Monday, October 4, 2010
Textbook: Supplementation
Course books , usually, are not written for a particular context. The authors of the book used by us, ironically, have no experience of teaching English in Saudi context. The book may be useful for an ESL environment, where classroom teaching and learning is supported by ample opportunities of the use and practice of target language outside the classroom. Here in our situation, the language experience of the students is limited to the classroom only. They do not find opportunities to practice and consolidate the language learnt in the classroom. The exercises in the book are not sufficient to give them enough practice. For example in Unit 1, the students learn the language function of introduction using the structure "verb forms of 'be':is,am, are''. My experience is that students produce the language structure for the time being to perform the function of introducing themselves and others but next day when they come to class, everything is washed from their brain. We need to consolidate this learning by giving them more practice through exercises and worksheets. Unit 1 can be supplemented by exercises about 'is, am, are' and Unit 2 yields itself for supplementation with exercise and use of Present Simple Tense.
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I spent last weekend poring over the Interchange series and I definitely agree that the exercises in the texts are on their own wholly inadequate for an EFL context--and especially one that is focused specifically on Saudi females. The book has its strong points, of course, but certain exercises are irrelevant (for example, I doubt that the duties of cashiers or tour guides are an immediate/pressing concern to young Saudi girls' existence, let alone their academic success). The series follows the standard format used in the US to assimilate newcomers to American life—basically to allow them to function in society (get around, find a job, shoot the breeze, whatever). Thus, I agree that supplementation is necessary—especially a concerted effort to make the material relevant to the particular student group.
ReplyDeleteThis past week, the only photocopier available conveniently decided to hibernate (or expire? as the beast has not yet been resuscitated :)). Until I purchased an all-in-one and paper of my own, the only option, pretty much, was writing out grammatical exercises on the board, whether from downloaded worksheets or the text itself (not all students had photocopies of the units, let alone their own copies of the books). I started substituting the students’ names and relevant activities/terms—shopping, Yanbu, makeup, siblings and so on instead of the standard Tims and Sandras and their in-line skates and neckties. The above yielded fruit in terms of interest and enthusiasm, especially in the area of speaking. Yes, it’s true that students should be exposed to a variety of situations, but in the beginning, when the language is utterly foreign—as it is for many of my students (they have trouble stringing together basic sentences)—something needs to be familiar. (On the other hand, the above requires ensuring that assessment evaluates language ability rather than mastery of the specific text.)
Relevancy is obviously a proven motivator. At the previous institution I taught at, the first research assignment for freshmen required their choosing/arguing a topic that was relevant to them in some way (for example, a student who enjoyed speedboating might write a paper about the effect of the manatee population on speedboat regulations). The object was to ensure that students saw rhetoric/argument as holding meaning rather than as dead words/regurgitated researched material on the page. Similarly, I think students at YUC should be deliberately and meticulously shown from the get-go how the material is relevant to them rather than to David Garza and Elizabeth Silva :).
On a side note, since studies have indicated that ELLs may pretty much pick up colloquial English within 2 years while academic English generally requires a good 7 years, I’m wondering if we shouldn’t address a bit more of the latter as well, perhaps by supplementing with a basic reading series (maybe one constructed by faculty as per experience/student reaction? different ones for the male/female student populations—geared to interest). I can see how colloquial language/vocabulary acquisition might be a primary concern at this point, but a bit more focus on reading (for pleasure rather than as part of an exercise/assignment) would help expand general/more academic vocabulary.
Another side note: Any ideas on promoting speaking practice? After all, when the tongue commits something to “memory,” the speaker is no longer required to engage in mental gymnastics in order to express a grammatically correct sentence :).
Thank you Fatima and Hamid for raising this very important issue
ReplyDeleteThe need for a proper, relevant and intelligent supplementation of the course book currently used with Engl 001 and Engl 002 has long been long overdue. We have been calling for it for the last three years. Now that we can finally do it, this supplementation needs to be consistent across the board. For proper evaluation of the teaching materials and for reliable assessment policy, it should be stressed that teachers share their supplementary materials with their colleagues. In fact, it is expected of the course leader to ensure that all teacher at a course level are covering the same language points.
It is inevitable photocopiers or printers fail every now and then. However, one can always borrow a laptop from the library and use project the activity for the students to copy. This proved to contribute towards improving their handwriting, spelling and even reading skills.
What also needs to be stressed is that the Engl 001 and Engl 002 syllabi are under review and therefore are open to many changes. Very soon the course objectives will be defined that should be used as the framework within which changes and modification should be made.
ELC is very recent and based on what I have read so far, I am very confident that there is lot of potential out there that will contribute positively to ensuring setting up a successful language centre.