Eduardo Mondlane University

Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences

English Language Teaching (ELT)

Name: Samuel Matsinhe

Lecturer: Dr. Gaspar Nhabinde

Presentation: Video Transcription

I hope you’re doing well. My name is Samuel Matsinhe. And I’m an ELT student. So I’m here to
present to you a topic you know which is ineffective use, of coursebooks at school. And. This will be
a critical review of a certain book which is Oxford English for grade 9.

So, the first thing that I will do is to try to just to to to to define what what those books are. And. And
also, I will be you know as this is a is a critical review of a certain book. OK, which is going to help
us understand the main question of my presentation here. And.

You know so far, I should tell you that the main question of my presentation that I will be trying to
answer will be you know how you know will be about the the, the ineffective use of course books.
You know, by teachers, which was revealed in a case study in a case study at secondary school. I
mean it, Francisco Manyanga secondary school.

So I will be, you know, presenting. I will be trying to answer this question. You know, teachers at
that school, they've been using the course books ineffectively. So, and for that I'll be making, I'll be,
I'll be making use of a second coursebook, so you know, describing the characteristics of it. And. You
know.

I get and and. And after that I will be, you know, pointing out the advantages of using the course
book, of course. And you know the the next part will be about you know the weaknesses of so the
points that I think the teachers should take into account when using the coursebooks, which would
basically be about the weaknesses of, you know, using a certain coursebook. And.

The last part will be about the you know will be about recommendation and basically it's sort of
recommendations for teachers you know on how to use course books in in the best possible way. So

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basically, you know this, my presentation will be divided up in 4 four parts as I mentioned here. So
yes, and the first part is let's understand what course books are.

When we talk about course books, we're basically talking about teaching materials, right? And this
teaching materials, they can be in form of textbooks or workbooks. And. You know. One of the things
that I can say about whose books is that they help us structure our lessons, our teaching, our our, our,
our lessons, I can say. And.

They give us a sense of a curriculum, you know, all syllabus for, for for us to to to guide. So in the
coursebooks for example, we find lessons, we find, as I said, the syllables we find, the exercise, the
content, and how it is organized in a way that will somehow, you know, structure our lessons. And.
You know, I should say help us learn. I mean help the students learn systematically or in a systematic
manner.

So now as I said, for the, for the, for the, for the presentation, I use the, you know, a workbook, which
is, I mean a textbook, which is English, Oxford English. So basically the book is roughly of 20 20
pages. Sorry 2 , 200 pages and it is divided up in 10 units. And each of these units has got exercises
I mean, lessons ranging from one up to to to seven or six.

So, and…One thing to notice is that most of these coursebooks, they have they they they they
emphasize the grammar, the grammar aspect of it. And one thing to point out here about this is that
they have for example the less in the lessons you know, you find. You know the the topics, for
example comparative sentences I mean comparative and superlative as a topic, present continuous
and you know, adverbs.

So we see that these books, most of them, they have this idea of, you know, grammar. They emphasize
grammar. So in a very, in a very same, you know, in a very abridged way I could, I could say, I'll try
to talk about some advantages.

First, the first one I can mention is about the the, the functional, the framework or the syllabus. As I
said, OK, the books give us the syllabus in order for us to have a sense of progress, as one of the
authors point out, you know who, by the way, who was by the name of Nunan. So he points out that
the books, the coursebooks help us in having a sense of progress, for example, moving from one
lesson up to the other.

So, and the next part is, the next point of of…the next the next positive point is the coursebooks
themselves they they help us in, for example the the texts. Right? and the I can say the content, the

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text and the… you know the text. The the text and the the the illustrations that I that's what I wanted
to say. So they have the illustrations which which can help teachers you know meet their goals in the
text. For example, in case of a tech… of a of busy teachers. So this can help you know, you know
find for, for example those teachers who don’t have a way of making the test on their own, so it can
help in that way.

And the last part, the last, the last part about the positive you know aspects of coursebooks and the
teachers you know have have used is that the coursebook itself, it's aligned with the curriculum. We
know that you know in a formal education it's very important to to know our goals. You know, to
know where we are, you know to to know what we we are doing in terms of the goals and the
objectives. So because this book has got these units. So we can have a sense of goals and objectives
which are aligned with the curriculum.

So now I will be talking about the the second point, the third point, sorry, which is the the weaknesses
I can say… and something which teachers have to take into account. So here is where I try to answer
the the, the, you know, the point that teachers have been using the books ineffectively. And I also
want to mention that one of the things that justifies this this question that I raised here…

I mean, teachers should be able to analyze and assess the coursebooks and be able to, you know, make
necessary changes in order to meet their objectives. But right now, as I will be talking about, this is a
point I'll be mentioning later. So the first thing is the first thing about the weaknesses…it has to do
with you know the I can, I can say the the, the, the lack of functional, functional framework.

What is basically functional framework? When I talk about functional framework, I'm talking about
how we learn the language. For example, one of the objectives that we have when we learn the
language is to be able to communicate. So because the book has an over emphasis on grammar, it
makes it difficult for teachers. Oh Sorry. You know teachers do not understand the fact that it can be
very difficult for students you know to you know develop speaking skills and be able to communicate
because the book lacks the book lacks functional activities.

And again the over the over emphasis on on on on grammar which is something teachers have not
been able to you know to to to pinpoint is that you know there is no free production. You know in
those in most of those coursebooks there's no, for example activities like information care which help
you know you know the students to develop their speaking skill.

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So, and the second point about the weaknesses is that you know these books in terms of skill… For
example, when I talk about writing, it only gives for example, composition activities without
prompted language, you know, without prompted prompted expressions. I can say or expressions that
can give aid the students in writing the this ah…, you know their composition.

So in terms of listening, the problem has to do with you know teachers for example, one of the things
we could noticed is that teachers they they they rely on you know reading for students to listen making
it you know ineffective in in in in in many ways. So lacking this you know for example audio cassettes
and I mean CDs. So that's one of the point.

Now the other point about, for example about you know about reading, that's that's why I want to
come is, is that most of these books, most of these books do not contain an appropriate language for
the leaners. We do not have an appropriate language in terms of register. The register comes in high
and therefore it makes it very difficult for for students, for grade nine student. I should have pointed
out this to cope with the level of of of of you know, of register…thank you.

So having said that, now I will bring up, I'll bring, I'll, I'll come up, I'll bring up the, the, the, the, the
general recommendations about how can teachers use the books effectively.

So the first thing is we should… The first thing is a realization that the teacher should, should, should,
should reach which is they have to perceive books not only has a means of… or as, as as as the only
way to meet their objectives. So they should not understand book has the only way they can achieve
or they can meet their objectives because according to according to to Cunning… Cunningsworth.

She point... She points out that you know, the book have got… sorry, Alwright , not Cunningsworth,
Alwright. He points out that the books have a limited have a limited role in the learning and teaching
process. So we should, they should not view only the book has a means of, you know, achieving all
the...

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