Richards-Chapter 8-9

Richards -Chapter 8
This chapter talked about how materials fit into curriculum designs. Some forms of materials include authentic and created material. Depending on the curriculum and based on needs of learners, the material used should be used to meet goals of curriculum. If materials are not suitable, then they should be adaptable. The difference between authentic and created material is that authentic is not necessarily created for curricula and created material is. Examples of authentic material include: photos, magazine articles or clippings, and video clips. Created material includes text, workbooks, and other materials ordered by schools for student and/or teacher use.
This chapter helped differentiate the different material for me. It also gave some suggestions on how to use materials such as adapting them to fit needs of my learners. I especially like the evaluating textbook section here in this chapter. The section on the teachers in the program asked if teachers play a part in selection of the books they teach from. So far I do not know if teachers are asked to help select. I’m only aware of teacher committees to write and revise standards and assessments, but have not heard of committees that help in selecting material.
As for my connection and things I found useful in this chapter are the questions to ask to evaluate textbooks. I’m beginning to see how I can questions the curricula I create and/or use so that I meet the needs of my learners the best. This section provided some criteria and a checklist I can use that would help me focus on selecting material that best fits needs of the learners I teach. It also helps me in adapting material when creating lessons. Does this material meet the goals, aims, and objectives of the curriculum? Will the material stimulate and motivate? These are excellent questions to keep in mind as I spend valuable time piecing together material.



Richards, J. C. (2001). The role and design of instructional materials. In Curriculum development in language teaching. (pp. 251-284). New York: Cambridge University Press.

Richards- Chapter 9
This chapter talked about evaluation as a tool to see and rate how a program is doing in terms of doing what it was created to do from planning to implementation. There are three types of evaluations here which are Formative, Illuminative and Summative. Formative evaluation is a type of ongoing evaluation. Some questions to think about in this process include what is working, what is not, and what problems need to be addressed. Illumative evaluation is an action research evaluation and seeks to answer things like the different aspects of a program work or how they are being implemented. Summative evaluation seeks to evaluate programs after the implementations. Some questions this seeks to ask include how effective, what students learned, how well was program received by teacher and learners, and how appropriate were the teaching methods.
The section I most liked is the audience for evaluation. This provided a nice evaluation process or questions to ask from all interested parties, including students, teachers, curriculum developers, administrators, and sponsors. If anything I will remember to ask myself these types of questions when planning, while implementing, and after implementation of any programs I use and/or material used to carry out the lessons.
The other thing I liked from this chapter was a little refresher on the Qualitative and Quantitative types of research. This helped remind me of the types of methods I can use in research. This chapter outlines the advantages and disadvantages of the methodologies used. It was a nice blast to the past.

Richards, J. C. (2001). Approaches to evaluation. In Curriculum development in language teaching. (pp.286-309). New York: Cambridge University Press.