The Retrospective Evaluation of English Language Teaching Materials in a Preparatory Year English Language Program in Saudi Arabia

The purpose of this study was to retrospectively evaluate the use of English language teaching materials in a one-year preparatory program of a Saudi Arabian public university. The materials were a set of ten books (commercial coursebooks) by Oxford University Press, consisting of five-level listening and speaking (five books) and reading and writing books (five books), with teacher-produced supplementary material (five books). Ninety-six teachers took part in the first part of the study, a macro-evaluation, by use of an instrument, the ELT-TEC. Then, the materials were micro-evaluated in-use through classroom observations and interviews. The results revealed a significant difference in the performance of the two book types. The commercial coursebooks books were rated more highly than the teacher-produced textbooks in macro evaluations. The observations and interviews confirmed the strengths of the commercial coursebooks, which showed high satisfaction/suitability in all sections across the ELT-TEC, while the teacher-produced textbooks revealed weaknesses in four major sections. As this evaluation exercise was done to determine the effectiveness of the materials used in the preparatory year, college administrators would have to make crucial decisions on the fate of the teacher-produced books as they have been found to have numerous weaknesses and decide if they have to be omitted or if an overhaul would be needed.