Evaluation of Curriculum Materials (An ELT Coursebook)
Background
I used the Quest series to teach low-advanced 9th graders who mostly wanted to go to foreign language high schools or go abroad for further study. The intensive English program aimed to develop students’ literacy and oracy skills in terms of four English skills: reading, writing, listening and speaking. This book was used in a reading class together with other test preparation reading textbooks.
1. Description
Title: Quest 2: Reading and Writing (McGraw Hill)
Author: Pamela Hartmann
Series: 3 levels
Focus Areas: Reading and Writing
2. Students Profile
Course: Intensive English Course
Grade: 9th grade
Level: High-intermediate to Low-advanced
Evaluation of Curriculum Materials
In determining the appropriateness and usefulness of this textbook as curriculum materials, I used both rubrics-one that I have developed myself and one provided by the professor to get a more precise and comprehensive picture.
1. Goals and Objectives
Goals and objectives are clearly specified under the title of Scope and Sequence of learning materials in a table in an introductory section. In addition, in a Welcome section, the book succinctly summarizes what kind of learning activities and skills the learners will practice for those objectives.
2. Instructional Content
1) This book presents learning materials in an integrative manner blending reading and writing skills within the academic context. Each chapter consists of five parts: 1) Introduction, 2) General Interest Reading, 3) Academic Reading, 4) The Mechanics of Writing, and 5) Academic Writing. In this way, the readings skills are not solely presented in isolation. This integrated approach merits serious considerations in that integrated and combined language skills suffice communicative, authentic language proficiency.
2) The contents include general materials from newspapers and magazines along with readings from academic textbooks such as anthropology, art, biology, economics, history, literature, and sociology. General materials seem to more focus on readability and readers’ interests whereas academic contents highlight authenticity of reading selections. Another thing to note is that readings and writing materials are presented in an increasing length and difficulty through the five sections of each chapter across the four levels. In this way, selection and layout of materials can reflect the students’ progress according to their ELD level.
3) This book is strategy-based. In each chapter, a variety of learning strategies including reading strategy such as guessing meanings, making inferences, using graphic organizers, test-taking strategy, and writing tips are presented to promote learning.
3. Materials Design and Instructional Delivery
The teachers’ Edition is well designed and easy to follow. In each chapter of the Teachers’ Edition, a list of suggested website resources are provided for reference. The students can research these website resources to gain additional information about topics presented in the chapter when necessary. As this textbook deals with academic subjects, gaining in-depth knowledge will help the students strengthen their understanding and at the same time form a foundation that can allow for extended productive activities such as debate, group discussion, and presentation, etc. In addition, at least 10 optional expansion activities are also provided in each chapter; thus, it can be used as extensive guides for novice teachers. In light of design and layout of the students book, photos and graphics are used to capture students’ interests while introducing each academic topic.
4. Instructional Resources and Learner Interaction
At least 10 optional expansion activities are provided in each chapter to facilitate students’ understanding and interactive learning. For each reading, the students are called on to be engaged in pre-reading, while-reading and post-reading activities to increase the comprehensibility of difficult academic texts. Most significantly, the book contains a range of reading activities designed to develop higher order thinking skills such as critical, analytical thinking skills, activating prior knowledge or schemata, and making inferences. It is highly noteworthy given that most reading textbooks currently used in secondary schools or language schools in Korea are focused on developing reading comprehension through test-taking skills, thus lacking in high level reading skills and reasoning. Pre-reading thinking and post-reading reflections can be modified into speaking activities such as group discussion and presentation. Vocabulary knowledge is mostly address in post-reading activities and syntax information is presented in a writing section. Through writing practice, the students not only learn the mechanics of writing such as cohesive ties, organizational skills and grammar, but they can practice expository writing. For increasing listing ability, the book also provides the students with audio files in MP3 format that can be downloaded from http://www.mhprofessional.com/product.php?isbn=0077196317&cat=270 with payment. For the sake of teacher’s convenience, EZ Test CD-Rom is also provided to create customized tests at a rather ease.
5. Assessment
The tests at the end of each chapter assess students on reading comprehension, critical thinking strategies, vocabulary, writing mechanics, and editing. Test items include multiple choice, fill-in-the-blank, and true/false for a total of 35 items per test along with essay practice. Thus, this book allows the teacher evaluate the students’ understanding and learning outcomes both formatively and summatively.
Summary
Having evaluated the material using both rubrics increased my awareness of the desirable criteria and the components of evaluation. Both rubrics focus on instructional resources, delivery, and assessment. While my own rubric also evaluates instructional delivery, yellow rubric was more specified in detail. For instance, the components of extension of learning time through assignments as instructional content and providing additional practice for struggling students or condensing instruction so that advanced students can concentrate on new materials were not considered in mine. It provided me an insight into the importance of correlation between the quality of instruction and student achievements. In addition, five evaluative rating scales seemed more effective to precisely assess the overall materials than three rating scales.
Conclusion
Quest is an effective book to teach the EFL students both academic contents and language skills-reading and writing. Especially, an integrative approach combining reading skills and writing skills are highly recommendable. The fact that this book is designed to facilitate higher order thinking skills through an extensive use of graphic organizers and learning strategies are also noteworthy. Finally, by providing a variety of methods of assessment, this book allows teachers both for formative and summative assessments. However, all of these merits may disservice to certain EFL teachers who are not acquainted with this integrative strategy-based approach with its focus on reasoning and critical thinking and process-based assessment. Albeit this possible drawback, I highly recommend this textbook for EFL a reading and writing class as second language learning should be integrative and authentic. The traditional English textbooks that contain de-contextualized materials dependent on one or two discrete language skills will merely help vocabulary development and grammar rules or test-taking skills at best.
