The use of authentic materials in an English for Specific Purposes

university class

El uso de materiales auténticos en una clase universitaria de

inglés con fines específicos

Lucía Sánchez Bejerano

Universidad Europea del Atlántico

lucia.sanchez@uneatlantico.es

ABSTRACT

The present article shows a didactic application based on the use of authentic materials

and English for Specific Purposes (ESP) in a university class. The designed proposal was

applied throughout a period of fifteen weeks in an English as a foreign language subject,

equivalent to a B1.2 level according to the Common European Framework of Reference

for Languages (CEFR). This lesson plan was applied in a group class of forty students

belonging to two different bachelor’s degrees: Psychology, and Sports Science and

Physical Activity.

Keywords: ESP, authentic materials, higher education, English as a foreign language,

reading.

RESUMEN

El presente artículo muestra una aplicación didáctica basada en el uso de materiales

auténticos y de inglés para fines específicos en un aula universitaria. Para ello, se diseñó

una propuesta que fue aplicada a lo largo de quince semanas en la asignatura de Inglés

Instrumental II equivalente a un nivel B1.2 de acuerdo con el Marco Común Europeo de

Referencia para las Lenguas. El grupo meta al que estuvo dirigida esta propuesta consistió

en una muestra de cuarenta estudiantes pertenecientes a los grados de Psicología, y

Ciencias de la Actividad Física y el Deporte.

Palabras clave: inglés para fines específicos, materiales auténticos, educación

universitaria, inglés instrumental, lectura.

Revista Nebrija de Lingüística Aplicada a la Enseñanza de Lenguas (RNAEL) ISSN 1699-6569

Vol. 17 Núm. 35 (2023) doi: 10.26378/rnlael1735536

Recibido:24/06/2023 / Aprobado: 10/11/2023

Publicado bajo licencia de Creative Commons Reconocimiento Sin Obra Derivada 4.0 Internacional

1. INTRODUCTION

The extended use of coursebooks in the scope of English as a Foreign Language teaching

makes it easier for teachers to plan lessons and to organise content. Very frequently,

coursebooks include a wide set of activities in order to cover the four main skills:

reading, writing, listening and speaking, especially when they are designed to prepare

students for language certifications. However, most of these activities might be

considered disposable since they lack interest for students, especially adults who are

studying at university and require more specialised content. Moreover, coursebook texts

tend to be decontextualised from an original source and, unfortunately, they are just an

excuse to practice the corresponding grammar and range of vocabulary. Thus, teachers

may offer “valid frameworks” (Ball, 2016: 25) so that students can engage with content

and, therefore, learn better. Among these valid frameworks, there is an increasing use

of authentic materials at university. Dania and Adha (2021: 149) define authentic

materials as “every resource that can be used for pedagogical purposes while it is

actually not designed to be used in language classroom.” Therefore, teachers work with

real texts (newspapers, books, magazines) rather than regular adapted content

(coursebooks, workbooks or graded readers).

Regarding this tendency of using authentic materials in contemplation of engaging

students into reading, we establish the following research question:

• Do university students engage with the use of authentic materials to work the

syllabus and ESP?

From this query, the present article addresses the matter by proposing a main objective:

• To design a proposal on the use of authentic materials for working on

reading skills, observing students’ participation after its application.

This main objective was broken down into smaller goals which allowed for an easier

approach to the main target. They are the following:

• To approach students with a questionnaire in order to know their use of

authentic texts for reading in English.

• To design and apply a didactic proposal of fifteen weeks (February-May

2022) based on the use of authentic materials.

• To gather information about students’ participation in the use of authen-

tic materials for working on reading skills.

The relevance of this matter is based, not only on the extended amount of research on

the topic, but also on the premise that it is English teachers' duty to enrich lessons so

that students can make the most of them. Moreover, as Ahmanpanah and Mohseni

(2017: 69) consider, “humanizing language learning materials helps language teachers

to design activities that are linked to learners’ lives and experiences.” Thus, the more

motivation, the better and more significant the learning is.

Regarding the context, this piece of work is set at the European University of the Atlantic

(Uneatlántico), in Santander. Most of the degrees at the university share some common

subjects of English as a Foreign Language in their syllabus: Inglés I, II, III, and IV,

depending on the degree. At the Uneatlántico, students from English as a Foreign

Language study vocabulary which is related to their field of study, that is to say, they

study English for Specific Purposes. Therefore, this was the main aspect which fostered

the study of authentic materials, as a form of studying ESP at the university. In the

Uneatlántico each semester there are three sessions of ESP, out of thirty in the academic

programme. The rest of the sessions are designed so that students from the same level

follow the same coursebook.

There is also some interest in study from the researcher’s experience as an English

teacher at the Uneatlántico. Three sessions per semester are not enough to make

students get used to specialised content. Besides, the materials used in these three

sessions are not always authentic materials, but adaptations from other ESP

coursebooks. Therefore, and following Ahmanpanah and Mohseni’s (2017) indications,

it is considered that a wider contact with the specific topics from the degrees is required.

2. SOURCES DESCRIPTION

2.1. English for Specific Purposes and authentic materials

According to Paltridge and Starfield (2014: 3), ESP consists of English learning “where

the goal of the learners is to use English in a particular domain.” This means that

students will be studying a specific type of vocabulary or topics, motivated by their

necessities. Furthermore, ESP students tend to be adults (Paltridge & Starfield, 2014),

which makes it even more logical to be taught at university, where specialisation is

required. What is more, ESP does not only focus on future academic necessities, but

also on occupational ones too (Anthony, 2018). The way of accomplishing these

demands is designing specific materials which cover them. Nonetheless, if the focus is

to provide students with the tools for their future development in a real English-speaking

environment, prepackaged materials might not be sufficient.

Authentic materials may supply the lack of naturalness in coursebooks as the latter

include adapted resources which are not extracted from real situations. Swe (2017: 234)

states that authentic materials can be “anything written in the target language and used

unedited in the classroom.” Therefore, they can be designed by native English speakers

or non-native speakers. By using real texts written in English, students can build a bridge

between their classroom and the real world, which will enable them to see a practical

use of the language. As for the type of materials that can be offered, Mishan (2005)

proposes using cultural products such as literature, the broadcast media, newspapers,

advertising, song and music, film, and ICT. Abdulhussein (2014: 334) even adds some

more such as “pictures, charts, diagrams, advertisements, realia.” Mukundan et al.

(2016) stress the use of a wide variety of sources to suit as much diversion in liking as

possible. Besides, these authors (Mukundan et al., 2016: 67) state that another criterion

for choosing authentic materials is using a “familiar and comfortable” topic. This way

the text can be easily related to previous knowledge, which will help the student

understand the text better, as information can be easily inferred (Kintsch & Van Dijk,

1978).

However, not every content that is being written without academic purposes is suitable

for being used in a classroom. Therefore, teachers must follow some criteria to select

the adequate texts. McGrath (2016) establishes some key aspects to bear in mind when

selecting authentic texts for the classroom:

Relevance (to syllabus, to learners’ needs), intrinsic interest of topic/theme,

cultural appropriateness, linguistic demands, cognitive demands, logistic

considerations: e.g., length, legibility/ audibility, quality (as a model of use or as

a representative token of a text-type, exploitability) (McGrath 2016: 102)

2.2. Authentic materials into context

In the investigation carried out at the Kazakh Ablai Khan University of International

Relations and World Languages (Yaleyubayeva, 2017), learners obtained better scores

at their tests with the use of authentic materials. Students could learn language in a

faster way as well as using it comfortably because “they had practiced a real language

used beyond the classroom” (Yaleyubayeya, 2017: 8). Some other studies have

implemented the use of authentic materials in a particular skill, such as reading. Blaker

and Ellsworth (2020) designed a programme to replace graded readers for extensive

reading at Konan University, Japan, so that students would engage more with their

readings. Authors (Balker & Ellsworth, 2020: 336) finally concluded that they had

“yielded positive attitudes.” Similarly, a study carried out by Nurazimi and Hidayat

(2021) in a Senior High School, in Indonesia, showed that students had an increase in

motivation after using authentic materials for reading comprehension. However, this

research by Nurazimi and Hidayat (2021) was carried out in a high school rather than

at a university. Thus, its results are interesting to look at, but it is necessary to develop

a further reading on studies which have more similarities with the present research.

As it was established before, the main objective includes getting to know student’s use

and interest in the authentic materials through the application of a questionnaire. Thus,

the following studies contain a review on the current literature which had a similar goal

so that a reliable questionnaire can be found. For this review, recent studies, no older

than ten years, have been considered.

Firstly, Abdulhussein’s work (2014) consists in a study from the University of Misan and

the University of Imam Al Saqeq, in Iraq. One of its main objectives was “investigating

EFL Iraqi college teachers’ attitudes toward using authentic materials in their reading

classes in Misan Governorate” (Abdulhussein, 2014: 331). For this, a questionnaire was

created. It consisted of a 36 statements tool which asked the degree of agreement with

a five Likert scale. The author tested its reliability through the administration of the tool

in two moments to the same sample. Both a Pearson correlation coefficient test and an

Alpha Cronbach Formula proved that the results were not significantly different. As for

the validity, a group of experts accepted it as well. As for the results in the investigation,

the study showed positive attitudes on the use of authentic materials. Moreover, the

questionnaire may be used in a similar study. Nonetheless, it is necessary to mention

that the tool was validated for a particular group only.

Ishaq and Khan (2016) developed another study at the University of Balochistan in

Pakistan where one of the main investigation questions was “what are the perceptions

of government boys’ and girls’ college students towards the use of the authentic material

in EFL classroom?” (Ishaq & Khan, 2016: 85). In this case, they also used a Likert scale

to assess only four items. The test was validated as well, and the results showed positive

attitudes on the use of authentic materials as well. However, on this occasion, the

questionnaire was not published. Thus, this investigation’s tool is dismissed for the

present dissertation.

In Anh and Yen’s (2017) investigation at the Can Tho Medical College in Vietnam, the

focus was to research about students’ perception in the use of authentic materials when

learning medical English terminology. In this case, a validated questionnaire of twenty-

nine statements was created. Students had to select a degree of agreement through a

five Likert scale. The findings of this study were various: there was a positive awareness

on the use of the authentic materials. However, students found it difficult to distinguish

which materials were authentic. In the study the use of realia is also recommended.

Since this questionnaire is focused only on medical authentic materials, it is not useful

for the present research either.

Within the Spanish context, it has been extremely difficult to find literature about the

use of authentic materials at university. However, there are multiple studies which

support the design of didactic units based on realia or cultural elements. For instance,

the one developed by Álvarez Gil (2018), in which teachers are encouraged to include

authentic materials so that students engage culturally with the language on a deeper

level.

In another study at the Al Ilyas Vocational High School in Indonesia, conducted by

Fitriana et al. (2019: 8), there was a similar objective which aimed “to describe students'

responses toward the use of the authentic materials.” In their results, they obtained

that the students showed more interest in their reading after having used authentic

materials. Nonetheless, when analysing the questionnaire, it was observed that there

were many grammatical inconsistencies. Thus, this questionnaire was not considered to

be part of the present work either.

Finally, more recent research conducted at the University of Nobi Sad, in Serbia by

Prošić-Santovac and Popović (2021: 139), had the intention “to gain insight into

students’ attitudes towards the use of authentic and nonauthentic materials in English

language teaching including their perception of the stakeholders’ agency in the process.”

Findings showed that students thought the authentic materials were not of their interest.

They felt more reassured with the use of textbooks. The questionnaire used in this

occasion was designed in Serbian, and, therefore, not applicable to another study which

was not developed in that language.

3. MATERIALS AND METHODOLOGY

Firstly, the researcher approached students with the purpose of understanding their use

of authentic materials and interests in reading. This was carried out using an adaptation

of AbdulHussein’s (2014) questionnaire (see table 3 in appendix 1), also used in a very

similar study. Therefore, and considering that the questionnaire had been validated and

it was reliable, it seemed adequate to use it in this study as well. Nonetheless, this

questionnaire was validated by that particular group. Thus, a new validation was needed.

Afterwards, and taking into consideration these results, a selection of texts from

authentic sources was made and applied throughout a period of fifteen weeks. This

selection followed the criteria proposed by McGrath (2016).

The cognitive demands the text requires were controlled through Bloom’s (Krathwohl,

2002: 214) taxonomy order of thinking skills. This structure divides activities in low

order thinking skills on the one side: remembering, understanding, and applying. On

the other hand, high order thinking skills which are more difficult tasks: analysing,

evaluating, and creating.

Finally, the researcher gathers students’ participation in the use of authentic materials

through an active observation during the lessons.

Sample of study

The population under study, n=31, consists of a heterogeneous group of second year

students from the degrees in Psychology and Sports Science -CAFYD- who are enrolled

in Inglés II. The total number of students enrolled in the course is forty. However, only

thirty-one come to class regularly. Thus, they are the only ones who carry out the

project. As for the other nine students remaining, three of them take the subject for the

second time and their timetables are incompatible. Three other students do not come to

class regularly as they already have a B2 level certificate, so they are exempted from

attending. The other three do not attend to the subject regularly. The selection criteria

for the application of the didactic approach were the following ones:

● Students that conform an Inglés II subject.

● Students to whom there is direct contact so that the didactic proposal can be

applied personally.

Inglés II is equivalent, in terms of level according to the Common European Framework

of Languages (Council of Europe, 2020) to a B1.2. The students must have completed

a course in Inglés I beforehand, which makes them familiar with a B1.1-B1.2 level.

4. INITIAL RESULTS

From the questionnaire (AbdulHussein, 2014), we obtained some results which helped

develop the text selection so that it accomplished students’ interests and necessities.

A total of thirty-one students participated in the questionnaire, fifteen females and

sixteen males, fifteen from Psychology, sixteen from Sports Science. In order to know

if this sample is a representative one, an equation presented in Aguilar-Barojas (2005:

336) has been applied. From that equation, we conclude that only thirteen out of forty

students are needed so that the sample can be considered representative. Therefore,

n=31 is a representative one. Even though this might seem a small population for the

sample, groups which study English as a Foreign Language at this level -B2.1- had at

the time a maximum of forty students per class at the Uneatlántico. Moreover, this

didactic application is designed ad hoc for this specific group, so it must accomplish its

necessities.

As was anticipated before, another type of analysis was required to validate the use of

the adapted questionnaire in this specific group. For this, a statistical analysis checks

Cronbach’s alpha, which determines the reliability of a test’s items (Taber, 2018). The

result, as shown in table 1, proves that the test is reliable since a result over 0.7 is an

acceptable one according to Taber (2018: 1279).

Crobach’s alpha

No. Of elements

.715

Table 1. Cronbach’s alpha to prove test’s reliability

Once the questionnaire has been validated, results are examined so as to accomplish

the objectives of the research.

4.1. Students’ reading habits

From students’ opinions towards reading in English, the most repeated answers –mode

– for the first questions are the following ones shown in table 2.

Question

Mode

1. Reading English is important.

Often

2. I like to read in English.

Sometimes

3. Reading helps me to improve my language proficiency.

Always

4 I usually do not read in English unless I have to.

Often

Table 2. Students’ opinions towards reading in English

From these results, we can suppose that students would appreciate some extra help in

reading since the majority agree that reading in English always helps them improve their

proficiency in the language. Moreover, they support the fact that reading in English is

important.

From students’ reading habits regarding the types of texts, the modes were the ones

presented in figure 1. Thus, they were more used to reading short stories, Internet

materials, and newspapers than other types of texts. It would be advisable then to keep

using the formats students are familiarised since they would probably find them more

attractive and interesting. As it can be seen, figure 1 is represented in a scale of numbers

which correspond to qualitative assessment. In this scale, 1 means never, 2 means

rarely, 3 means sometimes, 4 means often, and, finally, 5 means always.

Figure 1. Graphic distribution of students’ reading habits regarding the types of texts

4.2. Students’ preferences

From the questionnaire, it can be obtained that students prefer the use of TV or radio

programmes -as it is indicated in the results obtained in figure 2- since most of them

said they would always prefer working with those materials. There are some materials

such as short stories, magazines, newspapers or cassettes, and videos which they

would like to use often. It is also relevant to consider the rest of elements students

seem not to like that much. As for the materials they would like to use sometimes,

they outlined books and brochures, whereas for the materials they rarely want to use,

students highlighted novels. Finally, the materials that students never want to study

in a class are poems. Equally to figure 1, figure 2 is represented in a scale of numbers

which correspond to qualitative assessment. In this scale, 1 means never, 2 means

rarely, 3 means sometimes, 4 means often, and, finally, 5 means always.

Figure 2. Students’ preferences

Once the most popular materials were identified, we could discard the use of the TV or

radio programmes for this proposal, although it is useful as a practice of oral skills in

the regular lessons. Similarly, we could discard the use of cassettes. In fact, nowadays

many modern resources such as audios from podcasts or radio programmes are used.

They were discarded as well since they do not work on reading skills. Thus, the materials

in this didactic proposal were majorly those extracted from short stories, magazines,

newspapers, and internet materials. In a less frequent use, brochures could be read in

class. This is a surprising result because even though students do not seem to use

brochures, they would like to use them. Nonetheless, books were also dismissed as

there was not enough time within the syllabus to read full books.

4.3. Text selection and application for the didactical approach

The texts were selected according to McGrath (2016), who established that a text should

be analysed according to its relevance to syllabus or to learners, the intrinsic interest of

the topic or the theme, cultural appropriateness, linguistic and cognitive demands, and,

finally, logistic considerations such as length, legibility, audibility, and quality. Here we

present the analysis of two of these texts.

4.3.1 Text 4

This is a combination of a piece of news and a voucher which talk about an offer launched

by a gym, in order to be as fit as a delivery rider, as well as getting a free takeaway

meal. The news is relevant to the syllabus and to students as they cover topics of ESP

from both Sports Science and Psychology students’ syllabus, such as training types and

rewarding systems. The intrinsic interest of this topic is related to the degree of similarity

with the university degree of the students. Moreover, takeaway meals are a popular

resource among young population, especially during the pandemic caused by the

COVID-19. These texts are related to an offer launched in a gym in Manchester, United

Kingdom. Therefore, the relation to an English-speaking country is considered

appropriate culturally. Linguistically, the text requires to know some specific vocabulary

about types of workouts and feelings related to exercise and food reward. The tenses

used in the text are very varied. Nonetheless, students include the use of the future

perfect in their syllabus. The difficulty of this text resides in the use of a wide range of

new vocabulary. Moreover, the length of the texts is longer than the previous ones used

in other sessions. The order of thinking skills which are considered within the cognitive

demands correspond to remember, understand, apply, analyse, and evaluate. As for the

logistic considerations, the length of these texts is like the ones worked in the students’

coursebook (Edwards & Naunton, 2019), which are between three hundred-four hundred

words.

4.3.2 Text 5

This is an article from an online health magazine which shows an interview to an NBA

basketball player, speaking of the relevance of mental health in sports. Concerning its

relevance, the text covers topics of ESP from both Sports Science and Psychology

students’ syllabus, such as mental health in men and in sportive people. The intrinsic

interest of this topic is related to the degree of similarity with the university degree of

the students. Regarding the cultural appropriateness of this text, it has been extracted

from an American magazine. Overall, it is considered of cultural appropriate. Moreover,

the interview is made to a basketball player from an American league –NBA. The way

this African American is speaking is considered of cultural interest as it shows a different

characteristic features from vernacular black English and an informal register such as

“they don’t hurt”, “hella important” (Dukoff, 2021). This can be a challenge to students

as it may be the first time, they encounter such structures. In this occasion, the cognitive

demands included correspond to a low order of thinking skills which are remembering

and understanding. Finally, considering the logistic features of the text, the length is

similar to the ones worked in the students’ coursebook (Edwards and Naunton, 2019),

which are between three hundred-four hundred words.

4.3.3. Application

For the application, the same structure was used in every lesson. The activity lasted

between fifteen and thirty minutes every time it was done. Students were presented

with the topic to be discussed in the form of a pre-reading activity. They did this activity

in pairs or groups of three to foster motivation and increase confidence in themselves.

This pre-reading activity helped activate previous knowledge about the content and

recalling vocabulary that was going to be read later. After that, students were given the

text and asked to answer a few questions about its content. The type of questions was

open-ended or multiple-choice questions. Finally, students were asked about the content

of the text so that they could provide their opinion freely.

So that materials were attractive, they were presented in PowerPoint presentations

where a link to the original source was provided. That way, students could go straight

to the origin and enjoy the different text-types.

5. FINAL RESULTS

From the application of the didactic proposal, there were many appreciations that could

be observed. From the teacher’s perspective, this application was successful as all the

activities led to later discussions and debates in English. Moreover, part of the

vocabulary within the syllabus was practised in a more natural environment than a mere

gap filling exercise from a worksheet.

Concerning the texts presented previously, the teacher’s observations are the following

ones:

• 4th text: Twenty-eight students attended the class. There was a lot of

participation, especially from the Sports Science students. Thus, fifteen out of

twenty-eight students were highly motivated to participate. The rest were also

participative but not as much. They all agreed that cycling was a great training,

but they did not like the fact that people would associate exercise with takeaway

food. Psychology students thought that the type of offer in a long-term period

would be more prejudicial than beneficial for the gym. They ended up discussing

which the best takeaway restaurants in Santander were.

• 5th text: Twenty-nine students attended the lesson. Male students admitted that

they had been told not to cry because it was a girl’s thing. They also stated that

sometimes it was hard for them to speak-out, especially those from the Sports

Science degree as the majority were men and they were expected to be tough. A

good work atmosphere could be appreciated. Psychology students commented

that this is a fact they would like to change, and they consider that social

awareness is essential. Thus, in general they enjoyed the text and thought it was

useful in order to make students conscious of the topic.

In comparison with the coursebook readings, there were other observations worthy to

mention. There were three other reading sessions which used the coursebook materials.

The methodology followed was a similar one: the session would start with a pre-reading

activity in order to activate previous knowledge about the topic, then an individual

reading, and finally, some reading comprehension activities. These activities were

multiple choice or gap filling exercises. Some students participated in the activities but

not all of them formed groups to work on the texts. Some students got distracted and

ended up looking at their phones instead of the coursebook. It could be seen that

multiple choice questions were discouraging some students to keep participating as they

were failing some answers. In general, students seemed not to enjoy printed materials

from the book as much as they enjoyed reading from the authentic materials’ PowerPoint

presentations.

6. CONCLUSIONS

Regarding the main objective –to design a proposal on the use of authentic materials

for working on reading skills, observing students’ participation after its application- it is

relevant to say that the didactical proposal was successfully designed and applied.

Moreover, because of the direct contact with the study sample, it was possible to observe

students and take note of their participation and thoughts. Concerning this, it would also

be interesting to gather students’ perception towards the materials in a more structured

way, such as a questionnaire.

To accomplish the first specific objective -to approach students with a questionnaire in

order to know their use of authentic texts for reading in English- it is necessary to point

out that students stated they would like to use novels or short stories. However, because

of the already established syllabus it is impossible to fit all the contents within the

subject hours. It could be interesting to include a book or short story reading activity

within the continuous evaluation tasks. This cannot be done at the Uneatlantico, since

all the English as a foreign language subjects must follow the academic guideline which

is established by a coordinator.

Furthermore, having a look at the second specific objective -to design and apply a

didactic proposal of 15 weeks (February-May) based on the use of authentic materials-

students wanted to use magazines, newspapers, Internet materials and -in a less

frequency- brochures. All of them were used in the didactic proposal. Thus, it can be

considered that this proposal was designed according to the previous investigation to

detect students’ necessities and interests. Something relevant to mention is that,

despite videos being discarded at the beginning of the didactic implementation, a clip

(Squad3o3, 2022) was used in a pre-reading activity during the third session to

comment on the hacking collective Anonymous and its declaration of cyber war against

Russia. Its use was appreciated by students who, after watching, showed great interest

in keeping reading different tweets and commenting on the topic proposed. Thus, it

might be relevant to consider the mixture of skills during the teaching practice (speaking

and listening for example); firstly, because it seems more natural to use different skills

altogether rather than separately, and secondly, because students seem to enjoy it

more. Even though the major focus is on just one skill, a combination of several abilities

could be adding some more appealing to reading. This may partially contribute to

improving reading habits. Furthermore, this lesson plan is also designed so that it covers

some content which corresponds to the syllabus’ English for Specific Purposes. In her

study at Brno University of Technology in the Czech Republic, Ellederova (2021) shows

how students would rather use complete materials which worked on several skills

altogether during the same session. Thus, ESP, especially the one designed with the use

of authentic materials, should be integrating several skills and not just one so that

learning would be developed in a more natural context.

From the third specific objective -to gather information about students’ participation in

the use of authentic materials for working on reading skills- it was possible to obtain

diverse appreciations. In terms of making use of the language, it was very convenient

that students felt comfortable reading the texts. What is more, they even made the

effort to keep searching for extra information on several occasions. Moreover, the use

of different and controversial topics, such as Ukraine and Russia’s war or mental health

in men, brought into the classroom a different atmosphere. This enabled students and

teachers to bond on a deeper level making students feel confident about expressing

their opinions freely.

This research had some limitations which are necessary to mention. Concerning the time

frame, this didactic application was applied within the second academic semester at the

Uneatlantico. It would have been interesting to apply this didactic unit throughout the

entire academic year and gather students’ opinions afterwards. Basing all the English

subjects on this methodology, students would benefit from the use of authentic materials

and the lecturer could have a more solid idea on students’ perceptions towards its

utilisation in the classroom. That is because, although students have been asked about

reading preferences, it is difficult for the teacher to know this proposed material fulfils

learning expectations.

Another limitation was the access to students. Even though this didactic approach was

applied in a settled group class, attendance to regular lessons is an issue which may

affect a didactic proposal since it is not the same as planning an activity for 40 students

than for 20. Thus, every educational proposal should have a back-up plan in case an

activity has to be adapted at the moment.

It should also be mentioned that this proposal was applied to a small population. An

analysis which could be carried out to a larger sample might throw more significant

results. Thus, considering that the major task of design has been carried out, it would

be interesting to apply it in every group of the subject, which altogether correspond to

three hundred and twenty-nine students in total. Nonetheless, this would imply involving

more teachers and resources.

The major limitation in this type of proposal is the access to tangible authentic materials.

Therefore, as a solution, online varied materials were used at all times. Nonetheless,

the use of realia in the classroom could be a major improvement in the use of authentic

materials.

For future applications and future teaching of English as a foreign language and English

for Specific Purposes, which may have a good impact on students' performance in

English, is the use of authentic materials in other skills which are not just reading. Thus,

a language tandem partner with English speakers or using a wider range of authentic

materials in the lesson plan should be considered.

In conclusion, this article has concluded with interesting results which contributed to the

personal and professional development of the researcher. It is not always that a teacher

can reflect upon the materials they are using in a classroom nor students’ opinions.

Moreover, in a syllabus where everything is already settled, and students are used to

working in a certain style, it seems risky to introduce new methodologies. Thus, for the

researcher the present dissertation has been a challenge which, hopefully, means the

beginning of a more conscious way of transmitting the English language at university.

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APPENDIX

Give your opinion on reading in English.

always

often

sometimes

rarely

never

1. Reading English is important.

2. I like to read in English.

3. Reading helps me to improve my language

proficiency.

4 I usually do not read in English unless I

have to.

I would like to use the following materials in

class.

always

often

sometimes

rarely

never

27. Short stories.

28. Books.

29. Poems.

30. Magazines.

Comentado [A4]: Parece haber un solo apéndice por lo que

elimino el título reduplicado.

Comentado [A5]: ¿Este salto de numeración es normal? ¿se

explica?

Comentado [A6]: En todos los casos en los que no hay una

oración con verbo y estamos en presencia de construcciones

nominales, hay que eliminar el punto final.

31. Brochures.

32. Newspapers.

33. Novels.

34. Internet materials.

35. TV or radio programs.

36. Cassettes and videos.

How often do you consume the following

resources in English?

always

often

sometimes

rarely

never

27. Short stories.

28. Books.

29. Poems.

30. Magazines.

31. Brochures.

32. Newspapers.

33. Novels.

34. Internet materials.

35. TV or radio programs.

36. Cassettes and videos.

Table 3. Adapted questionnaire (Abdulhussein, 2014, pp. 339-340)