Page:Adapting and Writing Language Lessons.pdf/63

CHAPTER 3

'Does it carry its own weight by means of the rewards that it makes available?' As we pointed out in Chapter 1 (p. 23f), rewards may be of at least five different kinds; they be valid in terms of the values of the learner, and not of the materials writer only.

In the evaluation of an entire course, concern about strength will lead to such questions as:

Is the content relevant to the present and likely future needs of the trainees?

Does the textbook provide for the tools, both in vocabulary and in structure, that students will need in order to reach whatever goal has been set?

Are the materials authentic both linguistically and culturally?

Looking at a single lesson from the same point of view, one may ask:

Will the students derive from this lesson satisfactions that go beyond the mere feeling of having mastered one more lesson, and being ready for the next? (see below, p. 54f, and Chapter 1, pp. 23f.)

In particular, to what extent will the students be able to use the content of this lesson immediately, in a lifelike way?

On the smallest scale, a sentence like 'your horse had been old' (cited by Jespersen, 1904) is weak to the point of being feeble, because there is no situation in which anyone can use it. The cliché 'The book is on the table' is stronger, because the situations in which it be used are fairly frequent. But we must distinguish between the ease with which a situation can be created in the classroom, and the frequency with which it actually gets