Comparison of various textbooks and series used in the campuses of the North and South Central zones of the ITESM System with respect to their development of the four language skills as they are used for communicating

Texto completo

(1)•. INSTITTJTO TECNOLOGICO Y DE ESTUDIOS SUPERIORES DE MONIERREY CAMPUS EUGENIO GARZA SADA. COMPARISON OF VARIOUS TEXTBOOKS AND SERIES USED IN THE CAMPUSES OF THE NORTH AND SOUTH-CENTRAL ZONES OF THE ITESM SYSTEM WITH RESPECT TO THEIR DEVELOPMENT OF THE FOUR LANGUAGE SKILLS AS THEY ARE USED FOR COMMUNICATING. Tesis presentada como requisito parcial para optar al título de Maestro en Educación con especialidad en Lingüística Aplicada. Autor:. David M. Camps Melgar. Asesor:. Dra. Irene Gartz. Monterrey, N.L. 23 de noviembre de 1995.

(2) Dedication. This present investigation is dedicated to my wife in whom I have found support and encouragement throughout all this time.. But. above ali, I dedícate this work to the only true Godhead from whom all wisdom emanates..

(3) Acknowledgements. My most sincere gratitute to the following people who helped me to carry out this investigation:. To my advisor, Dr. Irene Gartz, for her advice, feedback and onentation in developing the present thesis.. To the Language Department Director of the Mexico City Campus, professor Rocío Matabuena, for her support during the elaboration of this investigation.. To my workmate, Miss Lisa Paulin, for proofreading this thesis and providing me with the sufficient bibliography I needed during the research process.. To Miss Angeles Alvarez for her technical advice m usmg software.. To my friend Luis Armenta for providing me with his collection of Forum journals.. To my assistant Miss Daniella Gurrea for helping me m typing the first drafts of this thesis.. To professor Juan Antonio Aguilar for letting me use his computer and software. 11.

(4) A bs tract. This thesis talks about a comparison of textbooks and senes used in the Northern and South-central campuses of the ITESM System. This investigation 1s divided into an introduction, four chapters and a conclusion.. Also, checklists and bibliography are in-. el uded. In the introduction the purpose of writing this investigation is dicussed.. The first chapter deals with the delimitation of the prob-. lem and discusses the proposals of the earlier and newer plans.. The. second chapter talks about the theory of the communication process and communicative competence as well as the language skills, which were divided into receptive skills (listening and reading), and productive skills (speaking and writing).. These language skills are. centered around the communicative skills or the way the information is being received and transmitted.. The third chapter deals. with the methodology of the analysis of the series, and the fourth chapter with the results.. To carry out this objective, checklists were. used to verify each activity found in each of the series analyzed. In the conclusion severa! points are discussed such as the adequacy of the series regarding the new program for 1995 and recommendations are being proposed.. 111.

(5) Resumen. La presente tesis es acerca de comparación de libros de texto y series utilizados en los campus Norte y Sur-centro del Sistema ITESM. La investigación está dividida en introducción, cuatro capítulos y conlusiones, además de incluir listas de verificación en el apéndice y bibliografía.. En la introducción el propósito de escribir esta tesis se discute. El primer capítulo trata sobre la delimitación del problema y. las. propuestas antigua y reciente. El segundo capítulo trata acerca del proceso de comunicación y la competencia comunicativa, como también las habilidades de la lengua, las cuales se dividieron en habilidades receptivas (escuchar. y leer) y habilidades emisoras (hablar y escribir) y que se centran alrededor de habilidades comunicativas o cómo la información se recibe y transmite.. El tercer capítulo aborda la metodología del. análisis de las series y el cuarto capítulo sobre los resultados obtenidos.. Para lograrlo, listas de verificación fueron empleadas. para verificar cada actividad alrededor de cada hablidad encontrada en cada una de las series analizadas. En las conclusiones se discuten vanos puntos, como la idoneidad de las series en cuanto al nuevo programa para 1995 y recomendaciones.. lV.

(6) General lndex Dedication .................................................................................................................. 1 Acknow ledgements ................................................................................................. .i i Abstract ............................................................................................................... 111 Resumen ............................................................................................................... iv General Index ........................................................................................... ~ ................. v Table lndex ............................................................................................................. viii Introduction ................................................................................................................ l l. Definition and delimitation of problem and project.. .......................... 3 1 .1. The problem ............................................................................................... 3 1.1.1. Antecedents of the problem ....................................................... 3 1.1.2. Definition of the problem .......................................................... l 3 1. 2. Purpose and delimitation of the project.. .................................... l 4 2 . Theoretical framework .................................................................................. 1 6 2.1. The process of communicating ........................................................ 1 6 2.2. Communicative competence ............................................................. 2 1 2. 3. Recepti ve and producti ve skills in FL teaching/learning .... 2 6 2. 3. 1. Receptive skills .............................................................................. 2 6 2.3.2. Productive skills ........................................................................... 31 2.4. Communicative activities ................................................................... 3 4 3. Methodology ...................................................................................................... 3 6 3. 1. General description of the textbooks ............................................ 3 6 3.1.1. Description of textbooks used in the Northern zone ..... 3 8 3.1.2. Description of textbooks used in the South-central zone .................................................................................................... 4 1 3.2. Selection of categories of analysis .................................................. 4 6 4. Results of the analyses .................................................................................. 5 7 4.1. Description of results ........................................................................... 5 7 4.2. Interpretation of results .................................................................... 7 1 5. Conclusions and recommendations .......................................................... 7 8 6. Appendixes 6.1. Appendix 6.2. Appendix 6.3. Appendix 6.4. Appendix 6.5. Appendix. A 1: A2: A3: A4: A5:. Listening: Listening: Listening: Listening: Listening:. In Contact 1 ....................................... 8 2 In Contact 2 ....................................... 8 5 On Target 1 ........................................ 8 8 On Target 2: Textbook ................... 9 1 On Target 2: Workbook ................. 9 4 V.

(7) 6.6. 6.7. 6.8. 6.9. 6.1 O. 6.11. 6.12. 6.13. 6.14. 6.15. 6. 16 6.17. 6.18. 6.19. 6.20. 6.21. 6.22. 6.23. 6.24. 6.25. 6. 26. 6.28. 6.29. 6.30. 6.31. 6.32. 6.33. 6.34. 6.35. 6.36. 6.37. 6.38. 6.39. 6.40. 6.41. 6.42. 6.43. 6.44.. Appendix A6: Listening: In Charge 1.. Textbook ................... 9 7 Appendix A7: Listening: In Charge 1.. Workbook .............. 100 Appendix A8: Listening: lnteractions 1.. Listening/Speaking Book ........................................................................................................ 103 Appendix A9: Listening: Interactions l/: Listening/Speaking Book ............................................................................................... 106 Appendix 81: Reading: In Contact 1........................................ 109 Appendix 82: Reading: In Contact 2....................................... 1 1 1 Appendix 83: Reading: On Target 1........................................ 1 14 Appendix 84: Reading: On Target 2 .. Textbook .................. l l 7 Appendix 85: Reading: On Target 2 .. Workbook ................ 121 Appendix 86: Reading In Charge 1.. Textbook .................. 124 Appendix 87: Reading: In Charge 1.. Workbook ................ 127 Appendix 88: Reading: lnteractions 1.. A Reading Book. 13 O Appendix 89: Reading: Interactions n. A Reading Book ........................................................................................................ 133 Appendix CI: Speaking: InContactl ..................................... 137 Appendix C2: Speaking: In Contact 2..................................... 13 8 Appendix C3: Speaking: On Target 1...................................... 139 · Appendix C4: Speaking: On Target 2 .. Textbook ................ 140 Appendix C5: Speaking: On Target 2 .. Workbook .............. 14 1 Appendix C6: Speaking: In Charge 1.. Textbook ................ 142 Appendix C7: Speaking: In Charge 1.. Workbook .............. 143 Appendix C8: Speaking: Intercations 1.. Listening/Speaking Book ............................................................................................... 14 4 Appendix C9: Speaking: Interactions u . Listening/Speaking Book ............................................................................................... 1 4 5 Appendix DI: Writing: In Contact l ........................................ 146 Appendix 02: Writing: In Contact 2 ........................................ 150 Appendix 03: Writing: On Target 1 ......................................... 15 4 Appendix 04: Writing: On Target 2 .. Textbook ................... 15 8 Appendix 05: Writing: On Target 2: Workbook ................ 162 Appendix 06: Writing: In Charge 1: Textbook ................... 166 Appendix 07: Writing: In Charge 1: Workbook ................ 170 Appendix 08: Writing: Interactions 1.. Writing Book........ 174 Appendix 09: Writing: Interactions u. Writing Book...... 178 Appendix 010: Writing: Interactions I: Grammar Book .. 182 Appendix 011: Writing: Interactions u . Grammar Book 186 Appendix 012: Writing: Mosaic 1.. Writing Book.................. 190 Appendix El: Communication: In Contact 1........................ 194 Appendix E2: Communication: In Contact 2........................ 197 Appendix E3: Communication: On Target ] ......................... 200 Appendix E4: Communication: On Target 2 .. Textbook .... 203 Vi.

(8) 6.45. 6.46. 6.47. 6.49. 6.50. 6.51. 6.52. 6.53. 6.54. 6.55. 6.56.. Appendix E5: Communication: On Target 2: Workbook. 206 Appendix E6: Communication: In Charge I: Textbook .... 209 Appendix E7: Communication: In Charge 1: Workbook. 211 Appendix E8: Communication: Interactions I: Listening/ Speaking Book .................................................................................... 2 1 4 Appendix E9: Communication: lnteractions 11: Listening/ Speaking Book........................................................................ .... . ... .. 2 1 7 Appendix El0: Communication: Interactions /: A Reading Book ........................................................................................................ 2 2 O Appendix El 1: Communication: lnteractions 11: A Reading Book ........................................................................................................ 2 2 3 Appendix E12: Communication: lnteractions /: A Writing Book ........................................................................................................ 2 2 6 Appendix E13: Communication: Interactions 11: A Writing Book ........................................................................................................ 2 2 9 Appendix E14: Communication: Interactions I: A Grammar Book ........................................................................................................ 2 3 1 Appendix El5: Communication: lnteractions 11: A Grammar. Book ........................................................................................................ 234 6.57. Appendix E16: Communication: Mosaic I: Writing Book .. 237 7. Bibliography .................................................................................................... 240. Vitae ......................................................................................................................... 247. Vll.

(9) Table lndex. Table. Page Texbooks and Series Used for English Courses. 6. 2. 1990 and 1995 TOEFL Seores and Levels of English. 9. 3. Categories of Listening Activities. 5O. 4. Categories of Reading Activities. 52. 5. Categories of Speaking Activities. 53. 6. Categories of Writing Activities. 54. 7. Categories of Communicative Activities. 56. 8. Comparison of Series with Respect to Complexity of Ac-. 80. tivities Proposed. viii.

(10) lntroduction. Being aware of the concern the ITESM System has for forming high-quality professionals, every five years the programs of English courses are revised.. As a result of this revision, a new Plan for the. English Language Department will come into effect in August 1995. Therefore, this present thesis was written with the purpose of shedding light regarding the new textbook series selected for each of the zones of the ITESM System.. As will be seen further on, textbooks. will be used for each level of English.. In this study the books and. series from the Northern and South-central zones will be analyzed. The textbooks used in the Pacific zone were not included because, when this thesis was in process. it had not yet been decided which were going to be used. The intention to analyze these textbooks for verifying whether they are suitable or not for each level of the English-as-a-ForeignLanguage (EFL) courses arose from the necessity to find out whether the objectives in this new Plan aimed for a better development of the four language skills: listening, reading, writing and speaking in a communicative manner.. It was also deemed necessary to find out. whether their function in the ITESM coincided with the material and activities offered in the selected textbook series.. The demand for a. higher level of English in the new Plan is even stronger than in the old.. For instance, the Test of English as a Foreign Language (TOEFL). is given as a placement exam for incoming students instead of a Spectrum-based placement exam as previously utilized in the old. Plan.. Likewise, new courses are launched in which students are 1.

(11) required to master English more efficiently.. Thus; in order to de-. velop a higher level of English in students, new textbooks were se lected. With this rn mind, the research project was carried out as follows:. 1.. An ample literature survey was conducted for obtaining the rele-. van t variables and a theoretical framework was established. 2.. A description for each of the textbook series of the Northern and. South-central zones was made. 3.. Checklists were elaborated in order to revise all the acti vities rn. the series according to the focus on language skills in each of them.. 4.. The data were collected by marking the activities in the check-. lists. 5.. The results were described and interpreted.. It is the hope of this author that the results of the present investigation are useful to the EFL programmers and teachers of the ITESM System and that its information may function as a guide for reconsidering the selection of the textbooks used in each of the two zones.. It may also be a tool that helps these educators to under-. stand better what is constantly endeavored in EFL teaching: how to achieve a better and more adequate way of instruction in order to foster in the students the development of the four language skills for communication.. 2.

(12) I.. The definition and delimitation of the problem' This chapter shall deal with the definition and the delimitation. of the problem approached in this thesis. and has been di vided into two parts.. The first part is concerned with the antecedents of the. problem--those events and objectives that have contributed to the condition and development of the problem.. The Study Plan for. I 995 will come into effect in August 1995 and impact upon the curricula of the English Departments of all ITESM campuses.. Ad-. ditionally, policies regarding the mission or purpose of the ITESM System in forming highly qualified bilingual professionals will be affected.. As a consequence, these events have shed light on how to. make a distinction between a desired or ideal situation and the observed or real one. Once the need or the problem is identified and defined, then delimitation is carried out in the second part.. l. l.. The problem This part is divided into two: the first deals with antecedents. of the problem and the second one with the definition of the problem.. 1.1.1.. Antecedents of the problem. Every five years a Study Plan is elaborated in the ITESM System.. By August 1995 a new plan will come into effect and will im-. pact the curricula of the English Language Departments in all the campuses, since changes will occur in their courses, programs, main objectives, textbooks and placement exam. 3. The 1990 Plan will be.

(13) replaced by this new Plan.. The 1990 Plan m the ·university of the. Mexico City Campus of the ITESM, as well as in the other campuses of the System, consisted of three obligatory courses in English each semester (English I, II and III), besides two remedia! courses of five hours a week each semester for those students who did poorly, and advanced courses for those who did well in their placement exam. According to the English Course Proposals far the 1995 Study Plan (1994 ), developed by the English Department of the Monterrey. campus, the current 1990 Study Plan for English was based on the following reasons: 1.. A better preparation for the students m their maJors was need-. ed. 2.. Many students manifested the wish to further their education m. the United States and Canada and pointed out their necessity to have a high TOEFL score. 3.. The ITESM System was concerned for its students' English pro-. ficiency because of the economic opening of the country, their opportunity to study abroad, and their ability to attend lectures and conferences by English speaking professors. 4.. The courses in English taken during the 1990 Plan had college. credit and were known as Sello Courses.. Students had to study. three semesters of English in order to conclude their credits and were expected to obtain a 500 or more TOEFL score by the end of their English Language Program (4-5).. Until the mid-term of the August 94 semester at the Mexico City Campus, students coming from high schools outside the ITESM Sys4.

(14) tem had to apply for a placement exam which was based on Spectrum and was a 100-question exam--twenty questions for each. level, from Remedia} I to Advanced I or English IV.. Students who. failed in the first twenty questions would begin in Remedia} l.. Stu-. dents who failed within the next twenty questions would register m Remedia} 11 and so on.. In order to be consistent with the forth-. coming Study Plan, by mid August 94, the TOEFL exam replaced the former exam and it was used in all the campuses as a placement exam with the following seores: l.. Remedia} I. 200-380. 2.. Remedia} 11. 381-430. 3.. English I. 431-480. 4.. English 11. 481-510. 5.. English 111. 511-550. 6.. English IV (Advanced 1). 551-and. more. The applicants who were placed below the English I level had to take two remedia} courses (without credit) and afterwards took their three obligatory courses.. Students who placed within or above. English I took three obligatory semesters of advanced courses in English (English IV, V, VI, and VII) or chose French or German. The textbooks series and books used for the English courses for the 1990 Plan are shown in the following table:. 5.

(15) Table l Textbooks and Series Used for English Courses. Course. Textbook. I. Remedia!. Used. Spectrum /: Student Book by John Oye and Nancy Frankfort. Spectrum. /:. Workbook by Sharon. Abrams. David P. Rein and Donald R. H. Byrd.. 11. Remedia!. Spectrum 2: Student Book by Sandra Costinet and Donald R. H. Byrd. Spectrum 2: Workbook by Sharon Abrams, David P. Rein and Donald R. H. Byrd.. English. I. Spectrum 3: Student Book by Diane Warshawsky and Donald R. H. Byrd. Spectrum 3: Workbook by David P. Rein and Donald Byrd.. English. Spectrum 4: Student Book by Diane. 11. Warshawsky and Donald R. H. Byrd. Spectrum 4: Workbook by David P. Rein and Donald Byrd. English. Building Skills for the TOEFL by. 111. Deborah English. Phillips.. Mosaic /: A Content-Based Writing. IV. Book by Laurie Blass and Meredith Pike-Baky. lnsights. English V. into Business by Michael. Lammon, Graham Tullis and Tonya Trappe. The American Way by Edward Kearny,. English VI. Mary Ann Kearny and Joann Crandall. Distant English. Neighbors by Alan Riding.. Newsweek. VII. 6. Magazine..

(16) As will be seen later in pages 11 and 12, the textbooks and series used for the 1990 Plan will be replaced by other textbooks and series proposed in the forthcomíng Plan.. The programs for the. remedia! courses and English I and II were based on the Spectrum series and will also be changed for new ones, which will be designed according to the new textbooks and series proposed in the new Plan. By August 1995, the new EFL program will be launched in all the campuses of the ITESM System.. Although not yet official, for. this new program the modification of all the English courses at university and high school levels is proposed as well as their main objective, which will be to prepare students m academic, technological and entrepreneurial English. Depending on the TOEFL seores obtained, the new English courses for the 1995 program are as follows: 1.. Four Remedia} courses for those students who pnor to their en-. rollment obtain a TOEFL score below 450 on the placement exam. a.. Remedia} I. 2 OO- 3 5 7. b.. Remedia} II. 360-390. c.. Remedia! III. 393-41 7. d.. Remedia} IV. 420-44 7. Students obtaining an inferior score must study harder and attendance at an academy to improve their English 1s recommended. These four courses will center on the four basic skills (listening, reading, speaking and writing in English) and will consist of one semester each.. In order to continue with the advanced English. 7.

(17) courses, students are required to obtain a 450 on the TOEFL.. If they. score lower than 450, they cannot register for the Sello Course A. 2. One Sello Course A or Intermediate English 1s for students who obtain a TOEFL score of 450-497.. This course 1s centered on oral. and writing skills. 3. One Sello Course B or Advanced Course I is designed for students obtaining a score of 500-557. It will be centered on the writing skill. 4. One Sello Course C or Advanced Course II is planned for students scoring 550-600.. This course will concentrate on what the teacher. considers important, since it is for students who have an almost full command of English.. In this way, the students commg from high schools outside the ITESM are required to obtain a higher TOEFL score than was stipulated in the 1990 program.. In order to establish the difference be-. tween the TOEFL exam seores of 1990 and 1995 plans, the TOEFL seores used in the Mexico City campus for the 1990 Study Plan and the 1995 Plan proposed in Monterrey are presented in Table 2. According to this new Plan, every year the TOEFL score will ascend ten points and by the year 2000 applicants scoring 430 will be in Remedia} I and so forth.. The requirement for the proficiency m. English will become more demanding in each new Plan. High school students from the ITESM System are not required to take the placement exam; they directly enroll in the Advanced. Sello Course.. However, both students coming from inside or outside. the System will have to take six courses of their majar in English. This means that they will not only have to know everyday English 8.

(18) but also academic, technological and entrepreneurial English.. For. this, it is mandatory to have a holistic preparation in English, which means a full command of the four basic skills plus ample knowledge of specialized terms and concepts.. Table 2 1990 and 1995 TOEFL Seores and Levels of English. TOEFL score. Course Level. before 1995. TOEFL score. Course Level. for 1995. -------------------------------------------------------------------200-380. Remedial I. 200-357. Remedial I. 381-430. Remedial 11. 360-390. Remedial 11. 43 l -480. English I. 393-417. Remedial 111. 481-510. English 11. 420-44 7. Remedial IV. 511-550. English 111. 450-497. Sello Course A. English IV. 500-547. Sello Course B. 550-600. Sello Course C. 551-and. more. Because in August 1995 a higher TOEFL score will be required of students, and it is assumed they have the sufficient proficiency in the English language when registering in the ITESM System, it will not be the main objective to teach language acquisition, but to shape. 9.

(19) the English language learned previously into academic, technological and entrepreneurial English. In Mexico, the demand for learning English is mandatory from elementary to high schools, so students who enroll at the university leve! of the ITESM System should have a high proficiency of the English language in their basic skills (listening, reading, speaking, writing for communicating).. This demand is due to the commercial. opening in Mexico, such as the NAFTA (North American Free Trade Agreement), society' s demand for better professionals, the competitiveness between schools with regard to bilingual education, graduate students, plans to further their education in English speaking countries, and the offer of specialized English books in science and technology. As has been mentioned although not yet official, the modification of all the English courses at uni versity level and their main objecti ves have been proposed for this new program in order to prepare the students in academic, technological and entrepreneurial English. Therefore, it is essential for those who will take the Sello courses to use adequate textbooks and series to have a good academic, technological and entrepreneurial preparation in English.. For Remedia!. courses, on the other hand, textbooks and series must help acquire the basic skills and it is this aspect--as was already mentioned before--which this thesis wants to concentrate on.. It is considered a. priority to analyze the textbooks and series in their treatment of listening, reading, speaking, and writing skills, in order to determrne if they are convenient and adequate for instructing the students in pertinent academic, technological and entrepreneurial Eng1O.

(20) lish.. Textbooks and textbook senes for each of the new EFL courses. have been proposed by the English Department and the Committee for the 1995 Study Plan and Programs in Monterrey ( 1995 Study Plan).. It was agreed by the Planning committees of different re-. gional locations that the Spectrum series used in the remedia! and intermediate courses. as well as the textbooks used in the advanced courses of the 1990 Plan, will be replaced in the 1995 Plan by the following series: 1.. For the Re medial I course the ScottForesman' s senes 1s proposed. for the North zone--In Contact 1 (Chapters 1-12) and In Contact 2 ( chapters 1-3 ).. For the South-central zone Interactions I series. (chapters 1-5) is suggested. 2.. For the Remedial II course the ScottForesman's series--In Contact. 2 (chapters 4-12) and On Target I (Chapters 1-6)--is proposed to be used in the North zone.. For the South-central zone Interactions I. series (Chapters 6-12) is considered. 3.. For the Remedial III course the ScottForesman' s series--O n Ta r-. get 1 (Chapters 7-12) and On Target 2 to be used in the North zone.. (chapters 1-9)--is proposed. Interactions II. series (Chapters 1-6). 1s proposed for the South-central zone. 4.. For the Remedial IV course the ScottForesman's series--On Tar-. get 2 (Chapters 10-12) and In Charge 1 (Chapters 1-12)--is proposed to be used in the North zone.. Interactions II series (Chapters. 7-12) 1s proposed for the South-central zone. 5. For the Sello Course A, the Mosaic I writing book 1s proposed to be used in the Northern and South-central zones.. 11.

(21) As for the other courses. the series Mosaic I is recommended as optional for the Sello Course B and for the Sello Course C, it is left up to the teacher on whichever he/she considers appropriate, smce students at this level have a high proficiency of English. According to the 1995 Study Plan, the On Target and In Contact series focus on the four basic skills (listening, reading, speaking and writing) ( 19).. Their integrated syllabus is based on teaching gram-. mar through ideas and situations and their learner-centered approach "makes students active participants in the learning process" ( 19).. Through the development of critical thinking skills the EFL. learner will be trained to classify, organize, in fer and derive conclusions. For the Sello Course A, Mosaic I A Content Based Writing Book by Laurie Blass and Meredith Pilce-Bay (29) is focused on the writing component and made for EFL students.. The objective is to help. students develop their academic writing and gain the essential proficiency (33 ). The necessity of rev1ewmg, companng, analyzing and establishing the appropriateness of the material according to the students' needs, and the goals of the new program cannot be reiterated enough.. So the textbooks and series--used in the South-central and. North campuses--will be revised for their handling of the four language skills.. For this reason, it is planned to analyze textbooks and. series, those proposed to be used in the South-central and North campuses, to determine for the forthcoming Plan which ones are expedient for the goals of the ITESM in forming qualified professionals who have mastered the English language. 12.

(22) Analyses have already been made of textbooks and series regarding their approaches to listening, reading and writing skills by three EFL teachers who each wrote a thesis dealing with one of each of these three skills, so an additional analysis in speaking and communicating is needed and will be done by this author. whose results will be presented in an integrated form with the already existing results.. In this way, there will be information and results about. these four skills in a single investigation.. This will lead to a com-. parison of various textbooks and series and give a clearer view to determine which books and senes are appropriate for the new levels in the university and will help give a better preparation to high school students of the ITESM System.. 1.1.2.. Definition of the problem. According to Principios, misión y estatuto general del Sistema. ITESM. (1994), one of the missions of the ITESM System is to form. highly qualified professionals in their field (10); therefore, learning and improving English play an important role m this formation, and are considered top priority throughout all the campuses of the ITESM System (16-32).. Present day education and technology call. for a solid foundation in English for academic and professional achievement (5).. The new EFL program intends to follow this line. and believes that the replacement of the courses and their specifications will improve results. The already mentioned Master's theses in EFL have carried out analyses of textbooks and series in one of each of these three skills--listening, reading and writing, where there are recommenda13.

(23) tions regarding their adequation and pertinence to teaching and usmg them for this new program.. For instance, the thesis by Walsh. ( 1994) from the Monterrey campus deals with the writing skill and analyzes textbooks and series. making interesting and helpful results and suggestions for teaching.. Lundin (1994) of the San Luis. Potosí campus focuses on the reading skill, and Clemente ( 1994) of the Estado de México campus centers on the listening skill.. Each of. them made a thorough study of each of the three skills of the textbooks and series used in other campuses of the ITESM, but an analysis of the speaking skill for communicating in the textbooks and series used in sorne campuses has not yet been done.. 1.2.. Purpose and delimitation of the project. Establishing the problem can be done following this simple formula: ideal situation is not equal to real situation.. The ideal. situation is that ali EFL programmers know everything about ali the textbooks and textbooks series available on the market, but the real situation is that few EFL programmers know something about sorne of the textbooks and textbooks senes.. Also, as is stated in the new. Study Plan Proposal, a higher proficiency is demanded by the ITESM.. It is assumed that all students from high schools come with. a good knowledge and proficiency of the English language in their basic skills, but the real situation is that many students do not come with the required proficiency level and knowledge of English. Therefore, the objectives of this present investigation are the following:. 14.

(24) 1.. Gather and present useful information about s·everal aspects of. severa! textbooks and series regarding the four basic skills, which may help prepare students for the new demands. 2.. Gi ve teachers access to a wider knowledge about the textbooks. and series used in the ITESM System. 3.. Analyze the textbooks and series concerning the basic skills and. approaches. 4.. Recommend, according to the results obtained in the analyses of. the textbooks and series, which textbooks and series may be appropriate for the forthcoming EFL 1995 Program.. The approach is delimited to the teaching of the basic (listening, reading, speaking and writing) language skills in the campuses of the South-central zone. There are many approaches m the history of EFL teaching in regard to the basic skills, such as the communicative approach, the cognitive approach, the situational approach and so forth, but here only those on which the textbooks and series are based will be explained.. The other ones are not discussed.. Concerning the basic. skills, the speaking skill for communicating shall be explored by this investigator.. Listening, reading and writing skills have already. been analyzed by the other investigators as mentioned above. Nevertheless, their recommendations, feedback and contributions concerning three skills, if considered pertinent, shall be presented together with the contributions and suggestions based on the analysis of the speaking skill for communicating from this study.. 15.

(25) 2.. Theoretical framework This chapter shall talk about the process of communicating,. communicative competence, receptive and productive skills, and communicative activities.. The communication model explained in. the following section is a simple one, but for introductory purposes it is sufficient for presenting how the communication process works.. 2.1.. The process of communicating. When communicating, people share information, ideas, altitudes and feelings.. This means people always intend to express. something to someone.. Basically, ali the communication models. agree on that the act of communicating consists of someone who sends a message and someone who receives it.. For this, both parties. need to be on the proper frequency regarding the message.. In. order to establish communication, three important parts are necessary: sender or source, message and receiver.. A sender or. source 1s someone (individual, institution, organization, firm, company, school, etc.) that sends the message.. Generally speaking,. the message is the information or signs the sender or addresser wishes to express and may be audible, written, body language and/or gestures (Schramm 3, Paoli 28).. A receiver or addressee 1s. the one who receives and interprets the sender's message.. It may. also be an individual or a group of individuals, institution, corporation, school, etc.. The source or sender encodes the. information or feeling that he wants to share and prepares it to be transmitted.. Once the message is encoded and sent, it becomes. independent from the sender and whatever the message may cause 16.

(26) 10. the rece1ver, it 1s beyond the sender to pre-vent" it.. This is. because the act of communication must be completed or decoded by him.. That is, the message has to be translated by him in order to be. u nde rs tood. According to Schramm ( 1991 ), to achieve good communication the following is needed: l.. The source must have clear and proper information.. 2.. The message must be complete and correctly encoded.. 3.. The message must be decoded by the receiver in such a way that. corresponds to the sender' s coding. 4.. The rece1ver must be capable to properly handle the decoded. message (4). People always have to select between transmitting more information, on one hand, or less and repeating more with the purpose to be better understood by the other.. This is called redun-. dancy and consists of repeating concepts and larger ideas so the message may be clearer and get through to the addressee.. Redun-. dancy can be distinguished in three types: l.. The redundancy used in the interna! system of a language.. For. instance, if future expressions are produced, words to refer the future will be needed: He will go tomorrow.. The redundancy used. in this sentence is with will and tomorrow which are a verb and adverb to make future expressions. 2.. The redundancy used to reinforce an idea: the beggar living. in. poverty and despair. 3.. The redundancy used when repeating the same form. tence:. The competition is very competitive. 17. 10. a sen-.

(27) The first redundancy is necessary, srnce it is part of the interna! system of the language used. stress an idea.. The second one may be used to. The third one must be avoided because it 1s unnec-. essary to repeat the same form or words in a sentence. The source may encade and the receiver decode, but this is only accomplished through the experience each one has had befare. For instance, someone from a tropical area has never seen snow and never heard of it.. This individual, when receiving the information,. will relate the whiteness of snow according to his/her own experience--perhaps with the whiteness of coconut pulp or something similar.. If both parties have a lot of knowledge in common, the act. of communication becomes easier, but if they have little in common, then it turns out to be somewhat difficult (Schramm 5).. This is a. problem which at times people face when they want to establish communication.. Many factors may be involved: cultural, educa-. tional, religious, social, and so on.. In this case, the addresser tries to. encade his/her message in a way that may be easy for the addressee to tune up with and relate it with his/her own expenence which can be similar to that of the addresser (6). Messages are formed by signs.. Any word is a s1gn represen-. ting something about someone's experience.. The word "car" would. not mean anything to someone who knows nothing about cars and never heard of it, but if this same word is already known and heard, the shape of a car, the model of a car and the sound of its engine running may come to the mind.. Mainly, all this knowledge is ac-. quired and retrieved through association.. However, there may be. someone who has a different idea of cars from that of another one, 18.

(28) because he/she has only seen a certain type of car which is different from what the other person has seen. between sigo and object.. Thus, there is a difference. The former does not undertake all the as-. sociations the subject itself implies (Schramm 6). The meanrng that comes from decoding a sign will need a reconstruction in the decoder's mind.. Precise encoding will only de-. pend on choosing available and linked responses to the meaning rn certain situations and each individual involved in the process of communicating may be both coder and decoder as well.. He/she. recei ves and transmits, which means that at all times signs are decoded, interpreted and coded as result of such process.. This. constant process of responding to each other is known as feedback ( 8). and through i t, the sender will learn how his/her messages are. being interpreted.. In conversations, for example, gestures and the. tone of the voice contribute, and when writing, words may be changed and spelling corrected.. In this way, when an individual. talks to someone, sound waves from his/her voice are the primary message, but the expression of his/her face and gestures as well as the relation of the given message with former messages are 1mportant.. In written messages, the meanings are not only trans-. mitted through words, but also through the size of the headings, the pictures presented, the different kinds of printing, etc.. To recapitulate, the process of communication may be simply presented as follows:. Sender----> Message-----> Receiver 19.

(29) The message moves between the sender and receiver and may be interpreted or not by the receiver as the sender intended to communicate.. It IS interpreted according to the signs the receiver Is. familiar with.. This is called reference framework (Paoli 28).. De-. pending on such interpretation, it is how someone may communicate with an individual or corporation, but if there are severa} interpretations, the framework will be different; consequently, the communication will turn out to be difficult due to the existence of many possible different meamngs.. Also, interpreting messages IS. not easy, because there are denotative and connotative meanings. The former refers to objective, factual meanings as they are found in a dictionary, and the latter corresponds to affective meanings.. A. cross may represent (denote) the Christian religion, but for many Christians it may mean (connote) much more than that.. It may. signify, for example, an object of worship, hope or even of salvation. For learning other languages, the process of communication 1s very important, smce a teacher (sender) transmits his/her lesson to his/her students (receiver), but if the message is not clear to the receiver, then the communication becomes deficient. a miscommunication takes place (Maurice 9).. In other words,. Thus, in language. teaching it is important to handle materials, methodology and techniques u sed for learning m the classroom properly.. As Maurice. states "it is not only the content of the materials but the style of the teaching that determines the effectiveness of the classroom Iearning" (9).. Also, awareness in the theory of communication permits. students to understand that every time they say something to someone it happens in a certain social situation, and the person with 20.

(30) whom they are communicating, his/her age, sex, s'ocial status, etc., plus the place and time in which the message is being sent, must be considered, in order to decide what variety (formal or informal), in this case of English, they will have to use in arder to achieve successful communication.. 2.2.. Communicative competence. In arder to understand what communicative competence 1s, it 1s imperative to define first what linguistic competence and performance are.. According to Chomsky, linguistic competence is the. (native) speaker/hearer's knowledge of the rules of his/her language system, like grammar and vocabulary, and the ability to judge whether sentences are grammatical or acceptable or not. Performance is simply the execution of this knowledge.. Chomsky. ( 1986) pointed out that it was indispensable to analyze and describe language by means of idealized abstractions instead of exhaustive accounts of natural speech, where rules were often deviated (3940).. Far many people language is seen as a set of rules used for. communicating, smce everyone communicates with fluidity and without much trouble, but for Chomsky, language is basically a mental process and utilized for interna! representation of information as much as far communication with other people. In arder to understand its use in social contexts, Chomsky argues that we must first of all understand the nature of what we are using, i.e. what knowledge we need to have stored in our minds in arder to produce and comprehend meaningful utterances (Smith 31 ).. 21. 000859.

(31) These distinctions between competence and· performance were accepted by investigators like Campbell and Wales ( 1970), but their op1010n differed in establishing that appropriateness of speech production in a given context should be considered.. These theorists. stated that the production or comprehension of the language by anyone in a certain situation must be adequate and that that 1s more significant than its grammaticality (Omaggio 3 ). At the beginning of the seventies Hymes pointed out that the rules of language are in direct relation to the procedures of social interchange and adequate social conduct. the term communicative competence. Based on this statement,. was coined, which "consists of. both knowledge of linguistic rules and knowledge of how these rules are used to communicate meanings" (Ellis 294).. In this case, stu-. dents of foreign languages are communicatively competent if the meaning they want to convey gets across to the receiver; albeit their knowledge of grammar is not very high (Omaggio 3). Omaggio ( 1986) quotes from Savignon to define commumcative competence as "the ability to function m a truly communicative setting--that 1s, in a dynamic exchange m which linguistic. competence. must adapt itself to the total informational input, both. linguistic and paralinguistic, of one or more interlocutors" (4 ).. Ac-. cording to this definition, in order for someone, speaking in a foreign language (L2), to achieve a successful communication, his/ her disposition is an important factor to express himself/herself in a foreign language.. It is also necessary to have resourcefulness to use. the vocabulary and sentence structures to make himself/herself understood.. Besides, the other factors involved in communicating 22.

(32) such as gestures and intonation linguistic accuracy should be deemed as an important constituent of communicative exchange (4 ). Omaggio presents the characteristics of communicative competence proposed by Savignon and they are described by this investigator as follows: 1.. It is interpersonal, smce it involves two or more people sharing. knowledge of the language. 2.. It involves written and spoken language.. 3.. It takes place in specific situation.. 4.. It considers the distinction between competence and perform-. ance.. The former is what someone knows about the language and. the latter what this person does with what he/she knows.. In this. case, performance is observable and through it competence may be developed, kept and assessed. 5.. It relies on the cooperation of parties involved m the process. (Omaggio 4-5). However, the term established by Savignon caused discrepancies among theorists who included notions to this term.. For. instance, sorne argued that the notion of grammatical competence should be considered in the concept of communicative competence. Canale ( 1985) not only agreed to the consideration of this notion into communicative competence, but included three more elements: 1.. Grammatical competence or the domain of grammar (pronunci-. ation, vocabulary, syntax). 2.. Sociolinguistic competence or the appropriateness of meanmg. and form.. That is, the forms available for expressing the same in-. formation (formal or informal).. 23.

(33) 3.. Discourse competence or the way the communicative events. (spoken or written) are linked to each other.. That is, how ideas are. organized and interrelated. 4.. Strategic competence or the way unsuccessful communication 1s. dealt with and the strategies for making communication more effective" (Duran et al. 12-13). The consideration of these elements is important in EFL teachmg.. For instance, if the modals can and may are being learned in. class, the appropriateness for using them in informal and formal situations must be clearly understood.. EFL speakers who are na-. tives of Spanish, in an informal and formal situation say can /?, for ¿puedo?, instead of may /?, used in formal English, since ¿puedo? 1s used for both informal and formal situations in Spanish.. When. speaking English in a formal situation which requires a more polite expression, if they still use can /?, they may be considered impolite. Moreover, Canale emphasizes that communicative competence applies not only to the underlying knowledge about language, but also to the use and ability of how adequately a person can carry out communication with this knowledge.. For this, the term proficiency. is adopted which implies communicative competence and performance. As Shaw ( 1992) establishes, "proficiency in language means not only knowing its phonology, syntax, vocabulary, and semantics but also being able to make use of this knowledge appropriately in actual communication" (9). According to this author, usmg this knowledge includes knowledge of rules which is how to say something to someone and 24.

(34) control or ability for use.. This means knowing a ·rule that implies. someone has it, plus having the ability to produce a sentence in another language in a real situation (9). For teaching languages, specifically teaching English as a second/foreign language, communicative competence, as Finocchiaro ( 1982) points out, is essential for students learning how to properly handle language in the social situation where the speech act is being carried out (9).. Furthermore, for learners of English, Finocchiaro. proceeds, trends, strategies, and goals concerning linguistic competence have changed into the following: 1.. As trends: it is currently accepted that students of English will. learn a Spanish, French or Portuguese English.. Also, the internal. consistency of conversational exchanges and other kinds of discourse has become study of interest. 2.. As strategies: the native language m learners may be used to ex-. plain elements in social context, to compare and counterpoint grammatical or communicative expressions.. Also, translation is used. when students are from the same background.. This is helpful in. providing equal contextualized communicative expressions and structures. 3.. As goals: the purposes or intents of speakers or writers have. become the center of language learning activities and tasks.. Fluency and accuracy are goals for learning a language (9). Even if these trends, strategies and goals were presented by Finocchiaro already in 1982, they are basically still valid today. For the purpose of this present thesis it is mandatory to consider communicative competence as essential in teaching; therefore,. 25.

(35) textbooks and activities must focus on this.. Furthermore, programs. and teachers of the ITESM System in particular must apply this comunicative competence for their multiskill courses in which students have to master academic and technical English.. Thus, m. the following sections i t shall be established, through the textbook analyses, whether the series are oriented towards this important goal.. 2.3.. Receptive and productive skills m FL teaching/learning. This section shall deal with skills m language teaching, which will be divided into two: (a) receptive skills which are listening and reading, and (b) productive skills which are speaking and writing. The former has to do with rece1vmg messages.. Both listening and. reading skills relate to the input of a language or rece1 vmg language by exposing learners, in this case, to English. with language production or output.. The latter has to do. Students are provided with. circumstances to activate what they know through the input and allowed to practice in the class (Harmer 40).. In addition, these two. types of skill usually occur at the same time.. For instance, an in-. dividual reads and writes at the same time when writing something based on what he is reading (Harmer 17).. 2.3.1. Receptive skills In order to achieve effective communication m L2, EFL students need to comprehend what is being said by someone.. For this,. they must have the ability to understand the spoken and written messages (Shrum and Glissan 113).. 26.

(36) As listeners and readers, EFL learners call u'pon Canale's four kinds of competencies explained formerly: the grammatical, sociolinguistic, discourse and strategic competence, upon which the learner depends to understand spoken and written productions. In this comprehension task students go through processes which may be top-down and/or bottom-up.. In a top-down process,. language is manipulated by learners in order to organize their understanding their thoughts by using higher-level skills pnor to attending to discrete language structures with the utilization of skill with less intensity of lower level skills (25).. This means that stu-. dents will be able to develop more complex skills, such as understanding details of a reading text, or skimming or scanning for information once they have developed simple skills, such as understanding the general idea of a reading text or understanding the reading structure of a text.. After a student receives input, stra-. tegies may be focused on an overall view of the topic of the text shown to them by understanding the main ideas or predicting what the author might express next.. In reading, this process is related to. the concept that an individual reads for meaning and comprehension through relating the new information to what he already knows (Dubin and Bycina 218). During this top-down process, learners have to perce1ve mformation as a pattern, understand it as a whole and break it down into details (Peterson 109).. The background information of the. listener is long term memory and helps him to understand.. Mean-. ing is derived by using contextual clues and activating background knowledge (Shrum and Glissan 113). 27.

(37) Meaning in the bottom-up process, on the other hand, is comprehended by first analyzing language parts.. In reading. comprehension, "the bottom-up model describes reading as a process of exact identification of letter, words, and ultimately sentences by moving the eyes from left to right across the page and building comprehension from letter to word to phrase to sentence" (Dubin and Bycina 219). In listening, students initially center a greater part of their restricted attention on severa} subcomponents of the skill developed.. Students may construct in stages decoding abilities from. the bottom-up process from smaller units to larger ones.. These. subcomponents may be, for instance, understanding the main idea, summarizing the main ideas, or making inferences from a conversation.. Then, this listening skill can be carried out spontaneously. after being constantly practiced when the attention of the students 1s not constrained from learning new skills (Peterson 108). The bottom-up process is used in the traditional approach to teaching where students learn grammar rules and vocabulary and then practice them in communication and activities which include drills; whereas in the top-down process learners "predict meaning . , take in large chunks of texts at a time . . . , match what they already know with the meamng derived from the text" (Dubin and Bycina 197).. Activities consist of meaningful, natural and whole. language, and are made with meaningful context.. In more recent. studies, it has been shown that exercising the bottom-up process in teaching has become more meaningful and contextualized; therefore, activities consist of uniting exerc1ses composed of sentences with an 28.

(38) incident or theme; givrng a setting or situation for· the exerc1se. in. the form of information regarding persons, activities, or descriptions and; combining cultural elements with the rehearsal of language within the exercise (Shrum and Glissan, 25). Harmer ( 1993) points out that it is necessary for the student to have a purpose and desire in relation to communicative tasks when dealing with listening and reading (182).. In the process of. communicating, the sender intends or wants to express something because he has a purpose.. Perhaps, he wants to express a feeling, a. thought or gi ve information in order to impress, move, provoke a reaction in his listeners or readers.. Also, Harmer says that learners. should have a communicative purpose or objective when using language.. If students have an objective, then their attention is focused. on the content of what is said or written (48).. According to him,. when they listen or read in the target language, two aspects appear:. interest and usefulness.. This author says that people read a text or. listen to a conversation because they are interested in it or it. IS. use-. ful for them ( 182). Based on this, Harmer indicates that readers and listeners use specialized skills when they read or listen and their comprehension of content is successful only if they master them.. These skills are. listed as follows: l.. Predicting what. 2.. Extracting specific information when listening or reading.. 3.. Understanding the general information.. IS. gorng to be heard or read.. In reading, this skill. IS. called skimming and the reader centers on essential information he wants to obtain.. In listening, sometimes listeners want to focus on 29.

(39) the marn message by putting aside things that are not important for them. 4.. Recognizing function and discourse patterns:. This is important,. since when reading it is necessary to understand the structure of a paragraph, its parts and organization. When listening it is necessary to know which sentence expressions are used by the speaker. 5.. Deducing meaning from context or what comes befare and after a. word, phrase, sentence, statement, etc.: Students need "to develop their ability to deduce the meanings of unfamiliar words from context in which they appear" (183-184 ).. Harmer says that teaching receptive skills must be done in real-life like situations, and the tasks the listener must carry out need to be realistic and motivating m arder to have a useful purpose for text study (188).. Up to now, this section has mainly talked about the significance of context--the setting or situation which may be informal/ formal setting, topics related to self or immediate environment, such as family, friends, shopping, etc.--in which the students are being exposed to, the purpose for listening or reading, and the tasks that determine the type of skill required, but little about vocabulary in the process of developing listening and reading skills which is also involved.. In arder to have a better comprehension of listening or. reading texts, it is important that students build their own vocabulary when listening or reading.. This will help them to come up. with more words that are associated with the same semantic level; 30.

(40) recogmzrng how the same words are redefined by several settings or situations; augmenting recognition of pronounceability, and recogmzrng affixes, suffixes or parts of speech (Shrum and Glissan l 16).. 2.3.2.. Productive skills. Speaking and writing are both called productive skills because rn both cases a message 1s encoded by someone who wants to transmit something.. A speaker or writer always has a purpose or intent-. 10n in expressing something to someone.. If there is no purpose or If. meanrng in speaking or writing, then there is no communication. speaking or writing only focuses on form and no setting or situation is provided, a communicative process is not taking place. shows the importance of the communicative component.. This. For in-. stance, a student may learn through drills or any other type of practice the procedure of how to produce structures mechanically, but having no meaning or purpose, the act of communication is not berng performed.. Students may know the language structures but not. the appropriateness of their use rn a social situation.. S tudents not. only have to learn a model to imitate, but also how to use language to express their ideas, feelings and thoughts (Byrne 10).. Of course,. communicating effectively also means the adequate use of grammar and vocabulary. From the foregoing, it becomes evident how many factors are involved in the process of communicating something.. In speaking,. for example, pitch and intonation in the speaker's voice are an 1mportant factor in communicating, also gestures and signs. 3 1. The.

(41) speaker can rephrase, slow down or speed up, depending on the context and situation and on what he wants to say. Harmer indicates three types of context--the situation or body of information which causes language to be used--in language presentation: the students' world, the outside world and formulated information.. For the students' world there are two kinds of context:. physical surroundings, which are their "classroom, school or insti-. tution," and the students' lives, which are their families, friends and expenences. The second context, the outside world, consists of all the situations in which people speak.. This is helpful for practicing English.. Situations can be created or simulated by students. The third context mentioned by Harmer is the information, used in the classroom and presented in timetables, notes, charts, frames, and forms, which he calls formulated information (57). Depending on the purpose of the language to be used, the situation is selected.. Assuming students are taught to give advice, a. situation must be created in which they can produce the necessary patterns to achieve this goal, and the necessary input must be provided.. The situation presented must be as realistic as possible.. Assuming students want to complain about sorne inefficient public service, the purpose will be to express dissatisfaction through writing a letter, but for doing so they need to know the necessary elements to be able to formulate their complaint: the structures, the vocabulary, and the form of an official letter.. Thus, in order to ef-. fectively communicate, the knowledge of form is necessary but accompanied by meaning or function.. 32. To g1ve an advice, for in-.

(42) stance, the students will need to know how to use should, had better, ought to, etc.. Students need to keep in mind who the rece1ver of their message is going to be as well as in what situation the message is being sent (formal or informal).. Many elements intervene in this process.. For an adequate teaching-learning process, it is necessary that textbooks suggest the corresponding communicative activities to accomplish the communication planned for the practice. Littlewood ( 1981) points out that "the most efficient communicator in a foreign language is not always the person who is best at manipulating its structures.. It is often the person who is most. skilled at processing the complete situation involving himself and his hearer, taking into account what knowledge already exists between them . . . , and selecting items which will communicate his message effectively" (4).. Thus, students need to be exposed to situ-. ations or contexts in which they may develop skills to communicate what they want in the most effective way possible. Students may be asked to do practice activities.. For instance,. if students are required to speak, they may carry out a conversational activity by working in pairs, in groups or role playing (Harmer 132-133).. If students are asked to write, their activities. may vary from organizing ideas, writing an outline, writing sentences, applying new vocabulary, developing syntax in order to write in a coherent and understandable way, writing an informal letter, or from taking notes up to writing a report or essay.. 33.

(43) 2.4.. Cornrnunicative activities Activities rnust be airned at prepanng students with the. necessary skills for cornrnunicating in different types of situations. Each skill can be divided into several subskills and that at various hierarchical levels.. If students are to develop the writing. skill, perhaps they need to learn subskills, such as building up vocabulary; writing the topic as well as supporting and concluding sentences; paragraph organization which will provide the basis for writing what they are required to, such as paragraph writing; letter writing; writing reports, essays and even short stories, in an effective cornrnunicative rnanner.. For this, Littlewood ernphasizes the. need to distinguish between acti vities airned at developing language forrns and those airned at developing cornrnunicative rneanings.. If. language teaching is only focused on grarnrnar or the cornbination of linguistic iterns, such as explanations of changing active voice into passive, it is not enough for the student to rnerely produce these structures as a way of cornrnunicating.. If forrns are only considered. frorn a functional point of view, and the setting or situation is not being taken into consideration; consequently, they will not have a functional meaning (3-4 ). According to the sarne author, students must be involved in activities in which their rnain purpose is to cornmunicate adequately with sorneone ( 16).. A balance has to be rnade between language. forrns and rneaning if cornrnunicative activities are performed (16). In this section, both Littlewood's types of cornmunicative. activities are considered and rnentioned as follows:. 34.

(44) I.. Functional communication activities:. In this type of activity stu-. dents ought to employ the language they know so the meaning intended is as understandable as possible. 2. Social interaction activities:. Activities should be emphasized in. social and communicative aspects.. Students must have the purpose. to convey meanings in an effective manner but they must also pay more attention to the social setting in which the interaction is takrng place (20). These two types of communicative activities will be taken into consideration during the analysis of textbook items. Activities for productive skills, depending on the level, may go from simple sentence writing to essay writing, or from saying someone's name to telling about an incident.. All of these must be center-. ed around a setting or situation, and when somebody is producing a message, he/she needs to be aware of the type of setting in which the communication is taking place.. With receptive skills, activities. may range from prelistening/reading, such as listening or reading a text or predicting its meaning, to recreating the text or g1vrng an opinion about it.. These activities must also be realized with a com-. municati ve purpose and authentic language, simulating real life situations.. 35.

(45) 3.. Methodology Keeping in mind the objective of this thesis as to verify the. suitability of the textbooks, this chapter describes the methodology used for the textbook description, the selection of categories of analysis and procedures of analysis.. 3. l.. General description of the textbooks. This section is concerned with the description of the series to be used in the 1995 Plan. Before the description of the textbooks is presented this mvestigator points out that this description was made by taking into consideration their authors, comments as commercial or advertizing aspects.. Nonetheless, this investigator has used these books in his. teaching as support or as official and corroborated these comments whether for advertizing purposes or for authentic devolopment of the language skills in class. As was mentioned in the first chapter of this research project, the analyzed books are only those to be used in: the Northern and South-central zones.. By the time this present thesis was in the. process of being elaborated, it was not yet decided which series the Pacific zone was going to use, so the investigation was limited to those of the Northern and South-central zones which are listed as follows: The senes to be used in the Northern zone and analyzed m this investigation is the following: l. In Contact 1 by Charles Raht, Barbara Denman, N. Elizabeth Lavie. and Sandra Briggs, published by ScottForesman in 1991.. 36.

(46) 2. In Contact 2 by Charles Raht, Barbara Denman, · N. Elizabeth Lavie and Sandra Briggs, published by ScottForesman in 1991. 3. On Target 1 by James Purpura and Diane Pinkley, published by ScottForesman in 1991. 4. On Target 2 by James Purpura and Diane Pinkley, including both textbook and workbook, published each by ScottForesman in 1992. 5. In Charge I (textbook) by Moya Brennan and Barbara Denman and In Charge 1 (workbook) by Sandra Briggs, published each by ScottForesman in 1993. The books analyzed m this thesis and to be used m the Southcentral zone are the following: 1. lnteractions I: A listening/Speaking Skills Book, by Judith Tanka and Paul Most, published by MacGraw-Hill in 1995. 2. lnteractions /: A Reading Skills Book, by Elaine Kirn and Pamela Hartman, published by MacGraw-Hill in 1995. 3. lnteractions /: A Writing Process Book, by Margaret Keenan Segal and Cheryl Pavlik, published by MacGraw-Hill m 1995. 4. Interactions /: A Communicative Grammar, by Elaine Kirn and Darcy Jack, published by MacGraw-Hill in 1995. 5. Interactions 11: A Listening/Speaking Skills Book, by Judith Tanka and Lida R. Baker, published by MacGraw-Hill in 1995. 6. lnteractions 11: A Reading Skills Book, by Elaine Kirn and Pamela Hartman, published by MacGraw-Hill in 1995. 7. Interactions 11: A Writing Process Book, by Margaret Keenan Segal and Cheryl Pavlik, published by MacGraw-Hill in 1995.. 37.

(47) 8. lnteractions 11: A Communicative Grammar, by Patricia Werner, Mary Mitchell Church and Lida R. Baker, published by MacGraw-Hill in. 1995.. 9. Mosaic /: A Content-Based Writing Book, by Laurie Blass and Meredith Pike-Baky, published by MacGraw-Hill in 1995.. 3.1.1.. Description of textbooks used m the Northern zone. In Contact 1 According to the researcher's observation, this book is designed for beginning students and consists of twelve chapters, plus a "Getting Started" chapter, which is an introductory section and has been classified by this investigator as chapter O.. Each chapter con-. sists of activities centered around a theme and specifically focused on listening, reading, writing and speaking with an emphasis on communicating. By browsing through the book, this investigator noted that the listening-skill part contains a prelistening section to introduce students into developing this skill.. There is also a pronunciation sec-. tion to help them to produce understandable utterances according to pronunciation standards.. This section includes word stress, inton-. ation, sound reduction and more. By looking through the book, it was noted that the reading skill part also has a prereading section with simple reading texts, plus activities and exercises to develop the skill according to what students are instructed to do. It was observed that the speaking skill part consists primarily of pair work activities where students have to perform conversa-. 38.

(48) tions according to the strategy proposed, which is· mainly telling someone something, asking and answering questions. In the revision of the book, it was noticed that the writing part provides writing activities and exercises in which the students have to write very simple and small paragraphs, concentrate on correcting their previous writing or make discussions on a topic by writing.. There is also a prewriting section plus strategies such as. exploring and organizing ideas, and writing simple drafts which help the learners to develop their writing skills. In addition, this textbook contains combined activities for each skill.. For instance, there are activities where the student has to. listen and write at the same time or listen and tell about what they have listened to. This textbook provides warm up, grammar and vocabulary sections for each chapter.. This first section introduces students to. the previously mentioned sections and these other two, along with exercises and acti vities, helping students to reinforce and execute the language skills in a more appropriate way.. In Contact 2 By browsing through this textbook, the investigator noted that it has also twelve chapters plus a "Getting Started" chapter, is also designed for beginners and follows the same line as its predecessor, but with elaborated activities, combined activities and exercises.. 39.

(49) On Target I Through scannmg this book, it was noted that it consists of twelve chapters plus a Getting Started chapter and is intended for intermediate students.. Its activities, combined activities, and exer-. cises for developing and improving the Ianguage skills are more elaborated and expanded than the previous textbooks but follow the same pattern as well.. The listening and reading parts continue with. the same sort of activities and exercises.. The speaking part has re-. creating situations where students act out situations.. The writing. skill becomes more complicated by emphasizing in strategies, such as exploring and organizing ideas, and writing and editing.. On Target 2 The investigator by surveyrng this book, noted that, as the previous textbook, this one 1s intended for intermediate students and provides the same number of chapters with almost the same activities, mixed activities and exercises.. There is also a workbook,. which was available when the present investigation was being written, and has ample activities and exercises to be performed in order to reinforce and apply what was learned and practiced in the textbook.. In Charge 1 By going through this book, it was noted that it is for advanced students and follows the same pattern with much more elaborate activities, mixed activities and exercises.. 40. The difference.

(50) found between this senes and the prev10us ones is that no prelistening, prereading, prewriting sections are found. Its workbook provides ample activities, mixed acti vities and exerc1ses to reinforce what is being learned and practiced.. The. strategies for each of the language skills are emphasized more.. For. instance, the writing and editing strategies are developed much more than. in. the previous series.. The reading skill adds more strat-. eg1es like understanding meaning from context, skimming and discussing the reading.. 3.1.2.. Description of textbooks used in the South-central zone. The textbooks proposed in the South-central zone are the Interactions series which are Interactions I and Interactions II. By going through the preface of each book, the investigator found out that Interactions I is for high-beginning students and. Interactions II for low intermediate to high-intermediate students. Both books form an integrated four skill approach, and deal with a particular skill plus the necessary grammar instruction.. Interactions I and Interactions II: A Listening/Speaking Skills Book According to the authors, Tanka and Most, these two books consist of twelve chapters with each chapter centered on a theme and divided into four listening substrategies and a speaking part: l.. Part l: Getting the main idea: stressed words and reductions are. emphasized for understanding the main idea and for reproduction of reduced forms of ordinary American English.. 41.