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Techniques for Adaptation
After recognizing a gap (mismatch or non-congruence) between published teaching materials and the needs and objectives of the classroom, the teacher has to address the practicalities of adapting the material to meet her class objectives more closely. McDonough and Shaw (1993) and Cunningsworth (1995) offer lists of techniques that may be used when adapting materials better to ‘fit’ a specific class.
These techniques are:

• 
  Adding; extending and expanding
  
• 
  Deleting; subtracting and abridging
  
• 
  Simplifying
  
• 
  Reordering
  
• 
  Replacing material
  

Adding
When adding to published materials the teacher is supplementing the existing materials and providing more material. The teacher can do this by either extending or expanding.
Extending
When extending an activity the teacher supplies more of the same type of material, thus making a quantitative change in the material. For example, an activity may practise a particular grammar point by asking the learner to complete a sentence with the missing verb in the correct form, such as the simple past. The coursebook may have provided ten sentences for this treatment, but the teacher may value this type of activity for her particular class and adapt the coursebook by adding five more sentences with missing verbs.
Expanding
Expanding classroom material is different from extending in that it adds something different to the materials; the change is qualitative. For instance, the teacher may feel her students need to be made aware of the different sounds of verb endings when used in the simple past but the coursebook does not address this phonetic issue. Consequently, she may add an activity or series of activities that deal with the phonetics of the past simple. The teacher may want to draw students’ attention to the fact that, when pronouncing the verbs visited, played and worked, the endings (-ed) are pronounced /id/, /id/ and /t/ respectively. Other expansions could involve including a discussion to contextualize and personalize the topic of a particular unit of study, or including a TPR phase to make difficult language items in a reading or listening text more comprehensible.
It is important to note that additions to materials can come at the beginning, at the end or in the middle of the materials being adapted.
Deleting; Subtracting and Abridging
As with the technique of adding, material can be deleted both quantitatively (subtracting) or qualitatively (abridging). When subtracting, for example, a teacher can decide to do five of the questions practising the simple past tense instead of the ten in the coursebook. When abridging, however, the teacher may decide that focusing attention on pronunciation may inhibit the learner’s fluency and decide not to do any of the pronunciation exercises in a coursebook.
Simplifying
When simplifying, the teacher could be rewording instructions or text in order to make them more accessible to learners, or simplifying a complete activity to make it more manageable for learners and teachers. It is worth pointing out here that there is a distinct danger of distorting language when attempting to simplify a text and thus making the text inauthentic.
Reordering
When reordering, the teacher has decided that it makes more pedagogic sense to sequence activities differently. An example is beginning with a general discussion before looking at a reading passage rather than using the reading as a basis for discussion.
Replacing Material
When replacing material a teacher may decide that a more appropriate visual or text might serve an activity better than the ones presented in the published material. This is often the case with culturally specific or time-specific activities. A teacher may decide to replace an illustration for one that students could identify with more closely or use information concerning a popular figure with whom the students are familiar rather than the one presented in the published materials.
Teachers may also decide to replace a whole activity depending on the goals of a particular class or lesson. For example, a reading activity might be replaced with a listening activity.
Three Examples of Materials Adaptation
In order to exemplify some of the adaptation principles and techniques mentioned in this chapter, we will describe three real teaching scenarios and select published coursebooks that could be realistically used in each of the scenarios. We will then suggest specific adaptations for each coursebook in order to tailor the materials better to each teaching scenario.
Scenario One
A class of 34 junior high school students in a Japanese public (not private) school. The students are 12 to 13 years old, and there are 17 boys and 17 girls in the class. The students have all had between one and two years of English instruction at elementary school but have difficulty in understanding simple oral communication.
The students currently spend five hours a week in English class.
This group of students needs more exposure to a wide and rich range of language input in a variety of contexts. The coursebook used for this class is New Horizon 1 (Tokyo Shoseki, 2002).
Rationale for Adaptation
Page 50 of New Horizon 1 (see Figure 5.1) presents everyday verbs in the present simple. Four verbs are presented in a single context and only in writing. The activity lacks kinaesthetic and auditory sensory input. The input is also limited and impoverished. Students are not given a choice about how they learn nor are they given an opportunity to personalize the input.
The materials could be expanded by adding a TPR phase at the beginning of this unit of study to provide kinaesthetic and auditory input as well as richer, more contextualized text. Learners also have an opportunity to attend to the input globally and interpret meaning before analysing the input to understand its form.
1. Teacher mimes Becky’s daily routine. Asks students to guess what Becky does each day.
2. Teacher acts out Becky’s daily routine while reading the script.
3. Students act Becky’s routine while teacher reads the script.
Becky’s Daily Routine (script)
Every day Becky wakes up at 6:30 in the morning.
She stretches her arms and rubs her eyes and she yawns.
Then she brushes her teeth and takes a shower.
Sometimes she likes to sing in the shower.
She puts on her clothes and eats her breakfast, usually toast and coffee.
After breakfast, she speaks to her dog.
At 7:30 she leaves her apartment and takes the subway to school.
On Saturday and Sunday she usually wakes up at 9:30 in the morning.
She stretches her arms and rubs her eyes and she yawns.
Then she brushes her teeth and takes a shower.
On Saturday she usually plays tennis or runs in the park.
The activity on page 50 provides limited opportunities for analysing the input.
By extending the activity through adding more information about Becky’s routine the opportunities for analysing linguistic forms are increased.
For example, the procedure below could be followed:
Extend the exercise on page 50 by adding sentences about Becky.
Students write sentences that they remember about Becky’s routine.
Students underline the verbs in the sentences about Becky.
Students put verbs in two columns, regular and irregular verbs.
She plays tennis well.
She goes to the gym.
She works hard.
She likes to sing.
Regular Irregular
plays goes
works
likes
The following expansion activity provides students with a choice about how they would like to continue processing the input analytically or globally. It also provides a choice between visual, auditory or kinaesthetic processing as well as an opportunity to personalize the input.
Teacher gives students written version of script. Students change script to make it true for themselves. For example, ‘Every day I wake up at 7:20 in the morning.’
Or
Student tells a partner his/her daily routine.
Or
In small groups, students mime their daily routine. The other students guess what’s happening.