An Evaluation of the Third-Grade High School English Textbook: An Iranian Case Study

Abstract: Textbooks are packages with different but interrelated parts. Thus, the selection of textbooks necessitates the meticulous consideration of their weakness and strength; otherwise, the process of learning will bear some inefficiency. The present study intends to depict the educational value of the third-grade English Book in Iranian high schools and its significance in the language program. To this end, the study was equipped with questionnaire adopted from Litz (2001) which entailed four parts. This study included only two parts of this questionnaire, student textbook evaluation form and teacher textbook evaluation form. 233 students (91 male and 142 female) majoring math and science on the third grade in different high schools in Ilam and 5 teachers teaching the English book took part in the study. These questionnaires were handed to the students across 5 schools in Ilam and teacher textbook evaluation forms were given to teachers of these schools. The textbook's defects and effectiveness in Iranian pedagogical system were probed in terms of textbook package (practical consideration), layout and design, activities, skills, language type, subject and content and overall consensus. Relatively shocking overall conclusion revealed that only a low number of teachers and students (2.5 and 4.56 percentage respectively) were eager to choose the textbook to study again.