Page:Adapting and Writing Language Lessons.pdf/385

CHAPTER 7 others. The degree to which a given text is realistic of course depends on the students with whom it is to be used. Recipes will be more realistic for (unliberated!) girls than for (unliberated!) boys; texts on animal husbandry will be very realistic for a few groups of students, but unrealistic for most. Folk stories are comparatively unrealistic for everyone, except insofar as listening to and telling such stories constitutes an essential social grace or an intrinsic pleasure.

The fourth criterion relates to 'transparency' (p. 48):

4. How many new words does the text contain? How easy will it be to explain the meanings of new words, either by gesture,or by paraphrasing in words that the students already know? Will unfamiliar grammatical constructions cause trouble?

SOURCES OF MICROTEXTS

Microtexts may be taken from outside sources: cookbooks, radio broadcasts, etc. newspapers, A simple example, useful with students who expect to discuss food and nutrition in Shona, is the following (Muswe ., 1956):

Apo mukaka unoregerwa uchirara, mangwana unofuma une mafuta awo ese ari pamusoro. Kuti mukabvisa mafuta aya, unosara wacho, ndiwo mukaka unonzi. Kune mashini inobvisa mafuta mumukaka nenzira yekugaya. Mukaka unosara, tinoudayidza kuti mukaka wakagayiwa, kana usina mafuta.

[When milk is left to stand, the next morning all