Materials
Development Tutorial Task Week 2
A. Watch Jeremy Short’s
presentation on his take of materials development.
Please take note on the reasons he created the materials and the
characteristics of his materials. Which principles for materials development
did Short apply when producing his materials?
He created the materials because students often complain of textbooks
being boring and he is trying to follow the changes that are taking place in
the education system nowadays. His materials are mostly, based on his
background or his interest back when he was a student.
Principle 1- Materials should achieve impact or in other words, be able
to attract learner’s curiosity, interest and attention. Short uses graphic
novels to replace the conventional textbooks. This will surely be able to
attract students’ interest as the elements are new and fresh to them. The
presentation of his materials is attractive as he inserts more usage of
graphics rather than words into the content. Often, learners find images easier
to remember compared to words as they are coloured and have different shapes/
criteria.
Principles 3- Materials should help learners to develop confidence.
Short developed the graphic novels which are stimulating and motivating to some
learners. They may be able to understand graphics better than words. Besides,
it is easier for them to remember a story based on images/pictures compared to
words. His materials can help learners to develop their existing
extra-linguistic skills such as being imaginative, creative or analytical.
Principle 4- What is being taught should be perceived by learners as
relevant and useful. Materials that learners can easily relate to are the best
in helping to learn. Often, learners will pay more attention to learn something
that may be useful to them and it is easier for them to understand learning if
the examples used are situations that they are familiar with. For instance,
Short implemented the idea of using research in franchising and family business
to teach entrepreneurial concepts to business major students. This could turn
out to be an effective way of teaching as most people can easily relate to how
the theories are applied into real life situations (business field).
Principle 15- Materials should maximize learning potential by
encouraging intellectual, aesthetic and emotional involvement which stimulates
both right and left brain activities. Graphic novel can help to stimulate both
left and right brain activities. This is because it is a story-based learning
and this can help to stimulate learner’s thoughts or feelings. For instance,
Short uses the story of Garcon to teach management/ business. There is a
possibility the learners will be able to relate the story to their real life
experiences and thus capturing their interest in reading more about it. A
simulation as mentioned by Short is also an activity that may stimulate
learners’ brain activities and awaken their certain senses in learning.
Crawford’s Principle 7- Materials need to be flexible to cater to
individual and contextual differences. It is important for teachers to recognize
different learners’ background, experiences, and learning styles. This is to
ensure that the objective of teaching will be achieved at the end of the
lesson. Short created the graphic textbooks as he believes that this would be the
best way of learning based on his background experience.
B. Design and complete the
following diagram.
As future language teachers, developing language learning materials will
become as aspect of your teaching career. Design a diagram on the aspects
influencing materials development using the provided key words.
First
of all, everything will be started off with the country’s vision. This is
because different countries have different
cultures and their main language or mother tongue may vary due to their
race. Certain country has certain goal that they would like to achive in their
education system. In Malaysia, students are encouraged to learn English as a
Second Language.
From
the country’s vision, the curriculum goal and objectives will be created and
establised. The resources of all countries may differ from one and another. For
instance, under-developed countries like South Africa might not be able to
provide the latest or in trend Information Technologies (ITs) for their
education system. So, their syllabus and curriculum in the English Language
will definitely be different compared to in Malaysia which is considered a
developing country.The English Language Curriculum in Malaysia is created based
on the culture and it is based more on the Communicative Language Teaching
(CLT) approach. In addition, the parent’s goals are also set after the
country’s vision. They will want their children to be someone who can help the
country in achieving the vision and at the same time being somebody the nation
will be proud of.
Principles
of teaching and learning should be based on the curricculum goal. The principles
are to be implemented on the whole education system in the country. The
principles of Second Language Acquisition (SLA) will also be integrated into
the education system. Materials used by teachers and learners are to be created
based on the two principles.This is because learners’ attitude in learning a
second language may vary according to theories such as Behaviorist, Innatist
and Interactionist.
From those
two principles, teachers will come up with different materials in teaching the
English Language to suit the learners’ proficiency levels. Syllabus for the
English Language will be based on the two principles. The textbook or teaching
tools will be created in accordance to the theories. For instance, materials
such as media (songs, movies, videos, magazines and etc) is suitable for
learners who learn a language based on Interactionist theory. Materials can be developed according to the
objective of the teachers with a lesson plan as the guidance along the lesson.
Next,
all schools‘ administration are to set their aim and objectives in accordance to
the syllabus which is based on the two principles. All schools in the country
should have a uniform guideline in setting their schools’ objectives and aims. The
materials that are developed under the two principles will be introduced to all
the schools in the country. This can ensure learners will be able to achieve
the same “outcomes” no matter which school they are going to attend. Besides
that, the parents’ goals might also affect the schools’ objectives and aims. This
is because most parents are likely to want their children attending a better
school. So, most schools will try to set their objectives and aims higher in
order to alleviate their reputation among parents.
From
the school administration, the teacher’s belief and rational should be based on
the schools’s administration which is mostly shaped by the Principles of
Teaching and Learning as well as SLA.They should be able to determine and
decide what to teach to the students and at the same time designing a lesson
plan that may help them to achieve or obey the principles set by the
government. Next, learners will be learning their lesson with teachers who may
use different types of materials. This way, teachers will be able to apply the
theory of second language acquisition into their teaching. The materials used
in teaching can be designed according to the students’ interests. Teachers may
prepare a simple quiz to assess the students’ current proficiency level first. Then teachers may carry out their lesson plans
according to the syllabus but they will have to alter them in accordance to the
students’ current learning abilities. After attending a few lessons they will
be tested again. Their language quiz, test or assessment will be based on what
they have learnt in class and may include some problem based task or field work
rather than the traditional way of just answering on papers.
Leanza’s reflection:
Through
completing this tutorial task A, I can have a clear image about the principles
of materials development (principles of second language acquisition and
principles of teaching and learning) are essential for developing materials.
The educators can apply those principles while developing the language teaching
and learning materials. Short has introduced the graphic novel which I found it
is useful for the learners as they are not only watching a comic but also
access the language learning at the same time. The classroom environment will
be very condusive and learners are willing to learn more as the materials
chosen by teachers or educators in classroom is interesting and engaging. The
learners can therefore perform well and be responsive throughout the whole
lesson, which is nowadays a rare scene in our daily classrooms.
For my
opinion, learners nowadays have many distraction surrounding them and they are
not able to concentrate on study or paying attention in class. Thus, the
teachers are facing the difficulties to make sure learners learn something from
them in class. Therefore, the application of the technology such as graphic
novel is creative and it might grasp learners’ attention and eventually they
are willing to pay attention in class and to learn. Short’s graphic novel also
included the requirement of learners to think what will happen in the next for
the stories provided in the graphic novel. This will be a good approach to
develop learners’ critical thinking skills and imaginative and creativity as
well despite of them being responsive.
Apart
from that, the stories with the real life experience of the main characters
lead to the feeling of authenticity of the learners. This causes them to relate
it to their own life experience and thus excite their curiosity and eventually
encouraged them to continue the reading.
Conclusively,
I learnt a lot from Short’s video after relating it to the principles of
materials development. What I can say is when it comes to language learning
materials developent, many criteria need to be under the educators’
consideration. For my opinion, educators should not only consider about the
appropriateness of the language learning materials and learners’ different
learning styles but the educators should always have passion in teaching. For
me, if a teacher is not passionatein teaching, definitely he or she will not
consider about learners’ learning condition but just want to finish the
syllabus provided by the Minister of Education as soon as possible. Finally, I
would like to give it to an end by saying that passionate teaching is essential
in order to create a successful learner.
For
the second task (task B) for the tutorial task week 2, we are required to
design a diagram about the aspects influencing the materials development.
Almost all of the groups in our class have different opinions about the
arrangement of the keywords related to the aspect influencing the materials
development. When our group members are having discussion about the
arrangement, we are having argument as well with our different opinions. Some
of us think that parents’ goal will affect the country’s vision. However, we eventually
agree with the parents’ goal is affected by country’s vision and at the same
time it affects the school administration’s aims and objectives. This is
because our group think that the parents have rights to choose a school or
learning environment which can lead their children to a better academic
performance. Thus, when they are making the selections, the schools’
administration aims and objectives are taken under their consideration.
Moreover,
we had another argument about the arrangement of the keywords again. Some of us
think that the test and assessment should be placed after the learners. Yet,
some of us think that the assessment and test should be placed twice in this
diagram as before the teachers start to develop any teaching and learning materials,
the learners’ current ability and proficiency level are needed to be tested in
order to have a clear image about their current level. Furthermore, there will
diffier in learning attitudes and styles as well among the learners in the same
class. After accessing the developed materials, the class are tested again in
order to see whether there’s improvement so the materials are evaluated whether
those are reliable or credible or not. Our group ended up the discussion about
the placement by making a cycle on those keywords(teachers’ rationale and
belief, learners, test and assessment).
For my
opinion, the diagram and the explanation clearly explained the aspects
influencing materials development. Not to mention that the important aspects-
two principles of materials development( principles of second language acquisition
and principles of teaching and learning) are vital for the development of
materials. These two principles should
be taken into consideration whenever teachers are developing a suitable
langugage learning materials. The flexibility, reliability, appropriateness as
others of the materials in order to support language learning are required to
be measured before the materials are developed and applied to the classroom
thus eventually producing successful learners.
This picture is
taken while we were having discussion about the tutorial task week 2.
