Applied Linguistics and Materials Development

Brian Tomlinson (Ed.), London/New York: Bloomsbury Publishing, 2013. Pp. ix + 272.

Reviewed by Daro Luis Banegas, University of Warwick, UK, & Ministry of Education of
Chubut, Argentina
Bridging the distance between theory and practice is a recurrent concern in foreign
language teaching. The literature is rich in understanding the tensions between what applied
linguists and ELT experts suggest and what teachers and learners do in the classroom.
Applied Linguistics and Materials Development edited by Brian Tomlinson contributes to
this issue by examining the gaps between theory and practice in relation to materials
development in the market so as to provide learners with effective ways of learning. Thus,
Tomlinson has teachers, researchers, and materials writers as the intended audience of this
edited collection.
The book opens with a reflective introduction through which Tomlinson revisits the
relationship between theory and practice and principled practices of materials development.
The introduction is followed by four parts which contain between four and five chapters.
All chapters follow a structure the authors usually term as what we know about a topic,
what we think we know about it, and what we would like to know. At the end of each part,
Tomlinson summarises the main discussions and offers further reflections on each area the
advanced by the contributors. With reference to contributors, there are 20 experts whose
affiliations evidence the international spirit of this book. Authors are based in Australia,
Germany, Ireland, Japan, Lebanon, Malaysia, the UK, and the USA. This multiplicity of
settings also illustrates a widespread interest in effective materials development.
Part 1 is called Learning and teaching languages and it includes four chapters which deal
with second language acquisition and materials, the role of semantics in the classroom, and
an emphasis on viewing coursebooks, for example, as learning materials rather than
teaching aids. In this respect, contributors in this part offer possible paths for developing
materials targeted at teacher education and young learners. Tomlinson examines principles
of language learning and materials as found in the literature but he notes that future reports
should be based on classroom research of language classes in order to move from principles
of materials evaluation to principles of material use derived from teachers real practices. In
so doing, we will narrow the distance between theories and principles proposed by applied
linguistics and materials enactment led by teachers.
Part 2, Aspects of language, contains five chapters focusing on spoken language research,
vocabulary, pragmatics, discourse analysis, and intercultural competence. However, the
authors of these chapters share their interest in the coursebook as a unit of analysis since
their reports emerge from coursebook analysis through different discourse research tools.
Tomlinson, in his comments to this part, highlights that coursebook publishers offer very
little about the guiding principles behind their products. The editor wonders the extent to
which what we know about language learning and language use informs coursebooks and
other learning materials. Nonetheless, he does acknowledge the fact that publishers usually
pilot their materials and carry out market research, but the outcomes are not shared with a
wider audience.
Part 3, Language skills, comprises five chapters. While the first two chapters examine
reading from a general stance (e.g. types of reading texts, types of reading, and strategies)
and among young learners, the remaining chapters investigate materials development for
listening, writing, and speaking. Unlike the previous parts, the outcomes reported in these
chapters seem to indicate a stronger alignment between research and materials for skills
development. Tomlinson observes that materials have started to include personalisation and
engaging topics and sources of input. Yet, as the editor argues, reading is still mainly
intensive and materials, although framed in skills development, are more concerned with
language practice. Therefore, skills development continues to be treated differently from
what learners do in their L1.
Part 4, Curriculum development, contains four chapters which go beyond the classroom.
Authors in this last part of the book discuss aspects such as language policy, perspectives
on influential language pedagogies (e.g. task-based learning and problem-solving learning)
and their impact on materials, modes of delivery of materials as seen in a continuum from
teacher-talk to blended learning to self-access materials, and last the relationship between
testing materials and language testing washback. Tomlinson suggests that the variety and
innovations underlying the materials in Part 4 should be seen as signs of improvement as
new technologies have become useful tools in the quest for effective materials.
Nevertheless, the reports in this part also warn that commercial materials, even when they
appear as digital tools and beyond the printed page, are still dominated by a focus on form
at the expense of meaning.
In conclusion, Applied Linguistics and Materials Development provides materials writers,
and researchers with principled frameworks, pedagogical tools, and issues to reflect and act
on. More importantly, this book should be seen by teachers as an invitation to become
critical materials users and engage in professional development by designing or adapting
their own materials under the light of informed decisions which integrate language learning
theories and classroom practices in their contexts.



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Dr Daro Luis Banegas is an associate fellow at Warwick University (UK) and a teacher trainer and
curriculum developer at the Ministry of Education of Chubut (Argentina). He is involved in online
and face-to-face teacher education programmes and leads projects on action research and CLIL
(Content and Language Integrated Learning). He is the current editor of the Argentinian Journal of
Applied Linguistics. His main interests are: CLIL, materials development, action research, and pre-
service teacher education.