The Salvadorians Junior High schoolers´ language learning materials design and

application.

The creations of adequate ELT (English Language Teaching) materials are

planned by designers within a particular context, from which they choose a certain
framework. The framework of language teaching then subdivides into context and
syllabus. The ELT (English Language Teaching) materials are embedded within
this context. The explicit statement of goals concerning a given language teaching
program me comes from this context. The selection of the syllabus´ framework, for
its constructing, comes from this statement of goals. Then, you´ve to keep in mind
that the selection of the appropriate type of syllabus content have implications in
the planning and designing of a course structure; the selection and design of ELT´s
(English Language Teaching) materials; the teaching method approaches; the
classroom management methods; the selection of content in lesson planning; the
evaluations criteria in tests and assessments and so forth. An attempt will be made
to compare the design and use of ELT (English Language Teaching) materials as a
help to future teachers; so they can recognize the principles behind them.

What relevance could have the learning to compare the different design and uses
of ELT (English Language Teaching) materials´ and principles for the future
teachers in their own contexts?

Firstly, the Junior High´s ELT (English Language Teaching) education in El

Salvador is based mainly on the Communicative Approach Teaching Method. The
Salvadorians functional-notional syllabuses are based on the Communicative
Approach Teaching Method. The communicative language teaching approach uses
certain materials; among its materials, we have the: Authentic Materials and the
Task-Based Materials. The practitioners of Communicative Language Teaching
view materials as a way of influencing the quality of classroom interaction and
language use. The EFL´s (“English as a Foreign Language", is a term used, mainly
to talk about students [whose first language is not English] learning English while
living in their own country). The uses of textbooks like the one of Jo McDonough
are of help to conduct an internal and external evaluation on the how the material
has been organized. The teacher is provided by it with a way of forming his/her
own criteria about the material. Let´s take for example, McDonough´s point of view
on the communicative language teaching method approach where he states:

1- “it is important to realize that ´communicative´ can in fact refer to all four
language skills”. (McDonough, Shaw & Masuhara, 2013) (pageNo.30,
paragraph No.3) ;however the English Syllabus for Junior High in the El
Salvador´s curriculum; in its methodological guideline No.1, states that
 2- “The communicative approach emphasizes comprehension and negotiation
of meaning more than production of structures” (English Syllabus Third Cycle
of Basic Education, 2008) (pageNo.16)

The El Salvadoran syllabuses´ are giving more priority to comprehension (reading

and listening skills) and to negotiation of meaning (speaking skill) than to the
writing skill in their stated hierarchical order. Yet, please note that they both make
comments on the four macro skills of the language.

Secondly, the syllabuses for Junior High´s ELT (English Language

Teaching) education in El Salvador are based on the functional-notional type of
syllabuses. This means that the El Salvarean English course is based on language
functions and not grammatical structures in its content´s items. (English Syllabus
Third Cycle of Basic Education, 2008) (p.59). The Jo McDonough´s Materials and
Methods in ELT textbook has also made mention of this type of syllabus in her
illustration of syllabus organization principle, (McDonough, Shaw & Masuhara,
2013) (p.13). She claims that the purpose in selecting a type of syllabus is so that
an appropriate and relevant syllabus be chosen for the intended learners and
situation.

Thirdly, McDonough also considered learners as one of various contextual

factors and examined eleven aspects to be considered concerning learners. These
are: Age,Interests,Level of proficiency in English,Aptitude,Mother tongue,
Academic and Educational level, Attitudes to learning, to teachers, to the
institution, to the target language itself, and to its speakers,Motivation,Reasons for
learning, Preferred learning styles, Personality. Another contextual factor he
considered and referred to was Setting. It refers to the teaching working
environment. It includes the teacher, the classroom, the institution, the education
system and the society and it´s particular culture at a given time and place. Under
these varying variables of contextual factors, which influence course planning,
syllabus design, selection of materials and resources, and the appropriateness of
methods; she lists another twelve variables: The role of English in the country, the
role of English in the school, and its place in the curriculum, the teachers,
Management and Administration, Resources available, Support personnel, the
number of pupils to be taught and the size of classes, time available for the
programme,both over a working year, and over any given week or term, Physical
environment, The socio-cultural environment, the type of tests used, and the ways
in which students are being evaluated and the assessment procedures, and
Procedures (if any) for monitoring and evaluating the language teaching program
itself. It is under this complex network of interrelated factors that teachers in the
front line make attempts to promote learning and at the same time fulfill the
curriculum´s goals.

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 Fourthly, the writer paid a visit to a local middle school to observe the
teacher giving a class for a period. The English teacher filled in with the fact that
class he was about to present was a continuation of a previous class about the
verb to be in the present progressive tense. The teacher humbly showed me his
lesson exercises on his telephone screen. He was going to have the class do these
exercises as practice. As in the previous class he had already given the students a
list of the verbs that were going to be used in the class for that day, he said. He
then, proceeded to write these exercises on the chalkboard and explained to the
students how the exercises were going to be completed in class. He went around
the classroom aisles showing a wordless book and started to ask questions to the
ninth grade students about what they thought the pictures in the wordless book
were describing. It was his idea of getting them to talk using what you can say was,
the TPR (Total Body Physical Response). Or the Notional-Functional syllabus
approach. In what included the CLT (Communicative Language Teaching)
approach as the McDonough´s textbook view on it can refer to all four language
skills. Page. #30, paragraph 3. He then, spends the rest of the teaching hour
correcting the spelling and sentence structures on the exercises given to the
students for practice on the use of the present progressive. It was obvious that the
students were learning slowly, but surely. To correct their writing skill the teacher
used the Grammar-Translation teaching method. He translated the grammar rules
in the target language to their first language when needed. The teacher said that
this was one before the last class for that unit. Since the class was observed in
September, it was probably the last or one before the last unit of the year. And out
of the twenty eight students of the class all but one show to be proficient for their
level according to the syllabus. There was clearly a drastic contrast between the
syllabuses and the real learning results. Since there was nothing wrong with the
learning material design. The marked differences have to come from the syllabus
and setting.

Conclusions

Over the last few years there seem to be an apparent increase of enthusiasm over
the way students can learn English. As a result the syllabuses reflect an increased
degree of difficulty in the expected learning from the mined. The increased
complexity in the learning goals is attributed to a certain point, to the failure in the
achieving of proficiency, and of the scaffolding technique of teaching. The students
are also not offered with enough motivation as they probably can´t see how the
learning of this new language has relevance in their everyday life and future in our
country. The right decision making may lie in the opportunities the country can
create for our students and teachers are able to see English learning as a
meaningful task. Where the learning activities will be enjoyable and financially

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profitable or promising. As for now, state´s investment in education as reflected in
the national spending budget is minimum?

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Bibliography

1-McDonough, J., Shaw, C., & Masuhara, H. (2013). Materials and Methods in ELT
(3rd ed., p. un rango de paginas entre ellas la numero 30). Oxford: John Wiley & Sons,
Inc.

2- Ministerio de Educación. (2008). English Syllabus Third Cycle of Basic Education

(1st ed., p. Un rango de páginas en las que se puede encontrar la #16). San Salvador.