Results and Discussion of Experimental Test 3: Choosing an English

Choosing an English Coursebook by Using GRA-AHP Method

When it comes to English language teaching materials, it is always difficult for schools and teachers to decide which published coursebook should be used in the classroom. It is always difficult for the teachers to have consensus in coursebook selection. However, coursebook has always been the main basis interaction between teachers and students (Ellis, 1997; Iakovos, 2011; Richards, 2001). For teachers, coursebook is the main basis of lesson plans and teaching resource (Ellis, 1997; Iakovos, 2011; Richards, 2001; Ur, 1991). Because there is a well-organized content and varieties of activities in the coursebook, teachers understand what to teach and how to teach clearly (Ellis, 1997;

Iakovos, 2011; Richards, 2001). For students, they can read the content in the coursebook and increase their learning motivation (Ellis, 1997; Iakovos, 2011;

Richards, 2001). Since coursebook plays such an important role in the classroom, teachers need to find a solution to choose the coursebook (Kuzu, Akbulut and Şahin, 2007). Due to the coursebook selection may influence students’ English learning, how to choose the suitable one seems to be more crucial (Chambers, 1997; Cunningsworth, 1995; McGrath, 2002; Miekley, 2005; Tok, 2010).

There are some criteria need to be considered when choose the coursebook;

for example, methodology, suitability for the target group, supplementary materials, exercise variety (Cunningsworth, 1995). Besides, some researchers use the evaluation, like the impressionistic method, the checklist method, and

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the in-depth method to evaluate the coursebook (McGrath, 2002). However, these methods are not objective enough due to they are based on teacher’s judgment, and there are few math models being applied to count the weightings of coursebook selection criteria (Miekley, 2005; Tok, 2010). Therefore, in order to find the coursebook, the methods of GRA, AHP and GSP are used in this paper to present the evaluation process and give the criteria weightings in a qualitative way.

The experiment aims to find a more objective method for choosing an English coursebook; therefore, the researcher decides to interview 12 experienced university English teachers. Method of AHP is then used to count the consistency of interviewed items. Next, the gamma value of each teacher and English coursebook selection criteria are calculated by using GRA. Finally, method of GSP is applied to present the ordinal results of teachers’ opinions and English coursebook selection criteria while GSM presents the choosing path in clear figures, respectively.

First of all, 12 experienced university English teachers are chosen as research subjects. The main reason of choosing them is because they have a lot of English teaching experience, and they have the cognitive awareness of English coursebooks. The subjects are coded as P( A) to P(L) in Table 4.5.

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Table 4.5 The coding information of professionals

Professionals Working experiences Professional area

)

P 6 years Applied Linguistics

) (D

P 14 years Applied Linguistics

) (E

P 10 years Applied Linguistics

) coursebook selection criteria (Chambers, 1997; Cunningsworth, 1995; Iakovos, 2011; McGrath, 2002; Miekley, 2005; Tok, 2010), and they are coded as I(1) to I(5) in Table 4.6.

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Table 4.6 Coursebook selection criteria items Coursebook selection

criteria items ( I)

Description

) 1 (

I General knowledge Learning styles, learning strategies, aims, culture in the coursebook.

) 2 (

I Variety tasks The tasks need to be appropriate for different learning situations and meet learners’ needs.

Also, there should be some authentic tasks.

) 3 (

I Additional resources available

Supplementary materials, like powerpoint, video, computers or anything which is suitable for self-study.

) 4 (

I Practical considerations Affordable or multi-level.

) 5 (

I Content Be relevant to the teaching goal, teaching methods, roles of teacher and learner, and curriculum design.

Through the three principles: non-dimension, scaling and polarization, the decision-making matrix can be constructed. In order to find out the order of they are shown in Table 4.7 (Satty, 1986, 1990, 2008).

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The collected data of professionals and English coursebook selection criteria are calculated by using GRA method. Next, the gamma values of each factor can be obtained and put into order. The ordinal results are listed in Table 4.8 and Table 4.9, respectively. The ordinal numbers of professionals are:

)

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Table 4.8 LGRA-P ordinal

Professionals gamma Professionals gamma ordinal

P(A) 0.017 P(B) 0 12

(Raw data) (Ordinal data)

Table 4.9 LGRA-I ordinal

Item Gamma Item Gamma Ordinal

(Raw data) (Ordinal data)

The ordinal numbers of coursebook selection criteria are:

) experiment can be generated, which is also the analytical figure (please see Fig.

4.12).

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Fig. 4.12 GSP of English coursebook chosen

According to Fig. 4.12, the most important item of choosing the English coursebook is the content, followed by variety tasks, additional resources available, practical considerations and general knowledge. The criteria order of choosing English coursebook can be summarized in Table 4.10.

Table 4.10 The criteria order of choosing English coursebook

Coding numbers Ordinal Item description

I(1) 5 General knowledge

I(4) 4 Practical considerations

I(3) 3 Additional resources available

I(2) 2 Variety tasks

I(5) 1 Content

Moreover, the GSM structure can be established in Fig. 4.13, and it presents a complete and systematic graph of English coursebook choosing path.

0, I(1)

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1 . 0

5 . 0 1













I(1) I(4)

I(3) I(2)

I(5)

Level Ⅱ Level Ⅰ

Level Ⅲ context-relevance

practical considerations

support teaching and learning

Fig. 4.13 GSM of English coursebook choosing path

Based on the results, it seems like from a pedagogic perspective, a clear content which is relevant to the teaching goal, teaching methods, roles of teacher and learner, and curriculum design is still the most important item among teachers. Then students’ needs are taken into consideration (e.g.

different learning situations, self-study) due to they are related to students’

learning directly. The least important items are practical considerations and general knowledge which show that the price of the coursebook and the learning styles in the coursebook are less important than the other criteria when choose the coursebook. Probably it is because the teachers can always adapt the coursebook to meet their learners’ needs.

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