VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES FACULTY OF POST-GRADUATE STUDIES NGUYEN THI THU TRANG AN EVALUATION BY THE TEACHERS AND STUDENTS ABOUT THE COURSE BOOK ENGLISH UNLIMITED A1-STARTER AT A PUBLIC SECURITY SCHOOL (Đánh giá của giáo viên và học viên về giáo trình English Unlimited A1-Starter tại một trường trung cấp Công an nhân dân) MINOR PROGRAMME THESIS FIELD: ENGLISH TEACHING METHODOLOGY CODE: 8140231.01 HANOI – 2018 LUAN VAN CHAT LUONG download : add luanvanchat@agmail.com VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES FACULTY OF POST-GRADUATE STUDIES NGUYEN THI THU TRANG AN EVALUATION BY THE TEACHERS AND STUDENTS ABOUT THE COURSE BOOK ENGLISH UNLIMITED A1-STARTER AT A PUBLIC SECURITY SCHOOL (Đánh giá của giáo viên và học viên về giáo trình English Unlimited A1-Starter tại một trường trung cấp Công an nhân dân) MINOR PROGRAMME THESIS FIELD: ENGLISH TEACHING METHODOLOGY CODE: 8140231. TRAN THANH NHAN HANOI – 2018 LUAN VAN CHAT LUONG download : add luanvanchat@agmail.com DECLARATION I, the undersigned, declare that this thesis is the result of my own research and has not been submitted to any other university or institution partially or wholly. Except where the reference is indicated, no other person’s work has been used without due acknowledgement in text of the thesis. Hanoi, 2018 Student Nguyễn Thị Thu Trang i LUAN VAN CHAT LUONG download : add luanvanchat@agmail.com ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS This thesis could not have been completed without the help and support from a number of people.
First and foremost, I would like to send my sincere thanks to my supervisor, Dr. Tran Thanh Nhan for her enthusiastic guidance, insightful comments, and valuable support throughout my research. I would also like to thank all of the lecturers of the Department of Post Graduate Studies, Vietnam National University for their useful lectures and materials which are of great value to my thesis. A special word of thanks is dedicated to all of my colleagues and students at the Armed Police School for their useful information and support.
Last but not least, I owe my gratitude to my family for their support and encouragement. ii LUAN VAN CHAT LUONG download : add luanvanchat@agmail.com ABSTRACT It is obvious that materials play an important role in language teaching and learning, and material evaluation is one of the necessary components in the teaching and learning process of any language. This thesis was conducted accordingly with the aims to evaluate the suitability of the course book “English Unlimited A1- Starter” for the first year students at the Armed Police School in terms of its aims, content and methodology from the teachers and students viewpoints. The thesis employed the quantitative and qualitative approach with two research methods: survey questionnaire for the students as the major and informal interview for the teachers as the supplementary.
In this thesis, the material is analyzed based on the criteria proposed by Hutchinson & Waters (1987) in order to investigate the suitability of the course book with the students’ and teachers’ requirements. The results indicated that the aims, content and the methodology of this material are relatively suitable. Besides, the author also recommends some adaptation for a better application of the course book. Hopefully, the results of the study can help both the teachers and students better understand the course book they are using in order to make reasonable adjustments of their own in future.
iii LUAN VAN CHAT LUONG download : add luanvanchat@agmail.com TABLE OF CONTENTS DECLARATION. iii TABLE OF CONTENTS. iv LIST OF TABLES. vi PART A: INTRODUCTION.
Rationale of the study. Scope and aims of the study. Scope of the study. Aims of the study.
Significance of the study. Methods of the study. Error! Bookmark not defined. Error! Bookmark not defined.
Data collection methods/ Data analysis proceduresError! Bookmark not defined. Design of the thesis. 5 CHAPTER I: LITERATURE REVIEW. Review of previous related studies.
The roles of materials in language learning and teaching. Definitions of materials. Types of materials. Roles of materials in language learning and teaching.
Definition of materials evaluation. Types of materials evaluation. Types of evaluators. Models of materials evaluation.
Criteria for materials evaluation. 14 iv LUAN VAN CHAT LUONG download : add luanvanchat@agmail. The role of materials adaptation. Techniques for adaptation.
Description of the context. Objectives of the course. 20 CHAPTER 3: RESULTS AND DISCUSSION. The suitability of the course book with the mastery of the course’s outcomes.
The suitability of the course book’s content. The suitability of language points. The suitability of other elements of the course book’s content. The appropriateness of methodology and learning conditions.
Students’ evaluation and suggestions about the course book. Summary of major findings. The suitability of the course book’s content. The suitability of methodology and learning conditions.
General comments about the course book. 54 PART C: RECOMMENDATIONS AND CONCLUSIONS. Limitations and suggestions for further study.XVI v LUAN VAN CHAT LUONG download : add luanvanchat@agmail. XVII LIST OF TABLES Table 1: Student’s opinion about their mastery of the course outcomes in terms of grammar.
26 Table 2: Student’s opinion about their mastery of the course outcomes in terms of vocabulary. 27 Table 3: Student’s opinion about their mastery of the course outcomes in terms of four skills. 28 Table 4: Students’ opinion about the necessity of the vocabulary related to the topics in the course book. 30 Table 5: Students’ opinion about the suitability of grammar items for their communication need.
32 Table 6: Students’ opinion about the suitability of the situations for their daily communication. 33 Table 7: Students’ opinion about the topics in the course book. 35 Table 8: Students’ opinion about the parts of each unit. 36 Table 9: Students opinion about the overall course’s proportion.
37 Table 10: Students’ opinion about the format of the course book. 39 Table 11: Students’ opinion about the text types of the course book. 40 Table 12: Students’ opinion about the teaching and learning fact in their class. 42 Table 13: Students’ opinion about suitability of the kinds of tasks in the course book.
43 Table 14: Students’ opinion about teacher’s technique usage frequency. 45 Table 15: Students’ opinion about the suitability of the teaching aids of the course book. 46 Table 16: Teachers’ and students’ opinion about teacher’s adaptation. 47 Table 17: Students’ opinion about teacher’s adaptation frequency.
48 Table 18: Students’ comments on the course book. 49 Table 19: Student’s suggestions for a better course book usage. 50 Table 20: Students’ opinion about their favorite topics. 51 vi LUAN VAN CHAT LUONG download : add luanvanchat@agmail.com PART A: INTRODUCTION 1.
Rationale of the study English, nowadays, has become an international language spoken all over the world. Thanks for this language; connections between nations all over the world become possible. It is the language used in all aspects of life such as economics, politics, science, technology, tourism, culture, and education. For this reason, it can be assumed that the role of English language cannot be just expressed in words.
In Vietnam, the importance of English was immediately acknowledged by the Vietnamese government and as a result the English language programs were made compulsory beginning at secondary schools and subsequently high schools and finally universities. The need of using English in the crime prevention cooperation between Vietnam and other countries in the world is increasing. Moreover, many daily situations related to foreign criminals and factors need to be faced by the police force. Therefore, English is taught as a compulsory subject in most Public Security Schools in Vietnam aiming to develop four skills – listening, speaking, reading, and writing as well as the knowledge of specific purposes in English.
As a school of Public Security system, the curriculum of the Armed Police School also consists of English as a subject to equip the students with basic knowledge of the language to communicate with foreigners in their job. To master English, it is necessary to consider the factors affecting the teaching and learning process such as learning objectives, learning outcomes, teacher’s methods, and course books. Among these factors, course books have played an important role in most language curricula. The reason for this is that materials, especially course books play a vital role in exposing the students to the English language (Dudley-Evans & St John, 2000:171).
The course book determines the classroom activities, influences teachers’ teaching methods, and the students’ roles. Nunan (2003:226) predicates that course book is the main element of any 1 LUAN VAN CHAT LUONG download : add luanvanchat@agmail.com curriculum and “it is difficult to imagine a class without book”. The course book chosen at the Armed Police School is English Unlimited A1- Starter which is written by Adrian Doff and published by Cambridge. It is used for the first year students and has been used for two years, however, since then no research on the course book evaluation has been carried out by the school administrators prior to the introduction of the course book to recognize its strengths and shortcomings, and to judge to what extent the course book meets students and teacher’s needs.
For this reason, I will choose the thesis “An evaluation by the teachers and students about the course book English Unlimited A1- Starter at a Public Security school”. It is a good opportunity to reveal the suitability of the material for the students’ level from the students’ and the teachers’ views so that adaptation can be made to gain better results of teaching and learning. Scope and aims of the study 2. Scope of the study This study will focus on evaluating the course book “English Unlimited A1 – Starter”.
The researcher bases on the Hutchinson and Waters (1987)’s criteria for evaluation with focus on the three following criteria: aims of the materials, content of the materials (in terms of language use, skills, topics, parts of unit, overall course’s proportion, format of course book and text types), and methodology (in terms of teaching and learning facts, kinds of tasks, teaching techniques, and teaching aids). Research participants are primarily confined to the teachers of English who have been teaching the material and the first year students at the Armed Police School. Aims of the study From the concrete situation of the teaching and learning context, this study aims to evaluate the appropriateness of the course book “English Unlimited A1- Starter” for the first year students at the Armed Police School from both teachers and students’ viewpoints with the hope that the collected information for improvement of the course book will be adapted to make it more effective for future use. To be more detailed, this study aims to: 2 LUAN VAN CHAT LUONG download : add luanvanchat@agmail.com - evaluate the course book “English Unlimited A1- Starter” from the viewpoints of the teachers and students at the Armed Police School to identify its strengths, deficiencies and weaknesses.
- offer suggestions for adaptation of the materials based on the major findings. Significance of the study The findings of the study will be useful not only to the researcher, and the course book designer but also to the teaching staff and the first year students at The Armed Police School. Besides, the findings will suggest some adaptation in order to improve the quality of the materials which is used for the students at the Armed Police School. More importantly, it is hoped that the research results will make some contributions to the field of material evaluation in specialized Vietnamese contexts.
Research questions To achieve the aims of the thesis, the following research questions are proposed: - How do the teachers at the Armed Police School evaluate the course book?