Analysing cultural aspects in EFL textbooks: a skill-based analysis

Abstract

In teaching/learning English as a Foreign Language, one of the goals is to develop interculturally competent citizens. Consequently, culture must play a major role. As textbooks are carriers of cultural information, special attention should be paid to the cultural content of textbooks. This article compares the cultural content of six B2-level textbooks for English language teaching in Spain. The editions range from 1992 to 2013 and were distributed by well-known publishing houses. The purpose of the study is to identify whether cultural content (general, big ‘C’ and small ‘c’) has been incorporated in newer editions to answer to globalised needs and, secondly, to determine which skill is used preferably to do so. The author has adopted a culture learning model developed by Lee (2009) and design a three-fold cultural checklist. Then, content analysis methodology (Krippendorff 2004) has been used to quantify qualitative data. Data suggest that even in newer editions, products, artefacts and external behaviours are used more frequently when trying to portray a specific culture, leaving aside general cultural content and internal culture (small ‘c’). It was also found that skill usage is different depending on the type of culture learning.

Readability and types of questions in Chilean EFL high school textbooks

“…Finally, it is worth mentioning that the findings of this study are in line with what has been shown in other countries in aspects of language teaching that are not systematically or appropriately addressed in textbooks, such as vocabulary (Jiménez‐Catalán & Mancebo‐Francisco, ; Nordlund, ), culture (Gómez‐Rodríguez, ; Raigón‐Rodríguez, ), grammar (Nozawa, ), speaking (Derwing, Diepenbroek, & Foote, ), and listening (Nguyen & Abbott, ), among others. Findings like these indicate that ESL/EFL textbooks around the world should be carefully examined by linguists, educators, and teachers to continue spotting weaknesses and proposing ways to make a present effective use of them as well as future positive changes in future editions.…”

The C-BIM Model in Improving Reading, Writing, and Critical Thinking Skills: Outcome and Perception

“…Teachers feel easy to improve students' reading comprehension and writing skills through each activity. This finding accords with some previous studies relating to culture and intercultural language learning in terms of improving language skills (Haerazi & Irawan, 2020a;Raigón-Rodríguez, 2018;Colaiacomo & Puntil, 2018;Hagar & Hagar, 2018;and Fernández-Agüero & Chancay-Cedeño, 2019). The class teacher directs students to scrutinize each word, phrase, and sentence in prereading activities.…”

Raising Students’ Cultural Awareness and Developing Their Intercultural Communicative Competence: The Case of the Greek State Primary School EFL Textbooks

“…To better exemplify this claim, it should be mentioned that based on survey findings 'culture teaching' in the Greek state school remains insubstantial and sporadic (Tzotzou & Kotsiou, 2015), which indicates that its application is not systematic or structured to a satisfactory level. The same holds true in other countries as proffered by many researchers in the field of intercultural education (Mekheimer, 2011;Raigon-Rodriguez, 2018;Reimann, 2009).…”