Adapting courses-Developing Materials for Language Teaching
- 1. Adapting Courses: A Personal View Claudia Saraceni By Shidak Rahbarian
- 2. Many examples of materials produced for language teaching and learning purposes seem to follow a very similar format Activities Such as drills, tests and tables Topics reoccur in low level books or for beginners And cause potential limitations Objectives Usually based on main format of Presentation, Practice, Production approach
- 3. Adapting materials A teacher-centred approach to adaptation Materials adaptation, is still left to the teachers’ hands, and it is largely based on their experience. A learner-centred approach to adaptation Clarke (1989) distinguishes Negotiated Syllabus. Externally Imposed Syllabus.
- 4. Adaptation as critical awareness development It supports a much more active learner’s role the learner is given the opportunity of sharing the ownership of the classroom and materials learners provide classroom input adapting courses can be used as an awareness development activity (Tomlinson, 2003) 1. facilitates learner involvement 2. promotes the use of materials adaptation 3. apply them also to teacher development
- 5. List of key features in materials adaptation Learner-centredness and critical awareness development 1. There are very few truly learner-centred, language teaching and learning materials 2. The materials should put learners at the center of the learning process and make them input providers 3. Teachers should be facilitators and co-ordinators 4. Materials adaptation, should be shared between - materials developers - teachers and - learners.
- 6. Flexibility and choice Materials should be flexible -should provide choice -should enable learners to develop a variety of skills and learning styles -encourage them to experience a wide range of tasks and approaches -they also become more independent learners. Learners themselves become more flexible learners -Learners can be encouraged to experience them all
- 7. Open-endedness and aesthetic experience Aesthetic Experience originated from (the theory of Aesthetic Response by Rosenblatt (1995) refers to the process of reacting spontaneously when reading literary texts (typically represents the immediate response to language and literature) involves interaction between readers, language and texts Literature and Aesthetic Experience part of a subjective process is created every time the text is read or written
- 8. Aesthetic experience and Materials adaptation Aesthetic Experience promotes the subjectivity of texts and their various interpretations. also materials should promote an aesthetic experience they should, not only be based on right/wrong testing and practice but, rather, they should also focus on open-ended tasks and texts
- 9. Relevance to draw a link between the adaptation process and reading open-ended materials, have the potential to become relevant to the learners when they fill those gaps with their ideas, interpretations and discussions. It is only at this level that materials become relevant and potentially more effective for learning development.
- 10. Universality Materials should be based on universally appealing topics culturally provoking culturally specific but, at the same time, they are present in all cultures A rich source of this type of topics comes from Literature, life experiences, feelings, relationships. Universality of topics enables learners to focus and gain a better understanding of cultural differences and commonalities (Jiang, 2000).
- 11. Authentic and non-authentic input In order to expose the learners to realistic input. Materials should be based on authentic texts In order to draw the learners’ attention to certain linguistic features with activities based on texts selected from authentic sources a combination of authentic and non-authentic tasks
- 12. Provocative topics and tasks In order to make learning more engaging and perhaps also more humanistic Materials should include topics and activities that can potentially provoke a reaction, Provide an aesthetic experience, whether it be positive or negative, that is personal and subjective.
- 13. Conclusions the adaptation process is considered at two levels: adapting materials with the purpose of making them effective and relevant to a specific classroom; adapting materials with the purpose of changing their objectives, in order to reduce the distance between research and classroom practice. Developing critical awareness of learning and teaching is the main aim of adapting and evaluating courses; learners can become, the main input providers, the teacher’s role is simply that of facilitator, co-ordinator and monitor.
- 14. Thanks for your attention Shidak Rahbarian