Evaluation of ESL Textbooks for Academic Courses in Pakistan

Abstract

Despite the importance of course evaluation in ESL programmes, it is largely an overlooked area of English Language Teaching (ELT), and only a limited number of studies have been conducted in evaluating academic courses in Pakistan.The current study evaluates an ESL course taught at a Pakistani university. At the level of Syllabus and Course designing special attention is paid to meet the objectives of the course but when it comes to implementation of those objectives through practice some areas are left or ignored. This study also seeks to find out what lacks in the implementation or teaching practice with regard to an ELT course.Drawing upon analysis of data from questionnaires and document analysis, the study found that although the university under study had adapted the course outline given by the Higher Education Commission, the course was only partially aligned with the HEC guidelines. The findings showed that the current course outlinelacked coverage of all four language skills and vocabulary development as envisioned in the HEC guidelines. Therefore, the study recommends incorporating all four language skills into the course outline and aligning it with HEC criteria.