A MODERN AUTHENTIC TERTIARY LEVEL FOREIGN LANGUAGE COURSEBOOK: CHALLENGES AND WAYS FORWARD

Abstract

The article analyses the reasons for the poor quality of modern foreign language course-books and writers’ typical mistakes. The reasons consist in 1) the lack of a generally accepted theory of the tertiary level foreign language coursebook, 2) the author’s insufficient competence, 3) increasing pressure on university teachers to produce and publish coursebooks. The paper suggests that a specific author’s competency, comprising research, intellectual, methodological, and linguistic competences, is central to producing a good coursebook. An algorithm for developing a modern authentic coursebook is proposed; each of the five stages thereof requires some of the above competencies, whereas lack of any of these leads to an inadequate product. Typically, it fails to provide a system of exercises and tasks to ensure the promised results in terms of developing language skills and attaining the desired level of linguistic competence. Feasible ways to improve the quality of coursebooks are suggested: 1) revising approaches to assessing teachers’ qualifications, 2) raising requirements for the quality of coursebooks, 3) training would-be materials writers in theory and involving them in actual writing through co-authorship with experienced colleagues.