Spark 3 Based on Criteria Designed by Alan Cunningsworth jolanda gjergji

5.1 Visual material

Student’s book is in full colour. Photographs, drawings and graphs are all attractively done and add an artful, contextual element to the activities. In addition, the textbook contains comic strips that gives visual life to discourse, combining the information given in with entertainment. These are found in the section named “Skills” (E.g. Module 2, p. 27). Most color photos are incorporated into the tasks. In all the sections, as a pre-task activity, the coursebook explicitly asks students to look at a picture and comment in some way. (E.g. Module 2, ex. 1, 2 p. 21). There are many instances in which vocabulary activities are visually supported, which makes the textbook more attractive. New vocabulary items are accompanied by images whose main function is to represent them as they are easier to remember. (E.g. Module 2, ex 1,2 p. 21; ex 6 p. 23; ex 1 p. 29).


5.2 Recorded material
The textbook has recorded materials which are provided on CD such as audio-taped short stories (Module 2, ex.1 p. 31), songs (p. 32) etc. The pronunciation corner is always accompanied with a record from the class CD (p. 29, 40, 52, 66, 76, 90, 100). Also the vocabulary requires the use of tape-recorder (ex.1 p. 21).


5.3 Examples of authentic language
The textbook provides many of authentic materials such as photographs, cartoons (p. 31), comics (p. 27) recorded songs, lyric of songs (which appear at the section named ‘Fun Time’, p.32), professionally audio-taped short stories (ex. 3 p. 31) etc.

5.4 Teacher’s book
A teacher’s book is widely available and is sold wherever the coursebook and workbook are. The teacher’s book gives some suggestions on how to approach each section or activity type encountered within the Spark 3 course. So, it provides valuable teaching tips addressing common problems and concerns. It is very helpful especially for less experienced teachers.