ASSIGNMENT : TextBook Evaluation

Reference : English Year 3 Sekolah Kebangsaan Textbook
Publisher : Abadi ilmu Sdn Bhd
Writer : Audrey Lim Bee Yoke
Manjindarjit Kaur
Shanti David
Editor : Tam Lye Suan
Graphic Designer : A.Komagarajan
Ilustrator : Salmah Rahim
Year of Publish : 2004


Textbook evaluation is done to determine and measuring up whether the textbook that has been use by the student in schools is appropriate and effective in guiding them to gain knowledge and participate in Teaching & Learning (T&L) process in class. There are three main characters that I need to stress in evaluating the textbook such as the organization, the content and the physical aspects of the book itself. The organization means that the arrangement of the content in the book as well as the image, text and so on whether it is comprehensive and helping the users to use the textbook clearly. About the content, I will look at the accuracy of the content, does it match the level of readers and is the language used appropriate with the user. Lastly, the physical aspects also important because at first, it can attract the user to read it willingly without feeling bored.

For this English Year 3 Sekolah Kebangsaan Textbook, from my observation it has the nice and attractive table of content complete with the pictures and colours. It is important because for Year 3 students, they will attract on the pictures and feel enjoy to read this book. The font used for the content is Arial 20 which is big enough to cover one page of table and content with clear and neat arrangement. It also state the objective for each chapter in the book such as what will the student get and able to do after completing certain chapter in the textbook. In addition, all pages in this textbook are numbered and match with the table of content so that the users do not have any difficulties in finding the topics and chapters. However, this textbook does not contain references, glossary and index on it. It maybe because of the writers feels that those elements are not so important in the Year 3 textbook.

For the content of the textbook, I would like to state here that the textbook meet the local and national standard because it contain variety of module and exercises for student and it also encourage the higher level of thinking. The issues talked in this textbook also accurate and up to date. For example, there are some images and brief explanation about interesting places in Malaysia such as Petronas Twin Tower, National Science Centre and Batu Caves Temple. The language used for the content of this textbook also appropriate for the intended age group which is Year 3 student. The sentences used are also clear, comprehensive and grammatically correct. About the activity that engage student, even this is an English Textbook, it also linked student to the other areas of study such as career study, parenting, sports and so on. However, for this book, at the end of each chapter, it doesn’t prepare student with end-of-lesson questions or quizzes to test student whether they really understand on the topic and able to complete the work given or not.

In physical aspects, I think for overall it is good because it uses a very clear font, Arial 16 and the language style used is also appropriate with the target users. Furthermore, for the arrangement of images and texts, it is comprehensive and attractive since it using the colorful images with the appropriate size of font and showing the diversity of culture in Malaysia, career and flora and fauna in this world. It is important for the student at this level to get an early exposure with the multicultural society and so on other than just learning their subject in class only. Besides, it also contains illustrations, tables and figures which are attention-grabbing and appropriate with the level of users. For the cover and binding of the book, I can say that it is durable and long-lasting since its use the plastic coated thick paper and the decoration is quite attractive and catchy.

As a conclusion, from the organization, content and physical aspect of the book, I can say that the editor and writer of the book do perform their job very well in analyzing and completing the needs if target users which is Year 3 student. For overall, I suggest this book to be use for Teaching & Learning (T&L) process in our primary school system for another couple of years but it can be improve due to any changes in order to make it more appropriate and interesting.