Job Discussion Forums

[nomadder]

How much say do you have in the textbooks at your school? I could pick anything at the eikaiwas I worked at but of course I waited till we finished the one they had usually.

My favorite picks by the end of my job were-from kindergarten up:

Alphabet Starters-Thomson
Mr. Bug's Phonics-Oxford
Up and Away-Oxford
Firsthand Access and Success-Longman
Impact series-Longman

I didn't like Interchange but maybe the new one is better. I despised Finding Out but always got stuck with it at least for the phonics study or because it was in use at the school.

[shmooj]

Despise Let's Go & Interchange more than you would care to hear
Tolerate Finding Out 1 but had to work hard to supplement it
Love Language in Use for adults though the Beginner book is a bit lame
Appreciate Clockwise for adults though it is a bit thin and the listening is very tough sometimes

[unchi pants]

Interchange must be one of the most hated text books around... Funny that it's so popular!

You can add me to the list of Interchange haters aswell.

Shmooj, what in particular do you hate about the book? For me, it's those moronic dialogues with those ghastly accents. I cringed everytime I heard it. I found the book a lot more bearable when I broke the CD!

I have since used Interchange and don't mind it so much, as long as it's supplemented with LOTS of other stuff. Some units are disgusting but others not so bad.

As far as kids books go ... American Start With English would have to be at the top of the hate list. Shoot the author!

Unchi Pants

[shmooj]

Unchi... I hate Interchange because it is pure marketing hype. It is bland, stuck in a timewarp, written by a man who himself should stick to jsut writing books about theory and, did I mention, pure marketing hype.

It is middle of the road. It has almost zero interesting texts in it, the listening is so badly acted out that it is cringeworthy and, did I mention, it is pure marketing hype.

It is a perfect example of a publisher setting out to dominate the textbook market by producing something that will offend no one and cater for a bit of everyone. In doing so it is a bland as leftover cardboard. But it sells because it is inoffensive and pure marketing hype (did I mention that)

I refuse to buy into it.

IMHO, an adult text is worthwhile if it passes what I call the TEacher Test. i.e. if a teacher actually wants to read it for more than 23 seconds, it is worth a look. One glimpse into badly illustrated Interchange will indicate that the graphic editor should have been sent to work in a slaughter house. Pick up one of the CLockwise texts or Language in Use and you find yourself wanting to read the articles and do some of the activities yourself (or maybe I'm just that sad )

[Lynn]

This thread could be posted on the main page.

I have worked at 6 schools in New York City and 4 of them use Interchange. I don't mind the listening. The students love it. I don't like the order of the book, though. It is very illogical and expects students to know things that haven't been taught yet. I use the Intro and level 1 books. Intro has so much new vocabulary thrown in there that I can't even explain the grammar point. I do a lot of this in my classes, "okay, everyone, close your books" and I do my own thing. (We cover 1-2 pages in a 2 hour lesson)

The other schools I worked at used Lado. Has anyone else used these books? What do you think?

I haven't heard of the other books mentioned on this thread. Lastly, I found "American Ways" an interesting book.

[nomadder]

Lynn I thought about posting in Gen.Dis but thought alot of the books may be targeted specifically to Japan or Asia.

I remember using Interchange 1 and the student was so frustrated by the fast pace of the listening exercises.

[Reesy]

Shmooj, leave poor Jack Richards alone! While he might be better suited to writing books on ELT theory, his textbook writing shows he also has a firm grasp of economic theory, namely utilitarian supply and demand .

Nomadder raises an interesting point about the textbook market in Japan and Asia. JALT and the ETJ Expos showcased a variety of Japan-specific books. MacMillan and Longman are two publishers that write a lot of books for this market. What does everybody think about the books targeted specifically for Japan and Asia. Has anybody used them? What did you think? Good? Bad?

[Gordon]

There is a new one from Oxford called "Identity", geared for young Japanese. It looks good and I'm going to order it for a class or two in my university this spring. I'll see if it works as well with a class.

[shmooj]

[Brooks]

Identity is good. Passport is not bad.
Fifty-Fifty 2 worked well. The other books are not as good, especially the intro book.
J-Talk has a few good chapters but overall, it could be better.

Transitions sucked.
I would like to use Headway, but it would be too hard for my students.

I like the Impact listening series too.

[shmooj]

I agree with Brooks re J-Talk especially with the wierd vocab they put in there even in vocab lists (skull ) and also re Passport. The illustrations are fabulous to use even as stand alone conversation materials.

Impact Grammar (Ellis) I also found to be good because it is inductive which makes a change (from Interchange!)

[TokyoLiz]

One of my favorites is Headway starter, elementary and lower intermediate. The lesson progressions are easy to follow, the teachers book has lots of information gap activities and the content is relevant and interesting.

The only problem is that they were British. Now there is an American Headway series and it's not bad at all.

I used Interchange a lot when I was teaching international groups of students, but I'd shy away from it in Japan. I find that in each unit, the skills are not very thoroughly presented - you get a little tepid grammar bit, some sentence matching and then a little pronunciation stuff, and then a reading at the back. For a mixed skills class (reading, writing, listening and speaking) the books are alright. However, I wouldn't dare use them in eikaiwa. They just aren't built for a conv. curriculum.

So, what's good? I really like the Cutting Edge series because it first introduces the context, vocabulary and learning goals, and then gives the students clearly-defined tasks to do using the target language. They're really pretty, with lots of graphics. However the listenings are fast and almost exclusively British. Not to knock British English, but many of your Japanese pupils are funny about American English.

I liked Jtalk, but it's aimed at mostly young people, so it has a limited appeal if you're teaching to a variety of ages. I found the listening sections clear and well-organized.

[Reesy]

Okay, we're getting lots of opinions about different texts that are available and besides the universal disdain for Interchange, no other books seem to be standing out for purely positive or negative reasons. This would be expected considering the various backgrounds of people on this board and the fact that we all teach different courses within varying curriculums for a diverse group of employers. That being said, I want to try and establish some common ground. I realize that this is virtually impossible. Nonetheless...

I think the majority of us teach at least 1 conversation/communication-based class per week. So, my two questions are these:

1. If you had to choose one textbook for the following classes (choose the one that best applies to your situation), which one would you choose? Why?

1. Senior High School OCB/OCA (Oral Communciation) (20-30 students)
2. Eikaiwa low intermediate conversation with no one under 16 years-old (about 10 students)
3. 1st year university communication/conversation (20-30 students)

2. What, if anything, do you think is lacking in Japanese conversation textbook syllabi? In other words, is there anything that you think the students need from their texts but aren't getting (i.e. more grammar, graded vocab, pretty pictures, a stimulant drug stapled to the back, etc.)

[kamome]

[Gordon]

I think it is more than a little vocabulary changes. As a Cdn, I too prefer the American Headway to the British one.