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Welcome to Teaching Materials!

You can learn the language teaching materials here.


About this site

I created this site to inform you about the language teaching materials.


Language Teaching Materials

- Audio-visual materials

- Print materials (worksheets, coursebook, etc.)

- Real objects

- Authentic materials

- Activities

Let's define materials

Anything that is used with the aim of teaching the target language, increasing the knowledge, and experience of learners with the language and facilitating the learning of the language.

Features of materials

-It should be meaningful, comprehensible and relevant to the child.

-It should be comprehensible and purposeful.

-It should be varied and attractive.

-It should develop imagination.

-It should be developmentally appropriate.

The use of coursebooks

-It is the most frequently used material.

Benefits:

-Provide guideline to the teacher.

-Not time-consuming

-Serve as a syllabus

-Provide profesionally developed material and tasks; a source of practical ideas.

-Give a sense of progress and purpose.

Drawbacks:

-May not be suitable for the needs of every learner.

-May have gaps in coverage.

-Problems in real life/natural use of language.

The use of authentic materials (Newspaper, articles, ticket, etc.)

- Teachers may be reluctant because the learners may not understand.

- Tailoring for the needs of the class.

- Intrinsically motivating, interesting.

- It should be appropriate in terms of age, language level and culture.

The use of computer-based materials

-The developments of in technology have brought innovation and new tools in language teaching.Computer and web based materials and resources can be utilized to integrate sound, colour, and movement into the classroom.

Why develop/adapt materials?

Problems

-Learners need more practice.

-Learners need to revise.

-The activity is insufficient.

-There are areas not covered.

-The activity is too long or boring.

-The activity doesn't work properly.

-The learners are already competent.

Adapt or adopt?

Teachers should hold an adapt-do-not-adopt approach to make the most of coursebooks or other materials at hand. Materials adaptation is making changes to materials in order to improve them or to make them more suitable for a particular type of learner. The teacher often needs to adapt materials in order to increase the effectiveness of the programme and materials used for their particular learners. The teacher may also need to create or supplement materials to bridge the gaps in the coverage of the textbook. that is to say, every teacher should be a materials adapter and developer in their profession from time to time.

It is advisable the teacher take the initiative to reorganize, adapt or supplement the content whan needed. Cunnigsworth (1984, p.6) expresses the rationale that lies under materials adaptation: No course book will totally suited to a particular taeching situation. The teacher will have to find his own way of using it and adapting it if necessary. So we should not be looking for the perfect course book which meets all our requirements, but rather for the best possible fit between what the course book offers and what we as teachers and students need.

Coursebooks cannot cater for the needs of particular groups of students; therefore, coursebooks must not constitue the whole programme and they should not be seen as the curriculum itself. The teacher is expected to be a materials developer in the sense that he needs to be able to be able to select, evaluate, adapt and produce materials to ensure a match between the given students and the materials they use when there is a loose fit or mismatch between course aims and learner needs on one hand and what the coursebook offers, on the other.


Did you know the priciples of materials adaptation?

  • Effective language taechers do not show a strict adherence to the coursebook, instead they make the best of it by a selective approach. Materials adaptation is altering the materials to improve or make them more suitable for a particular group of learners and can take several forms: Omission, addition, reduction, extension, modification and replacement.

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