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What do lve want teachingmaterials for?1R. L AllwrightThe question "Wh at do w e w ant teaching materials for?' is prematureuntil we e stablish what there is to be done in teaching and who shoulddo it. Starting with a unified conception of language teaching and learn-ing as 'the management of language learning', this paper proposes amanagement analysis which establishes a necessarily limited role forteaching materials, given the great complexity of the managementproblem revealed by the analysis. This leads to a diagnosis of teacher'overload' and learner 'underinvolvement', with implications forteacher-training and 'learner-training'. (Training is probably necessary iflearners are to become productively involved in managing theirlearning.) 'Learner-training' has further implications for course designand for teacher-training, and raises the question of how teachers canbest put their expertise at the disposal of 'trained' learners. Returning tomaterials, the paper then makes specific suggestions in support of aswitch of em phasis from 'teaching' materials to 'learning' materials.Finally the conclusion is drawn that questions of materials shouldgenerally be related to the conce ption of the w hole of languageteaching and learning as the co-operative management of languagelearning.

The question In this paper I will focus on the sorts of publications we might want pub-lishers to p rom ote , in terms of the sorts of jo bs we mig ht want teachingmaterials to do .To ask 'What do we want teaching materials for?' is unfortunately a pre-mature question. To say "What do we want materials to do?' may clarify theproblem, because it may remind us that, if we are thinking about the roleof teaching materials in the whole teaching/learning operation, then weought first to ask 'What is there to be done?' This question deliberatelyavoids reference to teaching or to the teacher, because I wish, at this stage,to leave 'who should do what' in the management of language learning anopen quest ion.T o be d on e' suggests action, but in fact there are three phases inmanagement, rather than one. There are things to decide, actions to betaken on the basis of those decisions, and a process of review to feed intofuture decision-making.

Figure 1 should help reinforce this point, widi its circularity and over-lapping segments indicating the dynamic interrelationships involved. Aftera decision has been takensay, to use a particular texdjook for a particular coursesome organization is necessarynamely die purchase and deliveryof an adequate quantity of the books to the classroombefore the decisioncan be fully implemented. The use of the textbook, for a sensible review to bepossible, has dien to be monitored to permit evaluation of its use andELTJournal Volume 36/1 October 1981 5

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Fig. 1. Decision, Action, Review.effectiveness, and the result can then go forward to inform subsequentdecisions.In ad dition it seems necessary to take a preliminary look at two differentapproaches to the question of die role of teaching materials. On the onehand there is die DEFICIENCY view. Accord ing to this view, we need teachingmaterials to save learners from our deficiencies as teachers, to make sure, asfar as possible, diat die syllabus is properly covered and that exercises arewell diought out, for example. This way of thinking might lead, at oneextreme, to die idea diat die 'best' teachers would neidier want nor needpublished teaching materials. At die odier extreme we would have 'teacher-p r o o f ma terials diat no teacher, however deficient, would be able to teachbadly widi.

O n die odie r hand, d iere is die DIFFERENCE view, which holds diat weneed teaching materials as 'carriers' of decisions best made by someoneodier dian the classroom teacher, not because die classroom teacher isdeficient, as a classroom teacher, but because die expertise required ofmaterials writers is importandy different from that required of classroomteachersthe people who have to have die interpersonal skills to makeclassrooms good places to learn in. For some diis conception may seem to'reduce' die teacher to die role of mere classroom manager. For odiers, i t'frees' die teacher to develop die expertise needed for dealing widi prac-tical and fundamental issues in die fostering of language learning in dieclassroom setdng.

Bodi die DEFICIENCY and die DIFFERENCE views have enough trudi indiem to be worth holding in mind simultaneously as we move towards amanagement analysis. Bodi views are based on die assumption diatdecisions are best taken (and 'acted upon', and 'reviewed') by diose wididie relevant expertise. Aldiough diis must, at first sight at least, seementirely reasonable, it does ignore die important possibility diat, at least insome not very improbable circumstances, die question of who takes diedecision, etc. , might be mo re im porta nt d ian die quesdon of whether or notdie 'b est' decision is always taken. W e shall need to re tur n to diis issuelater. Now it is dm e to intro duc e an analytical answer to die question 'Wha tis to be don e? '

The analysis This analysis of die issues involved in die ma nag em ent of language learnin gis simplified for die sake of expos ition. (See Ap pend ix 1 for die sam eanalysis elaborated into 27 separate points.) It is not intended to beespecially radical or controversial in its division of language teaching andlearning into four main areas. It may be surprising to see 'Guidance' givena section to itself, but odierwise die content should be familiar and, I hope,generally uncontroversial. The novelty, if diere is any, consists mainly inR . L . AUwright

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presenting the analysis without reference, at this stage, to 'who should dowhat', or 'what should be covered by teaching materials'.Goals Four main po ints need to be ma de abou t goals:1 Po ints of viewIn considering goals, at least four different points of view need to be takeninto account.

Fig. 2. Points of view.Figure 2 attempts to show, by means of the one-way and two-way arrows,that language teaching institutions and sponsors may interact and nego-tiate goals for particular courses, but that language teaching institutionsmay impose goals on teachers, and sponsors may impose goals on learners.Teachers and learners then meet and may also get involved in negotiationof goals.2 Types of goalsAt least two types need to be distinguished here: goals for oneself and goalsfor others. All four 'points of view' represent people or institutions whomust be expected to have personal goals. Teachers wish to develop theirteaching careers, language teaching institutions want to survive financiallyand with enhanced prestige, sponsors want to further their own interests,and learners, we ho pe, want to learn the languag e. The first three, however,have goals for the learners as well as for themselves. They not only havegoals, they may seek to impose those goals on the learners. Hence:3 Probability of conflictGiven these complications, it is not surprising if a conflict of goals is found.Teaching materials, of course, are chosen at least partly because of thelearning goals they embody, but these, we know, are not the only goalsinvolved in the whole management of language learning. This brings us to:4 Materials may contribute in some way, bu t they canno t determine GOALS.The role of teaching materials must then be relatively limited. No matterhow comprehensively the materials cover learning goals, they can nevereven 'look after' everything to do with goals, let alone actually determinethem.

Content There are three main points to be made about content, and then fourcategories of content to be described (bu t see Ap pendix 1 for a mo redetailed analysis).1 InputWe have got used to the input/intake distinction (c.f. Corder, 1967) inrecent years but o nly in terms of inpu t from the teacher. Le arners in class-rooms, however, listen to each other as well as to the teacher, and areexposed, potentially, to much more language than is focused on inteaching. I wish to distinguish between 'what is taught' in the classroom,and 'what is available to be learned' there, as a result of the interactiveW h a t do we want teaching materials or? 7


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nature of classroom events. If, for example, the teacher explains some-thing in th e target language, the language of that explan ation is available tobe learne d. It constitutes potential 'inta ke'. Similarly, all the things that getsaid when errors are being corrected constitute potential intake, as do allthe things said in the target language by other learners.2 'Emergent ' contentIf we define 'content' as the sum total of'what is taught' and 'what is avail-able to be learned', then it becomes clear that 'content' (potential intake) isnot predictable. It is, rather, something that emerges because of the inter-active natu re of classroom events.3 M aterials may contribute in some way, but canno t determine CONTENT.Again we find that the role of teaching materials is necessarily limited. Evenwhat learners learn is in an important way independent of die materialsused.This n oti on of content n eeds further analysis (see Ap pend ix 1) but h ere Ican simply indicate four m ain types of conte nt:a. Th e targe t languag e itselfb. Subject-matter contentThis may include knowledge about language in general, about targetlanguage culture, literature, etc. In die ESP (English for specific purposes)context, subject-matter m ay be an imp ortan t part of 'w ha t is taug ht' , or itmay be simply die 'carrier' of all the langu age conten t.c. Le arn ing strategiesPart of the content of instruction (bodi diat which is 'taught' and diat'available to b e learned') may be lea rning strategies, diat is, ways of dealingwidi language input to turn it into intake, or means of generating input (seeSeliger, 1980). Aldiough die learning of learning strategies has not,traditionally, been an explicit goal of language instruction, it has become,recently, much more usual to give it emphasis, as in 'study skills' coursesfor foreign students, for example. But all courses, not just diose labelled'study skills', could well aim to help learners widi learnin g strategies, as anobvious part of die management of learning. Learners diemselves, ofcourse, may well want to become better language learners. We shall returnto this issue under die heading 'learner-training' later.d. AttitudesIt is well accepted diat one of die goals of school la ngua ge instru ction is toimprove die attitudes of speakers of different languages to one anodier.However seldom this may be achieved, die development of positive inter-cultural attitudes remains important, but it is not often discussed as part ofdie content of instruction. Even where atutudes are not being explicitly'taught', however, diey are almost certainly 'available to be learned' in anylanguage classroom, from die teacher and from everyone present. Theyinclude atutud es to learning, of course, and n ot just language o r inter-cultural atutudes. To summarize, anyone involved in die management oflanguage learning has necessarily to deal widi atutudes as part of whatlearners may learn.This analysis of CONTENT has pointed to some of die many complexitiesinvolved: enough, I imagine, to reinforce my contention diat not too muchcan be expected of teaching m aterials.Method Here diere are diree main issues that have to be attended to (decided, actedup on , reviewed) in die ma nagem ent of language learning.

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1 Learning processesThe fundam ental question is 'W hat learning processes should be fostered?'This is dearly central for all concerned, from curriculum developers to thelearners themselves.2 ActivitiesThe next question is 'What activities, or what learning tasks, will bestactivate the chosen processes, for what elements of content?' A less deter-ministic version of this question might be 'What activities or learning taskswill offer a wide choice of learning processes to the learner, in relation to awide variety of content options? ' This amendment suggests, I thinkcorrectly, that we can neither predict nor determine learning processes, andtherefore perhaps should not try as hard to do so as we usually do in ourteaching materials.3 Activity managementThe third basic question is 'How can we manage these activities (set upgroup work, run simulations, etc.) so that they are maximally profitable?'(i.e. minimizing the management risks discussed in Allwright, 1978): forexample, who will work best with whom, how long can be allowed for anyparticular activity. Such questions may be the subject of suggestions inteaching m aterials, but detailed local decisions are clearly beyond the scopeof publications.Again we come up against die fact diat teaching materials are necessarilylimited in scope. They can, and do, contribute to the management oflanguage learning, but cannot possibly cope widi many of the importantdecisions facing the 'managers' working in their various situations.

Guidance I am using the term 'guidance' to refer to all those things that can beexpected to help people un derstand what they are doin g and how well theyare do ing it. Th e scope of die term dius ranges from the provision of a full-scale grammatical explanation, to die mere nod from a teacher to signifyacceptance of a learner's pronunciation. It also covers, of course, guidanceabout mediod (e.g. instructions for a simulation) as well as about content,and guidance about appropriate standards of attainment. These are majorissues in die management of language learning, involving decisions, forexample, about die most helpful type of explanadon to offer for givenaspects of die language, and about die type of error treatment diat will helpan individual learner.Clearly, in die circumstances, there is again a limit to what teachingma terials can be expected to do for us.This analysis has quite deliberately been presented widiout raising theimportant quesdon of 'who should do what' . That we can cover in die nextsection. Meanwhile, die analysis should have reinforced any doubts dieremig ht have been abou t the viability of ' tea ch er-p roo f teaching materials!The whole business of die management of language learning is far toocomplex to be satisfactorily catered for by a pre-packaged set of decisionsembodied in teaching materials. This is obvious if we recognize that, whileteaching materials may embody decisions, diey cannot diemselves undertake theaction and die review phases of die m an age m ent process. O f course very fewwriters actually claim diat dieir teaching materials can do everything, but asurprising n um ber do state diat dieir materials are entirely suitable for thelearner working neidier widi a teacher nor widi fellow learners, and diisimplies strong claims for what die materials can do. In turn it suggests apossible need for a 'learner's guide' to language learning, of which more

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later. Meanwhile, the main point is that the management of languagelearnin g is inevitably com plex.Implications So far I have delayed answering the question in my title and have pre-ferred instead to consider a more fundamental question: 'What is diere tobe done in the management of language learning?' In this section I shalldeal with implications for teacher-training, then with those for what I willcall 'learner-training', and finally with implications for materialsthemselves.

Implications fo r The main implication is clear: if we subscribe to the 'deficiency' view of theteacher-training role of teaching materials, then we are forced to admit that teachingmaterials cannot possibly make up for all our possible deficiencies asteachers. Perhaps teacher-training, then, should be based on a 'manage-me nt of language learning' analysis, and shou ld co ncentrate on those areasof teacher expertise (like die action and review phases, for example, or thepractical business of classroom interaction management) drat cannot besafely left to materials. This is hardly a new idea for teacher-trainers, but itdoes seem w orth em phasizing here.

If that was the only implication for teacher-training of die analysispresented above, little would have been gained. The analysis, by high-lighting die complexity of die teacher's job, also sheds light on a commonproblem found almost every time diat teachers are observed or observediemselves. It is die problem of teacher 'overload'. Teachers, it appears,seem to do 'all die work', and exhaust diemselves in die process. AsTelatnik noted in die diary she kept as a teacher (Telatnik, 1980) 'I'mworking harder dian they are ' . This might not matter, if teachers couldkeep up die pace widiout running into trouble, but die evidence (mosdyinformal, but see Allwright, 1975, McTear, 1975 for specific examples)suggests diat teachers who do so much work in die classroom run foul of anumber of management risks (see Allwright, 1978 for a fuller analysis) andtypically fail to present the language to be learned as clearly as they hadintended (because diey may offer off-die-cuff explanations diat are faulty,or treat errors inconsistendy, or leave die learners in doubt about whatdiey are supp osed to be doi ng, etc.).

The obvious answer would be to offer more training to produce moreefficient classroom teachers who could cope widi die inevitably largeworkload widiout falling foul of die risks. If, however, we entertain diepossibility diat teachers are not just do ing 'to o m uch ' work, but do ingwork diat die learners could more profitably be doing for diemselves, dieimmediate implication for teacher-training must be diat teachers need tobe trained not to do so much work, and trained instead to get die learnersto do m ore . Hen ce die concept of 'lea rne r-train ing ', since it is unlikely diatlearners will be able to share die burd en wid iout som e prep arad on .Implications for Teacher 'overload' often entails learner 'underinvolvement' since teacherslearner-training are doing work learners could more profitably do for diemselves. Involve-m ent does n ot jus t mean 'activity', however. It is no t jus t diat learners arenot busy enough. 'Involvement' means somediing more akin to Curran's'investm ent' (Curran, 1972 and 1976), which suggests a deep so rt ofinvolvement, relaung to die whole-person. This sort of 'whole-personinvolvement' should be related not simply to 'participation in classroomactivities' but to participation in decision-making, and in die whole

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business of the management of language learning. (It is, after all, theirlearning that is being managed.) But we should not expect the learners tobe already expert at the sorts of decision-making (and action and review)involved in the management of language learning. We must thereforeconsider ways of conducting learner-training. Before doing that, however,there is a further point to be made about the possible benefits of greaterlearner-involvement. On e of the 'manag em ent risks' is 'spoonfeeding', andthis shows up most obviously in the treatment of error: teachers seem toprefer supp lying the correct answ er to asking the learner to think again (seeLucas, 1975; Fanselow, 1977; see Cathcart and Olsen, 1976, for evidencethat learners, as things are, prefer it too). If learners could be trained totake much more responsibility for identifying and repairing their errors,for developing their own criteria of correctness and appropriateness, thenwe could expect a direct improvement in their language learning. At leastin this area, then, and no doubt in others as well, the investment of time intraining learners to assume a greater share of management responsibilitiesshould bring dividends in the short term as well as in the long, bothdirecdy and indirectly.But what ideas do we have for 'learner-training'? Of course, very manyteachers practise 'learner-training' already, but I wish to give ideas forlearner-training the prominence I believe they deserve. Thus, rather thanattempting a comprehensive review of learner-training as currently prac-tised, I shall instead report on personal experience with a course designedto foster learner-training and English-language training simultaneously.In 1978 I was asked, through the British Council, to direct the PolishAcademy of Science's annual three-week 'English seminar' for theirresearch scientists (who work in the Academy of Science's various researchinstitutes across Poland). From the outset it was agreed that the course(repeated in 1979) should be aimed at learner-training, at helping the par-ticipants become the sort of learners who could effectively go on with theirlanguag e learn ing after the course was over, even if no further courses wereavailable to them. At the same time it was of course agreed that we shoulddirecdy help the learners with their En glish. We could not offer th e 'future-orie nta tion ', as we called it, while neglecting the present need .In planning the course, the first essential was to think of ways of gettingthe learners to accept the innovationa preliminary, but fundamental,problem of learner-training. What has developed over die two years isfirstly a 'warm-up system' whereby prospective course-members receive, afew weeks in advance, a letter describing die intended natu re of the cou rseand asking them to come to it having thought about their learningpriorities and their preferred ways of learning English, and some intro-ductory activities for die start of die course, consisting of 'workshops' atwhich pa rticipants are given die task of pro du cin g person al profiles of theirlearning needs, and of dieir preferred language learning strategies (seeAppendices for copies of die profile sheets). These profiles dien constitutedie paper input to interviews of each learner by two of die tutors (one ofwhom, for die sake of die less confident learners, is a speaker of Polish). Atdiese interviews die priorities emerging from die profiles are discussed, tomake sure we know what die learner intended and to make preliminarydecisions about die learner's learning. At diis stage we tutors only have anoutline structure for die course, in die form of a suggested daily timetable.The learners are asked if diey can already see how diis structure mightfacilitate or frustrate pursuance of dieir personal priorities, and we discussWhat do we want leaching materialsfor* 11


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what adaptations might be possible on either side. For example, a personwho wished to get much more writing practice than was allowed for in thetimetable was invited to use Private Consultation Time (described below)for this purpose. From these workshops and interviews we hope learnersemerge with a clearer idea of what they want from the course and how toget it (within our necessarily imposed 'future-oriented' scheme). On theother hand, we tutors emerge ready to meet and take decisions aboutgrouping the learners, assigning tutors to groups and planning the firstlessons. One of the course-members (the one chosen to be student-representative) is present at our meeting to help in the important decision-making.2The second essential element in our course-planning was to find acourse-structure that would offer us and the learners a framework whichwas clear enough to satisfy our need for order, and yet which would beflexible enough to take into account die fact'that we would not know muchabout our learners' needs until die course-members actually assembled.The structure we developed consisted of three main timetabled elements:

1. Class Tim e.2. Self-Access Time.3. Private Consultation Time.(There was a fourth element, die writing workshop, which was important inits own right b ut less im porta ndy structurally; see below.)These three elements were given equal time (90 minutes each in a 6 x 45minute timetable) in the order in which diey are listed above. To meet diedemand for writing work and simultaneously to reduce die demand at anyone time on die self-access facilities, die Self-Access Time alternated dailywidi a writing workshop, so diat half die participants (25 to 30 people)worked on dieir writing while die remainder used die self-access facilities.These comprised four rooms: a listening centre, a 'communication room',a ' language workroom', and a 'reading/writing room'. (The self-accessfacilities were also available at untimetabled times in die early afternoonsand diroughout die evenings and weekends.) There were also social activi-ties each even ing, if only films to watch.The diree timetabled elements were allotted equal time to reflect dieirequal potential, and also to avoid die implications of die usual bias infavour of class time. The intention was diat die diree modes of learningshould complement and feed into each odier. 'Class Time' was diereforeused no t only for familiar language lea rning activities but also as a trainingground for decision-making. (For example, learners were asked as part ofdieir 'homework' to study in groups available texdjooks and select appro-priate exercises to propose for use in class.) In diis way Class Time was usedto help learners learn how to m ake best use of Self-Access Tim e. Individualor sm all-group problem s diat could not be appropriately d ealt widi in classcould be dealt widi by die learners in Self-Access Time, or in PrivateConsultation Time, when time could be booked for private discussionswidi die tutors. Our monitoring of what learners chose to do in Self-AccessTime and of what sorts of problems diey brought to us in die Private Con-sultation Time fed into our decisions about die best ways of spending ClassTime. It was particularly interesting diat often die learners brought learningproblems radier dian language problems to diese Private Consultations. Forexample, diey wanted advice on how to deal widi a listening com-prehension problem after diey had exhausted listening comprehensionmaterials in our listening centre.

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Halfway through the course we interviewed the learners again todiscover whether they felt that their learning priorities (in terms either oflanguage or of learning strategies) had changed, whether they foundcurrent course activities profitable, and whether they felt die course washelping or hinde ring in any way their pursuanc e of dieir priorities. Thus wecontinued to involve learners in the decision-making, die action based ondiose decisions (aldiough we tutors accepted die greater share of respon-sibility for die organization and implementation widi respect to class timeand to die course as a whole) and in die reviewing of bodi decisions andaction. We were asking die learners to monitor continuously and evaluatebefore taking more decisions. The mid-course review did all diis in a rela-dvely formal way, but the decision-action-review cycle was of course moreoften handled informally, whenever tutors and learners discussed die selec-don of materials during Self-Access Time, for example.3

The diird essential task in our planning was to diink ahead to possiblefollow-up activities. We could not hope to make our 'future-o riented 'course credible if we gave die future no diought ourselves. In practice,however, diere was litde we, as visiting tutors, could directly plan. Wecould only hope to persuade the Polish Academy of Science and die BritishCouncil of die potential value of making provision for learners who mightbe ready to make much greater demands on dieir facilities and supportingservices. No persuasion was in fact needed, and it is good to be able toreport progress in die development of year-round self-access facilities anddie creadon of an English 'club' for Polish Academy scientists wishing toco nd nu e dieir learning of English in a non-class setdng.4 Widi more moneymore could be done, of course, particularly for learners away from themain centres. We have also evolved a follow-up quesdonnaire (distributedseveral mondis after die end of die course) to help us find out what learnersdiemselves are doing to build on die diree-week course, and to get theiradvice for future courses and follow-up activities.

This Polish Academy of Science course has been described at somelengdi (diough still very sketchily) to reinforce die point diat learner-training is a concept widi implicadons diat go well beyond die classroom.Of particular importance, I believe, are die implications for course struc-ture, since widiout such changes 'learner-training' may uldmately lackcredibility. 5 Also of obvious importance, however, are die implications forteacher-training , to which I will now re turn .

Further implications Lea rner-training is not go ing to be don e well by teachers who believe diat,fo r teacher-training since only diey have die necessary expertise, only diey can be allowed aresponsible role in die management of language learning. Teachers need tobe trained to help learners develop dieir expertise as learners. Apart fromdie practical problems diis involves, diere is also die problem of what dieteacher is to do widi whatever pegagogic expertise he or she already has.How can we put our expertise in die business of language learning 'at thedisposal of die learners, so diat it is neither imposed upo n the learners n ordevalued by diem (in dieir new-found independence)? We call teachers'masters' radier dian 'servants', and yet, in the best traditions of domesticservice, it is servants who have die expertise, as cooks or valets, and so on,and dieir problem is identical to die teacher's problem as I have outlinedit: how to make dieir expertise available widiout imposing it (because diatwould be presumptuous), and widiout having it devalued (because thendiey would not get the rewards their expertise merited). It may help, then,Wh at do w e w ant teaching materials or? 13


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(and it may be salutory for other reasons) to see teachers as 'servants'rather than as 'masters'. Of course, it is not in the best interests ofdomestic servants to train their employers to do without them, but ineducation the situation is different: in education, since courses are necess-arily finite, there is an obvious need for teachers (servants with expertise)to help their learners become independent of them (to develop their ownexpertise as learners) so that they can continue to learn efficiently after thecourse is over. In order to achieve this, without either imposing dieirexpertise or having it devalued, I suggest that teachers, in addition to dieirrole as 'activities managers' in die classroom, need to accept the roles of:

1. 'ideas' people, ready widi practical advice about language learningstrategies and techniques, both for classroom and for outside use;

and 2. 'rationale' people, ready to discuss language learning and justifytheir opinions and advice.

These are certainly the qualities we needed as tutors in Poland, especiallyduring Self-Access and Private Consultation sessions. Somehow, we needto encourage die development of such qualities in teacher-training. At thesame time we should explore the possibility that there might be a role formaterials writers in all this.

Implications for In the type of language learning described above, we are not going to want,materials I suggest, materials diat pre-empt many of the decisions learners might be

trained to make for themselves. We are going to need learning materialsradier than teaching materials.

The most obvious and radical form for 'learning materials' to takewould be that of a learners' guide to language learning. It is difficult to findmany examples in publishers' lists at the time of writing, although there iswork in progress. The research so far is by no means conclusive, but anysuch guide could profit from die work of Rubin, and of Naiman and hiscolleagues (see Rubin, 1975, and Naiman et al, 1977), on die charac-teristics of die 'good language learner'. One possibility would be a guide to'independent' language learning, for learners widiout teachers. Such aguide could include advice on how to establish one's priorities, advice ondie most productive ways of exploiting native speakers and other usefulpeople (like off-duty teachers), and also advice on die sorts of exercises alearner might devise for personal use, or perhaps for use with friends. It istoo early to know what problems diere might be in writing such a guide(aldiough we can predict some, of course) but diat should not prevent usfrom exploring die concept.

An alternative learners' guide might be produced for classroomlanguage learning. Such a guide could include much of the same materialas for independent learners, but would focus on how to exploit die class-room as a language learning situation widiout making it more difficult forodier learners to do die same, and widiout antagonizing die teacher; onhow to make full use of die teacher's expertise widiout becomingdependent upon it, and on how to develop your own expertise as a learner.At its simplest diis may involve suggesting die sorts of diings learners mightdo to obtain repetitions or clarifications of diings said in die classroom.

The difficulties widi such learning materials as commercial publicationsmight be considerable, if we aimed diem primarily at die 'captive' learner(who, by definition, has not chosen to study a language) in our state schoolsystems. It would seem more sensible to aim them at die 'non-captive'learner, die sort of learner who, in Britain, might buy a 'teach-yourself'

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book a nd /or voluntarily enrol in evening classes. The captive learner is un-likely to have the strength of motivation required to purchase an extrabook, and may well resent it if such a thing is imposed by the teacher. Forsuch learners something much less ambitious, probably locally produced,would seem preferable, something that could be highly specific and there-fore more directly useful to poorly motivated learners. One possibility, insuch circumstances, would be to make the production of a local guide atask for one generation of learners for the sake of future generations, whowould then have the task of updating the guide as and when necessary.Apart from 'learners' guides to language learning' there are other poss-ibilities for learning materials. If, as I have suggested, the teacher needs tobe an 'ideas' person and a 'rationale' person, there is a potential need for' ideas' books and ' rat ionale' books.Under the heading of 'ideas books' I suggest we should first includebooks full of ideas for content. In circumstances where there is easy accessto 'raw' data in the target language (e.g. newspapers, magazines, etc.) it maybe quite unhelpful to suggest that teachers should look to specialistlanguage teaching publications for content ideas. But in die many settingswhere 'raw' data in die target language is not at all easily available there islittle reason to complain if teachers resort to specialist publications. Thereare examples on publishers' lists already 6 but diere could be room formany more perhaps, if teachers demonstrated a willingness to use suchcollections of ideas rather than fully pre determ ined courses.Another need is for ideas for activities. Although language drills are'activities' under any general definition, what I have in mind here is morerestricted in scope and biased towards relatively extended activities, forwhich we could still use plenty of ideas. Under this heading we could askfor more published simulations, for example, more role-play ideas, andmore ideas for communication games (but see die British Council work atELTI for major contributions in these areas7). Another need is for moreideas for what I call 'filler' activities, diat is, short, easily interrupted activi-ties diat die quicker groups can use during group work to supplementextended activities, while waiting for odier groups to catch up. In myexperience such 'activities ideas materials' (for example the Canadian'Gambits' materials by Keller and Taba Warner, 1976) can be passed tolearners for them to make dieir own selections (perhaps leaving die teacherto look after the organizational pr oblem s diat arise, once die learners havem ade dieir decisions). Again die im por tant p oint is diat such materials willflourish on publishers' lists only if teachers are willing to use them in pre-ference to fully worked out course books.When we talk ab ou t 'ration ale bo oks' we are at ou r furdiest from'normal' teaching materials, but teachers trying to share managementresponsibilities widi dieir learners will need not only 'ideas books' but alsobooks diat help diem understand die thinking diat lies behind dieirteaching and dius may help diem explain it to dieir learners. Of coursediere are plenty of books about die general background to languageteaching* but reladvely few deal widi die most recent ideas in a manner diatis accessible to die majority of teache rs.' Again I am not advo cating som e-thing new: radier I am trying to draw attention to and reinforce a changeof emphasis d iat is already perce ptible. It is a change tha t could p erha ps beproducdvely accelerated if its relation to a general change in die concep-tion of teacher and learner responsibilities for die management oflanguage learning was mo re widely accepted.What do we want teaching materials ort 15


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Summary and I started with a question: 'What do we want teaching materials for?' Iconclusions attempted to answer it through an analysis of what there is to be done inthe management of language learning. This analysis, with its obvious com-plexity, carried implications for teacher-training that themselves led to theconcept of 'learner-training' as a necessary development if learners are toshare managem ent responsibilities p roperly.'Learner-training', I argued, has important structural implications forlanguage courses, and this point was illustrated from my experience inPoland. This led to further implications for teacher-training, because ofthe difficulties it creates with the teacher's expertise, specifically with howthe teacher can sensibly put his or her expertise at die disposal of thelearners. From this I moved on to consider die implications for materials.Most obvious here was die change from 'teaching' materials to ' learning'materials, leading to support for die notion of ' learners ' guides' tolanguage learning, and for 'ideas' and 'rationale' books for teachers.Throughout this latter section I was concerned to point out that I was de-scribing a change already in progress, and attempting to reinforce it andperhaps accelerate it.Finally, I should return to my tide. I hope I have dealt with both thestraight and die ironic interpretations of my original question. If I have notdealt with them satisfactorily, I hope at least I have raised questions diatodiers will be prom pted to pursue. The most im portan t point for me is diatmaterials should be related to die conception of die whole of languageteaching and learning as die cooperative management of languagelearning. QReceived October 1980

Notes1 This is based on a paper presented at the Four-teendi TES OL Conve ntion, San Francisco, 1980.2 See also related work at CRAPEL (Nancy, France)and at the School for International Training(Bratdeboro, Vermont) .3 Anyone who knows anything about teaching willknow that reality cannot possibly have been so neat.It was not so neat, but this brief account, for all itsover-simplification of what was organizationallyvery complex, will perhaps indicate what we weretrying to do, and what we to some extent succeededin doing. There are numerous practical problems

involved in the introduction of such a course struc-ture . We think we sorted o ut a lot of them, butman y remain unsolved.4 See Ruth Ho k's 'Some thoughts on study circles andtheir potential for language teaching' in TESOLQuarterly, March 1980.5 At the same dme, those who cannot make radicalstructural changes should not be discouraged fromtrying 'piece me al reform s' and finding ways ofmaking them credible to their learners.6 Swan's Kaleidoscope and Spectrum come first to mind.7 Of special interest are:

a. the issue of ELT Documents devoted to Games,S i m u l a t i o n s and R o l e - P l a y i n g ( \ 9 1 1 1 \);b . the film Communication Games in a LanguageProgramme j

c. the book ELT Guides No. 1 (Byrne and Rixon,eds.): Communication Games, published by NFER.For further details see the References.8 See Corder ' s Introducing Applied Linguistics, f o r a nexcellent exam ple.9 But see Allen and Unw in's series, edited by Gedd esand Sturtridge, for example.

ReferencesAlhvright, R. L. 1975. 'Problems in the study of thelanguage teacher's treatment of learner error' inBurt and Dulay (eds . ) . New Directions in SecondLanguage Learning, Teaching and Bilingual Education.TESO L. 96-109.Allwright, R. L. 1976. 'Putting cognitions on the m ap :an attempt to model the role of cognitions inlanguage learning' in Povey (ed.). Workpapers mTeaching English as a Second Language V o l . X (June):1-14. UCLA.Allwright, R. L. 1978. 'Abdication and responsibilityin language teaching' in Studies m Second LanguageAcquisition Vol. 11/1:' 105-121.Allwright, R. L. 1979. "ESP and classroom manage-ment: the role of teaching materials' . Paper pre-sented at the Second Latin American ESP RegionalConference, Cocoyoc, Mexico.Bridsh Council. 1977. ELT Documents 77 /1 : Games,Simulations and Role-Playing.

Br id sh Counc i l . 1979. Communication Games in a16 R . L. Allwnght

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16 Selection of lea rning processes to b e em-ployed/exploi ted.17 Selection of lea rning activities/tasks to be em-ployed/exploi ted.18 Allocation of time.19 Allocation of people.20 Allocation of space.21 Sequencing.D. Guidance'Guidance' refers to information about die goals ofthe course, the target content, and about die learners'mastery of it all. It will also cover instructions aboutlearning activities and tasks.22 Explanations/descriptions of goals, all types ofcontent, and of learning activities/tasks.23 Cu es/hin ts to draw attention to criterial features oftarget content.24 Im m ed iate yes/no feedback (knowled ge of results).25 Eva luations of learner prog ress (includ ing tests).26 The t iming of 22 - 25 (exactly when to do w hat).27 The sett ing of standards of performance for allaspects of target content, and for classroombehaviour in general .Appendix tw o++ very high - low+ high ve ry low0 medium

NameDate ...

p f.3

Needs I m i lNeed-

FrequencyImportance-

What do you use English for?What do you do with English ?How often do you have this par-ticular need ?How important is i t to you (pro-fessionally and/or personally) toperform well in diis situation ?Proficiency required- How good is it necessary to be atEnglish to perform well in thesituation?How good are you al ready?How sure are you aboutjudgement of your ownficiency?

Proficiency now -Confidence yourpro-

For example :You may need toEnglish. Perhaps be able to write scientific papers indiis does not happen very often

(FREQUENCY ) , but i t is very impo rtant when itdoes (IMPORTANCE ++). You may feel that i t isnecessary to be very good at English (PROFICIENCYREQUIRED ++) in order to write scientific papers,and you may feel that, at present, your own pro-ficiency (for writing) is much lower (PROFICIENCYNOW - ) . You may be absolutely certain of this (CO N-FIDENCE ++ because you have just been trying towrite a pap er an d have found it extremely difficult.

+ very high - low Na me .+ high very low0 m ediu m Date ....

LearningActivity/strategy/techniqueV3f * I

Learning activity/strategy/techniqueWhat do you actually do in order to learn ?Frequency- How often do you do i t ?Enjoyment- How much do you enjoy/like doing i t?U sefulness- Ho w m uch d oes i t help you ?Efficiency- How good/efficient are you at doing it?

Are you getting die most out of dieactivity?The authorDick Allwright lectures on Applied Linguistics at dieUniversity of Lancaster. His teaching career startedwith EFL in Sweden, followed by study at EdinburghUniversity. For twelve years now he has been teachingpostgraduate applied linguistics, specializing inpsychological and socio-psychological aspects oflanguage teaching and learning.He has worked on short courses and seminars in agood many countries, and spent a whole year asAssistant Professor in the TESL Section of die Univer-sity of California at Los Angeles. He is a member ofTESOL's Research Committee, and co-chairperson ofthe Colloquium on Classroom-Centred Research diatis becoming a reg ular feature of each TESOL NationalConvent ion.His research has increasingly focused on die role ofthe learner and die possible benefits of increasedlearner involvement in man aging die learning process,but his interest in improving die quality of learning viaradical change s in classroom practice is roo ted in diebelief that understanding what goes on in classroomsis in many ways more important than changing whatgoes on.

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Language Programme. Film and Notes for TeacherTrainers.Bryne, D. & S. Rixon. 1979. ELT Guides No. 1: Com-munication Games. British Council/NFER.Cathcart, R. L. &: J. W. B. Olsen. 1976. Teachers ' andstudents' preferences for correction of classroomconversation errors' in Fanselow and Crymes (eds.).On TESOL 1976. TESOL.Corder, S. Pit. 1967. The significance of learners'errors ' in International Review of A pplied Linguistics5/4: 161-170.Corder, S. Pit. 1973. Introducing A pplied Linguistics.Penguin Modern Linguistics Texts.Curran, C. A. 1972. Counseling-Learning: A Whole-PersonModel or Education. Grun e and Strat ton.Curran, C. A. 1976. Counseling-Learning in SecondLanguages. Illinois: Apple River Press.Fanselow, J. 1977. T h e treatment of erro r in oralwork' in Foreign Language Annals, Vol. 10/4.Geddes, M. & G. Sturtridge (eds.). 1980. PracticalLanguage Teaching Series. Hemel Hempstead: Allenand Unwin.Hok, R. 1980. 'Some thoughts on study circles andtheir potential for language teaching'. TESOLQuarterly Vol. 14/1: 117-119.Keller, E. & S. Tab a W arner. 1976. Gambits (threevolumes: Openers, Links and Responders an d Closers).Public Service Commission, Ottawa.Lucas, E. 1975. Teachers' Reacting Moves followingErrors made by Pupils in Post-primary English-as-a-Second Language Classes in Israel'. UnpublishedM.A. The sis, Tel Aviv U niversity.McTear, M. F. 1975. 'Potential sources of confusion inforeign language lessons: the rules of the game'.Paper presented at the Fourth InternationalCongress of Applied Linguistics, Stuttgart.Naiman, N., M. Frohlich, H. H. Stern, and A.Todesco. 1977. The Good Language Learner. OISE,Toron to .Rubin, J. 1975. 'What the "go od lang uage le arner "can teach us'. TESOL Quarterly Vol. 9/1 : 41 -51.Seliger, H. W. 1980. 'Second language acquisition: thequestion of strategies'. Paper presented at the ThirdLos Angeles Second Language Research Forum.Swan, M. 1979. Kaleidoscope. Cambridge: CambridgeUniversity Press.Swan, M. 1979. Spectrum. Cambridge: CambridgeUniversity Press.Telatnik, M. A. 1980. T h e intensive jo ur na l as a toolto identify and illustrate ESL teacher/teachingvariables in the classroom'. Paper presented to theThird Annual Colloquium on Classroom-CentredResearch, at the TESOL Convention, San Francisco.

Appendix oneThe twenty-seven point management analysisLanguage teaching analysisThe role of the teacher and the role of the teaching materials

A. GoalsMaterials may or may not embody a fixed set of aimsand objectives. Some materials serve highly specificaims and are difficult to use for other purposes. Othermaterials are much more flexible and consist of ideasthat can be exploited for a variety of purposes. Theteaching, whether helped by the materials or not, mustreflect the relative weightings assigned to the aims, an dalso attend to the sequencing of objectives.1 Long-term aims.2 Short-term objectives.3 Relative weightings.4 Sequencing.B. ContentWhat we teach is of course the 'language' but thisneeds a lot of further analysis, because we may alsowant to teach (and/or learners may want to learn)features of target language discourse, and features ofthe target culture. Also we may include subject-matterfrom other disciplines (as in ESP). Some of thesubject-matter we use may be there just to carry thelanguage practice, and not to be learned (e.g. con-versation topics, or the content of drill items).5 Target language content.6 Target discourse content.7 Target cultural content.8 Target subject-matter content.9 'Carrier ' content.What we teach may also include selected learningstrategies and techniques, because we may want ourlearners to be better learners after whatever course weare giving them, so that they can carry on learningeffectively, perh aps even w ithou t a teacher.10 Target learning strategies to be developed.11 Target learning techniques to be developed.What we teach may also include attitudes, in the sensethat we would hope our learners would developpositive attitudes towards both their current learningand their future use and learning of the targetlanguage, etc.12 Target attitudes.Lastly, after selection, m atters of weigh ting, of timin g,and of sequencing have to be attended to.13 Assignm ent of we ightings to all elements ofcontent.14 Assignment of time to all elements of conten t.15 Sequencing.C. MethodDetermining how all the various elements of contentare to be learned is obviously a complex matter andinvolves thinking about the learning processes to beemployed, the activities or tasks that will draw uponthose processes, and about how to relate content, in allits complexity, to the activities or tasks. Then theaaual performance of the activities or tasks has itselfto be thought about: the amount of time needed, thenature of the groupings, etc.

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