INTRODUCTION
Research statement and rationale of the study
The textbook is one of the crucial factors in determining the learners’ success in language course (Mukundan, Jayakaran, and Vahid Nimehchisalem, 2012) In a developing country like Vietnam, it has been a regular practice to consider textbooks as a major source of the learning process to be undertaken in schools (Hoàng Văn Vân, 2012; Mahomood, 2010) Foreign language textbook is not an exception Vietnam is a country where English has become the compulsory subject in the educational curriculum from primary to upper secondary school In response to this fact, on 20 September, 2008 Decision No 1400/ QD-TT was issued by the Prime Minister on The Approval of the 10-year National Project for “Teaching and Learning Foreign Language in the National Formal Educational System Period 2008-2020” (the National Foreign Language 2020 Project, [NFL2020]) In implementing the Decision, be aware of the significant role of textbook, the Vietnamese Ministry of Education and Training (MOET) started to design the new curriculum and new English textbook with an aim to
“form and develop English language communication competence” (Piloted English Language Curriculum for Lower Secondary Education, p.3)
In the first and second phases of this Project, the pilot teaching and evaluation of the new textbook are the focus According to Sheldon (1988), textbook evaluation is necessary as it will help the teacher or program developer in making decisions on selecting the appropriate textbook, and familiarize the teacher with its future instruction That is the reason why the book evaluation is not new in English Language Teaching (ELT) in the world For instance, Tomlinson et al (2001) evaluated some textbooks published by leading UK publishers: “Language in Use” and “True to Life”
(by Cambridge University Press), “Cutting Edge” (by Pearson Longman), or textbook
The critical consideration of Vietnamese researchers is also given to this issue
For example, Nguyễn Thị Thúy Minh (2007) evaluated English textbook in use in Vietnam’s upper-secondary schools, Lê Thị Huệ (2009) carried out the study on Tiếng
Anh 11 in Phan Dinh Phung High School, Hanoi In light of the project 2020, it is becoming extremely difficult to ignore the importance of textbook evaluation One of the latest studies on textbook evaluation under this project is Lê Thị Bắc’s (2013), evaluating the course book “Tiếng Anh 6, Tập 1” in Hai Duong lower secondary school
Tiếng Anh 11 is developed to comply with the NFL 2020 Project and the Piloted
English Language Curriculum for Vietnamese upper secondary schools It has been adopted as textbooks for many upper secondary schools including Ha Long High School for gifted students, Cam Pha High School and Uong Bi High School, top high schools in three big cities in Quang Ninh province Although the new textbooks have been piloted for several years, there are no studies conducted to evaluate these books in particular contexts It is necessary that an evaluation on the textbook from perspectives of students and teachers should be carried out to discover whether the book is suitable within the context of teaching and learning It is also hoped that recommendations will be made for the textbook writers to improve the textbook’s quality to meet the goal of the NFL 2020 Project
Based on the gap that needs to be met as presented above, the researcher would like to conduct the study “Teachers' and Students' Evaluation of the New Tiếng Anh 11 : A Study at three Upper Secondary Schools in Quang Ninh Province”.
Aims and objectives of the study
This research aims at evaluating the quality of the new Tiếng Anh 11 compiled under the Project 2020 to find out the strong points and weak points of the new be made to improve the quality of the textbook to meet the requirements set by MOET (via the National Foreign Language 2020 Project): Upon finishing the secondary education, students’ English proficiency will reach Level 3 (equivalent to CEFR B1)
To achieve the above aims, the following objectives, presented in the form of two research questions, are set as follows:
1 What are the strengths and weaknesses of the new Tiếng Anh 11 as seen from the evaluation of the teachers and students who are using it?
2 What recommendations should be made for the textbook writers to improve the textbook’s qualities?
Scope and limitations of the study
In terms of theoretical framework for textbook evaluation, there have been various checklists and criteria suggested and developed by different scholars, such as Williams (1983); Sheldon (1988); Cunningsworth & Kusel (1991); Harmer (1998);
Richards (2001); Driss (2006); Rahimy (2007) Lê Thị Bắc (2013) states that as any of the checklists aim at evaluating textbook in general with no specification for a specific textbook under a particular context of evaluation like this, the evaluation criteria used in the study is a combination of evaluation frameworks and checklists proposed by Mukundan, Jayakaran, and Vahid Nimehchisalem (2011) and William (1983)
Besides, the population is restricted to 6 teachers and 160 students of grade 11 at Uong Bi High School, Ha Long High School for Gifted Students, and Cam Pha High School in Quang Ninh province who are using the new Tiếng Anh 11
There are two factors limiting the results of the study: a short time span for the study and a limited sample size The researcher could not carry out the survey on a larger scale so more or less the results might not be reliable enough for such a generalization In addition, combination of different evaluation checklists cannot ensure the best set of criteria.
Significance of the study
Once this thesis is completed, it can be of both theoretical and practical significance In terms of theoretical contributions, the results are anticipated to provide an appropriate textbook evaluation checklist basing on previous ones Besides, the findings should make an important practical contribution to establishment of qualities for a better Tiếng Anh 11 It is also hoped that with the evaluation from direct textbook users, students and teachers, the study will give positive feedback on the textbook so that it will soon be adopted to teach English for 11-graders in the nationwide In addition, this thesis is expected to serve as a reliable and useful reference material about textbook evaluation for other readers and researchers in their further studies on related subjects.
The structure of the study
The study includes 3 parts as follows:
Part A – Introduction – presents the background to the study, the statement of the problem, the aims, the research questions, and the scope and the significance of the study
This part consists of 4 chapters
Chapter 1 – Literature review – provides a short introduction about NFL 2020 Project, an overview of the Piloted English Language Curriculum for upper secondary schools in Vietnam, a brief review of the new “Tiếng Anh 11” In addition, a number of definitions of key terms by famous authors are also presented in this chapter The study, furthermore, applies some common sets of textbook evaluation checklists in order to create a questionnaire for data collection Besides, previous studies in the world and in Vietnam of textbook evaluation are also reviewed
Chapter 2 – Methodology – describes the research methodology employed in this study It introduces the research design, participants, sampling strategies, research instruments and data collection procedures
Chapter 3 – Findings and Discussion – presents data analysis, research results and discussion
Chapter 4 – Recommendations – gives several recommendations from students’ and teachers’ perspectives to improve the quality of the new textbook
Part C – Conclusion – summarizes what has been studied and gives recommendations for the improvement of the textbook.
DEVELOPMENT
LITERATURE REVIEW
To make the key concepts in the topic clear and build a theoretical framework, this chapter will define terminologies and briefly review previous literatures related to the topic The researcher will shortly present some definitions of the textbook and textbook evaluation, introduce the NFL 2020 Project, and describe some outstanding sets of evaluative criteria Furthermore, by summarizing related studies, the researcher could see the gap and draw a deep look into this issue
2 Teaching and learning English in Vietnam under the National Foreign Language Project
The Vietnam MOET is currently launching the project entitled “Teaching and Learning foreign Languages in the National Education System Period 2008 – 2020”
The NFL 2020 Project specifies the goals of teaching and learning English within the national education system and identifies seven tasks at both macro and micro levels for implementing the project in the three different phases, which is said to be worth 9.378 billion VND The first phase from 2008 to 2010 prioritizes to developing and perfecting the 10-year foreign language curriculum, focusing for exercising the pilot 10-year English program The second phase which extends from 2011 to 2015 focuses on introducing the 10-year foreign language program throughout the whole general educational system And in the third phase, the focus is on perfecting the 10-year foreign language program throughout the whole general educational system and on developing intensive foreign language program for vocational schools, colleges and universities (Hoàng Văn Vân, 2010) The main goals of the project is that ' by 2020 most Vietnamese youth whoever graduate from vocational schools, colleges and universities gain the capacity to use a foreign language independently This will enable them to be more confident in communication, further their chance to study and work in an integrated and multi-cultural environment with variety of languages.' (Decision No
1400/QD-TTg) This goal also makes foreign language as an advantage for Vietnamese people, serving the cause of industrialization and modernization for the country
2.2 An Overview of the Pilot English Curriculum for Upper Secondary schools
Upper secondary education in Vietnam consists of three grades 10, 11 and 12
The upper secondary curriculum needs to give students more opportunities to enhance both accuracy and fluency in English through 315 periods in total (105 for each grade)
Students practice and develop not only communicative competences (Reading, Speaking, Listening, and Writing), but linguistic skills (Pronunciation, Vocabulary, and Grammar) with 4 main themes: Our lives, Our society, Our environment, and Our future The curriculum focuses on communicative competence so that when finishing upper secondary school, they will have achieved level 3 of the Foreign Language Proficiency Framework for Vietnam (equivalent to B1 in the CEFR)
The pilot English for upper secondary schools includes two parts: general issues and suggestions for teaching contents for each grade In the first part, the principles to build and develop the curriculum and the objectives are presented Curriculum’s contents consisting of systems of themes and topics, communicative competences, linguistic knowledge, learning how to learn, the adoption of teaching method of Communicative Language Teaching (CLT) and learner-centered approach, testing and assessment procedures and conditions for curriculum implementation are further described in the curriculum The second part provides teachers with suggestions for teaching in each grade Themes and topics are clarified with specific suggested
2.3 An Overview of the Pilot Textbook Tiếng Anh 11
Tiếng Anh 11 is the second of a three-level English language set of textbooks for the Vietnamese upper secondary school It is divided into two volumes, lasts 105 periods as the other 2 grades Communicative competences are taught through four language skills in relevance to four main themes mentioned above Especially, students have a chance to get to know cultures of Vietnam, of ASIAN countries, and of some main English-speaking countries
Under the curriculum for upper secondary schools, the textbook “Tiếng Anh 11” also contains four main themes Each theme is covered in three units with different topics
Theme 1: Our lives: The generation gap, Relationships, Becoming independent
Theme 2: Our society: Current social issues, Caring for those in need, Vietnam and ASEA
Theme 3: Our environment: People and the environment in conflict, Global Warming, Preserving our heritage
Theme 4: Our future: Further education, Health care and longevity, the future of cities
After each theme, there is a review Each unit is divided into five sections taught in 8 lessons: getting started, language, four skills (reading, speaking, listening, and writing) communication culture, look back and project
Section 1 – Getting started – contains a menu listing the language and the skills taught in unit, a conversation introducing the overall topic of the unit, some topic-related vocabulary and the main grammar points, and a number of activities and practice to check students’ comprehension
Section 2 – Language – includes vocabulary (in-depth practice of words and phrases, additional vocabulary for use later in the unit, and word collocation); pronunciation (problematic aspects of pronunciation: sound clusters, weak forms, stress patterns, and intonation); and grammar (main grammar point in focus taught in meaningful contexts) All the sub-sections in the Language section are linked to the looking back section at the end of the unit
Section 3 – Skills – includes Reading, Speaking, Listening and Writing
Reading texts provide an input of language and ideas for students to use in the other skills The vocabulary and grammar points learnt in the previous sections are also recycled in the reading text The reading activities are designed in the order of three stages: pre-reading, while-reading and post-reading A variety of activities aim to develop reading skills such as skimming, scanning, through various types of tasks
Speaking follows the reading section, which links between two parts All speaking activities aim to encourage students to interact with others to share their experience with their partners Listening is also organized the same to reading, including pre- listening, while-listening and post-listening Both post-reading and post-listening stages create speaking environment for students And Writing guides students through the writing process and focusing on the specific text types required by the syllabus
Students are provided with a template and useful language before producing their own writing
Section 4 – Communication and culture – includes Communication and
Culture Communication recycles what students have learnt in the previous sections in terms of language items Students are encouraged to express their ideas freely without or less control of the teacher Culture contains cultural information about the ASEAN countries and English speaking countries around the world connected to the cultural aspects of the unit topic It helps students to broaden their knowledge of the world cultures
Section 5 – Looking back and Project – includes two separate sub-sections:
Looking back and Project Looking back offers revision and consolidation of the language learnt in the unit, including pronunciation, vocabulary and grammar
Activities aims to check students’ pronunciation and understanding of the meaning and use of the words or structures Project aims at providing students with an opportunities to combine all skills and knowledge learnt in the unit to make their final product The project activities often involve teamwork which develop students’ collaborative skills and promote their team spirit
According to Awasthi (2006), textbook can be defined as a teaching material for the teacher and a learning material for the learner A broader perspective has been adopted by Mahmood (2010) who argues that “textbook is a source of potential learning as to what students learn from textbooks and the practicality of that learning is mediated by the school context (teacher, peers, instruction, and assignments) This view is supported by some giants in the world to affirm the big contribution of textbook that it is “the visible heart of any ELT program (Sheldon, 1988: 237); “an almost universal element of teaching” (Hutchinson and Torres, 1994: 315); and “a guide for a teacher, a memory aid for the pupils, a permanent record or measure of what has been learnt” (Awasthi, 2006) From another aspect, Ur (1996: 183) emphasizes that textbook is a “framework” which regulates and times the programs
Therefore, he points out the limitations of using textbook that inhibits the teachers’ creativity and cannot take account of individual differences in learners
While a variety of definitions of the term “textbook” have been suggested, this paper will use the definition first given by Awasthi (2006) and just consider the advantages of textbook
Different writer have given different advantages of textbooks As mentioned in the definitions, textbooks are very useful tools in the hand of a teacher They play a necessary role in both teaching and learning They consist of detailed material on current topics and are designed to facilitate language development and knowledge acquisition They are central to the teaching and learning of any language program because they represent the appropriate content specifications selected from the total corpus of language for teaching purposes and for what is considered most useful to the learners as stated in the curriculum Richard (2001) lists the following considerable advantages of using textbooks:
- They provide structure and syllabus for a program
- They provide a variety of learning resources
- They can provide effective language models and input
The wide spread use of textbooks in different ELT contexts requires little further explanation Dendrinos (1992), Lee (1997) and William (1983) are unanimous in their opinion that it continues to play an essential role in ELT classrooms all over the world The importance of textbooks in the ELT classroom is so extensive that it is almost a universal element in ELT teaching (Hutchinson & Torres, 1994) and it is crucial to any ELT program (Lizt, 2005)
RESEARCH METHODOLOGY
This study explores the quality of the new Tiếng Anh 11 from the evaluation of high school teachers and students in Quang Ninh province To achieve this aim, I will raise the research questions and present in some detail the research design
As presented in the introduction, the research aims to answer the two following questions:
1 What are the strengths and weaknesses of the new Tiếng Anh 11 as seen from the evaluation of the teachers and students who are using it?
2 What recommendations should be made for the textbook writers to improve the textbook’s qualities?
This study combines both quantitative and qualitative research methods, which increases the value of mixing these two types of data However, the former is prominent since the researcher would like to survey on the teachers’ and students’ perspectives on textbook through the questionnaires The qualitative method is recruited to question and analyze the interviewees’ opinions If only quantitative data is collected, the researcher just sees a surface of problem The qualitative data provides a context for understanding the quantitative analysis According to Lingard, Albert, and Levinson (2008), together, the combination of qualitative and quantitative data conveyed an in-deep look into the studied problem, at context, processes, interactions and outcomes Moreover, in mixed-methods research, the researcher has flexibility in choosing methods of data collection, and the presentation of results can be convincing and powerful when both summary numbers and in-depth portraits of a setting are included However, the complexity of mixed-methods research is a disadvantage that requires more time and resources to complete Analyzing data would be more complex because the researcher not only works with statistics but has to decode qualitative information, which demands the researcher to be experienced (containing knowledge about this method and skills to deal with gathered data)
For this study, I combine both quantitative data and qualitative data collected in two phases in which the quantitative data will be collected first, then followed by the qualitative data The quantitative data from the survey are the major focus The researcher would like to determine how the new Tiếng Anh 11 meets the textbook evaluative criteria in both students’ and teachers’ perspectives to recognize what aspects the book strengthens in and what problems it may have A later time, qualitative data from the interviews are used to illustrate or further explain the quantitative findings This way of data collection and analysis is called explanatory design (Lingard, Albert, & Levinson, 2008)
160 students of grade 11 and 6 English teachers at 3 upper secondary schools in Quang Ninh province are invited to participate in the study Details are provided in the following table:
The number of Ha Long Cam Pha Uong Bi Total
The reasons for the choice of the participants are as follows
Firstly, the setting of the present study is at 3 top upper secondary schools, located in the 3 biggest cities in Quang Ninh using the piloted textbook in teaching and learning under the NFL 2020 project These schools have met the requirements as set by MOET for carrying out piloted teaching and learning: students and teachers are qualified; they have been teaching and learning the material for two years; the schools have sufficient teaching and learning facilities; and more importantly, they are willing to provide their evaluative feedbacks to the researcher
The research adopts both quantitative and qualitative research methods with a dominance of the former through the employment of questionnaires and interviews
Besides, qualitative research methods are also adopted to ask the teacher for their perspectives and recommendation to improve the new textbook
Data will be collected in this study using closed form of questionnaire as it allows proper control when attendees are doing the survey In addition, using questionnaires makes collected data easy to manipulate and categorize for analysis
Among various types of questionnaire items, the researcher decided to utilize the most frequent question type: closed-ended (or simply “closed”) questions, which the respondents are provided with ready-made response options to choose from That is, these items do not require the respondents to produce any free writing; instead, they are to choose one on the alternatives, regardless of whether their preferred answer is among them To be more specific, the Likert-scale, the most commonly used scaling technique will be used to design questions Respondents are asked to indicate the extent to which they disagree or agree with these items by making in the column of the responses ranging from 1 to 5
As mentioned, for the purpose of this study, a questionnaire is developed to ask high school English teachers and 11 th grade students who are classroom practitioners; it is not intended to ask specialists or educational administrators The questionnaire is designed to explore the quality of the textbook in as many aspects as possible There are two versions of questionnaires, one is for teachers and the other is for students The questionnaire for students consists of 48 items (criteria) which fall into three main categories: Physical features and organization, Textbook contents and Supplementary materials The “Textbook contents” includes 7 sections: Topics (items 9 to 12), Texts (item 13 to 20), Activities (items 21 to 27), Skills (item 28 to 33), Vocabulary (items
34 to 36), Pronunciation (items 37 to 40), and Grammar (items 41 to 44) The 53-item questionnaire for teachers is added with two more categories: Teacher’s book (items 49 to 51) and Objectives and Curriculum Fit (items 52 and 53)
The questionnaires for students are written in Vietnamese (English version will be translated into Vietnamese before delivering the questionnaires) to make sure that all the items will be equally understood Here’s is an example:
No Criteria Levels of agreement
STT Tiêu chí đánh giá Mức độ đồng ý
1 Các bài đọc thú vị x
With the aim of enhancing the reliability and the validity of the study as well as reducing the questionnaire’s limitation, the researcher goes on using semi-structured interview instrument, which allows the interviewer to ask probing questions and ask interviewees to clarify unclear answers and follow upon interesting one Interviews are conducted with 10 students (at 3 schools) and 4 teachers who already completed the questionnaires The researcher will ask them more for their perception of the new textbook; and what aspects do they think that the textbook and curriculum should be improved The result from interviews will contribute to giving meaningful implications after the finding discussion part
The interviews are prepared in English but because the research is conducted in Vietnamese, it is translated into Vietnamese to make sure that the teachers and students understand what is needed by the researcher Questions for interview can be seen in Appendix 4
The combination of two data collection instruments: questionnaire and interview help the researcher to have sufficient and reliable information to evaluate the quality of
After the data is collected by the five-point Likert-scale questionnaire, the researcher goes on analyzing data by using statistical analysis method A descriptive statistical analysis of students’ responses to the survey items is used to describe the basis features of the collected data by presenting quantitative items in a manageable form (William, 2006) This type of research is quantitative research which is described by the terms “empiricism” (Leach 1990) and “positivism (Duffy, 1985)
Descriptive statistics are used simply to describe what is going on in the collected data There are two major characteristics of a single variable including the
“mean” for central tendency and “standard deviations” for variability, which are used to decode the collected data on order to describe the respondents’ perception of the textbook’s quality Besides, data is also converted into percentages from overall average percentage of 48 items to average percentage of each item to make comparison easier
The interview made up the qualitative approach (content analysis method) of the study as this focused on personal accounts, description and individual insights of the respondents For qualitative analysis method, it consists of identifying, coding, and categorizing patterns and themes found in the data In this study, the researcher applies this method to classify which strengths and weaknesses of the textbook has In addition, answers recorded in the interviews will be decoded in order to give recommendations after the finding discussion
Step 1: Preparing: In this step, the researcher will prepare and design the questionnaire by referring to the supervisor’s consultancy and other research related to the same issue, especially the evaluative criteria of some big scholars
Step 2: Piloting: Constructive comments from the piloted group of 2 colleagues and 2 11 th graders will be considered to help the researcher make adjustment on questionnaire
Step 3: Administering: Face-to-face questionnaire administration method will be employed On average, it will take 15 minutes to administer the questionnaires
MAJOR FINDINGS AND DISCUSSIONS
This chapter aims at providing an in-depth interpretation and analysis of the results gathered from the evaluation sources – questionnaires and interviews with students and teachers As mentioned in the second part of methodology, collected data from questionnaires and interviews will support each other to clarify the finding and demonstrate the strengths and weaknesses of new Tiếng Anh 11 Recommendations are given in chapter 4 to improve the quality of the new textbook To review briefly the data collection process including 2 stages: questionnaires and interviews, take a look at the table below:
The number of Students Teachers
The questionnaire’ results are attached in the Appendices
The results from the survey show that teachers and students evaluate this new textbook in a quite positive view when the average mean is 3.62 The options of strongly agree and agree count for over 50% This can be seen in the fact that the overall evaluation of the students on 48 items at three scales strongly agree, agree and neutral is high: 84.8%, of which 15% rate as strongly agree, 35.9% rate agree, and 33.9% rate as neutral, only 12.1% rate as disagree and 7% rate as not good
In order to point out the strengths and weaknesses of the textbook, the data shows that the new textbook gets many strong points in comparison with the old one since the mean of every item ranges of over 3.0 to over 4.0 Form the collected data, the higher an item’s mean is, the better that item is However, a value of SD is quite high, mostly over 1.0, which indicates that the individual scores are clustered not really close to the mean This illustrates the choices of students and teachers are varied and different from others
2 Students’ and teachers’ evaluation of the textbooks in each of 5 main categories
2.1 The evaluation in the “Physical features and organization” category
The results obtained from this category show that evaluation of the students and teachers on new Tiếng Anh 11 is very positive with the highest mean among three categories, 3.85 61% of responses express their agreement that the book’s quality in terms of design is very good Disagreement rates only 13.6% Especially, the items of layout, type size and font, structure, review sections and glossaries are evaluated very positively
1 Layout is clear and easy-to- follow 34.0% 43.8% 25.7% 0.7% 0.0%
2 The type size and font are appropriate for the students 28.5% 50.7% 22.2% 2.8% 0.0%
4 The cover is strong and long- lasting 17.4% 32.6% 29.9% 18.1% 6.3%
The illustrations are informative and functional, stimulate students' visualization and creativeness 18.1% 36.8% 34.0% 13.9% 1.4%
Structure of the textbook and the use of headings, icons, labels, italics, colour and other methods of signposting is designed in a consistent way 22.9% 44.4% 33.3% 3.5% 0.0%
7 Review sections of grammar and vocabulary lists or glossaries are included 25.0% 49.3% 24.3% 5.6% 0.0%
8 The price of the whole package is reasonable and achievable 11.1% 27.1% 37.5% 17.4%
Table 3 Evaluation on general features and organization
To be specific, firstly, in terms of design, 77.8% and 79.2 % respondents evaluate that the layout is clear and easy to follow, and the type size and font are appropriate for the students, respectively, while no one rates as disagree and strongly disagree This result is also supported by the most of interviewees As S4 expresses,
“the new textbook is design beautifully with lively images The book is easy to follow because parts are organized clearly.” In the same vein, S9 shares that when using the book, she can prepare for the next lesson easier because the structure is very clear and easy to catch up Secondly, look quickly through the book, it can explain the reason why many respondents agree with item 6 “Structure of the textbook and the use of headings, icons, labels, italics, colour and other methods of signposting is designed in a consistent way.” (M6 = 4.03) Agreeing with this point, S7 says the way to put the titles and heading is clearly and consistent She usually knows exactly what she will learn Similarly, S8 states that the book is designed in larger size with clear heading and title like foreign course book, which attracts students at first sight Also giving a compliment to the structure, T2 expresses that the most improvement of this book is its logical sequence of eight parts in each unit 67% highly evaluate the consistent structure of the book while only 3.5% rate as disagreement Thirdly, one of the new parts satisfying the most of students is review sections of grammar and vocabulary lists or glossaries (74.3 % agree, M7 = 4.12) In her interview, S10 said in the new book, there is a detailed glossary of vocabulary in each unit so she can look up the meaning of new words in reading texts S9 also shares that before, she used to write grammatical structures in a notebook, but with the new book, she just needs take a look at the revision section of grammar in each unit to review if she forgets something Fourthly, the last item in this category evaluated highly is item 6 which M6 is 3.81 Many students are attracted in colorful pictures and lively images to illustrate the contents of the book The illustrations are informative and functional, stimulate students' visualization and creativeness Nevertheless, that SD value of this item is quite high (SD5 = 1.01) means the options of students and teachers are different from each other
There are, however, two things that should be taken into consideration First, the number of students and teachers rates the quality of cover page as “strong and long- lasting” is modest (item 4) Only 25 responses strongly agree and 47 agree while 35 people expresses their disagreement with this item Some students say that the cover was not really durable Second, the most striking observation to emerge from the data comparison is that the price of the whole package is also a controversial issue when SD value is 1.17 41 respondents (28.5%) disagrees with item 8 that “the price of the whole package is reasonable and achievable.”
2.2 The evaluation in the “Textbook contents” category
The results obtained from the participants’ evaluation of the “Textbook contents” category indicate that they are satisfied with it (M = 3.74) Overall, the average rating of 44 items by 144 students and 6 teachers at 2 levels: strongly agree and agree accounts for 56%, 34.5% rate as neutral, 9.4% rate as disagree, only 3.5% rate as strongly disagree
2.2.1 The teachers’ and students’ evaluation of the “Topics” section
Average mean of 4 items describing the quality of topics is high (M=3.98)
66.5% agreed that topics in the new textbook were better in general than in the old one
In her interview, S10 states that topics and contents are up-dated, for example, gap year and globalization Some news in the recent year is also included in the book However, discussing this issue, one teacher argues that although contents are new, there are some topics which are quite difficult and not suitable to students’ social knowledge as well as their needs
Topics are varied in different fields (sport, culture, economy, education, politic) 25.7% 44.4% 25.7% 7.6% 0.7%
Topics are interesting and suitable to the age of students 14.6% 33.3% 44.4% 11.1% 0.7%
11 Topics are relevant to students’ social and cultural knowledge 17.4% 56.3% 24.3% 6.3% 0.0%
12 The book avoids potentially embarrassing or disturbing topics 33.3% 41.0% 18.8% 4.9% 6.3%
Table 4 indicates a very high level of agreement among participants upon the variety of the topics which accounts for 70.2% Besides, over 70% agree that the topics are relevant to students’ social knowledge while 0% rates as strongly disagree and 6% rate as disagree Students can activate their knowledge and involve in the lesson effectively In addition, that the embarrassing or disturbing topics are avoided in the book is agreed by 74.3% Interestingly, one student expresses that she would like to explore such topics
2.2.2 The teachers’ and students’ evaluation of the “Texts” section
13 Texts are relevant to the topics of units 29.2% 51.4% 22.2% 1.4% 0.0%
14 Texts are interesting and suitable to the age of students 11.8% 46.5% 37.5% 8.3% 0.0%
15 Texts are authentic or close to real language situations 14.6% 43.1% 36.8% 9.0% 0.7%
16 Texts provide students with a variety of knowledge 10.4% 48.6% 33.3% 9.7% 2.1%
The length, difficulty and complexity of text are appropriate 11.8% 27.8% 0.7% 19.4% 9.0%
18 Language used is natural and real-life English 13.9% 41.0% 36.1% 9.0% 4.2%
Contents of the texts reflect basic cultural values of Vietnam, some countries in South-Asia and some main English-speaking countries 19.4% 51.4% 27.1% 6.3% 0.0%
Overall, 61.1% of the teachers and students are satisfied with the quality of the texts in the new book Only 11.3% expresses their dissatisfaction with it First, texts are relevant to the topics of unit (80.6% rate as agreement) and more interesting and informative than those in the old textbook (57.3% rate as agreement) Second, texts provides students a lot of knowledge about society, especially cultural values of Vietnam and some other countries Thanks to it, students have broadened their knowledge, which is one of the objectives stated in the curriculum of the 2020 Project
However, when conducting the interviews with the teachers, the findings have shown some shortcomings of the textbook Most of teachers complained that the reading texts were quite long with many new words that require students to guess This is similar to what the questionnaire’s results showed 28.4% of respondents disagree with item 17
“the length, difficulty and complexity of texts are appropriate” while over 28% evaluate it negatively Mean value is also lower than 3.0 (M17 = 2.4) In another aspect, talking about language used, one teacher comments “language used in the text is sometimes not natural, texts are not really authentic.” Table 5 presents that less than 50% evaluate the quality of the texts’ language positively that it is natural and real-life English (item 18), while 13.2% rate as dissatisfaction and 36.1% rate as “neutral”
2.2.3 The teachers’ and students’ evaluation of the “Activities” section
In general, the activities are evaluated in a positive view The average mean of 8 items in this category is 3.77 and the mean value of each item is over 3.5
20 Activities tend to engage students’ interaction in class 12.5% 43.8% 37.5% 9.7% 0.7%
Activities are efficiently graded according to complexity, follow the logical sequence from easy to difficult 7.6% 39.6% 40.3% 16.0% 0.7%
Activities are varied from individual to pair work and group discussion 13.9% 43.8% 36.1% 8.3% 2.1%
Activities involve Students’ knowledge and personal experience (tell a story, write a letter to your friend) 11.8% 41.7% 37.5% 10.4% 2.8%
Activities encourage sufficient communicative and meaningful practice 20.8% 34.0% 32.6% 11.8% 4.9%
Projects at the end of each unit help students to develop all four skills 22.2% 45.8% 25.7% 8.3% 2.1%
26 Activities for projects are diversified in form and content 15.3% 37.5% 38.9% 10.4% 2.1%
According to the survey results, activities in the new textbook are varied and interesting, which tend to engage students’ interaction via tasks to work in groups or works in pairs to develop students’ communication competence (M20 = M22 = 3.80) Especially, one of the most exciting activities that is very new is Project in the end of each unit This activity helps students to develop all for skills through a variety of tasks assigned by teachers (Item 25, M25 = 3.99) and promotes students’ creativity (item 27,
M27 = 3.68) To support for this finding, S1 and S5 agree that when conducting the project, students are able to develop different skills, not only English skills, but also other soft skills, such as team work, presentation skills, and “learning by teaching skill”, said S10 Having the same perspective, S9 tells that they can play games, make presentations about different topics or role plays, which are really fun and useful On the other hand, because of its length and complexity, the Project section is sometimes hard to conduct in class T3 says “We do not have enough time to carry out the whole project in class It requires students to prepare at home and depends much on their ability.” In the position of a teacher, T4 also declares that the Project is not really useful to develop students’ language skills as it should have been In addition, according to S7, sometimes projects are conducted, sometimes not He is not very interested in this part He feels that activities in the book are still boring Moreover, as can be seen from the table, there are two items evaluated the lowest of eight items in Activities First, level of complexity and difficulty is graded not really appropriately
Only 47.2% rate as agreement while 16.7% think it needs to be revised (M21 = 3.66)
RECOMMENDATIONS
Detailed analysis of the results shows that the new textbook has got some drawbacks that need to be improved to make it more effective A number of recommendations are given by the interviewees The problematic aspects of the book can be overcome through the supplementation and adaptation in terms of:
Though the illustrative images in the new book have received much compliment, some students expressed their dissatisfaction and gave some recommendations to make something changed As some students suggest, the cover page should be designed with more attractive images related to the topics in the book
It would stimulate students’ curiosity Besides, in reading texts, illustrations should be made for better appeal to the learners and aesthetic impact In addition to illustration, the quality of the cover page is also discussed As some students refects that the cover is not strong enough, they suggest improving the paper quality so that it could be more durable
More interesting topics should be added T1 says that though topics and contents are up-dated, there are still some which were quite difficult to conduct the lesson as well as not suitable to students’ social knowledge Sharing a same viewpoint, students also agree that topics should be closer and livelier to their life They are able to apply their basic knowledge to the learning process in order to gain the new one One student recommends that arts, sports, fashions, or celebrities should be considered to be implemented
That language section includes vocabulary, pronunciation and grammar is too much to cover in a 45-minute lesson Moreover, many teachers share a same point of view that grammar is a bit long and difficult Students need to have a good basic knowledge to understand well the lesson and catch up with the whole class Both teachers and students recommend that the number of grammar and each unit should be reduced or language section could be divided into two lessons
Since this book aims to develop students’ communicative competence more interactive activities should be added in order that students can promote their speaking skills Activities in the new textbook are diversified, but they are still boring A student suggests that it should have more games, tasks or activities to engage students in class
Student could learn more and memorize the lesson better when joining such activities and interacting with others
Materials for skills learning are not really authentic, particularly reading and listening Texts for reading are quite long and listening tracks are not supportive of any exams A teacher says that the reading texts should be more authentic, it can be taken from English or American magazines and newspapers or many other sources In addition, dialogues for speaking practice should be closer to real life Students want more interesting examples of daily speaking, for example: go shopping, eat out, in a restaurant or on the phone After the lesson, they are able to apply what I have learnt to make simple practical conversations Last but not least, listening tasks should be more varied in forms, contents and sources “It would better if students could practice to prepare for proficiency exams such as IELTS and TOEIC”, one student said
CD should be double checked delivered to the users Many students refect that in their CD, some tracks are missed, some are put in incorrect order, and some canoot play In addition, the tracks in CD are not marked with specific numbers which are relavant to the number in the textbook As a result, it takes time to find the tracks of the listening tasks As recommended by T3, the tracks should be named with the numbers in accoradance with those of listening tasks in the textbook Moreover, according to students’ responses, it can be seen that students seem to neglect the CD They rarely listen to the CD again One recommendation is that there should be more exercises to ask students to complete at home
Results from the interviews show that teachers and students have different perspective in terms of level of difficulty of the book Some said that the book was difficult while some wanted it to be more challenging This depends a lot on students’ ability and language competence For some students in Ha Long High School, they comment that the book contents are quite easy and not enough to meet their needs S3 suggests adding more advanced exercises or further activities with higher level of difficulty Furthermore, in the comparison to the old textbooks, S1 offers a recommendation that it should have a separate book for advanced students She comments that the new book is only suitable to the mainstream However, S6 says only good students are able to use this book effectively To some students in lower level, they find it hard to follow the lesson A teacher also agrees with this opinion She shares that if the book is used in large scale, it will cause a lot of difficulties for both teachers and students since levels of students are not equal To conclude, the contents of the book should be revised so that it can be appropriate to the common level of
The most common feedback from students is that there is a gap between what they learned and what they were tested Students using new textbook have to spend more time learning for the exams because all structures, vocabulary and topics in the test still follow the main contents of the old textbook Most of the interviewees say it should be equivalent between knowledge in the new textbook and the format of national exam.
CONCLUSIONS
As mentioned, the aim of this survey research is to get feedback from students and teachers of 3 high schools in Quang Ninh province who are using Tiếng Anh 11 so that further corrections and revisions will be made to perfect the materials before putting them into use on a large scale The research used the questionnaire as a main research instrument and followed by interviews to make clear the findings Research results have indicated that students’ and teachers’ evaluation of the new textbook is quite good However, there are still some minor drawbacks in the categories of
“Supplementary materials”, and in the sections of grammar and texts CD’s quality need to be improved The length of reading texts and language sections should be considered Some other items evaluated low should be revised carefully In short, 15 outstanding strengths and 8 weaknesses are summarized in the table below:
1 Layout is clear and easy to follow
2 The type size and font are appropriate for students
3 The illustrations are informative and functional, stimulate students' visualization and creativeness
4 Structure of the textbook and the use of headings, icons, labels, italics, colour and other methods of signposting is
1 The cover is not very strong and durable
2 The price of the whole package is not reasonable and achievable for all students designed in a consistent way
5 Review sections of grammar and vocabulary lists or glossaries included are useful
Topics 6 Topics are varied in different fields (sport, culture, economy, education, politic), relevant to students’ social and cultural knowledge
3 Some topics are difficult and not close to students’ background knowledge
Texts 7 Texts are relevant to the topics of units
8 Texts are interesting, authentic and close to real language situations
9 Contents of the texts reflect basic cultural values of Vietnam, some countries in South-Asia and some main English-speaking countries
4 Length, difficulty and complexity of texts are not very appropriate
Activities 10 Activities tend to engage students’ interaction in class through a variety of pair works and group discussion
11 Projects at the end of each unit help students to develop all your skills
Skills 12 Materials for four skills are quite sufficient and varied in forms and contents
5 Listening material is note well recorded and varied
(monologues, group conversation, songs, people in everyday situations, e.g in shops, restaurants, etc
13 Language knowledge, including pronunciation, vocabulary and grammar are repeated and reinforced in subsequent lessons and practiced in context
6 The number of new words introduced in each lesson is still inappropriate
7 The sound quality of the audio CDs needs to be improved
8 Mock tests and quizzes should be more varied
Teacher’s book 14 The teacher’s book provides supportive and comprehensive guidance, helps teachers to identify suitable teaching techniques and amount of knowledge introduced to students
15 Clear statement of the textbook’s objectives fit the curriculum of English teaching for upper secondary school compiled under the 2020 Project
After finding out a number of drawbacks of the new textbook, eight practical recommendations are given to the writers and editors as follow:
5 Diversifying materials for skills learning
Hopefully, these recommendations will be useful for improving the qualities of the textbook before it is used in nationwide scale
There are at least two limitations that should be pointed out here concerning this survey research First, because the research has received feedback from only 6 teachers and 144 students, the results cannot be said to fully reflect the overall picture of the quality of the textbooks Second, the interviews were conducted right after the questionnaires had been collected Therefore, the questions for the interviews which had been prepared could not help to clarify the questionnaire’ results effectively
The following things should be done to overcome the limitations as mentioned above:
First, a survey should be conducted to get evaluative feedback from as many English teachers in these schools as possible
Second, the similar research can be done but in a longer period The interviews should be carried out after the procedure of analyzing data collected from the questionnaires In this case, the researcher will know what needs to be clarified and discussed with the respondents more Results from interview may be more useful and supportive of the findings
Finally, during the process of data analysis, I realized that the perspectives between students and teachers are different The further research can be made to point out those differences and explore the reasons
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APPENDICES APPENDIX I QUESTIONNAIRE FOR STUDENTS
In an attempt to evaluating the qualities of the new textbook " Tiếng Anh 11",
(Sách thí điểm) compiled under the National Foreign Language (NFL) Project entitled: “Teaching and Learning Foreign Languages in the National Education System, Period 2008-2020” I would greatly appreciate if you could be willing to respond to the questions below Please answer the questions below by ticking () the choice that you find most suitable
Thank you very much for your cooperation and participation!
PERSONAL INFORMATION Your name (optional): _
In responding to the statements in this questionnaire, please check ( ) the appropriate choice to indicate your level of agreement, from strongly agree to strongly disagree
Str ong ly agre e (5) A gre e (4) N eut ra l ( 3) D isagr ee ( 2) Str ong ly dis ag re e (1)
1 Layout is clear and easy-to-follow
2 The type size and font are appropriate for the students
4 The cover is strong and long-lasting
5 The illustrations are informative and functional, stimulate students' visualization and creativeness
6 Structure of the textbook and the use of headings, icons, labels, italics, colour and other methods of signposting is designed in a consistent way
7 Review sections of grammar and vocabulary lists or glossaries are included
8 The price of the whole package is reasonable and achievable
9 Topics are varied in different fields (sport, culture, economy, education, politic)
10 Topics are interesting and suitable to the age of students
11 Topics are relevant to students’ social and cultural knowledge
12 The book avoids potentially embarrassing or disturbing topics
13 Texts are relevant to the topics of units
14 Texts are interesting and suitable to the age of students
15 Texts are authentic or close to real language situations
16 Texts provide students with a variety of knowledge
17 The length, difficulty and complexity of text are appropriate
18 Language used is natural and real-life English
19 Contents of the texts reflect basic cultural values of Vietnam, some countries in South-Asia and some main English- speaking countries
20 Activities tend to engage students’ interaction in class
21 Activities are efficiently graded according to complexity, follow the logical sequence from easy to difficult
22 Activities are varied from individual to pair work and group discussion
23 Activities involve Students’ knowledge and personal experience (tell a story, write a letter to your friend)
24 Activities encourage sufficient communicative and meaningful practice
25 Projects at the end of each unit help students to develop all four skills
26 Activities for projects are diversified in form and content
28 The four skills (listening, speaking, reading, writing) are adequately covered and integrated
29 Exercises and tasks pay attention to sub- skills (listening for gist, listening for detail, listening for specific information,
30 Listening material is well recorded and varied (monologues, group conversation, songs, people in every day situations, e.g in shops, restaurants, etc
31 The reading text types (an article, a dialogue, a letter, an email) and reading comprehension activities (gap-filling, MCQ, answer questions) are rich and diversified
32 Writing text types (a letter, a paragraph, an email, an essay) and writing activities (gap- filling, answer the question) are rich and diversified
33 There is sufficient material for spoken English (e.g dialogues, role-plays, discussions, debates, problem-solving activities, etc.)
34 The pronunciation points (strong and weak form of words, linking sounds, elision, intonation) are presented in meaningful context
35 Activities to practice the pronunciation points are varied in context (in words, phrase and sentences)
36 The pronunciation points are repeated and reinforced in subsequent lessons
37 The number of new words introduced in each lesson is sufficient and appropriate (8-
38 New words are introduced in realistic contexts
39 New words are practiced in a variety of activities
40 Lexical chunks are taught instead of individual words
41 The number of grammatical structures
42 Grammar points are introduced with interesting and catchy examples
43 The grammar points are repeated and reinforced in subsequent lessons
44 Activities to practice grammar aim to develop their communicative competence
45 The sound quality of the audio CDs is good
46 Workbook helps students to reinforce all what they learnt in class (both skills and languages)
47 Workbook extend the contents of textbook appropriately (language knowledge and communication skills)
48 There are mock tests and quizzes provided to help students test their learning and prepare for real tests
Thank you very much for your cooperation!
APPENDIX II PHIẾU KHẢO SÁT DÀNH CHO HỌC SINH
Với mục đích đánh giá chất lượng cuốn sách giáo khoa mới "Tiếng Anh 11"
(Sách Thí điểm) thí điểm biên soạn trong khuôn khổ của Đề án “Dạy và học ngoại ngữ trong hệ thống giáo dục quốc dân, giai đoạn 2008 – 2020”, tôi rất mong em trả lời đầy đủ các câu hỏi dưới đây bằng cách đánh dấu vào lựa chọn mà em thấy phù hợp nhất
Cảm ơn sự hợp tác và tham gia của em rất nhiều!
Em hãy đưa ra câu trả lời của mình cho mỗi nhận định bằng cách đánh dấu "" vào MỘT trong các lựa chọn
STT Tiêu chí đánh giá
H oàn toàn đồn g ý ( 5) Đ ồng ý (4 ) B ình t hƣ ờng (3) K hôn g đồn g ý ( 2) H oàn toàn kh ông đ ồng ý (1)
A THIẾT KẾ VÀ CẤU TRÚC
1 Bố cục rõ ràng, dễ theo dõi
2 Cỡ chữ và kiểu chữ phù hợp với học sinh
3 Bề ngoài của sách hấp dẫn
4 Bìa cứng và giữ được lâu
5 Hình ảnh minh họa mang tính thông tin, kích thích trực quan và sự sáng tạo của người học
6 Cấu trúc của sách, cách sử dụng tiêu đề, biểu tượng, ký hiệu, màu sắc và các dấu hiệu trực quan khác có tính thống nhất cao
7 Có các bài ôn tập ngữ pháp, danh mục từ vựng đã học
8 Giá cho một bộ sách là hợp lý
9 Đa dạng trên nhiều lĩnh vực (văn hóa, thể thao, kinh kế, chính trị, xã hội)
10 Thú vị và phù hợp với độ tuổi của học sinh
11 Liên quan đến kiến thức văn hóa, xã hội của học sinh
12 Các chủ đề nhạy cảm, tế nhị không được đề cập
13 Bài khóa liên quan đến chủ đề bài học
14 Nội dung thú vị và phù hợp với lứa tuổi học sinh
15 Nội dung gần gũi và đúng với các tình huống trong thực tế
16 Học sinh mở rộng được các kiến thức liên quan đến mỗi chủ đề, lĩnh vực
17 Độ dài, độ khó và phức tạp của bài khó được
18 Ngôn ngữ sử dụng tự nhiên, gần với tiếng Anh bản ngữ
19 Nội dung có tính cập nhật, phản ánh những giá trị văn hóa tiêu biểu của Việt nam, một số nước Đông Nam Á và vài nước nói Tiếng anh tiêu biểu
20 Đẩy mạnh sự tương tác của học sinh trong lớp
21 Được phân loại theo mức độ phức tạp và sắp xếp một cách logic từ dễ đến khó
22 Đa dạng và phong phú với các hoạt động cá nhân, đôi, hay thảo luận nhóm
23 Liên quan đến sự hiểu biết và kinh nghiệm cá nhân của học sinh (kể một câu chuyện, viết thư cho bạn)
24 Khuyến khích việc thực hành nâng cao khả năng giao tiếp
25 Các projects giúp học sinh phát triển được tổng hợp 4 kỹ năng (nghe, nói, đọc, viết)
26 Hoạt động cho Projects cuối mỗi bài được đa dạng hóa dưới nhiều hình thức và nội dung
27 Các projects đẩy mạnh khả năng sáng tạo của học sinh
28 Bốn kỹ năng được phân phối phù hợp và có tính tích hợp cao
29 Bài tập và hoạt động tập trung vào phát triển các tiểu kỹ năng (nghe chi tiết, nghe lấy thông tin chung, đọc để tìm ý chính, đọc để tìm thông tin cụ thể)
30 Đĩa nghe có âm thanh tốt, tình huống nghe đa dạng (độc thoại, hội thoại, bài hát, tình huống hàng ngày như tại cửa hàng, tại nhà hàng, …)
31 Ngữ liệu cho luyện đọc (bài báo, đoạn hội thoại, lá thư, email) và hoạt động cho việc để phát triển kỹ năng đọc (đọc và trả lời câu hỏi, chọn đáp án đúng, điền từ) đa dạng dưới nhiều hình thức
32 Ngữ liệu cho luyện viết (viết thư, đoạn văn, email, bài luận) và hoạt động cho việc phát triển kỹ năng viết (điền từ, trả lời câu hỏi) đa dạng
33 Ngữ liệu cho luyện Nói phù hợp, đa dạng về loại hình như hội thoại, đóng vai, thảo luận, các hoạt động giải quyết vấn đề,
34 Các hiện tượng phát âm (nối âm, đồng hóa âm) được trình bày trong bối cảnh cụ thể
35 Các hoạt động để luyện tập phát âm đa dạng trong bối cảnh (luyện tập với từ, cụm từ, câu)
36 Các hiện tượng phát âm được nhắc lại và củng cố trong những bài học tiếp theo
37 Lượng từ mới được dạy trong mỗi bài hợp lý
38 Từ mới được giới thiệu trong tình huống thực tế
39 Từ mới được luyện tập bằng nhiều hoạt động khác nhau để giúp học sinh nhớ từ
40 Những cụm từ được dạy nhiều hơn thay vì các từ đơn lẻ
41 Lượng cấu trúc ngữ pháp được giới thiệu trong mỗi bài phù hợp
42 Các hiện tượng ngữ pháp được giới thiệu thông quá các ví dụ thú vị và dễ nhớ
43 Các hiện tượng ngữ pháp được nhắc lại và củng cố trong những bài tiếp theo
44 Các hoạt động luyện tập ngữ pháp hướng tới phát triển năng lực giao tiếp
45 Đĩa CD chất lượng tốt
46 Sách bài tập giúp học sinh củng cố những kiến thức đã học trên lớp hiệu quả
47 Sách bài tập mở rộng nội dung sách giáo khoa giúp học sinh phát triển ngôn ngữ và kỹ năng giao tiếp
48 Có các bài kiểm tra thử giúp học sinh kiểm tra lại kiến thức và chuẩn bị cho các bài kiểm tra chính thức
Cảm ơn sự hợp tác của các em!
APPENDIX III QUESTIONNAIRE FOR TEACHERS
In an attempt to evaluating the qualities of the new textbook " Tiếng Anh 11",
(Sách thí điểm) compiled under the National Foreign Language (NFL) Project entitled: “Teaching and Learning Foreign Languages in the National Education System, Period 2008-2020”, I would greatly appreciate if you could be willing to respond to the questions below Please read every statement carefully and tick () the choice that you find most suitable
Thank you very much for your cooperation and participation!
PERSONAL INFORMATION Teacher’s Name (optional): _
Experience in English Language Teaching:
First year 2-5 years More than 5 years
In responding to the statements in this questionnaire, please check ( ) the appropriate choice to indicate your level of agreement, from strongly agree to strongly disagree
Str ong ly agre e (5) A gre e (4) N eut ra l ( 3) D isagr ee (2) Str ong ly dis ag re e (1)
1 Layout is clear and easy-to-follow
2 The type size and font are appropriate for the students
4 The cover is strong and long-lasting
5 The illustrations are informative and functional, stimulate students' visualization and creativeness
6 Structure of the textbook and the use of headings, icons, labels, italics, colour and other methods of signposting is designed in a consistent way
7 Review sections of grammar and vocabulary lists or glossaries are included
8 The price of the whole package is reasonable and achievable
9 Topics are varied in different fields (sport, culture, economy, education, politic, etc.)
10 Topics are interesting and suitable to the age of students
11 Topics are relevant to students’ social and cultural knowledge
12 The book avoids potentially embarrassing or disturbing topics
14 Texts are interesting and suitable to the age of students
15 Texts are authentic or close to real language situations
16 Texts provide students with a variety of knowledge
17 The length, difficulty and complexity of text are appropriate
18 Language used is natural and real-life English
19 Contents of the texts are up-dated, reflect basic cultural values of Vietnam, some countries in South-Asia and some main English-speaking countries
20 Activities tend to engage students’ interaction in class
21 Activities are efficiently graded according to complexity, follow the logical sequence from easy to difficult
22 Activities are varied from individual to pair work and group discussion
23 Activities involve Students’ knowledge and personal experience (tell a story, write a letter to your friend)
24 Activities encourage sufficient communicative and meaningful practice
25 Projects at the end of each unit help students to develop all four skills
26 Activities for projects are diversified in form and content
28 The four skills (listening, speaking, reading, writing) are adequately covered and integrated
29 Exercises and tasks pay attention to sub-skills (listening for gist, listening for detail, listening for specific information, skimming, scanning, etc
30 Listening material is well recorded and varied (monologues, group conversation, songs, people in every day situations, e.g in shops, restaurants, etc
31 The reading text types (an article, a dialogue, a letter, an email) and reading comprehension activities (gap-filling, MCQ, answer questions) are rich and diversified
32 Writing text types (a letter, a paragraph, an email, an essay) and writing activities (gap- filling, answer the question) are rich and diversified
33 There is sufficient material for spoken English (e.g dialogues, role-plays, discussions, debates, problem-solving activities, etc.)
34 The pronunciation points (strong and weak form of words, linking sounds, elision, intonation) are presented in meaningful context
35 Activities to practice the pronunciation points are varied in context (in words, phrase and sentences)
36 The pronunciation points are repeated and reinforced in subsequent lessons
37 The number of new words introduced in each lesson is sufficient and appropriate
38 New words are introduced in realistic contexts
39 New words are practiced in a variety of activities
40 Lexical chunks are taught instead of individual words
41 The number of grammatical structures introduced in each unit is appropriate
42 Grammar points are introduced with
43 The grammar points are repeated and reinforced in subsequent lessons
44 Activities to practice grammar aim to develop their communicative competence
45 The sound quality of the audio CDs is good
46 Workbook helps students to reinforce all what they learnt in class (both skills and languages)
47 Workbook extends the contents of textbook appropriately (language knowledge and communication skills)
48 There are more tests and quizzes provided
49 The guidance is supportive and comprehensive, helps teacher to develop techniques and methods of teaching in the classroom
50 There are explanations about teaching techniques, grammar rules and culture-specific information
51 The tapescripts, answer keys, vocabulary lists, lesson summaries, structural inventories are provided in the teacher’s book
52 Clear statement of the objectives of the course and of each textbook
53 The book is clearly linked to the curriculum they serve
Thank you very much for your cooperation!
APPENDIX IV QUESTIONS FOR INTERVIEWS
Questions will be added more after I receive the questionnaire’s response
1 In comparison to the old textbook (grade 8, 9), what is the most improvement of the new one as you can see?
2 What do you think about the quality of the new textbook, in terms of:
3 Can you study effectively with the book? How has your learning English changed since you used this new book? Do you have any difficulties?
4 What points do you feel satisfied with the new textbook the most?
5 What points do you think that the new textbook needs to improve?
Can you give some recommendations?
1 In comparison to the old textbook (grade 8, 9), what is the most improvement of the new one as you can see?
2 What do you think about the quality of the new textbook, in terms of:
3 Can you study effectively with the book? How has your learning English changed since you used this new book? Do you have any difficulties?
4 What points do you feel satisfied with the new textbook the most?
5 What points do you think that the new textbook needs to improve?
Can you give some recommendations?
6 Does the new textbook fulfill the objectives of the National Foreign Language
2020 Project and the Piloted English Language Curriculum for Upper Secondary Education? Specify your answer please!
1 So với SGK cũ, sự cải tiến rõ ràng nhất của SGK mới là gì?
2 Thầy, cô, em đánh giá gì về chất lượng của SGK mới trên 3 phương diện:
3 Việc giảng dạy (học tập) của thầy, cô (em) từ khi sử dụng bộ sách giáo khoa mới thay đổi như thế nào?
Sách có dễ dàng để thiết kế và tiến hành bài giảng không?
4 Điều gì làm thầy, cô (em) hài lòng nhất về bộ sách?
5 Điều gì thầy, cô (em) nghĩ sách cần tiếp tục bổ sung và chỉnh sửa để việc dạy và học được hiệu quả hơn?
6 Dành cho giáo viên: SGK mới có đáp ứng được mục tiêu của Đề án Ngoại ngữ
2020 và chương trình thí điểm không?
1 Mean SD Overal rating (53 items)
1 Layout is clear and easy-to-follow 49 34.0% 63 43.8% 37 25.7% 1 0.7% 0 0.0% 4.24 0.79
2 The type size and font are appropriate for the students 41 28.5% 73 50.7% 32 22.2% 4 2.8% 0 0.0%
4 The cover is strong and long-lasting 25 17.4% 47 32.6% 43 29.9% 26 18.1% 9 6.3% 3.49 1.13
5 The illustrations are informative and functional, stimulate students' visualization and creativeness 26 18.1% 53 36.8% 49 34.0% 20 13.9% 2 1.4%
Structure of the textbook and the use of headings, icons, labels, italics, colour and other methods of signposting is designed in a consistent way 33 22.9% 64 44.4% 48 33.3% 5 3.5% 0 0.0%
7 Review sections of grammar and vocabulary lists or glossaries are
8 The price of the whole package is reasonable and achievable 16 11.1% 39 27.1% 54 37.5% 25 17.4% 16 11.1% 3.40 1.17
Topics are varied in different fields
(sport, culture, economy, education, politic) 37 25.7% 64 44.4% 37 25.7% 11 7.6% 1 0.7%
10 Topics are interesting and suitable to the age of students 21 14.6% 48 33.3% 64 44.4% 16 11.1% 1 0.7% 3.74 0.92
11 Topics are relevant to students’ social and cultural knowledge 25 17.4% 81 56.3% 35 24.3% 9 6.3% 0 0.0% 4.03 0.81
12 The book avoids potentially embarrassing or disturbing topics 48 33.3% 59 41.0% 27 18.8% 7 4.9% 9 6.3% 4.08 1.12
13 Texts are relevant to the topics of units 42 29.2% 74 51.4% 32 22.2% 2 1.4% 0 0.0% 4.22 0.76
14 Texts are interesting and suitable to the age of students 17 11.8% 67 46.5% 54 37.5% 12 8.3% 0 0.0%
15 Texts are authentic or close to real language situations 21 14.6% 62 43.1% 53 36.8% 13 9.0% 1 0.7%
16 Texts provide students with a variety of knowledge 15 10.4% 70 48.6% 48 33.3% 14 9.7% 3 2.1%
17 The length, difficulty and complexity of text are appropriate 17 11.8% 40 27.8% 1 0.7% 28 19.4% 13 9.0% 2.40 1.29
18 Language used is natural and real-life
Contents of the texts reflect basic cultural values of Vietnam, some countries in South-Asia and some main
20 Activities tend to engage students’ interaction in class 18 12.5% 63 43.8% 54 37.5% 14 9.7% 1 0.7% 3.80 0.88
Activities are efficiently graded according to complexity, follow the logical sequence from easy to difficult 11 7.6% 57 39.6% 58 40.3% 23 16.0% 1 0.7% 3.66 0.90
22 Activities are varied from individual to pair work and group discussion 20 13.9% 63 43.8% 52 36.1% 12 8.3% 3 2.1% 3.80 0.92
Activities involve Students’ knowledge and personal experience (tell a story, write a letter to your friend) 17 11.8% 60 41.7% 54 37.5% 15 10.4% 4 2.8%
Activities encourage sufficient communicative and meaningful practice 30 20.8% 49 34.0% 47 32.6% 17 11.8% 7 4.9%
25 Projects at the end of each unit help students to develop all four skills
26 Activities for projects are diversified in form and content 22 15.3% 54 37.5% 56 38.9% 15 10.4% 3 2.1% 3.76 0.96
The four skills (listening, speaking, reading, writing) are adequately covered and integrated 15 10.4% 69 47.9% 49 34.0% 13 9.0% 4 2.8%
Exercises and tasks pay attention to sub-skills (listening for gist, listening for detail, listening for specific information, skimming, scanning, etc 14 9.7% 74 51.4% 44 30.6% 13 9.0% 5 3.5%
Listening material is well recorded and varied (monologues, group conversation, songs, people in every day situations, e.g in shops, restaurants, etc 13 9.0% 45 31.3% 56 38.9% 20 13.9% 16 11.1%
The reading text types (an article, a dialogue, a letter, an email) and reading comprehension activities (gap-filling,
MCQ, answer questions) are rich and diversified 18 12.5% 68 47.2% 52 36.1% 9 6.3% 3 2.1%
Writing text types (a letter, a paragraph, an email, an essay) and writing activities (gap-filling, answer the question) are rich and diversified
There is sufficient material for spoken
English (e.g dialogues, role-plays, discussions, debates, problem-solving activities, etc.) 11 7.6% 56 38.9% 67 46.5% 11 7.6% 5 3.5%
The pronunciation points (strong and weak form of words, linking sounds, elision, intonation) are presented in meaningful context 22 15.3% 52 36.1% 56 38.9% 19 13.2% 1 0.7%
35 Activities to practice the pronunciation points are varied in context (in words, phrase and sentences) 20 13.9% 51 35.4% 65 45.1% 10 6.9% 2 1.4%
36 The pronunciation points are repeated and reinforced in subsequent lessons 18 12.5% 57 39.6% 57 39.6% 14 9.7% 4 2.8% 3.72 0.95
The number of new words introduced in each lesson is sufficient and appropriate (8-10 words) 20 13.9% 53 36.8% 39 27.1% 22 15.3% 16 11.1%
38 New words are introduced in realistic contexts 27 18.8% 57 39.6% 47 32.6% 10 6.9% 9 6.3%
39 New words are practiced in a variety of activities 20 13.9% 55 38.2% 47 32.6% 19 13.2% 9 6.3%
40 Lexical chunks are taught instead of individual words 21 14.6% 51 35.4% 56 38.9% 8 5.6% 14 9.7%
41 The number of grammatical structures introduced in each unit is appropriate 20 13.9% 72 50.0% 39 27.1% 13 9.0% 6 4.2% 3.82 0.99
42 Grammar points are introduced with interesting and catchy examples 22 15.3% 43 29.9% 64 44.4% 16 11.1% 5 3.5% 3.66 1.01
43 The grammar points are repeated and reinforced in subsequent lessons 19 13.2% 69 47.9% 52 36.1% 6 4.2% 4 2.8% 3.81 0.88
44 Activities to practice grammar aim to develop their communicative competence 18 12.5% 56 38.9% 52 36.1% 16 11.1% 8 5.6%
45 The sound quality of the audio CDs is good 12 8.3% 44 30.6% 48 33.3% 19 13.2% 27 18.8%
Workbook helps students to reinforce all what they learnt in class (both skills and languages) 12 8.3% 39 27.1% 63 43.8% 20 13.9% 16 11.1% 3.34 1.10
Workbook extend the contents of textbook appropriately (language knowledge and communication skills) 11 7.6% 45 31.3% 56 38.9% 23 16.0% 15 10.4% 3.38 1.11
48 There are mock tests and quizzes provided to help students test their learning and prepare for real tests 10 6.9% 33 22.9% 42 29.2% 38 26.4% 27 18.8%
The guidance is supportive and comprehensive, helps teacher to develop techniques and methods of teaching in the classroom 1 16.7% 5 83.3% 0 0.0% 0 0.0% 0 0.0%
There are explanations about teaching techniques, grammar rules and culture- specific information 0 0.0% 6 100.0% 0 0.0% 0 0.0% 0 0.0%
The tapescripts, answer keys, vocabulary lists, lesson summaries, structural inventories are provided in the teacher’s book 0 0.0% 6 100.0% 0 0.0% 0 0.0% 0 0.0%
52 Clear statement of the objectives of the course and of each textbook 1 16.7% 5 83.3% 0 0.0% 0 0.0% 0 0.0% 4.17 0.41
53 The book is clearly linked to the curriculum they serve 1 16.7% 5 83.3% 0 0.0% 0 0.0% 0 0.0% 4.17 0.91
APPENDIX VI THE INTERVIEWS’ SUMMARY
Questions Mai Phương (S1) Phượng (S2) Xuân (S3)
1 There are more grammatical structures (tag questions, special questions) with diverse types exercises to practice these structures
The old textbook is much thicker and heavier The number of pictures is limited and not good quality
In the new one, the number of words is reduced, instead by lively images that stimulate students’ interest and promote students’ creativity
