Diseño de Materiales - Week 5 - Principles of Effective Materials Development

Introduction: Hello and welcome to Week 5 of the course Diseño de Materiales. In this class we will review key concepts from a reading about deriving principles of materials development from principles of second language acquisition and teaching.

Today's Goals:

• Explore Tomlinson's principled approach to materials design by matching SLA and teaching-learning principles with criteria for materials development and use.
• Prepare for your informant interview.
• Review the instructions and guidelines for your Materials Evaluation Rubric assignment.

Guiding Questions:

• How can SLA research inform my practice as a materials designer.
• What are my personal principles of materials design?

Task 1: The Columbian Exchange

For our warm up activity, we will take a look at the Columbian Exchange, the movement of plants and animals from the Old World to the New World as a result of contact between Europe and the Americas beginning on October 12th 1492.

Click the link and find your section of the document.

• Group Quiz: CLICK HERE

Task 2: Matching SLA Principles with Materials Development Principles

In chapter 4 of Harwood (2010), Brian Tomlinson argues in favor of a principled approach to materials development by first identifying principles from second language acquisition research as well as principles about teaching-learning in general in order and then using those as categories to generate materials for materials development. Click your group link below and follow the instructions in the document. 

• Group 1: CLICK HERE
• Group 2: CLICK HERE
• Group 3: CLICK HERE

References:

Harwood, N. (Ed.). (2010). English Langauge Teaching Materials: Theory and Practice. Cambridge University Press.

McGrath, I. (2016). Materials Evaluation and Design for Language Teaching (2nd ed.). Edinburgh University Press.