1

VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HA NOI
UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES
FACULTY OF POST – GRADUATE STUDIES
*****************

ĐOÀN PHƯƠNG NGÂN

TEACHERS’ AND STUDENTS’ EVALUATION OF
ENGLISH 1.1 TEXTBOOK IN USE AT VIETNAM
UNIVERSITY OF COMMERCE
ĐÁ NH GIÁ CỦA GIÁ O VIÊN VÀ SINH VIÊN VỀ GIÁO TRÌNH
TIẾNG ANH 1.1 ĐANG SỬ DỤNG TẠ I TRƯỜ NG ĐẠI HỌC
THƯƠNG MẠI
M.A. Minor Programme Thesis

English Teaching Methodology
Code: 60 14 10

Hanoi - 2010


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VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HA NOI
UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES
FACULTY OF POST – GRADUATE STUDIES
*****************

ĐOÀN PHƯƠNG NGÂN


Table of contents………………………………………………………………….

iv

List of Abbreviations……………………………………………………………..

vi

List of Tables ..……………………………………………………………………

vii

List of Figures and Charts……………………………………………………….

viii

CHAPTER I: INTRODUCTION ……………………………………………….

1

1.1 Rationale of the study………………………………………………………….

1

1.2 Aims of the study………………………………………………………………

2

1.3 Research questions……………………………………………………………..


2.2 Material evaluation ……………………………………………………………

5

2.2.1 Definitions of material evaluation …………………………………………

5

2.2.2 Types of material evaluation ………………………………………………..

6

2.2.3 Purposes of material evaluation ……………………………………………..

6

2.2.4 Approaches to material evaluation ………………………………………….

7

2.2.5 Principles for material evaluation …………………………………………...

7

2.2.6 Models for material evaluation ……………………………………………...

9

2.2.7 Criteria for material evaluation ……………………………………………...

3.3.1 Questionnaires ………………………………………………………………

16

3.3.1.1 Student questionnaire……………………………………………………...

16

3.3.1.2 Teacher questionnaire ……………………………………………………

17

3.3.2 Interviews……………………………………………………………………

17

3.4 Procedures ……………………………………………………………………..

17

3.5 Data analysis …………………………………………………………………..

18

CHAPTER FOUR: DATA ANALYSIS AND DISCUSSION ………………...

19

4.1 Results and discussion…………………………………………………………


4.2.1 Summary of main findings…………………………………………………..

32

4.2.2 Strengths and weaknesses of the textbook …………………………………

33

CHAPTER FIVE: CONCLUSION……………………………………………...

37

5.1 Summary……………………………………………………………………….

37

5.2 Limitations of the study………………………………………………………

37

5.3 Implications ……..…………………...……………………………………….

38

5.4 Recommendations for further studies.………………………………………..

39

Reference………………………………………………………………………….



Disagree

EFL

English as Foreign Language

M.

Mean

N

Neutral

Ord.

Order

SA

Strongly Agree

SD

Strongly Disagree

Sd.

Standard Deviation


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4.4: Students‟ Opinions on the Textbook Language Content

22

4.5: Students‟ Evaluation of the Textbook Language Skills

22

4.6 Teachers‟ Evaluation of the Textbook Aims and Approach

24

4.7 Teachers‟ Evaluation of the Textbook Design and Organization

25

4.8 Teachers‟ Evaluation of the Textbook Topics

26

4.9 Teachers‟ Opinions on the Textbook Language Content

26

4.10 Teachers‟ Evaluation of the Textbook Language Skills

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The textbook, a key component in most language programs, is one of the major teaching
and learning resources used both inside and outside the classroom (Richard 2005). It has an
enormous influence on what is taught in class and how it is taught. In Tyson‟s research
(1997), he found “those new and in-experienced teachers, or those who lack adequate time
for lesson planning, may actually teach from the first page of the textbook to the last,
skipping little or nothing” (p. 89). Due to its very important role, selecting a right textbook
for an English course is not an easy task for each EFL teacher.
Nguyen (2007) reviews all the advantages and disadvantages of using the textbook in her
research. On the one hand, the textbook offers certain advantages like instruction and
assessment standardization (Richard 2005), providing syllabus for a program
(Cunningsworth 1995), receiving students‟ credibility (Sheldon 1988) and making an
effective resource for learning in the classroom and self-directed learning (Cunningsworth
1995). On the other hand, it also shows several reservations like being able to control the
methods, processes, and procedures of classroom practice and „deskill‟ teachers (Allwright
1982); and not suiting all classrooms as it is written for global market (Richard 2005).
Being aware of all the above advantages and disadvantages, the teachers at English
Department, University of Commerce carefully selected content for English 1.1 textbook,
which is used for English 1.1 course, the first English course for the students at this
university. The content selection for the textbook is based on the course objectives,
students‟ levels and their needs and the course length. Sources of the textbook are Business
Basics (2000) written by David Grand and Robert Mc Larty, published by Oxford Press,
and Market Leader (2004) written by David Cotton, David Falvey and Simon Kent,
published by Longman.
This textbook has been in use at Vietnam University of Commerce since 2008. It has,
undeniably, contributed greatly to the English language teaching and learning there, but for
some unanticipated problems, it remains unsatisfactory. As a matter of fact, no research on
evaluation of this textbook had been carried out to see how far it suited the course. Thus,


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2007). Practically, those findings are beneficial to both teachers and course designers in
improving the quality of the course
1.6 Overview of the paper
The study consists of five chapters as follows:
Chapter 1 introduces the background to the thesis, the aims, significance, scope and
methods of the thesis
Chapter 2 is a review of literature on material evaluation.
Chapter 3 presents an overview of English 1.1 course and English 1.1 textbook, and
describes the methodologies employed in the study.
Chapter 4 analyses data and discusses the findings of the study.
Chapter 5 concludes the study.


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CHAPTER TWO: LITERATURE REVIEW
The present chapter reviews previous research related to evaluating EFL materials. It first
sheds light on materials with their definitions and classifications (section 2.1). Then, the
chapter reviews material evaluation with its associated issues (section 2.2). In this section,
definitions, types, purposes, approaches, and principles of materials evaluations are
explored. The section also outlines criteria and models for evaluating materials with
different viewpoints of different researchers.
2.1 Materials
2.1.1 Definition
Language learning materials are often associated with coursebooks as they have been the
main source of people‟s experience of using materials. However, according to Tomlinson
(1998), materials are a “term used to refer to anything which is used by teachers or learners
to facilitate the learning of a language”. He affirmed teachers can adapt materials
according to ages and proficiency level of the students.

been given a great deal of attention. Murphy (2000) strengthens this point when he
considers evaluation one of the key concepts in ELT to “determine the extent to which a
programme is worthwhile, and to aid decision-making through the purposeful gathering
information”.
Sheldon (1988, p.237) agrees with Hutchinson and Waters (1987, p.97) that textbook
evaluation is basically a straightforward, analytical “matching process: matching needs to
available solutions”.
Dudley-Evans and St John (1998) regard material evaluation “as a whole process which
begins with determining what information to gather and ends with bringing about change
in current activities or influencing future ones.”
In order to evaluate a textbook, Cunningsworth (1984, p.2) raises a number of questions
and emphasizes the one: “Good for what and bad for whom?” He believes that textbook
evaluation does not mean making “absolute judgments in the abstract” and that it is
“making relative judgments, taking the learning situation in consideration.”


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2.2.2 Types of material evaluation
In classifying material evaluation, different authors suggest different terms. Johnson
(1989) and Robinson (1991) both agree on three types of material evaluation: preliminary,
formative and summative. Cunningsworth (1995) and McGrath (2002) introduce similar
distinction but in different terms: pre-use, in-use and post-use evaluation. Preliminary or
pre-use evaluation establishes potential suitability of the materials. Formative or in-use
evaluation examines how materials really work in the classroom by gathering data on
planning decisions, implementation and response. Summative or post-use evaluation
provides reflective assessment of a coursebook‟s performance and can be useful for
identifying strengths and weaknesses which emerge over a period of continuous use.
Ellis (1997) classifies materials evaluation into two types which includes predictive
evaluation and retrospective evaluation. They are respectively designed to make a

needs”. Evaluation helps assess whether the coursebook is the most appropriate for the
target learners at various levels and in various teaching context. Moreover, the evaluation
process will involve elements of comparison, especially where existing materials are being
challenged by newly produced materials.
2.2.4 Approaches to material evaluation
Cunningsworth (1995) distinguishes between two approaches to textbook evaluation which
are impressionistic overview and in-depth evaluation. The former is defined as forming
“a general impression of a course book fairly quickly, just by looking through it and
getting an overview of its possibilities and its strengths and weaknesses, noting significant
features which stand out.” The latter is identified by “seeing what is prominent and
obvious in a course book” together with “examining how specific items are dealt with,
particularly those which relate to students” learning needs, syllabus requirements, how
different aspects of language are dealt with, etc.”
2.2.5 Principles for material evaluation
Cunningsworth (1984, pp.5-7) proposes four principles for materials evaluation:
Relate the teaching materials to your aims and objectives.
When designing a course, its aims and objectives are set first. Based on these, teaching
materials should be sought. In other words, the aims of a teaching programme should
determine the course materials to be used and not vice-versa.


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If one does a retrospective evaluation of a selected material, this principle reminds him or
her to consider whether the material matches the aims and objectives of a language
programme first. This is a very important consideration.
Be aware of what language is for and select teaching materials which will help equip
your students to use language effectively for their own purposes.
The materials selected must consider what the learners will do with English on completing
their course. The activities students participate in class should be a preparation for their

effectively. When one has to evaluate a material, these research findings assist him/her
with criteria checklists and models for the evaluation. He/she can adopt or adapt one
checklist and one model which best suit his/her teaching and learning circumstance
It is critical for evaluators to apply their principles of evaluation to the contextual
circumstances of their own evaluation in order to determine the most reliable and effective
procedures.
Evaluators must be cautious in making generalizations of their evaluation. A material can
be judged to be suited to this circumstance but not to others and vice versa.
2.2.6 Models for material evaluation
Evaluation, according to Hutchinson and Waters (1987: 97), is basically a process of
matching needs to available solutions. Accordingly, the evaluation process is divided into
four steps which are presented in the following diagram:
DEFINE CRITERIA
On what bases will you judge
materials? Which criteria will be
more important?

SUBJECTIVE ANALYSIS
What realizations of criteria do
you want in your course?

OBJECTIVE ANALYSIS
How does the material being
evaluated realize the criteria?

MATCHING
How far does the material match your needs?
Figure 2.1: The Materials Evaluation Model of Hutchinson and Waters (1987: 98)



How appropriate are the aspects of design and the
aspects of publication to the target situation of use?

ACTION
Adopt the materials
Reject the materials
Adapt the materials
Supplement the materials
Make the materials a critical object

Figure 2.2: A preliminary framework for materials analysis and action by Littlejohn
(1998)
The diagram shows that the two steps of describing target situation and analyzing materials
are conducted spontaneously and independently. After that, match and evaluation are taken
which reveals the level of appropriateness to the target situation. From these analyses,
decision on materials is reached in the last stage.


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These two models vary in the processes but both are invaluable in setting out a way to
evaluate materials.
2.2.7 Criteria for material evaluation
Criteria are crucial since they serve as the basis for evaluators‟ judgments. Various writers
have suggested ways of helping teachers to be more sophisticated in their evaluative
approach, by presenting evaluation 'checklists' based on supposedly generalizable criteria
that can be used by both teachers and students in many different situations.
According to Sheldon (1988), no general list of criteria can ever really be applied to all
teaching and learning contexts without considerable modification. However, most of these
standardized evaluation checklists contain similar components that can be used as helpful

8. Clear attractive layout, print easy to read
9. Content clearly organized and graded
10. Plenty of authentic language
11. Good grammar presentation and practice
12. Fluency practice in all four skills
13. Encourage learners to develop own learning strategies and to become
independent in their learning
(Checklist used by Ali Jahangard 2007)
Research by Roseman, Kulm, and Shuttleworth (2008) proposed quality indicators to judge
a textbook. These indicators look at textbooks at a quite different point. They organized the
instructional characteristics of effective materials (textbooks) into broad categories that
include:
Taking account of student ideas
Textbooks should help teachers in attending the ideas that students already have and to
help students gain a better understanding of key concepts and skills. This will help in
concept building. Concepts are key building blocks for the structure of knowledge of
various academic disciplines. All concepts possess at least four components i.e. attributes,
examples, definitions and hierarchical relation (Tennyson & Park, 1980).
Engaging students with relevant contexts, experiences, and phenomena
Textbook should use a variety of contexts-from visual models to symbolic representations
of hands-on activities and first-hand experiences-to build formal ideas and skills.
Promoting student thinking about phenomena, experiences, and knowledge
Textbooks should help students make sense of their experiences and ideas. Textbooks that
provide carefully chosen and sequenced questions and tasks can help students reflect on,
clarify, and explain their reasoning and ideas.


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Developing and using scientific and mathematical ideas


-

The teaching of listening skills

-

The teaching of speaking skills

-

The teaching of reading skills

-

The teaching of writing skills

-

The teaching of grammar

-

The teaching of vocabulary

-

The teaching of phonology

These checklists appear to be more suitable to the evaluation of English 1.1 textbook.

David Grand and Robert Mc Larty, published by Oxford Press, and Market Leader (2004)
written by David Cotton, David Falvey and Simon Kent, published by Longman. The
textbook mainly develops three linguistic skills (reading, listening and speaking) and
linguistic knowledge (grammar and vocabulary). It covers some common situations in
business such as self introducing, talking about work and leisure, telephoning solving
problems, making bookings and checking arrangements, entertaining, presenting a product,
dealing with problems, participating in discussions.


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The textbook consists of 8 units, Supplementary grammar, and key to supplementary
grammar. Each unit is divided into four or five sections which are Starting up,
Vocabulary, Reading, Listening and Skills. Starting up includes activities such as
listening, speaking or vocabulary exercises to warm students up. Vocabulary activities
extend learners‟ vocabulary in a given lexical area and give them the opportunity to
practice the new terms in both controlled and free contexts. Reading texts always present
new language and vocabulary, and help students practice information-finding or general
comprehension. Listening activities give practice in understanding new language in its
spoken form, in listening for specific information, in understanding the gist of the
dialogue. Skill activities are used for discussion around a theme, to access students'
knowledge of a language point, and to provide controlled and free practice of target
language. After each unit, teachers revise English basic grammar using the Supplementary
grammar part. Teachers usually have 150 minute class time to cover content of each unit
plus grammar.
3.2 Participants
The participants in the study were 100 first - year economic majored students from
Vietnam University of Commerce. These students have taken English 1.1 course. They
come from five faculties of VCU: Business Administration (23 informants), Economics
(18 informants), E-commerce (21 informants), Finance and Banking (16 informants.), and

43

47

10

Percentage

71%

29%

35%

65%

43%

47%

10%

In addition, 8 teachers were given questionnaire forms to fill in, and then interviewed.
These Vietnamese teachers come from English faculty of VUC. The reason for choosing
these teachers is that they have taught English 1.1 classes. They have different teaching


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experience and academic degrees. These variants are reported in Table 3.2 in number and

3

5

Percentage

37.5%

50%

12.5%

12.5%

87.5%

37.5%

62.5%

3.3 Data collection instruments
A descriptive research design incorporating both qualitative and quantitative instruments
was used to accomplish the objectives of the study. The use of both types of instruments
provides a more comprehensive picture of the participants‟ attitudes than could be possible
with one data collection method alone. (Creswell, 2008). The instrument employed were
(1) two questionnaires (quantitative treatment): a learners‟ evaluation questionnaire and a
teachers‟ evaluation questionnaire; and (2) interviews with both learners and teachers from
a representative sample of the participants (qualitative treatment). The analysis of the data
collected was used to draw conclusions related to the research questions already identified.
3.3.1 Questionnaires

3.3.2 Interviews
In order to provide a deeper understanding of students‟ and teachers‟ evaluation of English
1.1 textbook, it was deemed useful to conduct interviews. Interviews were conducted with
all 8 teachers and a subgroup of 22 students randomly selected from those who had agreed
in advance to participate in follow-up interviews for the purpose of the study. The
interviews were audio-taped and then transcribed to be analyzed
The questions in both learner and teacher interviews were the same. (See Appendix E).
However, the interviews with the students were conducted in Vietnamese, their L1, to
overcome likely deficiencies in their ability to speak and understand the target language.
These interviews were transcribed and translated into English.
3.4 Procedures


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The required data was collected at the end of English 1.1 course in May, 2010. As
mentioned earlier, the plan was to use questionnaires and follow-up interviews in order to
collect the required data for the purpose of the study
The questionnaire was administered by the researcher in person to ensure effective
implementation. After the introductions were made, the research topic was explained to the
students in Vietnamese, their native language, in order to increase the students‟ comfort
and understanding. The students were given 25 minutes to complete the questionnaire.
None were allowed to leave before the scheduled time so as to avoid them trying to rush to
fill out the questionnaire in order to leave the class early.
Upon completion, the students were informed that interviews would be conducted in order
to gain more insights about their evaluation. They were also informed that the interviews
would take no more than 15 minutes each, would be conducted in Vietnamese, and would
be confidential. Moreover, the students learned that the interviews would be audiorecorded and that the tapes would be destroyed upon completion of the study.
Appointments were set with those who agreed to be interviewed.
Unlike the students, the participating teachers were given one week to complete the