An Introduction to the Primary English Textbooks

An Introduction to the Primary

English Textbooks(class-1-5)

Mohammad Shahidullah

Assistant Upazila Education Officer

Moheshkhali, Coxsbazar

The textbooks, those are taught and used for the students at primary school, are quite fine and well-planned. The students have been being benefited from these books deeply and skillfully. Here, we would like to discuss about the English for Today of Class-1 to Class-5. The Sub-cluster training Manual for December/2014 is assigned to conduct two demonstration classes on the English Textbooks. One of the demonstration class would be presented on the English Textbooks of Class one and  Class Two giving emphasis on Listening and Speaking skills as well as class activities and teaching techniques. The other demonstration class would be conducted on English for Today for classes-3 to 5, focusing on listing the activities for reading and writing skills. So, I would like to give an special importance on the English Textbooks. However, it is known to all that the Textbooks are written, prepared and edited for considering children from all walks of lives living in Bangladesh. They may be highly aware of literacy and education or may be low-level or may be the middle-class family children. Simultaneously, the Authors and Editors kept in their mind, while writing the books that this is the age of knowledge and communicative language. I would like to quote some comments of the Chairman of NCTB, Professor Md. Abul Kashem Mianh that he wrote as Preface of the Textbooks. He writes about the English Textbooks;

`The Primary curriculum has been revised in the light of the National education Policy/2010; which emphasizes  Learning English as an International Language for communicating locally and globally.----to help the students’ attain competencies in all four language skills in English through meaningful and enjoyable activities. Emphasis has been given on Listening and speaking skills as the foundation on which to develop reading and writing skills. ‘

So, we all related to the primary education, perhaps could have realized, what the honorable Chairman has said in his comments. We all would try to proceed on, according to his thought, in our teaching-learning activities in future and in this sub-cluster training.

Directions given for teaching English for Today( Primary English Textbooks):  There is a direction given for the teachers in each English Textbook to be followed, before teaching the books . The main points of the direction are;

1. From the childhood, the students would learn four skills of English Language like Reading, Writing, Listening and Speaking through practice in the class.
2. If anyone, who wants to learn and acquire the knowledge of English Language, he has to practice a lot of English words and texts. A teacher can enable the students to give the chance of those activities.
3. The teacher has to teach the students Some of the expressions like greetings, farewells, commands, instructions etc. everyday. He/She would create such an environment in the class, so that the students can practice listening and speaking in his/her class.
4. The teacher must be careful of correct pronunciation, intonation, stress and the students would follow him/her.
5. He is to ensure the inter-active activities more and more with the students giving works like; pair work, group work, chain drill, role play etc. in the class and outside.
6. The teacher should have to use English in the class as far as he can and make the students to so, but when  he  would feel that the students couldn’t follow him, he can make them easy, speaking in the mother-tongue Bengali. At a time, he would get responses from the students gradually.

Introduction to the English Textbooks:

The five English Textbooks approved for the classes One to Five are defined and assigned for the primary school students would be introduced here in brief now one after another.

English for Today

Class-One

Writers:

M S Hoque/Yasmin Banu/Md Abdur Razzaque/Naina Shahzadi

There are 30 topics in this textbook. Like;

1. Greetings, Pre-writing and alphabet song, 2. Introductions,letter- A, 3. Saying goodbye; letter-B, 4. Numbers,letter-c, 5. Commands;letter-C, 6. Numbers;letter-E, 7. Rhyme, Review (A-E), 8.What`s this? Letter-F, 9.Numbers; letter-G, 1o.Rhyme; Letter-h,11.Commands; Letter-I, 12.Rhyme; Review-J, 13. Rhyme; Review(A-J), 14. Review (1-5); Letter-K, 15. Numbers; Letter-L,16. Commands; Letter-M, 17.Rhyme; Letter-N, 18.Numbers; Letter-o, 19. Where do they live?; Review (A-O),20. Numbers; Letter-p, 21. Rhyme; Letters Q and R, 22. In the village, Letter-5, 23. In the room; Letter-T, 24. Numbers, Review (A-T), 25. Rhyme, Letter-U, 26.Numbers,Letter-V, 27.Rhyme,Letter-W,28.Number,Letters X-Y, 29.Letter-Z,Review (A-Z), 30. Alphabet Song And Vocabulary.

Back page Wise-word: Unity is strength.

English for Today

Class-Two

Wrtiters:

M S Hoque/Yasmin Banu/Md Abdur Razzaque/Naina Shahzadi

Twenty Nine Topics are included in this textbook. They are;

Greetings, Reviw-Aa to Ee,2. Numbers,ReviewFf toJj, 3.Commands,Review-Kk to Tt, 4.Numbers,Review-Pp to Tt,5.How old…/,Review-Uu to Zz, 6.Numbers, Alphabet- a to z, 7.How old are you?, Alphabet, 8. Numbers, How many..?, 9. I`m in … Numbers review, 10. Numbers, I`m……., 11. Head and shoulders, Parts of the body,12. Numbers, Parts of th body, 13. Days of the week, 14. Numbers, Story: Rima and the seed, 15. Story; Rima and the seed, 16.Numbers, Colours, 17.colours and numbers, 18.Numbers, a/an, 19. Shapes qand Numbers, 20. Numbers, Mr Shape, 21 bLucky the Citcle, Shapes and Colours, 22. Sizes, 23. Animals, Where is it?, 24.Anmals where they live, 25. Life every day, 26. Kartiz`s Life, in the/at…., 27. Anita`s Life, Where do anmals live?, 28. HOW MANY/, 29. Story: The Golden Goose and Vocabulary.

God is kind.

English for Today

Class-Three

Writers:

M S Hoque/Yasmin Banu/Md Abdur Razzaque/Naina Shahzadi

There are 40 topics are included in the textbook English for Today for Class-3. They are namely;

1. Greetings and Introductions, Introducing a student,
2. Introducing a teacher, Introducing someone,
3. Dialogue: Keya, Riya and Mashuk,
4. Numbers: Cursive small letters,
5. Commands and Instructions, inside the classroom, Commands and instructions,
6. Numbers, Cursive small letters,
7. Commands and Instructions,
8. Numbers, Cursive small letters,
9. Commands and instructions: outside the classroom, Commands, instructions and requests: at home and at school,
10. Numbers, Cursive small letters,
11. Commands, instructions and request,
12. Numbers, Cursive small letters,
13. Letters and sounds,
14. Numbers, Cursive small letters,
15. Names of the days and months,
16. Numbers, Cursive small letters.
17. Names f the months, Number of days of the mnth,
18. Numbers, Cursive capital letters,
19. Occupations,
20. Numbers, Cursive capital letters,
21. Occupations,
22. Numbers, Cursive capital letters,
23. What tey do?
24. Numbers, Cursive capital letters,
25. What sounds do they make?
26. Numbers, What are they doing?
27. What are they doing? Numbers
28. Story: The Cow and the frog,
29. Where is it?
30. Punctuation and capital letters, Numbers,
31. Punctuation and capital letter,
32. Punctuation and capital letters, Numbers,
33. Story: BtHE BOYS AND THE FROGS,
34.  My family, Numbers,
35. My friend, Letters and sounds,
36. Food we need, Numbers,
37. What food should we eat?
38. Cleanliness, At the shop,
39. Story: The Crow
40. Story: The Crow and Vocabulary.

Back page Wise-word: Health is wealth.

English for Today

Class-Four

Writers:

Shaheen M. Kabir/ A.M.M.Hamidur Rahman/Md. Zulfiqar Haider and Goutom Roy

There are 26 topics are included in the textbook English for Today for Class-4. They are namely;

1. Say Who You Are,
2. Hello! Hello! Hello!,
3. A Family Tree,
4. Say It Right!-1,
5. A Bookshop,
6. Traffic Rules,
7. Classroom Language,
8. Say It Right!-2,
9. Days 0f the Week,
10. Telling the Time,
11. Sagar and His Family
12. Clap your hands,
13. Foods and Meals,
14. Tune up!
15. Write it well-1,
16. Write it well-2,
17. The Hen and the Chicks,
18. A Letter to a friend,
19. The Pocket,
20. Months of the Year,
21. Reading the Calendar,
22. A Day out,
23. Hilyday,
24. Tails,
25. A Day in Garment Worker`s Life
26. The Lion and the Mouse and Vocabulary.

Back page Wise-word: Honesty is the best policy.

English for Today

Class-Five

Writers:

Shaheen M. Kabir/ A.M.M. Hamidur Rahman/Md. Zulfiqar Haider and Goutom Roy

There are 29 topics are included in the textbook English for Today for Class-5. They are namely;

1. Hello! May I Introduce Myself?

2. Say It Right,

3. Speak with Rhythm,

4. An Evening with Saikat`s Family,

5. Leisure Time,

6.Days in a Calendar,

7. Eat Healthy, Live Healthy,

8. Write to Me Soon,

9. A Firefighter,

10. Say It with Tune,

11. I wanted t5o do,

12. Punctuation Review,

13. `Have you seen an Igloo?” asks the teacher.

14. My Home Town,

15. Where Is the Library?

16. How far Is St. Martin?

17. Telling the Time,

18. The Hare and the Tortoise,

19. Happy Birthday!

20. May I help you?

21. Life is Beautiful,

22. What Sports Do You Like?

23. Birds n Springs,

24. City Street and Country Roads,

25. The3 Liberation War Museum,

26. It Was a geat Day!

27. We shall Overcome!

28.Do You Have a Library Card?

29. Fitzy Frog Loses Hs Voice.

Back page Wise-word: Slow and steady wins e race.

Some activities for improving Listening and Speaking Skills:

1. Look, listen, say, do etc,
2. Reading aloud,

3. Memory games,

4. Dialogue practice,

5. Answering questions (for about pictures, reading or listening texts),

6. Open questions and answers (for example students asking each other about families),

7. Role play (for example, acting out dialogues and plays),

8. Rhymes and songs,

9. Stories,

10. Guessing games,

11. Talking about a picture,

12. Describing pictures,

13. Exchanging personal information,

14. Social talk in the class room (for example, about holidays or festivals),

15. Taking interviews,

16. Debates,

17. Audio recordings

18. Teacher/students talk.

Stages of listening and speaking:

For recognizing words:

Pre-listening/speaking

Help students to guess the meaning of unknown words using context.

While listening/speaking

1. Present the words/numbers orally as the  children listen,

2. Then ask the children to reproduce the words/numbers orally as child speaks,

3. Do some activities, like; listen, and show/matching.

Post-listening/speaking:

-Provide feedback on the strengths and the area of improvement,

-Use activities, like; Look and say

For test presentation:

Pre=listening/speaking

1. Discussing the topic or type of conversation with the learners,
2. Helping the teachers to develop their vocabulary relted to the topic.

While listening/speaking

1. Ask learners to read and understand the questions/fill in the blanks/True-False.
2. Tell them to listen to the text and answer the question(teacher will read the text aloud)
3. Let the students listen to the text again and do the task while listening (if necessary)

Post-listening/speaking

Give feedback, and consolidate what they have learnt.

Some techniques for improving Listening and speaking skills:

1. Repeating words/phrases, text, rhymes; making sure that students hear them more than once,
2. Relating the text to the students lives; for example by getting them interested in the topic or finding out what they know about the topic,
3. Using pictures or drawings
4. Teaching words and phrases that students don`t know, or helping them to find out what they mean,
5. Breaking up long texts into short pieces,
6. Telling students that they need to practice listening to English. The more they listen, the easier it will get,
7. Telling students not to worry, if they don’t understand every word.

Techniques used in speaking:

1. Teaching vocabulary, 2. Chorus drilling, 3. Chain drilling, 4. Open pair work (Demonstrate how to do it in group), 5. Pair practice, 6. Open group work (Demonstrate how to do it in group) and 7. Group practice.

When and how to correct speaking:

1. Finding the mistakes during pair/group work: When the students are working in pairs or groups, the teacher can walk around and listen to as many students as possible. He/she can make notes about common mistakes,
2. Controlled practice (chorus drill, chain drill/pronunciation practice): The teacher can arrange a controlled activity after the pair/group activity without mentioning which pair/group made the mistakes. It helps them avoid making similar mistakes next time they use the language and in this way helps them improve their English.

How and When to asses speaking:

Here are some suggestions for speaking skills. We may have more ideas. We can add the following list with our ideas;

1. Teachers can regularly ask questions to all students in the class, At the nd of the lesson, teachers make notes on the students` performance. Teachers can do this over time—for example they can ask six different students each time, making sure that they ask all students in the class eventually (and not always the same students, for example, the students having roll no first, middle, last or the more confident students).
2. When students are working in pairs or groups, teachers can walk around the room and listen and make notes. It will usually be impossible for teachers to monitor each pair or group or every activity. Teachers can assess 3 to 4 different groups each time.
3. Teachers can give oral tests to individuals or small groups of students.
4. Teachers can give oral tests to pairs over a period of time-when other students are doing pair work.

Conclusion:

 I have read through all the English textbooks and they are written for the primary level students. Here, I have re-written the topics class-wise. All the topics given for making the students to achieve four language skills; like Reading, Writing, Listening and Speaking. These topics have been written for the general students of our country, but I think for the good and advanced students it needs to add more serious types of topics. The NCTB experts and the writers of the Textbooks `English for Today’ from class-I to class-5, all are very experienced and renowned educationists. We can keep confidence upon them. Their thought and plan for the primary level students wouldn’t go in vain. The teachers, who teach English at primary schools, are advised to do their teaching-learning activities, acquiring the contents and outcomes, effectively. If possible, please, make the students read and learn more seen and unseen topics compared to the textbooks matters, so that they could be able to be competent enough for the competency based test-items given in the Primary Education Completion Examination.