Abstract

Summary

Introduction and Theories

Objectives and Methodology

We aim to show/analyze/study how North Star 5 - Listening and

Speaking, 3rd edition, attends to Brian Tomlinson’s principles 2 and 3 of effective

materials development in contrast to the great majority of commercial

coursebooks.

Presentation of the Coursebook

PREISS, Sherry. NorthStar 5 - Listening and Speaking. 3rd Edition. New

York: Pearson Longman, 2009.

The coursebook NorthStar 5 – Listening and Speaking, of English

advanced level, is basically composed by a welcome page of introduction,

followed by the approach and the principles that guide the coursebook, and a

section that explains the different focuses - Focus on the Topic; Focus on

Listening; Focus on Speaking - of the material, how they are formed and how

each focus works within the units. Still in this preliminary part, there is an

explanation of the components of the material – teacher’s manual and

achievement tests; DVD; companion website -, end, at last, an elucidation on

‘MyNorthStarLab’, an online learning and assessment program, how it works

and its key features.

In the sequence, there is the ‘Scope and Sequence’, containing all the 10

units of the book, and what each of them is supposed to bring and arouse

concerning the theme developed by the unit, critical thinking, listening and

speaking skills, vocabulary, grammar and pronunciation. (REVIEW 2 FIRST

PARAGRAPHS)

In the very beginning of the 3rd edition of NorthStar 5 – Listening and

Speaking, there is an exclusive page of welcome to the prospective students,

which covers what the book is capable of motivating and the special features of

its third edition.

It is first presented to the forthcoming students that NorthStar motivates

them to be successful in their academic as well as their personal language

goals. Therefore, it is possible to notice here an initial concern that will be

present and developed throughout the book, regarding the student’s

individuality, their personal perspective of language and intended achievements

(“personal language goals”, PREISS, p.4), and also, a special concern related

to an academic environment in which these students may be involved with and

possibly taking place in.

It is claimed that in all levels of the NorthStar series, up to the highest

one, level 5 (? CHECK), the two great strands developed - Reading and Writing

and Listening and Speaking – offer a fully integrated approach for both students

and teachers. In the case of the material considered in the present analysis, the

attention is on the second great strand, that is, on listening and speaking.

The page of welcome to NorthStar reserves a large part of it to present

what makes the third edition of the book so special, content that is brought in

four major subdivisions.

‘New Themes’, the first subdivision, is considered special, since the book

is alleged to be updated and to convey a variety of genres, in authentic context,

what, according to the author, challenge students intellectually. This concern

about bringing authentic and updated material is also present in Tomlinson

(2010), the main theoretician considered in this paper, when he considers that it

is fundamental that language learners be in contact with authentic and

meaningful language in use.

The second element presented in this section is entitled ‘Academic

Skills’. The author states here that in this new edition there is a more purposeful

integration of critical thinking and an improved focus on academic skills, such as

inferencing and synthesizing, preparing students for success in the classroom

and in standardized tests. We soon understand that the main purposes

presented and intended by the author, and possibly, by the book series (?), are

to give instruments and possibilities to stimulate critical thinking and enhance

students’ skills about elements that would be necessary in taking standardized

tests, and as a consequence, preparing them for an eventual academic

atmosphere. Once again, it is preparing students to deal with real-life situations,

with significant instruments for those circumstances.

The third aspect exposed is the ‘New Design’ of the third edition. Here it

is revealed the importance of full color pages, with a greater number of

illustrations, pictures and graphic organizers, in fostering student engagement

and in making the contents more realistic. It’s important to point out that the

aesthetic issue is openly visible when it comes to the design of the material and

the emotional involvement that it generates, being it positive or negative. This

idea of stimulating aesthetical, intellectual and emotional involvement is a worry

much present in Tomlinson and very appreciated by him while presented in one

of the principles of language acquisition, in his Principles of effective materials

development (2010).

And the last feature presented in this section is ‘MyNorthStarLab’. The

author brings here the online learning and assessment program, which provides

students with exclusivities, such as original activities to build academic

vocabulary and to promote pronunciation practice using voice recording tools. It

also offers focused test preparation to help students succeed in international

exams as TOEFL® and IELTS®, with instant feedback and personalized study

plans, for instance. The program helps teachers too, by including flexible

gradebook and authoring features that give them the control of content and help

them track student progress. Thus, it increases the possibility of students being

in contact with the target language of their studies, preparing them for

international recognized exams and helps teachers to be in contact with

students and students’ productions outside classroom, what is significant and

facilitator in present times, when people are frequently connected to each and

connected with the world through the usage of technology.

Talk about the NorthStar approach and principles that guide it

The Unit is divided into:

1 Focus on the Topic

2 Focus on Listening

3 Focus on Speaking

(as we find in Welcome to NorthStar, pages 6 to 10)

- Why we did the choice we did

We selected North Star 5 - Listening and Speaking because it clearly

attends to Tomlinson’s principles 2 and 3. One of the principles of this material

is: The more profoundly students are stimulated intellectually and emotionally,

the more language they will use and retain. As we can see, the connection to

Tomlinson is unquestionable. Is this too strong to say?

Research on this connection? – both Erica and Cris I guess..

Besides, and because of principles 2 and 3, North Star 5 - Listening and

Speaking opposes itself to the majority of materials that we understand as

commercial coursebooks. In this context, we take the former as “an opportunity

to go deeper into the language, thus also in the subject” and the latter

(commercial coursebooks) as superficial, especially in and for the subject.

For the part above is possible to cite English Language Learning

Materials – A Critical Review by Tomlinson.

- What we understand from\as commercial materials - Cris

I’ll leave this part as it was because what is here is useful for

commercials materials anyway.

We thought about using pattern of commercial materials

The Wise Up Series - Book 4 clearly sells itself as it carries the name of a

language school. As any kind of enterprise, the material and the school possess

a slogan: “Inglês Inteligente” which means in a way that the others are not

bright at all !!! rsrs

It presents itself to the learners as a material that works with the most

new methodology in language learning and etc.

Description of the (Coursebooks – or units?) and Analysis

No changes in this part yet.

- North Star 5 - Listening and Speaking

The units of North Star are built on a theme, thus listening and speaking

parts are totally interconnected.

For our analysis we selected unit 6 - Spiritual Renewal because it

explicits the focus on the subject. Its theme is religion which is definitely a deep

and personal issue as it has the potential to stimulate the expression of the self.

As it appears in the syllabus, the content of unit 6 is:

Theme: Religion

Listening One: The Religious Traditions of Fasting

- A radio interview

Listening Two: Describing Monastic Life

- A radio interview

Critical Thinking

Separate fact from myth

Infer word meaning from context

Analyze and discuss different opinions

Recognize similarities and differences among various religions

Understand the importance and value of religious rituals

Listening

Make predictions

Listen for main ideas

Listen for details

Make inferences about a speaker’s intention

Organize and synthesize information from the listenings

Speaking

Discuss background knowledge and personal beliefs

Role-play scripted and semi-scripted conversations

Tell and encourage others to tell an anecdote

Role-play a group discussion

Vocabulary

Use context clues to infer meaning

Identify and use word forms

Identify and use idiomatic expressions

Grammar

Count and non-count nouns and their quantifiers

Pronunciation

Vowel alternation

Looking to this syllabus unit, we should pay attention to the presence of

the part Critical Thinking and to the fact that it appears side by side with

listening, speaking, vocabulary, grammar and pronunciation items.

Besides, as we can see, the unit offers the potential to engage learners

affectively and cognitively (T No.2). For example, by: Analyze and discuss

different opinions and Recognize similarities and differences among various

religions, the material is providing ground for the arousal of opinions and thus

discussion; it is involving learners by dealing with their beliefs.

Not to mention that the syllabus above offers activities that have the

potential to allow\make learners think about what they are doing in order to

respond to it personally (this is the magical word) and the potential to make

them think and feel before, during, and after using the language for

communication (T No.2). We intend to exemplify this principle as it follows.

For all this and more (T No.3), unit 6 works with radio broadcasts, blog

entries (also written), interviews (also written) and online journals or audio

blogs. In general, these texts (in audio and written form) help the learner to be

aware of how a monastic life is, giving descriptions of monasteries and

interviews with people such as travelers and professors or with people who

became monks or nuns. As the unit progresses it is interesting to observe that

some of these people abandoned an urban and contemporary life for a life in

solitude and meditation.

As Unit 6 conducts learners deeper and deeper into the theme, it also

conducts them deeper into language. By the end of Listening One, they had

already been in contact with new ideas and new vocabulary and then they are

asked to answer the following questions. We must add that by this activity\

exercise and others, learners are being prepared for the final activity of the unit.

- EXPRESS OPINIONS, p.129.

1

2

3

The listening part ends with part C* in which Listening One and Listening

Two are integrated. In part C, learners are asked to fulfill a chart based on the

two listenings and after they are asked to prepare a one minute mini-lecture, but

instead of presenting it to a whole class, the coursebook suggests it to be done

in small groups. Once again it is preparing them for the final activity.

- STEP 2: Synthesize

to copy or ‘cut’ from the book, p.130.

* there is also listening in the speaking part.

In the speaking part, almost at its end, learners are asked to prepare and

tell an anecdote. They have already seen and worked with more new

vocabulary, expressions, grammar and pronunciation through the contact with

different texts and listenings.

This is the activity:

3 Prepare and tell an anecdote.

p.142.

Once again learners are getting ready...

The final activity of unit 6 is a debate: to debate the pros and cons of (a)

business expansion for a monastery. The whole unit was elaborated to allow

learners to feel secure and perform successfully in this. Learners were exposed

to information, ideas, experiences, opinions, vocabulary, expressions, grammar

and etc. They were asked to say their beliefs before and during the activities.

They worked together, prepared a mini-lecture and an anecdote and now they

can use all this for the debate.

Description of - Production: Group Discussion, p.143.

The four selected activities guide us to Tomlinson’s principle number 3:

Language learners who achieve positive affect are much more likely to achieve

communicative competence than those who do not. This must be better

explained… Rodrigo, help!

Moreover, this final activity has the potential to occur as an interesting,

enjoyable and relevant task “so as to exert a positive influence on the learners’

attitude to the language and to the learning process” (T No.3). It becomes an

achievable challenge as the unit progresses and it manages to stimulate

emotive responses by the use of a polemic theme\issue: religion.

Use Jameson somewhere…

- Commercial Materials

- Contrastive Exercises

We will “invent” them based on Fame \ Wise Up.

3?

Someone will be needed here.

Conclusion

Bibliography

Tomlinson, B. Principles of effective materials development. In

HARWOOD, N. (2010) English Teaching Materials – Theory and practice.

London: C.U.P. pp. 81-108.

Annexes

North Star 5 Unit 6 and some other parts, such as the syllabus…