IH World Teacher Development – Teaching YLs Self-Study Pack

USING AUTHENTIC MATERIALS

This worksheet is intended for you to keep a record of what you have learnt while doing the tasks in
the self-study pack.

Task What did you learn from the task?

Task 1: What are authentic
materials?

Task 2: Why use authentic

materials?

Task 3: Example 1
(Supplementing coursebooks)

Task 4: Example 2 – Movie

Segment

Task 5: Example 3 – Nursery

Rhyme

Task 6: Example 4 - Cartoon

Exploiting Authentic Materials Reflective Summary

 IH World Teacher Development – Teaching YLs Self-Study Pack

Task 1 Notes – What are Authentic Materials?

1. Take a pen and paper and write your definition of authentic materials.

Authentic materials refer to any resource taken from a genuine (non-contrived) real world context and
applied in the classroom to facilitate language or skill development. The intention is to replicate the
language use of a native speaker in order to encourage the development of both natural and useful
knowledge for a learner. Within the context of a reading lesson, a daily newspaper may be taken into the
class and used in the same way as a reader out of the classroom would; that is, skimming the headline
for interesting articles, scanning the weather forecasts or sports scores for specific pieces of information
such as key words, phrases or numbers, or perhaps reading an article on world politics or the local
economy with greater attention to detail.

2. Answer given: Authentic materials are materials (texts, audios, etc.) which are designed for native
speakers. Jordan (1997, p. 113) refers to materials that are not written for language teaching purposes.

3. Word search to find 13 sources of authentic materials:

 newspapers
 stories
 YouTube
 magazines
 nursery rhymes
 songs
 announcements
 brochures
 television
 movies
 radio
 recipes
 podcasts

Exploiting Authentic Materials Reflective Summary

 IH World Teacher Development – Teaching YLs Self-Study Pack

Task 2 Notes – Why Use Authentic Materials?

Some reasons for using authentic materials in the language classroom:

 Provides exposure to natural language

 Prepares students for the ‘real world’
 Builds confidence in dealing with ‘unfiltered’ language
 Can add insight into the target culture
 Can be a way of bringing the ‘outside world’ into the classroom
 Materials can be selected that are relevant to the students’ needs and interests
 Students may see authentic materials as being more relevant and feel more motivated
 Can be more topical than published material (which can date quite quickly)

Factors to Consider:

The material itself:

 Is it interesting?
 How complex is it linguistically?
 How “standard” is the language?
 Is it culturally accessible?
 Will classroom use infringe copyright?

The tasks themselves:

 Are they relevant to the students?

 Even if much of the language is complex, can achievable tasks be designed?
 “Springboard potential”: can the tasks lead on to other useful classroom activities? (i.e. the post-
reading and post-listening stages)
 Does it lend itself to an authentic task, i.e. can it be used in the same way that the person it’s
designed for would use it?

Exploiting Authentic Materials Reflective Summary