013, pp. 24-25) offered his own theories as products of his reflective exercises. Here are
some of his theories.

● Language learners succeed best if learning is a positive, relaxed and enjoyable experience.
● Language teachers tend to teach most successfully if they enjoy their role and if they can gain
some enjoyment themselves from the materials they are using.
● Each learner is different from all the others in a class in terms of his or her personality,
motivation, attitude, aptitude, prior experience, interests, needs, wants and preferred learning
style.
● Each learner varies from day to day in terms of motivation, attitude, mood, perceived needs and
wants, enthusiasm and energy.

2. Learning theory
The teacher should also look into the results of research about language learning, taking care of looking
as closely as possible at the context closes to the learners. Although researches performed somewhere
else in the world will be helpful, it is still more meaningful and practical to look at the results of local
researches on language learning.
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The following are examples of research results that can help the teacher in articulating the principles in
materials evaluation (Tomlinson, 2013, p. 26)

a. Making mental connections is a crucial aspect of the learning process. In order for learning to be
successful, connections need to be made between the new and the familiar, between what is being
learned and the learner’s life and between the learning experience and its potential value in the
future.
b. Experiential learning is essential (though not necessarily sufficient) and, in particular, apprehension
should come to the learner before comprehension (Kolb, 1984; Kelly, 1997; Tomlinson and
Masuhara, 2000; Kolb and Kolb, 2009).
c. Learners will only learn if they need and want to learn and if they are willing to invest time and energy
in the process. In other words, both instrumental and integrative motivation are vital contributors to
learning success (Dornyei and Ushioda, 2009).

3. Second language acquisition (SLA) researches

Tomlinson (2013, pp. 27-30) summarized SLA findings that can be bases for principled materials
evaluation by citing Tomlinson (2011a, 6-23).
● Materials should achieve impact (through novelty, variety, surprise, bizarreness, attractive
presentation and appealing content).
● Materials should help learners to feel at ease (e.g. through the use of white space to prevent clutter
and the use of texts and illustrations which they can relate to their own culture, through a supportive
approach which is not always testing them and through the use of a personal voice).
● Materials should help the learners to develop confidence (e.g. through ‘pushing’ learners slightly
beyond their existing proficiency by involving them in tasks which are challenging but achievable).
● What is being taught should be perceived by learners as relevant and useful (Stevick, 1976; Krashen,
1982; Wenden and Rubin, 1987).
● Materials should require and facilitate learner self-investment (e.g. through giving learners
responsibility for making decisions and through encouraging them to make discoveries about the
language for themselves (Rutherford and Sharwood-Smith, 1988; Tomlinson, 1994, 2007; Bolitho et
al., 2003).
● Learners must be ready to acquire the points being taught both in terms of linguistic, developmental
readiness and of psychological readiness too (Meisel et al., 1981; Pienemann, 1985, 2005).
● Materials should expose the learners to language in authentic use (ideally to a rich and varied input
which includes unplanned, semi-planned and planned discourse and which stimulates mental
response). See Mishan (2005), Rilling and Dantas-Whitney (2009) and Tomlinson (2012).
● The learners’ attention should be drawn to linguistic features of the input (so that they are alerted to
subsequent instances of the same feature in future input (Seliger, 1979; White, 1990; Schmidt, 1992;
Ortega, 2009).
● Materials should provide the learners with opportunities to use the target language to achieve
communicative purposes (in order to automatize existing procedural knowledge, to check the
effectiveness of their existing hypotheses (Swain, 1985, 2005) and to develop strategic competence
(Canale and Swain, 1980).
● Materials should take into account that the positive effects of instruction are usually delayed (and
therefore should not expect effective production immediately to follow initial presentation but should
rather ensure recycling and frequent and ample exposure to the instructed features in communicative
use).
● Materials should take into account that learners differ in learning styles (Oxford and Anderson, 1995;
Oxford, 2002; Anderson, 2005) (and should therefore ensure that they cater for learners who are
predominantly visual, auditory, kinesthetic, experiential, analytic, global, dependent or independent).
● Materials should take into account that learners differ in affective attitudes (Wenden and Rubin, 1987)
(and therefore materials should offer variety and choice). Materials should maximize learning
potential by encouraging intellectual, aesthetic and emotional involvement which stimulates both right
and left brain activities (through a variety of non-trivial activities requiring a range of different types of
processing).
● Materials should provide opportunities for outcome feedback (i.e. feedback on the effectiveness of
the learner in achieving communication objectives rather than just feedback on the accuracy of the
output).

Tomlinson (2013, p. 29) and adding items to his previously cited list. He wrote that materials should:

● help the learner to develop cultural awareness and sensitivity (Tomlinson, 2000b; Byram and
Masuhara, 2013);
● reflect the reality of language use;
● help learners to learn in ways similar to the circumstances in which they will have to use the
language;
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● help to create readiness to learn (e.g. by helping learners to draw their attention to the gap between
their use of a feature of communication and the use of that feature by proficient users of the
language, or by involving the learners in a task in which they need to learn something new in order to
be successful);
● achieve affective engagement (Tomlinson, 2010).

Tomlinson also cited Richard (2001, p. 264) who presented a different of shorter list of qualities that
materials should possess. Richard suggested that each unit in a material

● Gives learners something they can take away from the lesson.
● Teaches something learners feel they can use.
● Gives learners a sense of achievement.
● Practices learning items in an interesting and novel way.
● Provides a pleasurable learning experience.
● Provides opportunities for individual practice.
● Provides opportunities for personalization.
● Provides opportunities for self-assessment of learning.

Types of Materials Evaluation

Evaluation of materials will vary depending on its objectives, the evaluator, and the context in which the
evaluation is carried. A teacher, for example, will evaluate materials as part of selecting materials to be
included in the curriculum or for research purposes. A student on the other hand may conduct the evaluation
training purposes. The objectives of the teacher and the student may even reverse and with it their
methodologies of evaluating.

Tomlinson (2013) proposed three types of evaluation namely ‘pre-use evaluation’, ‘whilst-use evaluation’, and
‘post-use evaluation’.

A. Pre-use evaluation
Pre-use evaluation is performed before a material is released for use and measures the potential of the
materials in achieving success as a language learning material. This kind of evaluation can be
impressionistic and can involve quick judgment of the material. To make the process less subjective, the
evaluation can be made criterion-referenced. This means that a set of criteria can be created as bases for
the evaluation. Having more than one evaluator examine the material in separate locations and have their
scores average can significantly reduce subjectivity (Tomlinson, 2013).
It is the most commonly performed type of evaluation for two main reasons: it is used to determine
quickly which materials to adopt and it is easier (albeit quicker) to administer (Mishan and Timmis, 2015).
Making use of checklists in evaluating materials is widespread. The evaluator has to keep in mind
that the context of evaluation (e.g. users, learning objectives) has to be at the center of the evaluation to
ensure validity of evaluation. In preparing the tool for evaluation, for example a checklist, Tomlinson and
Masuhara (2004, p.7) proposed the following as criteria in selecting or creating the appropriate evaluation
tool.

a. Is each question an evaluation question?

b. Does each question only ask one question?
c. Is each question answerable?
d. Is each question free of dogma?
e. Is each question reliable in the sense that other evaluators would interpret it in the same way?

With these criteria, a good evaluation criteria or questions should be specific, clear, answerable, valid and
reliable that different evaluators would arrive at the same generalization.

B. Whilst-use evaluation
This evaluation is performed while the material is being used. As is measures the moment use of the
material and not rely on prediction, it more reliable than a ‘pre-use evaluation’. However, as it can only
observe momentary or short term effect of the material, it cannot tell long term impact of the material to
learning (Tomlinson, 2013). Whilst-use evaluation can measure the following (pp. 32-33).

a. Clarity of instructions
b. Clarity of layout
c. Comprehensibility of texts
d. Credibility of tasks
e. Achievability of tasks
f. Achievement of performance objectives
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g. Potential for localization

h. Practicality of the materials
i. Teachability of the materials
j. Flexibility of the materials
k. Appeal of the materials
l. Motivating power of the materials
m. Impact of the materials
n. Effectiveness in facilitating short-term learning

As in any type of evaluation, the criteria in ‘whist-use evaluation’ can help gather only impression of the
materials when observing the teacher or learners using the materials. However, breaking the criteria into
smaller and more manageable points of observable characteristics can increase the validity of the
observation and evaluation.

C. Post-use evaluation
Post-use evaluation of materials is the most useful yet least administered of the types of material
evaluation as it can measure short-term effects (e.g. motivation, achievability, teachability, instant
learning, etc.) and long-term effects (e.g. long term memory, application, relating multiple sources, etc.)
(Tomlinson, 2013). It can answer the following important questions (pp. 33-34).

● What do the learners know which they did not know before starting to use the materials?
● What do the learners still not know despite using the materials?
● What can the learners do which they could not do before starting to use the materials?
● What can the learners still not do despite using the materials?
● To what extent have the materials prepared the learners for their examinations?
● To what extent have the materials prepared the learners for their post-course use of the target
language?
● What effect have the materials had on the confidence of the learners?
● What effect have the materials had on the motivation of the learners?
● To what extent have the materials helped the learners to become independent learners?
● Did the teachers find the materials easy to use?
● Did the materials help the teachers to cover the syllabus?
● Did the administrators find the materials helped them to standardize the teaching in their
institution?

A post-use evaluation of a materials can be done by the combination of the following methods (p. 34).

● tests of what has been ‘taught’ by the materials;

● tests of what the students can do;
● examinations;
● interviews;
● questionnaires;
● criterion-referenced evaluations by the users;
● post-course diaries;
● post-course ‘shadowing’ of the learners;
● post-course reports on the learners by employers, subject tutors, etc.

Although very useful and can show a comprehensive evaluation of a material, post-use evaluation can be
quite challenging it may involve data on the users before and after exposure to the materials and following
the users after use to really check long-term effects.

To demonstrate the differences of how the same item or criterion appear in the different types of materials
evaluation checklist, Mishan and Timmis (2015) presented the following examples (p. 59).

Pre-use: How far are the materials likely to motivate the learners? 5 4 3 2 1
Whilst-use: How far do the learners find the materials motivating? 5 4 3 2 1
Post-use: How far did the learners find the materials motivating? 5 4 3 2 1

Evaluating Checklist for Materials Evaluation

Before beginning any language material evaluation, it is useful to examine the checklist or tools to be able to
select the appropriate tool. Tomlinson (2013) proposed the following criteria in examining and evaluating
checklist and criteria (p. 36).

● Is the list based on a coherent set of principles of language learning?

● Are all the criteria actually evaluation criteria or are they criteria for analysis?
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● Are the criteria sufficient to help the evaluator to reach useful conclusions?
● Are the criteria organized systematically (e.g. into categories and subcategories which facilitate
discrete as well as global verdicts and decisions)?
● Are the criteria sufficiently neutral to allow evaluators with different ideologies to make use of them?
● Is the list sufficiently flexible to allow it to be made use of by different evaluators in different
circumstances?

Developing Criteria for Materials Evaluation and Conducting Evaluation

It will be useful for evaluators to create their own set of criteria in materials evaluation. Not only does this
process help define clearly the context of the evaluation, it also helps articulate the teaching practices of the
evaluator and establishes a more systematic evaluation (Tomlinson, 2013). With this, Tomlinson (2013, pp.
37-44) presented principles in for developing criteria for materials evaluation and in conducting the evaluation.
In this section, these principles will be briefly discussed.

1. Brainstorm a list of universal criteria

Brainstorm with colleagues criteria that will apply in various materials regardless of form (textbook,
video lecture, interactive CALL software, etc.) and target learners (Filipino students learning English
in junior high school, Japanese college students learning English as a foreign language, adults
training in healthcare services who are taking English language proficiency training, etc.). Tomlinson
(2013) presented the following questions as samples of universal criteria (p. 37).
● Do the materials provide useful opportunities for the learners to think for themselves?
● Are the target learners likely to be able to follow the instructions?
● Are the materials likely to cater for different preferred learning styles?
● Are the materials likely to achieve affective engagement?

2. Subdivide some of the criteria

If the evaluation will be a basis for the revision or adaptation of materials, it will be useful to break the
criteria down into more specific criteria or questions. Specific questions can define more clearly the
direction of the revision or adaptation.

3. Monitor and revise the list of universal criteria

The next step after subdividing the some of the criteria that need to be specified is to review them
and rewrite them according to the following criteria.
● Is each question an evaluation question?
● Does each question only ask one question?
● Is each question answerable?
● Is each question free of dogma?
● Is each question reliable in the sense that other evaluators would interpret it in the same way?

4. Categorize the list

After revising the criteria or questions based on the criteria above, group them into logical categories.
Doing this not only helps in forming generalizations, it also enables you think of other related criteria
as you cork on building the criteria or the evaluation instrument (Tomlinson, 2013). Some of the
categories may be (p. 40-41):
● Learning Principles ● Activities
● Cultural Perspective ● Methodology
● Topic Content ● Instructions
● Teaching Points ● Design and Layout
● Texts

5. Develop media-specific criteria

Media-specific criteria are questions that are applicable for the medium of the material your
evaluating (Tomlinson, 2013). Examples of mediums or forms are textbook, audio materials,
interactive books, videos, etc. As examples, media-specific criteria for videos may look like these.
● Are important verbal prompts available to emphasize important expressions?
● Is the audio in sync with the visuals?
● Does the paring of visual objects and sound help in facilitating understanding?

6. Develop content-specific criteria

Content-specific criteria are questions that are specific to the content of the lesson or topic. These
questions have to be present to be able to able to measure the content validity of the material. The
following questions are examples of content-specific criteria for a section in ‘giving directions’.
● Are there provisions of dialogues demonstrating giving directions?
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● Does the section include the essential vocabulary for giving directions?
● Are students given an activity to converse with a pair to give directions?

7. Develop age-specific criteria

Create criteria of questions that ask for the suitability of the materials to the age of the target learners.
These criteria are based on the learners’ cognitive and affective development, previous experiences,
interest, wants, and needs. Tomlinson (2013, p. 42) gave the following examples as age-specific
criteria.
● Are there short, varied activities which are likely to match the attention span of the learners?
● Is the content likely to provide an achievable challenge in relation to the maturity level of the
learners?

8. Develop local criteria

According to Tomlinson (2013, p. 42) It is this set of criteria which is unique to the specific evaluation
being undertaken and which is ultimately responsible for most of the decisions made in relation to the
adoption, revision or adaptation of the materials.

Typical features of the environment which would determine this set of materials are:
● the type(s) of institution(s);
● the resources of the institution(s);
● class size;
● the background, needs and wants of the learners;
● the background, needs and wants of the teachers;
● the language policies in operation;
● the syllabus;
● the objectives of the courses;
● the intensity and extent of the teaching time available;
● the target examinations;
● the amount of exposure to the target language outside the classroom.

Examples of local criteria would be:

● To what extend do the activities allow the learners to use the tools available in their
environment?
● To what extent are the readings materials reflect the reality of life of teenagers in the
Philippines?
● To what extent do the stories appeal to 13-year old learners in the Visayas?

9. Develop other criteria

Aside from the criteria above, you can also develop criteria that may include those that are specific to
teachers, administrators, gender, culture, or specific to L1.

10. Trial the criteria

After completing all the criteria, try-out the instrument with a small sample evaluation team. This is to
check whether the criteria are sufficient, answerable, reliable and useful. With this, revisions can be
done before the actual evaluation.

11. Conducting the evaluation

Culling from his experience, Tomlinson (2013, p. 43) proposed an effective way of conducting an
evaluation.

● make sure that there is more than one evaluator;

● discuss the criteria to make sure there is equivalence of interpretation;
● answer the criteria independently and in isolation from the other evaluator(s);
● focus in a large evaluation on a typical unit for each level (and then check its typicality by
reference to other units);
● give a score for each criterion (with some sets of criteria weighted more heavily than others);
● write comments at the end of each category;
● at the end of the evaluation aggregate each evaluator’s scores for each criterion, category of
criteria and set of criteria and then average the scores;
● record the comments shared by the evaluators;
● write a joint report.
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Materials Adaptation

Adaptation is the process of making the materials more suitable for the circumstances or context in which it is
used, in a way that any intrinsic deficiencies in the materials are compensated (McGrath 2002, p. 62). This
means that the work of adaptation may involve modifying some parts of the materials to make them more
tailored to the learners and their environment. Materials adaptation can be described as ad hoc or as
principled.

Ad hoc adaptation is a simple act of selecting materials or part of which by relying simply on relying on one’s
intuition, preference, or what one believes to be effective for the learners. An example of this is when a
teacher selects activities in books are video clips from YouTube.

Principled adaptation, on the other hand, is performed after an evaluation of the material. The evaluation
does not need to be extensive as the objective is just to get a principled rationale and guide for the adaptation
of the material (Tomlinson and Masuhara, 2003, as cited in Mishan and Timmis, 2015). In this manner, the
adaptation is guided by grounded decisions or principles based on a prior evaluation. According to McGrath
(2013), material adaptation can be reactive as it responses to classroom events as they happen or proactive
when adaptation is done before the course or class begins. McGrath also points out that adaptation can focus
on selected course, section, or activity.

Areas for Adaptation

McGrath (2013, pp. 62-63), as cited in Mishan and Timmis (2015, pp. 69-70) have summarized the potential
areas for adaptation.

● language (the language of instructions, explanations, examples, the language in exercises and texts
and the language learners are expected to produce) [presumably the language they are expected to
produce in controlled practice activities]
● process (forms of classroom management or interaction stated explicitly in the instructions for
exercises, activities and tasks, but also the learning styles involved)
● content (topics, contexts, cultural references)
● level (linguistic and cognitive demands on the learner)

Process of Adaptation of Materials

Tomlinson and Masuhara (2004, p. 15, as cited in Mishan and Timmis, 2015, p. 70) suggest the prototypical
process of adaptation

1. Create a profile of teaching context. Survey the environment and context where the material is used.
2. Identify the reasons for adaptation. This will be guided by the survey you will have conducted earlier.
3. Evaluate the materials in relation to a specific group or learners or context.
4. List the objectives of learning for a specific group of learners in order determine the direction of the
adaptation.
5. Adapt the materials by modifying the any or a combination of the following areas: language, process,
content, level.
6. Teach using the adapted materials and perform simple or complex evaluation by determining the
materials’ success and the failures
7. Revise or modify the adaptation based on your evaluation after teaching.

Teachers may not need to go through all the stages of adaptation that Tomlinson and Masuhara (2004)
proposed. However, going through all the stages maybe a good exercise for teacher as the reflective nature of
the process leads teachers to look into their own teaching paradigms and practices.

McDonough, Shaw, & Masuhara (2013) presents different techniques that you can employ for adaptation of
materials. In the discussion in this module, examples extracted from McDonough, Shaw, & Masuhara, will be
presented to illustrate the technique. For a fuller discussion, you may refer to Materials and Methods in ELT: A
Teacher’s Guide (3rd edition) by McDonough, Shaw, & Masuhara.

● Adding (including expanding and extending)

Adding implies that materials are supplemented by putting more into them, while taking into account
the practical effect on time allocation.
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a. Adding can be done through extending. An example is when the materials contain practice in the
pronunciation of minimal pairs (bit/ bet, hat/hate, ship/chip) but not enough examples of the
difficulties for learners with a particular L1. Japanese speakers may need more l/r practice, Arabic
speakers more p/b, Spanish speakers more b/v and so on.
b. Adding can be done through expanding. An example can be when a discussion section is added
at the end of the unit to help to reinforce and contextualize the linguistic items covered, particularly
if it is carefully structured so that the most useful points occur ‘naturally’.

● Deleting (including subtracting and abridging)

In deleting, material is taken out rather than supplemented
a. Deleting can be done through subtracting. Our pronunciation exercises on minimal pairs contain
too much general material. Since our students all have the same mother tongue and do not make
certain errors, many of the exercises are inappropriate. Arabic speakers, for example, will be
unlikely to have much difficulty with the l/r distinction.
b. Deleting can be done through abridging. The materials contain a discussion section at the end of
each unit. However, our learners are not really proficient enough to tackle this adequately, since
they have learnt the language structures but not fluency in their use. The syllabus and its
subsequent examination do not leave room for this kind of training.

● Modifying (including rewriting and restructuring)

Modifying is the process of making internal change in the approach or focus of an exercise or other
piece of material.
a. One class of modification is to rewrite the approach used in the materials to suit the needs of the
learners or the teaching situations. An example is when the teacher orally records a reading
passage as audio model when audio model does not come with a book.
b. The other class of modification is to restructure the activities or learning tasks. For example, the
materials may contain role-play activities for groups of a certain size. The logistics of managing a
large class (especially if they all have the same L1) are complex from many points of view, and it
will probably be necessary to assign one role to a number of pupils at the same time. Obviously
the converse – where the class is too small for the total number of roles available – is also possible
if perhaps less likely.

● Simplifying
The main application of this technique has been to texts, most often to reading passages. Traditionally,
the emphasis has been on changing various sentence-bound elements to match the text more closely
to the proficiency level of a particular group of learners. Thus, for instance, we can simplify according to
a. Sentence structure. Sentence length is reduced, or a complex sentence is rewritten as a number
of simpler ones, for example, by the replacement of relative pronouns by nouns and pronouns
followed by a main verb.
b. Lexical content, so that the number of new vocabulary items is controlled by reference to what
students have already learned.
c. Grammatical structures. For instance, passives are converted to actives; simple past tense to
simple present; reported into direct speech.

● Reordering
This procedure refers to the possibility of putting the parts of a coursebook in a different order. This
may mean adjusting the sequence of presentation within a unit, or taking units in a different sequence
from that originally intended.
a. Materials typically present ‘the future’ by ‘will’ and ‘going to’. However, for many learners, certainly
at intermediate level and above, it is helpful to show the relationship between time reference and
grammatical tense in a more accurate way. In this example we would probably wish to include the
simple present and the present continuous as part of the notion of ‘futurity’, perhaps using ‘Next
term begins on 9 September’ or ‘She retires in 2015’ as illustrations.
b. Reordering can include separating items of content from each other as well as regrouping them
and putting them together. An obvious example is a lesson on a particular language function felt to
contain too many new grammar points for the present proficiency level of the learners.