¿Reflejan las metas o no? : Un análisis de tres libros de texto de ELE del instituto sueco y el reflejo en ellos del plan de curso para lenguas extranjeras de GY11 y del Marco Común Europeo de Referencias para lenguas

Sammanfattning:

When it comes to the foreign language teaching in Sweden, there are, amongst others,  two recommendation direction documents that serve as help and support to achieve an appropriate acquisition and teaching of the foreign language. These documents are the courseplan for foreign languages by GY11 that is established by the Swedish department of education and the Common European Framework of Reference for languages, that’s been written by the European Council. In this essay, we have chosen to analyse wheather or not three Spanish textbooks, Caminando 3, Alegría 3 and Vistas 3, reflect the goals that are established in these two documents. When we analyse the textbooks we are only taking two aspects of language learning into account, these are the cultural aspect and the aspect of oral interaction.

In order to complement the investigation we have handed out questionnaires to eight Spanish teachers, that work in a commune in the south of Sweden, where we ask them if they try to implement the goals established by these two documents in their teaching, if they have any knowledge about these documents, and whether they find that these three textbooks reflect these goals or not. The textbook analysis shows that all of the three books accomplish the goals set by the two direction documents when it comes to both aspects. According to our investigation the book that presents the best reflection is Vistas 3, which also is the only book published after the actualisation of the courseplan of GY11.                                                                       

However, the majority of the teachers believe that they know the means of both direction documents. Even so, it is clear that the course plan is the document that is best known and that the mayority of the teachers have been educated about its goals, which is the opposite of the results of the same questions concerning the Common European Framework of Reference for languages. In addition, the majority of the teachers say that they do not try to implement the goals of this document in their teaching. Then again the results of the courseplan are different as it says that the majority of the teachers actually try to implement and take notice of this document, and its goals, in their teaching.           When it comes to the questionnaire results of the textbooks, Alegría 3 has the best results. It is considered to accomplish the established goals by both documents and to serve as a functionable tool in the teaching of the two aspects. The majority results of Vistas 3 and Caminando 3 is that they are only considerd to partly accomplish the goals of the documents of directions, and to partually serve as good tools in teaching of the two aspects. To sum up, the questionnaire results of Vistas 3 and the results of the analysis don’t correspond. This might be because of the lack of knowlede that one of the teachers, who wasusing this book, had concerning the documents of direction.

In conclusion, it is important to remember that the textbooks shouldn’t be used as the only teaching material to follow the guidelines of the direction documents.