(Luận văn thạc sĩ) an evaluation of the textbook “advanced business interpretation translation” for the fourth year students of english at a university in ho chi minh city

VIETNAM ACADEMY OF SOCIAL SCIENCES
GRADUATE ACADEMY OF SOCIAL SCIENCES

Hồ Như Minh Nghi

AN EVALUATION OF THE TEXTBOOK
“ADVANCED BUSINESS INTERPRETATION &
TRANSLATION” FOR THE FOURTH YEAR
STUDENTS OF ENGLISH AT A UNIVERSITY IN
HO CHI MINH CITY

MA THESIS IN ENGLISH LANGUAGE

HO CHI MINH CITY, 2021

Luan van


VIETNAM ACADEMY OF SOCIAL SCIENCES
GRADUATE ACADEMY OF SOCIAL SCIENCES

Hồ Như Minh Nghi

AN EVALUATION OF THE TEXTBOOK
“ADVANCED BUSINESS INTERPRETATION &
TRANSLATION” FOR THE FOURTH YEAR
STUDENTS OF ENGLISH AT A UNIVERSITY IN
HO CHI MINH CITY

Field: English Language
Code: 8.22.02.01

Supervisor: Phạm Lan Anh, Ph.D.

HO CHI MINH CITY, 2021

Luan van


DECLARATION BY AUTHOR
I, the undersigned, hereby certify that the thesis entitled “An evaluation
of the textbook Advanced Business Interpretation & Translation for the fourthyear students of English at a university in Ho Chi Minh City” is the result of
my own research for the Degree of Master of Arts in English Language. The
substance of the thesis has not, wholly or in part, been submitted for any other
degree to any other universities or institutions.
Except where reference has been made in the text, this thesis contains no
material previously published or written by another person.
The study reported in this thesis was approved by the Graduate Academy
of Social Sciences.
Author’s Signature

Hồ Như Minh Nghi
Approved by
SUPERVISOR

Phạm Lan Anh, Ph.D.
Date:……………………

ii

Luan van

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
In order to complete the thesis “An evaluation of the textbook Advanced
Business Interpretation & Translation for the fourth-year students of English
at a university in Ho Chi Minh City”, the author has been supported by many
people. Through this opportunity, I would like to express my gratitude to these
people for helping me finish this thesis.
First of all, I would like to express my genuine appreciation to Ms. Phạm
Lan Anh, Ph.D, my supervisor, for her considerate guidance and her passionate
inspiration as well as her thorough explanation on my research paper.
Secondly, I would like to thank Mr. Nguyễn Đức Châu, my teacher at
HUFLIT University - Department of Foreign Language for supporting me
during my research.
Thirdly, I am very thankful for all the participants of this study, who have
cooperatively taken part in taking questionnaires as well as contributed their
opinions on the textbook and the course.
In addition, I would like to thank all of the lecturers who gave me
interesting lessons, dedication and advice during my study at Graduate
Academy of Social Sciences.
Last but not least, I must express my appreciation to my superior at my
workplace who has encouraged me to continue my learning path and has always
believed in my ability to complete this thesis and to have a brighter future.

iii

Luan van


TABLE OF CONTENTS
DECLARATION BY AUTHOR ............................................................................. ii

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS .................................................................................... iii
ABSTRACT ............................................................................................................ iv
LIST OF TABLES ....................................................................................................v
LIST OF CHARTS ................................................................................................. vi
TABLE OF ABBREVIATIONS............................................................................ vii
Chapter 1. INTRODUCTION................................................................................1
1.1 Rationale..............................................................................................................1
1.2 Aims of the study ................................................................................................3
1.3 Research questions ..............................................................................................3
1.4 Scope of the study ...............................................................................................3
1.5 Significance of the study .....................................................................................4
1.6 Research methods ................................................................................................5
1.7 Structure of the study ..........................................................................................5
Chapter 2. LITERATURE REVIEW ...................................................................6
2.1 The role of textbooks in ELT classroom .............................................................6
2.1.1 Definition of textbook ......................................................................................6
2.1.2 The role of textbooks in ELT ...........................................................................8
2.2 Materials evaluation ..........................................................................................10
2.2.1 Definition of materials evaluation ..................................................................10
2.2.2 Reasons for materials evaluation ...................................................................11
2.2.3 Types of materials evaluation ........................................................................12
2.2.4 Approaches and Criteria for materials evaluation..........................................14
2.2.5 Popular models of materials evaluation .........................................................17
2.3 Previous studies on ELT textbook evaluation...................................................21
2.4 Review of the textbook “Advanced Business Interpretation & Translation” ...25
2.4.1 Review of the textbook ..................................................................................25

Luan van

2.4.2 Overview of students' needs ...........................................................................27
2.5 Summary of Chapter 2 .....................................................................................27
Chapter 3. METHODOLOGY ............................................................................29
3.1 Research question ..............................................................................................29
3.2 Research participants ........................................................................................29
3.3 Research method ...............................................................................................29
3.4 Data collection instruments ...............................................................................31
3.4.1 Document analyses.........................................................................................32
3.4.2 Questionnaires ................................................................................................33
3.5 Summary of Chapter 3 ......................................................................................35
Chapter 4. FINDINGS AND DISCUSSION ......................................................36
4.1 Data analysis .....................................................................................................36
4.1.1 The suitability of the textbook to the aims of the course ...............................36
4.1.2 The suitability of the textbook to the course contents .............................. ....46
4.1.3 Students’ recommendations ...........................................................................58
4.2 Summary of findings and discussion ................................................................60
4.2.1 General conclusion .........................................................................................60
4.2.2 Strengths and weaknesses of the textbook .....................................................61
4.3 Summary of Chapter 4 ......................................................................................63
Chapter 5. RECOMMENDATIONS AND CONCLUSION ............................64
5.1 Recapitulation....................................................................................................64
5.2 Concluding remarks ..........................................................................................65
5.3 Implications .......................................................................................................66
5.4 Limitations and suggestions for further studies ................................................68
REFERENCES ......................................................................................................69
APPENDIX 1: Questionnaires by David Litz (2005) ......................................... I
APPENDIX 2: Questionnaires by David Litz (2005) - Vietnamese version ........... II
APPENDIX 3: The questionnaire for students .......................................................III
APPENDIX 4: The questionnaire for students - Vietnamese version ................... IV

Luan van


ABSTRACT
The aim of the study is to evaluate the textbook Advanced Business
Interpretation & Translation currently being used by the 4 th year students and
teachers of Department of Foreign Language - Interpretation and Translation
major at HUFLIT to investigate whether this textbook suitably meets the
requirements of the curriculum in terms of aims and contents. In order to
achieve enough data for the study, selected 20 of 4th year students of the
Department of Foreign Language - Translation and Interpretation were given
questionnaires. The researcher also used document analysis to conduct the
evaluation of the content of Advanced Business Interpretation and Translation
and the subject content in the university’s curriculum plan. The result of the
survey showed that the textbook Advanced Business Interpretation and
Translation has highly met the course’s requirements in terms of aims. On the
other hand, the students had some feedback on the textbook’s content’s lack of
excitement or shortage of complicated terms and structures. However, in
general, most of the students stated that the textbook is suitable with their
English level.

iv

Luan van


LIST OF TABLES
Table 4.1: Output standard of English - Vietnamese Professional
Translation ................................................................................................. 38
Table 4.2. Output standard of English - Vietnamese Professional

Interpretation ............................................................................................. 39
Table 4.3. 4th year English major students’ opinion on the aims of the
textbook Advanced Business Interpretation & Translation ...................... 43
Table 4.4. Plans and curriculum of Business Interpretation ..................... 45
Table 4.5. Plans and curriculum of Business Translation ......................... 48
Table 4.6. Units of lesson in the textbook................................................. 51

v

Luan van


LIST OF CHARTS
Chart 4.1. Students’ opinions on proficient vocabulary and special terms for
each field ..................................................................................................... 41
Chart 4.2. Students’ opinions on their translation skill improvement after the
course .......................................................................................................... 42
Chart 4.3. Students’ opinions on their interpretation skill improvement after
the course..................................................................................................... 42
Chart 4.4. Students’ opinions on the skills.................................................. 52
Chart 4.5. Students’ opinions on the language type of the textbook .......... 54
Chart 4.6. Students’ opinions on the Subject and Content of the textbook 56

vi

Luan van


TABLE OF ABBREVIATIONS
ELT

HUFLIT
ESL
EFL
CLO

English Language Teaching
Ho Chi Minh City University of Foreign
Languages - Information Technology
English as a Second Language
English as a Foreign Language
Course Learning Output

vii

Luan van


Chapter 1
INTRODUCTION
1.1 Rationale
It is widely known that English, as the most common language used by
people all over the world, is being taught in most parts of Vietnam and in all
levels of education. However, if you take second-language speakers into
account, and therein lies the rub, almost without exception, people respond
better to the language they grew up speaking. To effectively sell to people, it is
not enough to speak a language that they understand, especially if their
understanding is limited. You must speak to them in the language their heart
speaks. There is a reason demand for translation services is booming. While
English has been periodically crowned as “the language of global business,”

translation and interpreting services remain a vital part of doing business
around the world.
Ho Chi Minh City University of Foreign Languages - Information
Technology (HUFLIT) was founded on October 26th, 1994 in accordance with
the Decision No. 66/TTg of the Prime Minister. During the past 25 years with
all effort of HUFLIT’s lecturer team and staff, the University has been
recognized and appreciated for its training quality by the society. HUFLIT has
established many cooperation relations with regional and international
universities. HUFLIT has 08 (academic) departments, 02 programs, 4
administration offices, 3 committees, a library, and 3 centers with more than
180 employees and 400 lecturers. One of the three Specialized English
Language Programs is Translation - Interpretation.
In the teaching context of Translation - Interpretation, the textbook
Advanced Business Interpretation & Translation by Dr. Nguyen Duc Chau has

1

Luan van


been the main textbooks for many years. This textbook helps learners
familiarize with special terms, concepts and practical knowledge that would be
useful for their future careers, and to upgrade students’ skills of translation in
both oral and written forms after they finish intermediate courses. However,
over time it has been perceived to suffer from certain drawbacks. Additionally,
4th year students of the Department of Foreign Languages still find it hard to
perform translation skills after the course. Furthermore, due to the number of
units in this book is beyond outline requirements, teachers have to select
alternative units to teach without making students overwhelmed with advanced
knowledge. For all of those, it seems obviously necessary to conduct evaluation

research on the textbook. The findings of the study, hopefully, will help the
researcher and teachers of the Department of Foreign Languages improve the
material, and more importantly to promote their Translation - Interpretation
teaching. On those above-mentioned grounds, the researcher decided to
undertake this study to evaluate whether the textbook suitably meets the
requirements of the curriculum in terms of aims and contents.
At HUFLIT, the book of Advanced Business Interpretation &
Translation - put into use in 2010, is designated to those in 4th year, who hold
certain knowledge of basic translation skills. Since its first use in teaching, there
has been no official evaluation of researchers or teachers conducted to review
the suitable methodology of this textbook. Furthermore, complaints about the
problems arising during the learning process of students regularly emerge,
especially on the vocabulary and some unit contents. Besides, some lecturers
still question the relevance of the book to students’ needs. Therefore, a study to
evaluate Advanced Business Interpretation & Translation is urgently needed.

2

Luan van


1.2 Aims of the study
The aim of the study is to evaluate the textbook Advanced Business
Interpretation & Translation currently being used by the 4 th year students and
teachers of Department of Foreign Language at HUFLIT to investigate whether
this textbook suitably meets the requirements of the curriculum in terms of aims
and contents.
The findings will help teachers to adjust the use of the book so that they
can optimize the strong points and adapt or substitute weak points from other
related materials to meet the learners’ needs. Furthermore, it is expected that

the results of the research, to some extent, could help students from the
Department of Foreign Language get over their fear of translating in both oral
and written forms.
1.3 Research questions
This study aims to find out the answer to the following research
questions:
(1) To what extent are the contents of the textbook Advanced Business
Interpretation & Translation suitable for senior students with different levels of
English and their major knowledge?
(2) To what extent do the aims of textbook Advanced Business
Interpretation & Translation meet the requirements of the curriculum?
1.4 Scope of the study
In materials evaluation, there have been a number of criteria that should
be taken into consideration, such as the content, the methodology, the layout,
the authenticity, and so on. It will be highly precious to conduct a
comprehensive evaluation of the textbook. However, within the scope of a

3

Luan van


minor thesis, the criteria for evaluation with focus on two criteria: aims and
content.
Materials evaluation is a complicated process that requires taking various
factors into consideration. However, due to the limited time and the ability of
the researcher, the study just focuses on analyzing the syllabus and the material,
along with questionnaires which will be given to selected 20 of 4th year students
of the Department of Foreign Language - Translation and Interpretation.
Department of Foreign Language offers 3 specialized programs which are

Translation

and

Interpretation,

English

Language

Teaching

and Office Administrative Skills. The hardest program for high English level
students is Translation and Interpretation. That is why only few students of the
university chose to learn the major of Translation and Interpretation. The
Translation and Interpretation class only has 25 students. The researcher
selected 20 out of 25 students based on their translation ability, their general
knowledge and their adequate class attendance.
1.5 Significance of the study
The study will be useful to students, teachers and researchers in the field
of Business Translation teaching and learning. The results are expected to
provide a more useful and effective way in teaching and learning translation
skills. The results also reflect the strengths and weaknesses of the textbook in
use, so that teachers can find appropriate teaching methods for students. For
researchers who share the same interest in this topic, this study could serve as
a reliable source of reference in their studies.

4

Luan van

1.6 Research methods
In order to answer the two research questions above, the qualitative and
quantitative case study was employed. The data were collected through
document analysis, and questionnaires with 4th year students of the Department
of Foreign Language at HUFLIT.
1.7 Structure of the study
The thesis structure is divided into five chapters:
Chapter 1 is the Introduction. In this part, the rationale, the aims, the
research questions, the scope of the study, the significance of the study, the
methods of the study and the structure of the study are presented.
Chapter 2 is the Literature Review which includes a theoretical
background of textbook evaluation, materials evaluation, previous studies on
ELT textbooks evaluation as well as some information related to the textbook.
Chapter 3 is the Methodology which mentions research questions,
research method, data collection instruments, investigates the participants and
summary of Chapter 3.
Chapter 4 is Findings and Discussion. This part shows some findings
concluded from the data analysis, summary of findings and discussion,
summary of Chapter 4.
Chapter 5 is the Recommendations and Conclusion which includes the
conclusion, recommendations and limitations of the study and suggestions for
the future study.

5

Luan van

Chapter 2
LITERATURE REVIEW
This chapter presents an overview of the theoretical background for evaluation
of the textbook Advanced Business Interpretation & Translation being used for
the seniors of English at HUFLIT. Overall, this chapter consists of five main
sections. The first section mentions the role of textbooks in English Language
Teaching classroom. The second section gives deep comprehension about
materials evaluation in types, approaches, criteria and some popular models for
materials evaluation. The third section broadly reviews the previous studies
related to English textbooks evaluation in different contexts. The fourth section
focuses on reviewing the textbook Advanced Business Interpretation &
Translation and students’ need. The last section summarizes this whole chapter.
2.1 The role of textbooks in ELT classroom
2.1.1 Definition of textbooks
Textbooks are easily defined by dictionaries. For instance, MerriamWebster dictionary defines a textbook as a book used in the study of a subject
such as:
a: one containing a presentation of the principles of a subject
b: a literary work relevant to the study of a subject
Meanwhile, according to Cambridge dictionary, a textbook is a book that
contains detailed information about a subject for people who are studying that
subject. From these definitions, textbooks are generally known as a written
guideline for the demands of teaching and/or learning in education. Textbooks
not only help teachers follow the framework of the course to meet the aim of
the curriculum of the university, but also guide students step-by-step from basic
to advanced lessons.

6

Luan van

On the other hand, from some experts’ perspectives, various profound
definitions of textbooks have been provided. According to Grant (1987), there
are two kinds of textbooks: traditional textbooks and communicative textbooks.
Traditional English textbooks include subject information, usually focusing on
grammar, reading and writing skills because the accuracy of the language is
highly rated. Traditional English textbooks are frameworks for universities and
teachers to orient tests or exams to students. The other kind of textbooks is
communicative textbooks. Opposite to traditional English textbooks,
communicative English textbooks emphasize on speaking, listening skills and
practices. They bring not only detailed definitions but also methods that can be
seen or heard in daily life, which capture students’ attention and urge to learn.
Learning a communicative English textbook means practicing repeatedly and
many times with classmates. To be able to teach communicative English
textbooks, teachers must have excellent organizational abilities. As the demand
for speaking English fluently grows day by day, communicative textbooks are
widely considered a premium basis to evaluate one textbook with the tendency
of communication.
In order to assist with student learning, to support teachers as language
teaching effectively, a useful textbook must have characteristics such as a
strong course framework for both teaching and learning, logical and wellplanned syllabus.
However, not all textbooks have those characteristics. According to
Harmer (1998), some textbooks’ contents might be difficult and inappropriate
to some certain aspects of the action of learning of learners. For example, a
well-planned textbook contains some chapters that are too long and
complicated for students. For that reason, teachers have to shorten the lesson

7

Luan van

and have the lesson explained in a simpler way. Based on this opinion, it is
necessary to have other simple materials to support the textbook.
2.1.2 The role of textbooks in ELT
Gelfman, Podstrigich and Losinskaya (2004) outline what they believe
are the functions of a modern textbook which includes governing, developing,
communicating and expressing, as well as being a resource for supporting
individualization and differentiation of teaching. As such, textbooks are
generally used to inspire and guide students to form up new knowledge, to
equalize particular points and accuracy of information, to build up new
questions, or/and to supply students with innovative, varied sided information.
On the other hand, Sewall (1992) stresses that high level education is
hard to accomplish without textbooks. In addition, Valverde and Schmidt
(1998) claim that most of the cases where textbooks become impossible to learn
happen because teachers try to take over every chapter, every lesson within
textbooks without considering the logical methodologies for teaching and
learning. Moreover, Horsley and Laws (1992) claim that a qualified and logical
textbook is really useful in terms of guiding teachers in educating effectively
as well as encouraging students to learn actively. Mikk (2000) emphasizes the
importance of bringing excitement for education through textbooks; “students
have many sources of information available, if their textbooks are dull, they are
unwilling to study them. Interesting and enthusiastic textbooks develop
curiosity and interest in the subject".
In other words, most schools and universities use textbooks in teaching
and learning. They are materials that not only help teachers follow the
framework of the course in order to meet the aim of the curriculum of the
university while teaching lessons, but also develop students’ awareness of

8

Luan van


studying. The fact that students learn faster when their textbooks are interesting
enough are proved through advantages of textbooks by numerous theorists.
Firstly, Sheldon (1988) indicates that textbooks used in ESL/EFL
classrooms "represent the visible heart of any ELT program" (p.237) as well as
offer substantial benefits for both students and teachers. He also notes that
students usually anticipate having a published textbook when they learn a
language and they will be more assured when they study with a textbook than
listening only to the teacher without published materials or "in-house"
materials.
Secondly, Hycroft (1998) suggests that one of the principal benefits of
textbooks is that students’ learning process and their increase of knowledge will
be estimated easily and precisely.
Thirdly, teachers can save lots of time and energy preparing their own
materials if they use textbooks in teaching. Teachers can have more time on
giving out more exercise for students to practice or planning an exciting and
qualified lecture for their students (O'Neill, 1982; Sheldon, 1988).
Fourthly, Cunningsworth (1995) states that textbook is not only a
material for self-learning, but also a perfect support for less experienced
teachers because of its detailed source of knowledge from definitions,
activities, examples to many levels of practical exercises, etc.
Finally, Hutchinson and Torres (1994) propose that textbooks may play
an important role in encouraging teachers to create new teaching styles by
presenting brand new teaching methods, update latest changes of the subject.

9

Luan van


2.2 Materials evaluation
2.2.1 Definition of materials evaluation
The definition of materials evaluation has been defined in various ways
by different researchers. However, their ideas all contribute to giving a more
comprehensive and inclusive definition.
According to Dudley-Evans & St. John (1998), evaluation is a complete
process which “which begins with determining what information to gather and
ends with bringing about changing current activities or influencing future
ones”.
Tomlinson (1998, p.3) claims that materials evaluation means “attempts
to measure the value of materials”, or “the systematic appraisal of the value of
materials in relation to their objectives and to the objectives of the learners
using them”. In other words, the value of materials will be evaluated to see if
the content is easy for students to understand and enjoyable in learning or
teaching.
According to Hutchinson and Waters (1987), materials evaluation is a
process of “matching the needs to available solutions. There is no absolute good
or bad textbook - only about degrees of fitness for the required purposes”.
In general, materials evaluation is the process of collecting information
and analyzing this data to evaluate the value of the textbook, to judge if the
textbook meets the university’s curriculum, or encourage students to learn
effectively, or provide a good framework for teachers in teaching. Furthermore,
evaluating a textbook might discover some problems that needed to be fixed or
promoted.

10

Luan van


2.2.2 Reasons for materials evaluation
Not all qualified textbooks are suitable for all teachers and learners.
Deciding whether or not one textbook should be used instead of others is really
important since it has to meet the needs of teachers and students. That is why
textbook evaluation plays an important role teaching and learning as it can
discover the strong points and weak points within textbooks, and can find out
if the content of the textbook relevant to the aim of the course so that teachers
can improve their lessons to suit the course aims, and learners’ needs.
According to Awasthi (2006) and Tomlinson (2003), in order to choose
a well-designed textbook, a process of evaluating the textbook is unavoidable.
Rea-Dickens and Germanie (1994) also share the same view, “to evaluate
language teaching methods, materials, and effectiveness as teachers and also
how materials are presented to learners, the types of learning tasks used and the
way the courses are designed… they all must be evaluated” (Rea-Dickins and
Germanie, 1994, p.5). Moreover, another reason to explain the importance of
the role of the textbook evaluation is stated by Sheldon (1988) that a thorough
textbook evaluation enables administrators and teachers to distinguish between
all of the textbooks in the market.
One further reason for textbook evaluation proposed by Hutchinson
(1987) that it may be helpful to teachers because it contains enough information
for them to enhance their knowledge of language so that they can develop their
professional growth in teaching methods. Therefore, materials evaluation
enables teachers not only to select a textbook, but also to develop their
awareness of their own teaching or learning situation.
In conclusion, materials evaluation is indispensable in language teaching
and learning. Therefore, it is compulsory that materials be evaluated periodically
so that they do not become stale with the particular program involved.

11

Luan van


2.2.3 Types of materials evaluation
There is controversy regarding the types of materials evaluations.
Robinson (1991) classifies materials evaluation into three types: preliminary,
formative, and summative evaluation.
Preliminary evaluation takes place before the course begins and involves
making predictions about the potential value of materials on people who use
them (Tomlinson 1998, 2003). He indicates that this type of evaluation is often
impressionistic, subjective and unreliable since a teacher scans a book quickly
to gain an impression about its value. Evaluating a textbook before a course not
only chooses relevant and appropriate textbooks for the students, but also
identifies specific aspects of the textbook for adaptations (Ellis, cited in
Tomlinson, 1998). Based on the sequence of uses, Cunningsworth (1995)
suggests that preliminary evaluation is the most difficult kind of evaluation, as
there is no actual experience of using the book for us to draw on. In this case,
we are looking for the future or potential performance of the textbook.
Summative evaluation takes place at the end of the course and addresses
the question of whether the materials have been effective (Alderson, cited in
Robinson, 1991). It is the most important and valuable type of evaluation
because it can measure the actual effects of the materials on the users and
provide reliable information (Tomlinson 1998, 2003). Tomlinson maintains
that it can measure short term effects such as motivation, impact achievability
and instant learning. Cunningsworth (1995) believes that summative evaluation
provides retrospective assessment of a textbook's performance and can be
useful for identifying strengths and weaknesses, which emerge over a period of

continuous use.
Formative evaluation takes place while the course is ongoing and it
measures the value of the materials whilst observing or using them. The results

12

Luan van


obtained can be used to modify what is being done (Alderson, cited in
Robinson, 1991, p.59). Mukundan (2009), for example, indicates that
retrospective evaluation is the re-evaluation of materials while they are in-use
to decide if the materials work.
Ellis (1997) argues that there are two types of materials evaluations;
‘predictive’ and ‘retrospective’ evaluations. A predictive evaluation means
deciding which materials suit the most to the course’s aims. Retrospective
evaluation happens once the materials have been used. The materials will be
evaluated further to find out whether the materials have worked out for the aims
of the course. Both predictive and retrospective evaluations aim at making the
teaching/ learning environment more effective. Vasiljevic (2011) concurs with
Ellis (1997) in mentioning ‘predictive’ and ‘retrospective’ evaluations.
Whereas Tomlinson (2003) maintains that there are three types of evaluations;
pre-use, whilst-use and post use evaluations. It is worth mentioning that Ellis
and Vasiljevic’s ‘predictive’ is similar to Tomlinson’s ‘pre-use’ evaluation and
‘retrospective’ is like ‘post-use’ evaluations. Retrospective or post-use
evaluation is the most important and valuable evaluation as it presents the real
impact of the materials on the users (Tomlinson, 2003). However, a problem
with this type of evaluation is that it is time consuming and sometimes
‘impressionistic’ (Vasiljevic, 2011, Ellis, 1997). To focus on the post-use
evaluation, Ellis (1997) argues that ‘macro-evaluation’ is a manageable way to

evaluate materials. He defines macro-evaluation as “an overall assessment of
whether an entire set of materials has worked” (p.37). To do this type of
evaluation, there are several ways of measuring the actual post-use influence of
the material such as tests of what has been taught, questionnaires, examinations,
interviews, dairies and evaluation checklists (Allison, 1999).

13

Luan van


To sum up, although different terms are used to indicate the types of
materials evaluation, they are basically similar. Almost all the researchers agree
that materials evaluation is necessary for two main reasons. First, it is helpful
for measuring the impact of the materials on the learners. Second, it encourages
further development of materials. That is why this research has been carried out
to present the opinions and judgements of the HUFLIT teachers and fourth year students of English on the current Advanced Business Interpretation &
Translation learning materials. Of all the types of materials evaluation
mentioned above, the retrospective or summative materials evaluation can only
be meaningfully determined after a period of classroom use. For the purpose of
this study to evaluate the textbook Advanced Business Interpretation &
Translation, the researcher used the summative evaluation.
2.2.4 Approaches and Criteria for materials evaluation
Many useful approaches and checklists for evaluation criteria have been
proposed by Ellis (1997), McDonough and Shaw (2003), McGrath (2002),
Tomlinson (2003), etc., which vary according to particular ELT contexts.
Evaluators can choose from the available checklists for their evaluation, or they
can select their own criteria to reflect the priorities of their own specific
teaching and learning contexts.
There is a variety of evaluation approaches and criteria discussed in the

literature. The criteria tend to be rather similar although different names are
given by different authors. There are some approaches (Cunningsworth (1995),
Byrd’s (2001), and Ur’s (1996) giving detailed criteria for evaluation, but they
do not give a clear framework for the whole process of evaluation, while other
approaches, such as those suggested by Ellis (1997), Tomlinson (2003),
Littlejohn (1998) and McGrath (2002) provide evaluators with a clear

14

Luan van


framework for the whole process and detailed criteria. However, they are for
non-context specific evaluations. In order to conduct an effective evaluation,
evaluators need to apply their chosen criteria of evaluation to the particular
contextual circumstances of their evaluation. The most important consideration
is that evaluators should be aware of their purpose for evaluation because there
are many purposes for evaluating textbooks (selection, balancing teaching,
supplement, etc.). Also, textbook evaluation can be conducted either before the
book is used, while it is being used or after it has been used (Tomlinson, 2003).
In general, each approach to textbook evaluation, as mentioned above, has its
own strengths and weaknesses, evaluators should choose or even devise an
approach which is the most principled, systematic and suitable for their context.
Therefore, it is also important for evaluators to combine approaches, in order
to offset the weaknesses of one approach with the strengths of others.
Tomlinson (2003) suggests a three-stage process of evaluation: pre-use
evaluation, whilst-use evaluation and post-use evaluation.
- Pre-use: A quick look through a textbook (artwork, illustrations, appearance,
content pages, etc.) to gain an impression of its potential value.
- While-use: Evaluate the following criteria:

●

Clarity of instructions

●

Clarity of layout

●

Comprehensible of texts

●

Credibility of tasks

●

Achievement of performance objectives

●

Potential for localization

●

Practicality of the materials

●

Teachability of the materials

●

Flexibility of the materials

15

Luan van