INTRODUCTION 1.1 Rationale of the study
Aims of the study
An evaluation of teaching materials helps to identify particular strengths and weaknesses of the materials The finding of the thesis will be very useful for both the researcher and the teachers, who are teaching the coursebook “English for Engineering” It will provide the authorities and the teachers with scientific evidence to improve the quality of the current book used for the second-year students of HNIVC.
Research questions
The thesis will be conducted to answer the following research question :
How does the textbook, used for the second-year students at HNIVC, meet the course requirements in terms of the aims, the contents and the methodology?
In order to answer the question above, the researcher intents to carry out the following procedures:
- Reviewing the literature relating to material evaluation and setting up the criteria for evaluating the material Based on the theoretical framework the researcher analyses the material;
- Conducting a questionnaire for the students to find out their opinions about the materials they have learned;
- Conducting a questionnaire for the teacher to find out the opinion about the material they have used;
- Finally, the researcher makes suggestion and recommendations on the development of the material.
Scope of the study
Evaluating teaching is complicated work and it needs to take into consideration lots of different aspects such as materials effectiveness, efficiency, attitudes, specialty, validity, reliability, etc In this study, the researcher just focuses on three criteria which are stated in the requirements of the students at Hanoi Industrial Vocational College: in terms of the aims, the content and the methodology in the textbook „ English for Engineering‟.
Methods of the study
To collect the data, the methods used in this thesis are document analysis, survey questionnaires, and informal interviews
Document analysis here refers to the analysis of the materials itself and the requirements of the course
Survey questionnaires specifically designed for both the teachers and the second- year students who have experienced using the book
Informal interview is used to seek for detailed and objective opinions of examples of teachers and students on the material and students‟ needs This method we used when researching some opinions on the aims, the content and the methodology of the teachers and students in our college Therefore, it is not written in the appendix.
Design of the study
The study is organized into five main chapters as follows :
- Chapter 1 Discusses the background to the study and statement of problem, the aims, the researcher question, the limitations and overview of the thesis;
- Chapter 2 Presents a review of literature, concentrating on the issues related to ESP material evaluation;
- Chapter 3 Describes the research methodology; description of teaching ESP and its objectives at HIVC; the data collection instruments, the subjects as well as the data collection procedures;
- Chapter 4 Discusses findings of the data analysis, objectives of the course; significance of each criterion;
- Chapter 5 Suggests solutions to improve the material and concludes the study.
Conclusion
In this chapter, we showed the procedure that we will do in the thesis; the reason that we chose this topic; the aims of the study that needs to evaluate this textbook; to conduct the work, we need to give the research questions, whether this question need to analysis during working on the thesis; then we introduced the scope of the study, we focus more on the aims, the content and the methodology in the textbook when we analysis the data that we collected for the study; next we discussed about the methods of the study; and finally, the design of the thesis is introduced in order to join all the parts of the thesis closely and consequently.
Materials in language teaching and learning
ESL (English as a Second Language), ESOL (English for Speakers of Other Languages), and EFL (English as a Foreign Language) all refer to the use or study of English by speakers with a different native language The precise usage, including the different use of the terms ESL and ESOL in different countries, is described below These terms are most commonly used in relation to teaching and learning English, but they may also be used in relation to demographic information ELT (English Language Teaching) is a widely-used teacher- centred term, as in the English language teaching divisions of large publishing houses, ELT training, etc The abbreviations TESL (Teaching English as a Second Language), TESOL (Teaching English to Speakers of Other Languages) and TEFL (Teaching English as a Foreign Language) are also used The literature on the subject of textbook evaluation is not very extensive Various writers have suggested ways of helping teachers in particular to be more sophisticated in their evaluative approach, by positing „checklists‟ based on supposedly generalizable criteria These sometimes elaborate systems use a variety of „scoring‟ methods to assess how well specific textbooks measure up under scrutiny (see Tucker 1975, van Lier
1979, Allwright 1981, and Williams 1983) Tucker, for example, proposes an ingenious method whereby textbooks are assigned numerical scores, which are then plotted on a „Value Merit Product Graph‟, the object of which is to compare the resulting score curve against an ideal target profile drawn up in advance by the teacher
According to Hutchinson and Waters (1987), textbook evaluation is basically a straightforward, analytical „matching process: matching needs to available solutions‟ Our own view is that this issue is rather more emotive and controversial for teachers; many would agree with Swales (1980) that textbooks, especially course books, represent a „problem‟, and in extreme cases are examples of educational failure We would like to explore the reasons for such strong reactions, and to put forward possible evaluative solutions We wish to concentrate on course books because, whether we like it or not, these represent for both students and teachers the visible heart of any ELT program The selection of a particular core volume signals an executive educational decision in which there is considerable professional, financial and even political investment This high profile means that the definition and application of systematic criteria for assessing course books are vital Supplementary textbooks and materials on the other hand may not carry the same burden The evaluative criteria for these can to some extent remain implicit, or be allowed to define themselves more informally in the local situation
2.2.1 Roles of textbooks in EFL/ESL class
Back in 1934, McElroy stated that “the textbook is decidedly not the sole condition of an effective class; quality of teaching is more important” 75 years later, an enormous body of research on the role of the textbook in EFL classrooms has accumulated around the globe, indicating that „successful‟ learning and teaching in primary and secondary EFL school environments is dependent on a wider spectrum of factors, not only on the quality (or quantity) of English language learning materials The importance of the teacher is, of course, undisputed (see, for instance, Butzkamm 2005)
Over the past decades, it has become increasingly clear that context-sensitive EFL instruction requires teachers to take into account many anthropological and sociocultural factors which influence the conditions under which English is taught Currently, global textbooks produced for teaching and learning English as a foreign language in many different countries are criticized for paying too little attention to this, especially for largely failing to assist EFL teachers in bridging the cultural background(s) of „their‟ individual learners and the diversity of English-speaking target language cultures
College textbooks come in a variety of shapes and sizes, paperback, spiral bound, or hardcover, but what is most important is finding used copies While all college textbooks are available brand new, hot off the printing press, the brand new versions can cost you double the price of a used textbook For a new college student, money spent on textbooks can easily eat up a month's worth of wages However, there has been a sharp decline in textbook purchasing in the past few years Students are bypassing the typical types of school textbooks and embracing ways to save money on books Many students are now taking to sharing textbooks The more students taking the same class, the easier it is to share the textbook A new type of textbook is becoming readily available Instead of purchasing expensive, heavy textbooks, some colleges and publishers are including free, downloaded textbooks Students simply download the textbook to their computer and print out necessary pages or read the textbook online This is helping students focus on the expense of tuition, room, and board without having to worry about finding inexpensive versions of the textbooks they need.
English for specific purpose ( ESP) 1 What is ESP?
ESP has had a relatively long time to mature and so we would expect the ESP community to have a clear idea about what ESP means Strangely, however, this does not seem to be the case Some people described ESP as simply being the teaching of English for any purpose that could be specified Others, however, were more precise, describing it as the teaching of English used in academic studies or the teaching of English for vocational or professional purposes Swales (1985) presents an article by C.L Barber on the nature of Scientific English which was published as early as 1962 But it was the late 1960s and the early 1970s which saw the greatest expansion of research into the nature of particular varieties of English – for example, descriptions of written scientific and technical English by Ewer and Latorre (1969), Swales (1971), Selinker and Trimble (1976) and others Most of the work at this time was in the area of English for Science and Technology (EST) and for a time ESP and EST were regarded as almost synonymous But there were studies in other fields too, such as the analysis of doctors – patient communication by Candlin, Bruton and Learther (1976) In short, the view gained ground that the English needed by a particular group of learners could be identified by analyzing the linguistic characteristics of their specialist area of work or study … became the guiding principle of ESP (Tom Hutchinson and Alan Waters (1987)
According to Dudley-Evan (1997), the characteristics of ESP can be described as follow:
1 ESP is defined to meet specific needs of the learners;
2 ESP makes use of underlying methodology and activities of the discipline it serves;
3 ESP is centered on the language appropriate to these activities in terms of grammar, lexis, register, study skills, discourse and genre
1 ESP may be related to or designed for specific disciplines;
2 ESP may use, in specific teaching situations, a different methodology from that of General English;
3 ESP is likely to be designed for adult learners, either at a tertiary level institution or in a professional work situation It could, however, be for learners at secondary school level;
4 ESP is generally designed for intermediate or advanced students;
5 Most ESP courses assume some basic knowledge of the language systems
HNIVC offers students with all ages when they have certified that they finished High School in Vietnam All students will be expected to have the subjects in a college preparatory curriculum, or in an appropriate college course of study, that they can perform well in their future working environment So at HNIVC students need to be trained about their future career as well as English as a means to find a job after graduating After learning
120 lessons for General English, our students will continue learning 60 ESP lessons This can help them for more opportunities to find a better job This is why ESP is taught in this college.
Textbooks evaluation 1 What is textbooks evaluation?
In today's classrooms, textbooks serve as tool and tutor, guidebook and gauge
Teachers throughout the world use texts to guide their instruction, so textbooks greatly influence how content is delivered Schmidt, McKnight, and Raizen (1997) identified textbooks as playing an important role in making the leap from intentions and plans to classroom activities, by making content available, organizing it, and setting out learning tasks in a form designed to be appealing to students To make the most effective use of a textbook, however, teachers must decide which textbooks are appropriate for their needs A teacher needs to determine the extent to which a textbook focuses on and is aligned with a coherent set of significant, age-appropriate student learning goals that the teacher, school, or district has identified as integral to the understanding of and progress in a particular academic subject They must also assess how well a textbook's instructional design effectively supports the attainment of those specified learning goals The only way to gain this information is through careful evaluations of textbooks and other curriculum materials
To evaluate a textbook, reviewers examine each content-matched activity in light of the instructional criteria and rate the set of activities according to a prescribed set of indicators and scoring scheme for each one Their findings are presented as profiles of judgments for each learning goal across the set of criteria with evidence provided to support each judgment
Sheldon (1988) has offered several reasons for textbook evaluation He suggests that the selection of an ELT textbook often signals an important administrative and educational decision in which there is considerable professional, financial, or even political investment
A thorough evaluation, therefore, would enable the managerial and teaching staff of a specific institution or organization to discriminate between all of the available textbooks on the market Moreover, it would provide for a sense of familiarity with a book‟s content, thus assisting educators in identifying the particular strengths and weaknesses of textbooks already in use
This would go a long way in ultimately assisting teachers with making optimum use of a book's strong points, and recognizing the shortcomings of certain exercises, tasks, and entire texts To make the most effective use of a textbook, however, teachers must decide which textbooks are appropriate for their needs A teacher needs to determine the extent to which a textbook focuses on and is aligned with a coherent set of significant, age-appropriate student learning goals that the teacher, school, or district has identified as integral to the understanding of and progress in a particular academic subject They must also assess how well a textbook's instructional design effectively supports the attainment of those specified learning goals The only way to gain this information is through careful evaluations of textbooks and other curriculum materials This thesis reveals how well a textbook can support teachers in their efforts to help students learn specific ideas and skills, specifically those in nationally accepted standards and benchmarks This textbook evaluation gives busy educators the solid information they need to make informed choices about which textbooks can help their students improve their knowledge and skills in teaching and learning English
Evaluating materials can be divided into three types : preliminary, formative and summative evaluation
This kind of evaluation will be normally carried out before a course begins Its aim involves selecting the most appropriate materials from the publications that are available for a particular group of learners At the same time, from the kind of evaluation the evaluators can also identify specific aspects of the materials that require adaptation Is is necessary to have a set of criteria which is ranked in order of priority for making decision of textbook selection and adaptation (Robinson, 1991)
According to Brown (1995) summative evaluation is usually characterized as occurring at the end of the program The purpose for gathering information not capable of improving that particular determine the degree to which the program was successful evaluation is to decisions that result from summative evaluation tend to cause sweeping changes and are fairly large in scale Examples of such decisions might include the cancellation or continued funding of a program to a much more suitable site This leads to the fact that these decisions or judgments often produce so much anxiety and defensiveness in student, teacher, and curriculum makers
Before handling an evaluation project, evaluators have to determine the purpose of the work, i.e determine whether their evaluation would be formative or summative So what type of evaluation should be done to a university language program? It might be noted that most university language program are continuing institutions that do not conveniently come to an end so that summative can not be performed Therefore, a formative evaluation is always a choice when an evaluation to a university language program is needed
Scriven (1967) cited in Lynch (1996) first used the term formative evaluation in connection with curriculum development Is was defined as the use of systematic evaluation in the process of curriculum construction, teaching, and learning for the purpose of improving any of these three processes One of key characteristics of formative evaluations is that it takes place during the course of program delivery, and it therefore provides a mechanism for improving the program during the course of the program delivery Brown (1995) adds that the types of decisions that result from formative evaluation are numerous and relatively small in scale because such decisions are mean to result in modifications and fine tuning of existing curriculum Formative evaluation can be built into the curriculum during its development and implementation When planners make such evaluation a regular part of the curriculum, they are in the enviable position of constantly being able to gather and analyze information to be used in changing , developing, and upgrading their program
The role of formative and summative evaluation is proved to be essential to any language training program, however, both two types of evaluation seem to be very unfamiliar to nearly all of the language program in particular and educational programs in Vietnam At HNIVC, this evaluation project is the first program evaluation that has ever been done though a lot of adjustments to the program have occurred The purpose of this evaluation project is to improve the current course book for students of HNIVC, so the type of evaluation chosen for the project is formative evaluation
Many authors have introduced different models for materials evaluation in the literature However, depending on purpose and kinds of materials evaluation, one should choose an appropriate model For example, in order to select the most suitable materials using both macro and micro evaluation, Donough and Shaw' model (1993) can be utilized
In order to carry out a materials evaluation at micro laver, the model suggested by Ellis
(1993) can be employed The models defined by Hutchinson and Waters (1993) and by Cunningsworth (1995) aim to carry out a macro- evaluation, and to investigate the suitability of the materials to the learners' needs and the syllabus requirements A short description of each model will be presented in the following sections:
Evaluation model by Mc Donough and Shaw (a combination of macro and micro – evaluation)
In 1993, Donough and Shaw suggest their materials evaluation It is a three- stage model that is called external evaluation, internal evaluation, and overall evaluation (see Figure 1) This model is based on the view that it is useful for teachers to perform and external evaluation of materials so that they can gain an overview of organizational principles involved, then move to a detailed internal evaluation of the materials to see how far the materials match up to what the author claims as well as to the aim and objective of a given teaching program Accordingly, external evaluation is considered as a preliminary evaluation or a macro- evaluation It is an examination of the claims made for the whole materials by the author or publisher These claims can be made somewhere on the cover of the book, in the instructions, or even in the table of contents The evaluation at this stage helps to identify whether the material is potentially appropriate
The internal evaluation stage (micro – evaluation) requires an in-depth look oat two or more units to examine what will actually be presented ” inside” the materials themselves and whether the claims made by the author are the one found in internal evaluation
The next step is overall evaluation of the materials It examines the suitability of the materials on such numbers of factors as the usability, the generalizability, adaptability, and flexibility factors This model is shown as figure 1 From figure 1 it is clear that the internal stage will be carried out when the materials have been evaluated to be potentially appropriate in the external evaluation If the findings at this stage show that the materials are inappropriate, the evaluation will be finished quite early
Macro - evaluation inappropriate/ potentially appropriate (External)
Exit Micro - evaluation inappropriate/ appropriate adopt/select (Internal)
Exit Figure 1 Materials evaluation model of Mc Donough and Shaw (1993)
Evaluation model by Ellis (a micro- evaluation)
Materials adaptation
Materials adaptation means matching materials with the learner‟s needs, the teacher‟s demands and administration‟s purpose To adapt materials we have to consider five major factors
(1) Addition: Addition is an adaptation procedure which involves supplementation of extra linguistic items and activities to make up for the inadequacy/ insufficiency of materials
Addition of extra materials is necessary/ applicable/ appropriate when the following situations are faced:
Areas are not covered sufficiently
Texts/pictures/tasks are not provided
Texts/pictures/tasks are fewer than needed
Tasks are limited in scope
Tasks are of limited range
(2) Deletion/ Omission: Deletion is an adaptation procedure which involves removal of some of the linguistic items and activities which are found to be extra and unnecessary So, deletion is a process in which materials are taken out rather than added Materials should be reduced through omission when the following situations are faced:
Learners are clear about a language point
Learners are competent in a skill
There are too many tasks on a particular area/point
The item/ area concerned is not a priority
The item/ task is not well designed
The item/ task is not well-suited to its aim(s)
The topic is not appropriate for learners
(3) Modification/ Changing: Modification means changes in different aspects of materials, such as linguistic level, exercises, assessment system and so on Modification of materials is applicable/ appropriate in the following situations:
Texts are of inappropriate length
Materials are inappropriate to the aim
Materials are inappropriate to the learners‟ age/ experience
Materials are unclear, confusing or misleading
(4) Simplification: This procedure is employed to make materials less complicated or easier to understand If the language teaching material is found to be difficult or mechanical for the target learner, it (material) can be made suitable for the learner through the process of simplification
(5) Rearrangement/ Re- ordering: Rearrangement is a procedure of materials adaptation through which different parts of a course book are arranged in a different order or sequence
Rearrangement of materials helps to make them comparatively more interesting and appropriate for the learner as well as the teacher Learners may reorder materials by:
Using a practice task for lead-in and elicitation
Revising an area earlier than the course book does
Providing an appropriate follow-up.
Conclusion
In chapter 2, we tried to review the literature of the material evaluation Why we need textbook evaluation We remind the types of textbook that the students use everyday; we would expect the ESP community to have a clear idea about what ESP means; the characteristics of ESP; the conditions of applying ESP in HNIVC, why our students need to learn ESP To evaluate a textbook, reviewers examine each content-matched activity of each special book To make the most effective use of a textbook, however, teachers must decide which textbooks are appropriate for their needs Here we say about three types of textbooks evaluation: preliminary, formative and summative evaluation and why we choose formative evaluation for this project Depending on purpose and kinds of materials evaluation, we use the Hutchinson and Waters (1993) model to evaluate our English teaching material.
Research methodology
In this study, the researcher employed two of the instruments: document analysis and questionnaire We realized that they are suitable with our evaluative purpose and time for our research They will be detailed in the next chapter According to Robinson‟s model, we can describe these methods as follow:
Document analysis: Document analysis is use of “content analysis and other techniques to analysis and summarize printed materials and existing information” (Taylor & Steel,
1996) The purpose of using this instrument is to utilize any preexisting information that may be available The documents that need to be analysis “can include data sources within a program such as the materials under the evaluation, the course syllabus, the curriculum, or external data source” (Brown, 1995)
Questionnaire: Questionnaire aims to seek evidence of the teachers‟ and the students‟ opinions about the aim, content and methodology of the material Questionnaires are chosen because they allow wider sampling, they ask everybody the same questions and they are time-saving technique to collect information from a large respondents at the same time (Wallace, 1998) The respondents would feel more comfortable and willing to fill the questionnaires than they were asked to answer the questions directly during a face to face interview Also questionnaire with closed question can help analysis the data straightforwardly and conveniently.
Description of teaching ESP and its objectives at HNIVC 1 Description of the students at HNIVC
3.3.1 Description of the Students at HNIVC
Students at Hanoi Industrial Vocational College graduated from High School in Vietnam
- To learn and train their future job;
- To learn about English and ESP;
- to encourage an awareness of English for Technical knowledge;
- to collect printed and visual materials from the media in various languages in addition to English;
- to conduct interviews and organize the close relation between ESP and their own knowledge through ESP texts; to exercise note-taking;
- to design questionnaires; to make oral presentation and reporting
3.3.2 Description of the teachers at HNIVC
At HNIVC, there are 6 English teachers; age from 28 to 48 Because ESP teachers did not have sufficient technical background and teacher training, qualified teachers to teach ESP are lacking All teachers indicated that there are no in-service ESP training courses available, especially for technical purposes Three of the six teachers had attended General English training courses, which provided TEFL/ TESL training, or sometimes, multi-media or Teaching English for Children In other words, teachers are inadequately trained to teach ESP Generally, ESP teachers are primarily the teachers of General English When transferring from General English to ESP teaching, they might have encountered several difficulties One is a difference of attitude difficulty, between literature and science in particular Therefore, ESP teachers need to orient themselves to a new environment for which they are not well-prepared.
The teaching and learning ESP at HNIVC
As far as English is concerned, HNIVC considered General English to be the main focus, rather than technical English This is due mainly to the subjects they teach, mostly General English One of the HNIVC emphasised that General English should be the basis, then technical English will be easier to focus on A similar view was expressed by teachers Five of the six teachers argued that General English should be concentrated on and supplemented with technical knowledge From the surveys, the majority of English teachers in colleges of technology supported this view This was also confirmed by informal interviews whose learners‟ needs analysis and survey indicated that the learners concern language proficiency level more than technical knowledge.
Data collection procedures 1 Document analysis
Document analysis is a technique used to gather requirements during the requirements elicitation phase of a project It describes the act of reviewing the existing documentation of comparable business processes or systems in order to extract pieces of information that are relevant to the current project, and therefore should be consider projects requirements It means that, for this thesis, we need to collect materials from the library; the experience teachers that use this book or know about the career mentioned in the book; and the students who learns this book regularly
According to the aim, the content and the methodology of the course, we conduct some questions for the teachers and for the students Most of them are the same because we want to explore their opinions about one question; only some questions are distinguished to discover whether this textbook can be taught or it can be learned After using this book, we give these questionnaires to the teachers and the students in our college We also translate the questions for students into Vietnamese in order to show them the exact meaning we want to ask them and they can answer what they think about these questions
The questionnaire for the teachers (see appendix 1) was also carried out simultaneously with the questionnaire for the students It was divided into three sections and consisted of 27 questions
In the first section, the teachers‟ questionnaire contained ten questions aimed to ask the teachers about the aim of using EFE, whether the material is suitable to the aims of the course The teachers can agree or do not with the aims of the questions; in fact, we want to find out that this textbook can be taught in our college Of course, in this material, four skills all were not presented together, because we emphasis only reading and writing skill, and sometimes students can practice saying the conversation but the listening does not pay more attention because the students only listen to the teacher when he/ she reads the text
The second section consists of ten questions to find out the content of EFE In this section, we want to know whether the teachers agree or not about the content of the textbook corresponding the requirement of the course; the grammar presented in the coursebook was enough for the students to learn or the structures introduced in the coursebook were adequate to the students' need
The last section contains seven questions about methodology that teachers use when they utilize this textbook These questions are so important because we need to know how the teachers use this book and whether they think it can be acceptable to teach
It depends much on the teachers‟ methods to transmit the textbook‟s knowledge to the students and how the students react at the lessons
In this questionnaire, the questions were designed to find out the teachers' analyses towards the textbook relating to the suitability of the textbook to requirements of the course in terms of the aims, the content, and the methodology The scales used in the teachers‟ questionnaire were as same as those used in the students‟ questionnaire This would make it easier for the researcher to compare students‟ and teachers' views later
They were also asked if they faced any difficulty in teaching the textbook, and to make suggestions for the improvement of the materials The purpose of these sections was to suggest procedures to help the teachers exploit the textbook more effectively
The questionnaire for students (see appendix 2) consisted of 3 parts with 27 questions
The first part consisted of 10 questions They were designed to find out the students' evaluation in terms of suitability of the ESP textbook to the aims and objectives of the course; whether students perceive the aims of the materials; the students were required to answer if they are provided or deleted any tasks and exercises, what parts they thought were most suitable to their level and what were least suitable
The second part included 10 questions in order to collect the students' information relating to suitability of the textbook to the content requirements of the textbook in terms of grammar, structures, vocabulary; the structures introduced in the coursebook were adequate to the students' need In fact we need to know, whether the students can perceive all the knowledge and can apply them in their real working condition
In the third part, seven questions were used to send to the students to analyze suitability of the textbook to the methodology requirements of the course: how they understand the materials in the textbook through the lessons; whether the techniques the teachers used are appropriate to them.
Conclusion
The view of the research methodologies that we have outlined in this chapter relates the way that we do for this thesis The model we chose here is Robinson‟s, it means: document analysis and questionnaire Then we showed the description of teaching ESP and its objectives; description of the students and the teachers at Hanoi Industrial Vocational College Next the teaching and learning ESP at HNIVC; the data collection procedures; we discussed about document analysis, it is a technique used to gather requirements of a project and the questionnaires According to the aim, the content and the methodology of the course, we conduct some questions for the teachers and for students to discover that this textbook can be taught or it can be learned.
Significance of each criterion
to understand and solve problems which promote higher order thinking skills
The methodology used in ESP has therefore consolidated the notion of a linguistic community within scientific disciplines and emphasized vocabulary as well as the kinds of tasks normally required in these fields Specific techniques for teaching ESP have also evolved such as the use of models (Master, 1997), journals (Sheppard and Stoller, 1995), and visuals (Nooreen, 2003) The methodology of the book is modern and communicative based
New language is presented in PPP form (presentation, practice and production) in the first sections of the unit and then students are expected to produce the language firstly in more controlled activities and then finally in freer fluency promoting tasks at the end of each unit
Language structures are given clear examples in the language study section and then students are expected to practice specific grammar points or chunks of language by first practicing simple writing activities Gatehouse (2001) states that „the catchword in ESL circles is learner-centered or learning-centered.‟
4.3 The realization of each criterion in the textbook “EFE”
At our college most students are age from 18 to 25, may be some is over, they are males and females They all graduated High Secondary School They have finished English course for 12 th grade at school After learning 60 lessons of General English at our college, they continue to learn ESP for their future career For this research, 60 second-year technical students are required to participate in our survey
The aims of the course for the second-year technical students at HNIVC are as follows:
Getting students familiar with English as a Foreign Language;
Practicing essential grammar; functional language; structures and vocabulary;
Helping students to understand the specific fields, that they work for;
Building up learners' confidence in using the four language skills of reading, speaking, writing, and listening to communicate in real life and work situations
The essential grammar, functional language, structures and vocabulary that the aim of the course mentioned, were the content of grammar, structures, functions and the areas of vocabulary the students should achieve after learning the coursebook In addition, they can use at least 400 basis ESP words in their career
As required by the course, the coursebook should cover a fair range of language points and skills Specifically, the coursebook should cover grammar, vocabulary, and four skills of reading, writing, speaking and a little listening because students only listen to their teachers In addition, a variety of text types and topics should be introduced into the coursebook Following is the specification of the content requirement of the course This textbook is used for the students who know the basic English for communication and the basic specific knowledge about their career in Vietnamese so that they can catch ESP more conveniently and clearly
The content of EFE is chosen upon following criteria
1 Revise and improve basic grammar;
2 Consolidate the necessary vocabulary for technical students;
3 The content of the texts obtains the basic technology such as materials, the details of the machines as well as its specific technology as the methods of production, the cutting tools, the measurement instruments and the metal cutting machines Beside, EFE remind the labour safety matter, this is very important when students go to work in real condition
The English course at HNIVC aimed to teach the students to use English both accurately and fluently The method of language teaching was combination of traditional and communicative approach Throughout EFE, the students were presented with useful language and they had the opportunity to personalize the language they learned, made use of their own knowledge and experiences and expressed their ideas and opinions in their career
The teachers were also expected to make use of variety of teaching-learning techniques such as pair-work, group-work, and individual-work to develop different interactions in the language classroom
The data from document analysis and questionnaires will be analyzed and discussed under the following headings:
● The appropriateness of the material to the aims of the course;
● The appropriateness of the material to the content requirements of the course;
● The appropriateness of the material to the methodology requirements of the course;
● The suggestions for the material improvement
4 4 2 The appropriateness of the material to the aims of the course
4.4.2.1 The appropriateness of the aims of the coursebook in terms of language aspects
There are a lot of different areas grammar were presented in the coursebook The use of the passive voice form of to “call” (Unit 1) ; How + adjective (Unit 2); What is it made of? (Unit 3)
The grammar section in the coursebook presented and practiced grammatical structures such as the passive voice in all unit because this is ESP book so that they always use passive voice to describe or introduce things, other basic grammar students have learned when they learn General English course In each unit, the grammar section had three stages: presentation, rules and practice
In the first stage, the students were exposed to the grammar point in use in a presentation dialogue or text This could be illustrated in the presentation of the passive voice to “make” in Unit 3 as follows:
In the second stage, the use of “make” in active voice This reminds students to remember the use of this verb and it is familiar to them Then describe how to use “make” in the passive voice: the structure of “make” in some cases The students may be asked to use examples and work out the rules for the structure For example:
1 What is it made of?
- It is made of rubber
2 Where is it made in?
- It is made in Vietnam
3 Why are they made of rubber?
They were also asked to refer to the grammar reference section at the end of each unit, which was an overview of the structures in each unit presented in a visual format, and showed uses, example sentences and notes The Question 1 in Section 1 of the questionnaire required the students to indicate the extent to which they agreed or disagreed with the effectiveness of the material in relation to the aims of the course by circling one of the responses from strongly disagree to strongly agree Question 2 reflected that the students, to some extent, had the perceptions about the aims of the materials: Questions 3 and 4 of Section 1 showed that the students had the same idea with the researcher 92% of the students agreed that the coursebook helped them consolidate a lot of basis grammar and grammatical structures that they have learned before, only 8% of the students disagreed or not sure 37% agreed and 41% strongly agreed with opinion “ the coursebook provided you new grammar items and grammatical structures” 22% disagreed and not sure The data collected from the teachers questionnaire gave the similar results 100% of the teachers agreed that the coursebook not only helped the students consolidate a lot of basis grammar and grammatical structures, but also provided them new grammar items and grammatical structures
Relating to vocabulary and language functions, the researcher realized that the coursebook aimed to help the students to practice language functions in terms of ESP
There were a lot of language function in each unit in the coursebook For example, in Unit
1, Unit 2, Unit 3, the names of the materials were introduced In Unit 4, Unit 5, Unit 6, the shapes of materials were presented In Unit 7, there were functions of the material Unit 9
Unit 10, Unit 11 provided the students with the descriptions of the machines Unit 12 mentioned with measuring instruments Unit 13 described the properties of the materials
Unit 14 said about joining methods Unit 15 & Unit 16 reminded the safety rules Unit 17 introduced the CNC lathe The texts also aimed to provide the students certain amount of vocabulary in different areas: the names of the materials (Unit 1, 2, 3), the shapes of materials (Unit 4, 5, 6), functions of the material ( Unit 7), descriptions of the machines (Unit 8, 9, 10), experience in the work (Unit 15, 16)
Conclusion
The aim of this thesis is to evaluate the textbook “EFF” in order to improve the ability of application of this book in teaching ESP at HNIVC, so from the study we do above we can find out some results below and suggest the solutions to resolve the problems
On the topics of materials adaptation, Donough and Shaw (1993) indicate that adaptation should take place when
1 There is not enough grammar coverage in general;
2 There is not enough practice of grammar point of particular difficulty to these learners;
3 The reading passages contain too much unknown vocabulary;
4 The comprehension questions are too easy because the answers can be lifted directly from the text with no real understanding;
5 The listening passages are inauthentic because they sound too much like written material being read out;
6 The subject- matter is inappropriate for learner of this age and intellectual level;
7 The photographs and other illustrative material are not culturally acceptable;
8 The amount of material is too great or too little to cover in the time allocated to lessons;
9 There is no guidance for teachers on handing group work and role play activities with a large class;
10 There is too much or too little variety in the activities;
Similarly, Gabrielator (2002) shows that what should be adapted in a materials are aims, topics, texts, visuals, guidelines and explanation, exercises, activities, tasks
Based on the finding of the study presented in chapter four, the researcher proposes that the coursebook should be adapted according to some various aspects that Donough and Shaw (1993) and Gabrielator (2002) Also according to Hutchinson and Waters' advice (1993), the researcher of this study considered the more important areas to the