Chapter 5 Ilinawati F2201141005

Chapter 6 Suzan Dewi F2201141012

Chapter 7 Henry Elisa F2201141014

The Process of Materials Writing

Chapter 5

A FRAMEWORK FOR MATERIAL WRITING

ILINAWATI F2201141005

In this topic offers the reader a practical idea of the different as aspects of the process of material writing by teachers for the classroom . This is achieved through Case studies illustrating the process.

The comment below are the autentic voices of students and teachers of english as foreign language.

I have noticed that the coursebook I use doesn’t seem to deal with “ real “ English . ( Italian Secondary School Teacher)

The textbook my institute has written says that you use “ please “ and “ would “ for simple request and “ would you mind “ for more polite request. I have heard lots of other thing such as “ could you possibly “ ( Croatian evening institute teacher )

I get very confused with all these noughts and zeros and nothing in your language.. ( Argentinian part – time student)

The evening institute has identified a need for material that practise making requests, but clearly the Croatian teacher feels that she doesn’t know enough about the language of request to teach it as effective as she would like to do.

This teacher will have to engage in some linguistic exploration of the functional area of “ request “ in order to produce more informative materials for her classes.

Exploration more informative material to support the material in the class, e.g: book, syllabus.

Some of teachers consider that the material doesn’t appropriate for their area, here are the example :

1. It’s a very nice book and very lively, but in the selection on “ process “ for example all the exercise are about unsual things for our country. We are hot country and also have many muslims. The exercise are about snow, ice, cold morning, water cisterns ; writing and publishing EFL books and making wine. I can tell you I can’t do making wine and smoking pot in my coutry. (experinced school teacher from the Ivory Coast).

2. Sir....what is Opera ?( Iraqi student in mixed nationality class using materials designed to practised reading narrative )

The implications of these quotations are not linguistic ; rather they address the problem of appropriate contextual realisation for material.

Contextual Realization the material should exponenentially expanding, organised and assorted collection of visual, large collection of written text, conveniently organised ( e.g by text-type, topic, degree of complexity )

Pegadogical Realisation of the material by finding the appropriate exercise and activities and writing of appropriate instructions for use.

The Physical appearance and production of materials is important both motivation and for classroom effectiveness. Teacher engaged in writing materials need to develop the same care and attention to presentation that one would expect of good publisher.

The evaluation will show whether the material have to be rewritten, thrown away, or may be used again as they stand with a similar group.

The process of writing MaterialsIDENTIFICATION by teacher or learner(s) of a need to fulfil or a

problem to solve by creation of materials

EXPLORATION of the area of need/problem in terms of what language, what meanings, what functions, what skills, etc

CONTEXTUAL REALIZATION of the proposed new materials by the finding of suitable ideas, contexts or texts with which to work

PEDAGOGICAL REALIZATION of materials by the finding of appropriate exercises and activities and the writing of appropriate

instructions for use

PHYSICAL PRODUCTION of materials, involving consideration of layout, type size, visuals, reproduction, tape length, etc.

A Framework for Materials WritingIdentification of need

or materialsExploration of need

Contextual realisation of materials

Pedagogical realisation of

materialsProduction of materials

Student use of materials

Evaluation of materials againts agreed

objectives

Dynamic Path Optional steps and feedback loops

Case Study Case Study 1 : Materialas produced for a class at upper – intermediate students

Step 1 : Identification of Need;In a reading text , the students come across the sentence : It’s time the Prime Minister listened more carefully to his critics. They are puzzled by the apparent clash between the past form and the actual meaning of the verb “ listened “. They ask for an explanation and further example.

Step 2 ; Exploration of LanguageThe teacher promises to respond and consult about pedagogic grammar

Step 3 ; Contextual Realization The teacher decides to produce the worksheets on “ Hypothetical Meaning” to try to anchor the concept and the related language in students mind and decides to provides the simplified contexts for practice , based in students’ own day – to – day experience rather than on external text source.

Step 4 ; Pedagogical Realisation The teacher decides on a contrastive approach ( fact vs Hypothesis ) initially with an exercise focusing on distinction, and on the verb forms involved.

Step 5 ;Physical ProductionThe worksheet is produced as a Word document, photocopied and distributed to learners.

Step 6 ; UseThere is an introduction in class, followed by compleition of the worksheet at home and checking in the next class.

Step 7; EvaluationStudents comments and difficulties with the worksheet , for example :

‘ in step one there is a fact and Hyphotesis in the sentences. It’s confusing .

The example of Hypothetical Meaning : WorksheetStep One(a) Fact or Hypothesis ? Tick the right box for each

statement.1. I’m pleased that you’ve finished the work2. I wish you would finished the work3. It’s time you finished the workb) Now underline the verb forms of ‘ finish’ in each

sentence. What do the fact in common? What do the hypothesis have in common? What is the paradox about some of these verb form?

F H

Material writing is at its most effective when it is turned to the needs of a particular group of learners.Sooner or later, every teacher of any subject comes up againt a need of to write materials. How they respond to this need depends on all sorts of variable:

The prevailing norms in a spesific educational contextThe amount of time availableThe availability the of reprographic facilitiesThe teacher’s background and training In some contexts, teachers are expected to adhere rigidly to a

presribed coursebook.Most of teachers are busy to contemplate writing their own

material from scratch, though there are few who do not adapt teir textbooks in some way.

CONCLUSION

2. Teachers understand their own learners best.Teachers understand their learner’s needs and their preferred learning styles. The more they become involved in researching their own classrooms.3. All teachers need a grounding in materials writing.The process material writing raises almost every issue which is important in learning to teach: selection and grading of language, awareness of language, knowledge of learning theories, socio- culture approciacy – the list could be extended.

4. All teachers teach themselves.Teachers teach specific groups of learners, they also, inevitably , “ teach themselves” and this has powerful implications when it comes to the material they are to teach with. 5. Trialling and evaluation are vital to the success of any materials.Learning to write material is , inevitably, a matter of trial and error.

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SUSAN DEWI F2210141012

CHAPTER 6 WRITING COURSE MATERIALS

FOR THE WORLD a great compromise

( Jan Bell and Roger Gower )

6.1 INTRODUCTION :• Coursebook writers may set out to write materials they would want to

use themselves if they were teaching in a particular situation, but their role has to be to collaborate in the publication of material for others.

• They need to cater for a wide range of students, teachers and classrooms context and to modify any initial ideas they may have as a result of what they continue to learn about those needs and interests.

• 6.2. Coursebooks in general : Confronting the issues - For some years now there has been debated the desirability of using books. - Coursebooks provide teachers and learners with a range of proffesinally develop materials within tried and tested syllabus structure, thereby allowing teachers to spend their valuable time more on facilatating learning the materials production.

- Marketing teams and distributors often make sure their products get into as many schools as possible, no matter how suitable they are for the context.

- Some also accept the need for coursebooks, but argue that the quality of many of those are published is poor.

- It would be impossible for us ( teachers ) to write books if we thought otherwise.

• These are some of more important ones ( coursebooks ). 1. If one of your pedagogig principle is that creativity is

important in the classroom. Then how can you make since that your coursebook doe not take away investment in and responsibility for learning from teachers and learners ?

2. If coursebooks are sometimes used by schools to maintain consistency of syllabus. How can you at the same timemake sure they reflect the dynamic and interactive nature of the learning process ?

3. Although it is true no coursebooks can cater for all individual needs of all learners all of the time. Can you provide enough materials to meet most of the needs,most of the time and build in enough flexibility to enable teachers to indivudualise it?

4. If the language presented in coursebooks includes few genuine. How can ensure that your samples of use are as natural as

possible ?5. If coursebooks are frequently pridictable in format and content.

How can you bring to your material a feeling that it is boring ? (Indeed, Rinvolucri 2002 felt the need to suggest ways of

‘humanising‘ the coursebook).

6.2.1 The notion of compromise :- The needs of individual students and teachers as

well as the expectation of particular schools in particular countries can never be fully met by the materials themselves.

- Everything depends on the relationship that a user in particular teacher, has or is allowed to have with the material.

- coursebooks are tool which only have life and meaning when there is a teacher present.

- They are never intended to be straight jacket for a teaching programme in which a teacher makes no decisions to add, to animate or to delete.

6.2.2 The publisher’s compromise :- Compromise is not just something that is shared by users.

Publishers also compromise- Otherwise they would not get the material they want, that

is material that they can not only be proud of when exhibiting againts other publishers but which sells because potential users want to use it.

- The Eastern, Middle Eastern, Latin American, European and UK markets may have certain things in common ( they may all be prepared to commit themselves to the same grammar syllabus, for example ).

6.2.3 The authors.And what of the authors ?- They,too , find themselves compromising and indeed they

often feel themselves compromised by publishers, particularly authors who experienced teachers with a strong conviction of how learners learn best.

- The teachers who are authors have to compromise. Their teaching experience is often different from that of many intended users and their ideas might not work in majority of classroom.

- Authors who are not teachers also have to compromise.

6.3 A CASE STUDY- Intermediate- level course for adult students both in the UK

( 15- 21 hours a week ) and in private school overseas ( 2-3 hours a week ).

- The assumption was that teachers would have experienced in setting up communicative activities in the class, working with texts to develop reading and listening skills are being able to use coursebooks flexibly.

However, the brief itself indicated a need for compromise :

1. The multiligual intensive UK situation and the monolingual far less intensive situation are, as we have already seen not the same.

2. Monolingual situation differ. Can you write for both Europe and the Middle East when the shared knowledge and cultural assumptions are so different ?

3. Desfite our decisions, the material was still likely to be used by less trained, untrained or differently trained teachers.

4. What is an adult ? It was likely that the material would be choosen by some schools when it is inappropriate for their situation and used by learners who are too young to identify with the cultural content of the material.

5. It was likely that the material would be used in some schools where the language syllabus and undeed the whole programme of study are framed by the coursebooks, eventhough the aim was to try to produce materials which could be used flexibly.

6.3.1 PRINCIPLES :We decided on a set of key principles :1. Flexibility

We wanted an activity sequence that worked pedagogically. But it was important that teachers should feel trhey could move activities around, cut them out or supplement them according to need.

2. From text to languageWe wanted to provide authentic texts which contained examples of the focus language rather than construct texts of our own.

3. Engaging contentWe wanted to provide human interest texts which although they came from a British or neutral context would stimulate the students to make cultural and personal comparisons.

4. Natural languageWe wanted spoken texts to be as natural as possible and therefore for avoid actors ‘ over projecting ‘ in the recording studio.

5. Analytic approachesWe wanted a variety of approaches to grammar, but decided to place great importance on students working things out for themselves–an analytic approaches.

6. Emphasis on reviewWe felt the need to review rather than present alot of grammar at this level.

7. Personalised practice- we wanted to provide a lot of practice activities at this level. We

felt that even oral practice of pronounciation and fixed structures should as far as ossible be personalised.

- Complete the following sentences : ( a ) I’d be very miserable if .... ( b ) I’d terrified if ... ( c ) I’d leave the country if ....8. Integrated skills- We believe that the ‘ receptive skills’ of reading and listening

should not be tagged on after the language work. Language use is a combined skill where everything depends on everything else at the very least we generally listen and speak together.

- We believe that both langauge work and the productive skills should come out of work on listening and reading text.

9. Balance of ApproachesWe wanted a balance in our approaches. We wanted inductive, deductive and affective approaches to grammar.

10. Learning to learn- We regarded this as very important,, but we thought it best

to integrate learner development work through out rather than make it ‘up front‘ training.

- We decided to have up- front work a vocabulary skills to get students to analyze grammar for themselves and to provide a language reference for students at the end each unit.

11. Professional respect We wanted to produce something that gave us professional

satisfaction and academically credible to our colleagues, something we could be proud of.

6.3.2 PRESSURE• The Publishers- As inexperienced coursebook writers, we were soon confronted,

not only be the harsh realities of commercial publishing but by some of the diverse needs of potential users.

- The publishers were encouraging and allowed us alot of creative freedom. They share many of of our aspirators and also wanted something that would give them academic credibility as well as healthy sales.

• Schools and Institutions- One of our problems was to sort out the real from the illusory in

this area.- Alot was made by the publishers of the fact the the main book

had to be the right lenght, there had to be so many units, so many pages per unit.

Institutional needs nevertheless imposed perdfectly proper constraintd on our writing :

The materials should not be inappropriate to the context, the topic should be interesting to thier students, the materials should not date too much ,it should be ‘ user friendly ‘, it should be enable students to make rapid progress.

• Teachers - We felt teachers wanted a book. They could symphatise with

in terms of its pedagogig principles.- If the teachers have alot of demands on their time. They

would need it to fulfill certain criteria.• Students - Students would want materials that they could enjoy and

which they could identify with and learn from.- They needed supplementary materials such as workbooks.

6.3.3 PRINCIPLES CONPROMISED

- With all these factors at work, it is not surprising that the issue of compromise was central to our work.

* Overall structure - It was clear that the idea of flexible coursebook was not (at that

time) fully understood by our potential users. - The resource was not universally accepted when many students

did not have access to the workbook. - Teachers feel the recources from coursebooks help them to build up their programme. * Methodology - We did manage to get away from a traditional approach in terms of unit structure since we started each unit with a skills activity

rather than a language presentation.

- We found analytic exercises were not very popular in some parts of the world.

- There were seen to be too serious and to expect too much from students.

• Texts- we resisted publisher pressuree to make our texts more

intelectual.- It was clear there were going to be problems with

unadapted authentic texts.- We also wanted our listening to be natural and as

authentic as possible.• Content- In terms of content, we realized we could not please

everyone.- We did not want to fight sky of the taboo subjects of sex

and soon.

* PILOTING- There was a pilot edition of the material which proved to be

good training for us as writers, but most of the materials in the pilot edition did not get used except in parts of the workbook.

- We also taught some of the pilot material.- But for the final edition direct piloting was difficult of

schedules and budgets were to be met.- We relied more on our own experience and the experience

of advisers.

• CONCLUSION :- This is a personal account and yet it is undoubtedly typical

of most writing teams in one way or another.

- Compromise almost by definition is a subtle art if all sides are to be satisfied with getting less than they originally wanted.

- We were lucky in that the publishers respected our lead in terms of the content and the methodology and also compromised.

- At least , wihout certain compromises, we would have produced less effective materials.

- THANK YOU VERY MUCH -

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Chapter 7How Writers write:

testimony from authorsPhilip Prowse

Henry Elisa_F2201141014

1. Introduction

The process of material writing from the writer’s perspective:

a. Taken in 1994A group of ELT materials writers from all over the world met in Oxford in April 1994 for a British Council Specialist Course with UK-based writers and publishers.

b. Taken in 2009 (15 years later)Four leading ELT materials writers were asked to read the chapter and to reflect on their own practice.- Jeremy Harmer(author of Just Right series, Marshall Cavendish)- Sue Kay(co-author of the Inside Out series, Macmillan)- Pete Sharma(author of Blended Learning: Using Technology in and beyond the Language Classroom)- Jeff Stranks(co-author of the English in Mind Series, Cambridge University Press)

2. Writers’ Perspective in 1994

Writing together means that:- Sitting down at a table together.- No gossip or chatting, just work.- Doing the writing process in the same room.- Consulting with the other only if there

is knotty problem.- The team of writers must first meet

and agree on an overall approach and

methodology.

Agreements between project coordinator and UK consultant:

a. During the first workshop; the group decides on topics, functions, skills, focus, treatment of grammar, vocabulary, format of a unit and a lesson. Then unit are allocated to each member.

b. Writers go back to their hometown and devise unit accordingly. They send them to project coordinator for checking. The consultants get them for suggestion as well.

c. In about three months the group meet again

3. Creative ProcessProduction process of a modern course book:- Initial ideas to copies in the classroom- The actual creation of the lesson

4. Working With Publisher

Initial stage:- Research on new level- Meeting with co-author- Creation of draft unit- Submit rational

Meanwhile:- Build up ideas for other syllabuses-

vocabulary, writing, pronunciation, etc.- Meeting with the designer and art editor

at this stage the ‘look’ they want from the book, and how they can make it look different from other levels.

- When received the draft unit and rationale, there is a meeting with publisher and project manager, to share views and ‘take a stand’ on what change.

First draft

Send the first draft out to about 14 readers and triallers and feedback on the first draft is again followed up by a mega-meeting with publishers when change in content and philosophy may occur.

Readers are encouraged to focus on the big issues rather than the ‘toddlers’.

Second draft:

It is usually done over a relatively intensive period and often involve quite a lot of change – finding new texts, cutting out presentation, adding other activities, etc.

Write ‘to the page’, with an eye on design and layout.

Have to get involved in briefing the person writing the workbook and Teachers’ book.

Third draft:

It is usually limited time, and has to involve making their own recordings, too, as well as the key.

There are also meeting with designers editors.

Finally :

Two relatively new development:- input from marketing- the rise of freelance editors

5. Designer and Illustrators

Frequently a design for the look of the student page is finalized before much of the writing is done, and authors write to fit the design.

Problem with the designer: - They operating on a tight budget- They can employ third rate illustrators- They will try and convince that the illustrations we are getting are actually very good.

Problems with the artbriefs for illustrators:- My maxim of illustrator: any one

illustrators can either read and or draw.- Suspension of Gricean maxim.

6. Technology

Submission of text on disk as well as paper was the norm by 1994 rather than the exception.

Publishers’ desire to set text direct from disk and eliminate errors from rekeying means that the disk have to be submitted without any of the wonderful features of design and layout which modern word processing package allow.

7. A time and a place to write

Another reassuringly divergent set of view, the time on when and where to write.

The final contribution may represent a dream, rather than realitity.

8. Conclusion

A different set of prompts and questions would certainty have elicited different responses, and it would have been interesting to see if these had focused more on learning principle and objectives, and less on syllabus, ideas and procedures.

Relationship between writers and the classroom: how many still teach regularly, visit schools and observe classes, and work with groups of teachers.

The publishers’ view of writers, the teacher’s view of materials, and the learner’s perception of the whole process.

9. Reflections after 15 years a. The influence of the market

- ‘For most UK publishers the influence

of the marketing team over almost every aspect of materials

production is now paramount’ (p.161)

- Mares (2003: 131): ‘when I first began to write commercial

materials I was subconsciously writing clones

of myself”, then he concluded that ‘when writing, do not write just for yourself. …….’ (2003: 139)

b. The ELT writer and technology Mishan (2005:41) concludes ‘Authentic texts

provide the best source of rich and varied comprehensible input for language learners’.

The life of ELT writer has been transformed due to advances in technology in general, and educational technology in particular.

The power of the computer has allowed us to see the patterns which were previously invisible.

ELT writers can use a concordancer to find every occurence of a word or phrase within a corpus.

A corpus is a ‘collection of texts, written or spoken, stored on a computer’. (O’keeffe et al. 2007

c. Using the internet- World Wide Web is a rich source of knowledge for writers, as well as inspiration on every topic imaginable.

d. Writing together

Working face to face is essential for the initial planning, brainstorming, creative phases as well as for discussion of material and reviewing. (Sue Kay)

The primary one is that of synergy – just being in the same room helps. (Jeff Stranks)

e. The creative process

Mishan (2005: 59): “what I suggested here is text driven approach, one that is ... Learner-centred and works in a converse fashion (to PPP), in that it starts with (authentic) texts, and derives the language features to be studied fromthese.”

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