Published teaching resources I have had the opportunity to order all

I have had the opportunity to order all material to be used by our school for the last 6 years. During this time I have been astonished to see how many different resources are available for the teacher.

While it has been a valuable aid for new, inexperienced teachers I found that other more experienced teachers preferred their own material to all the resources available.

Most experienced teachers commented that if they only use material supplied by the publisher, their individual teaching skills were taken away. This has presented a problem where management expected teachers to teach according to the prescribed material and use resources presented to them.

However, I feel that although all this material is available and the teacher basically does not have to prepare anything it all comes down to the level of the students. The teacher needs to change and select material according to the students needs and this has to be understood by teachers and management for the program to be successful.

Most of the publishers focus on students where English is their first language and I have found very little material available from a reputable publisher for students of ESL.

For this particular task I will concentrate on the reading material published by Houghton Mifflin. There are many other publishers and most of the publishers have all the same resources.

The following material is available:

1.Student book

2.Student workbook

3.Teachers guide ' Refers to each unit in the student book. It gives a detailed explanation of the unit. What needs to be covered in the lesson, how to cover all the material, what is expected of the students at the end of the lesson and worksheets.

4.Teachers annotated workbook ' Exactly the same as the student workbook but including the answers.

5.Picture cards ' a complete collection of picture cards and activities for each unit.

6.Leveled readers ' these include below level, on level, and above level readers that refers to the topic of the unit with additional reading. It gives the teacher the choice of getting weak students to read the below level readers and improve their reading and vice versa.

7.Audio/video tapes ' these are used for listening activities ' it refers to stories in the unit.

8.Unit resources ' these give the teacher additional information about the unit, including activities, problematic vocabulary and additional worksheets.

9.Unit tests ' prescribed tests for each unit, covering essential skills as prescribed in the teacher's guide.

10.Unit Transparencies ' for each unit, transparencies with worksheets are provided. This eliminates the time the teacher has to write on the board and all worksheets are presented in professional manner.

11.CD Rom ' this gives the teacher the opportunity to create test and examinations by choosing pre-set questions on the CD Rom.

12.Website ' a comprehensive website where help is provided for teachers is also available. Teachers have the opportunity to search the site for any additional material, worksheets and activities.

Apart from the above, many publishers also offer workshops for the teachers. I have found these workshops to be of tremendous help as representatives explain in detail exactly how, when and where the above is to be used.

Obviously, if the teacher is not in touch with the students and know their exact needs and capabilities all of the above will be of no value.

As said previously, most of the material must be adapted and changed to suit students of English Second/Foreign Language. Unfortunately most of these skills will come only from experience and the cooperation of all involved.