Seasoned and Novice English Teachers’ Perceptions of ‘Prospect 2’: A Critical Exploratory Study on Teaching Experience
Subject Areas : Applied Linguistics
Hossein Issaee
1
,
Hamed Barjesteh
2
1 - Department of English Language and Literature, Ayatollah Amoli Branch, Islamic Azad University, Amol,, Iran
2 - گروه آموزش زبان انگلیسی ، دانشگاه آزاد اسلامی،دانشگاه آیت الله آملی،آمل،مازندران،ایران
Keywords: Textbook, ELT, internal evaluation, Seasoned teachers, novice teachers, external evaluation,
Abstract :
When a textbook is developed and used for an English Language Teaching (ELT) context, its evaluation is even more important because its pedagogical value needs to be determined (Richards, 2007); however, ELT teachers’ perceptions regarding a particular textbook may differ based on their teaching experience or academic degree. Considering a model provided by McDonough and Shaw (1993) based on external and internal evaluation of textbooks, this study aims to evaluate ‘Prospect 2’, the main English textbook for 8th-grade of junior high-schools in Iran. In effect, 400 EFL teachers were randomly invited from three provinces of Iran (i.e., Mazandaran, Gilan, and Golestan) to participate in the study. The Participants were divided into two groups of 1) the seasoned teachers with over 10 years, and 2) the novice teachers with less than 10 years of teaching experience, in order to explore their perspectives on (non)alignment between their attitudes in teaching experience at ‘Prospect 2’. A 54-five-point Likert-scale questionnaire was adopted and submitted to both groups. Employing SPSS, the teacher-researchers analyzed the data, and it was revealed that the teaching experience does affect the perceptions of ELT teachers regarding the evaluation of a particular textbook. While seasoned teachers were not satisfied with some crucial aspects of ‘Prospect 2’, and believed it has not met its pedagogical objectives, the novice group revealed moderate satisfaction. However, a number of similar themes such as the lack of authentic language, variant dialects, motivating illustrations, and poor printing, to name but a few, were reported by both groups.
