So, having analysed the intended context and the two possible publications, I am left with a decision which should be based on the results of my evaluation. Tomlinson ¹ suggests that a framework for this can be created by transforming a list of principles about how languages are learned into evaluation criteria. I returned to my earlier list of principles for this task and came up with the following list.

• Would these materials facilitate and encourage autonomy?
• What roles do these materials suggest for teachers and students?
• What aspects of these materials would challenge learners to move beyond their current level?
• Do these materials lend themselves to flexible use?
• What learner needs would these materials respond to?
• How relevant is the language presented to the learners’ lives outside the classroom?
• How is cultural sensitivity and understanding promoted in these materials?
• What would make learners ascribe face value to these materials?
• What cognitive processes do these materials provoke?
• How authentic are these materials, in task and text?
• Would these materials facilitate regular feedback?
• How do these materials take into account the need for recycling and opportunities to make use of language previously encountered?

One issue I encountered was the question of whether this list should distinguish between a course book as materials and other things. It is an important one, because whilst I am never likely to write a course book, it is part of my job to make recommendations and selections as to the books we use. On the other hand, producing materials for use in my specific classes is not out of the ordinary for me. If both sets of decisions and choices should be made with reference to my aforementioned principles, do the same evaluation criteria apply in both cases, or does some form of adaptation need to be made?

In the rest of this post, I return to the question of Speakout vs. Headway as the next course book for my class of general English intermediate level learners.

Would these materials facilitate and encourage autonomy? 

Both publications come with a multitude of components, including workbooks and CD-ROMs for students’ independent use. However, autonomy is more than simply doing extra exercises at home. The way that language is presented and the texts chosen impact on this also. One strength of Speakout is the extensive use of content from the BBC. I can imagine that this is motivating and confidence-boosting for learners and arguably, a lesson built around a clip from a programme might encourage a learner to seek out similar programmes to watch later or at least give them a sense of being able to follow a text of this nature.

What roles do these materials suggest for teachers and students? 

Headway, with its ‘traditional’ methodology, seems to favour a classroom in which the teacher is the leader, dispenser of information and in control at all times. The grammar-centric nature of the activities and the frequent use of meta-language suggest that the teacher, as the expert on all things grammatical, would need to remain in this role. Pair and group work is usually confined to tasks where speaking is the main objective. Speakout takes the opposite approach. Grammar is approached through a text and learners are encouraged to notice patterns and discover rules. Collaborative working is often encouraged.

What aspects of these materials would challenge learners to move beyond their current level?

In my view, Headway would push my learners beyond their current abilities in terms of their understanding of grammatical structures and their ability to describe and explain them. For some learners, I imagine that this would feel very motivating and satisfying. The extensive controlled practice exercises would, I expect, deliver the intended sense of control. Whether these enhanced abilities would translate to uncontrolled communicative contexts is a matter for debate. Conversely, Speakout would appear to push learners to discern patterns of language use for themselves. Whilst this might not afford some learners the same sense of satisfaction and progression that Headway could offer, it would arguably present different challenges.

Do these materials lend themselves to flexible use?

In both cases, as with most course books, the activities are designed to follow on from each other. That is not to say there is no flexibility as to the order of presentation, but this would require careful consideration on the part of the teacher. Imaginative teachers could make other adaptations to how the materials are delivered, but neither book appears specifically designed to facilitate this.

What learner needs would these materials respond to?

As I discussed in my earlier post, it is difficult to make specific statements about learner needs in the context of a class operating continuous enrolment. However, I can consider what needs the writers and publishers understand themselves to be responding to. Headway positions itself as the traditional choice, responding to, presumably, traditional needs. Speakout envisions itself as the course book for the 21st century, responding to the needs of 21st century learners. Headway bases its syllabus and methodological recommendations on what it claims is 20 successful years of publishing ELT course books. Speakout’s authors claim to have arrived at their priorities through extensive research, although no reference to this is provided.

How relevant is the language presented to the learners’ lives outside the classroom?

McGrath ² points out that one of the problems with the approach to materials analysis and evaluation involving close inspection of parallel units is that these can be misrepresentative of the true content of the publications. I acknowledge that this could apply in the case of the two units I have compared. The contexts chosen in Headway are questionable in their relevance to learners who, like my students, have no particular need or desire to adopt British or indeed Western culture as their own. The inclusion of a reading task based on Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet is a good example of this irrelevance. Terms such as ‘nobleman’, ‘banished’ and ‘dagger’ are firstly, likely to be unfamiliar and secondly, unlikely to be much use in the future. Whilst Speakout’s choice of a parent’s first person narrative on life with teenagers might attract some criticism for cultural specificity, in my view it is of wider relevance.

How is cultural sensitivity and understanding promoted in these materials?

This is not explicitly addressed in the units I examined from either publication. As mentioned above, Headway does appear to take a particularly anglo-centric view, although learners are encouraged to give their opinions on how the Chinese philosophy of yin and yang relates to the person we are likely to fall in love with. In both cases, it would fall to the teacher to consider how this issue might be addressed, with consideration of the micro-context of each individual class.

What would make learners ascribe face value to these materials?

The physical production is high quality in both cases. However, the inherent differences in the values behind the publications are likely to appear to learners in different ways. Those who see themselves as 21st century citizens and value the authenticity Speakout prioritises are likely to ascribe greater face value to the inclusion of BBC content, video podcasts and the like. Those who see language learning in ‘traditional’ terms, for whom it is viewed as a process of assembling competence and fluency block by block, by way of expanding one’s grammatical knowledge, Headway’s grammar-centric syllabus would be likely to present greater face value.

What cognitive processes do these materials provoke?

Speakout encourages learners to deduce the rules involved in language use; there are frequent instances requiring evaluation or judgement (In your opinion, are the replacements better than the original things? Is it important for parents to know about their teenagers’ plans?); additionally there are tasks which require reasoning (How do you prefer to communicate? What does it depend on? Make some notes to prepare for the discussion). Headway encourages recall (Look at the pictures by Vincent van Gogh. What do you know about him? Shakespeare wrote comedies, tragedies and history plays. What titles do you know? Do you know any of the stories?); grammatical analysis (Compare the use of tenses in these sentences. Say which tense is used and why. Put the verbs in the correct past tense, active or passive) but also includes evaluation or judgement tasks (Whose fault was the tragedy? In the play, Juliet was just 13. Do you think this is too young to fall in love?). As would be expected, in both publications, there are tasks designed to call upon a variety of cognitive processes across the unit.

How authentic are these materials, in task and text?

Authenticity is Speakout’s big claim and evidence for it can be found in the texts, particularly the listening texts, which are selected. Along with the DVD lesson based on the BBC extract, efforts are made to ensure that the other audio recordings are less ‘scripted’ than is typical for a course book. The language presented in the functional lesson on dealing with misunderstandings is, by my judgement, authentic to that context of use. Headway seems to prioritise texts which present the grammar as required by its syllabus over authenticity. For example, in the listening activity where the speakers recount their first experience of falling in love, speakers deliver lines such as ‘he made me go weak at the knees’ and the speech is careful and considered, with no overlapping turns, very much unlike natural language.

Would these materials facilitate regular feedback?

With similarity to some of the points above, in both cases it would fall to the teacher to ensure that learners often received helpful feedback. Neither book specifically facilitates this in my view but both present ample opportunities for teachers to listen to language produced. In terms of feedback on controlled exercises, Headway would likely provide for more of this, whereas Speakout would enable more chances for teachers to comment on unstructured or semi-structured language use.

How do these materials take into account the need for recycling and opportunities to make use of language previously encountered?

The limitation of examining only one unit of a course book which McGrath identified applies here also. It is hard to say, in either case, how this would be encouraged over the course of the units. As in the case of the previous criterion, able teachers would have no problem facilitating this and would need to make recourse to their own resources or activities to do so.

In conclusion

So what will my recommendation be? It will come as no surprise to anyone who has read this far that a choice between these two titles will unequivocally mean Speakout would get my nomination. It’s not that I believe it to be without faults or entirely sufficient to meet my needs and those of my learners on its own – rather that Headway’s ‘traditional’ mindset, the influence of which is felt throughout the book, is at odds with my own view on language learning. I have tried and failed to learn languages myself using the methodology it espouses. I have also experimented with it at length during my eight years in the classroom. Whilst there are some learners who are comfortable with this approach, being as how they know what to expect and how something which approximates (but isn’t) progress is so easily charted and measured, I don’t believe I am meeting anyone’s needs by delivering lessons from a course book built on those ideals.

It was quite a process to arrive at that conclusion. I likely would have made the same decision had I simply flicked through both books. But this way, my choice is supported, backed up with reasoning and careful thought. I’m quite proud of myself for getting to the end of it!