1.

Introduction
Effective materials should consider all factors that can affect pupils
understanding. In order to select the best materials, it requires in-depth knowledge,
not just of pupils' backgrounds and learning experiences, but also their abilities,
interests, and learning styles (McDonough, Shaw & Masuhara, 2013). For this
coursework, my group has decided to create a pop-up book for a 60-minute writing
lesson. There are many criteria that need to be taken into account when producing
this material.
As such, this essay shall further justify the choice of the materials that our group has
produced.

2.0

Justification
2.1

Factors in selection and evaluation

One of the factors that we have considered in selecting and evaluating our

material is exploitability. It can be exploited and adapted by modifying the content.

For example, it can be restructured to teach grammar skill which is proper noun.
Pupils will have the opportunity to learn about different types of occupation words
and places of working. Through this skill, teacher can also conduct a drilling activity
on the pronunciation of the occupation words. Apart from that, teacher can also
conduct language game through this material. For example, teacher can use the
pictures in the pop-up book to conduct riddle game by asking pupils what are the
occupations and what do they do for a living. Thus, pop-up book will not just attract
pupils attention in learning but at the same time, it can be exploited to many
language skills.
Another factor while selecting and evaluating our material is the cost
effectiveness. While producing it, we have used raw materials such as recycled box,
reused manila cards and papers. These materials are easy to get because the
resources are available. It is not just cost effective, but at the same time, it is also
environmental friendly. In this regard, rather than throwing away waste materials or
burning them to pollute the environment, they can be recycled to create useful
instructional resources for teaching and learning, to give meaning to the global call to
reduce, reuse and recycle as the only acceptable ways of disposing trash (Katkar &
Bairgadar, 2010). Therefore, as future teachers, we have to use recycled materials in
the classroom in order to save the environment and also to maintain cost
effectiveness while developing our teaching materials.

2.2

Principles and factors in selection and adaptation of the teaching and

learning materials
In creating the pop-up book, we have used the principle of addition
and modification from Year 4 English textbook, Topic 4 People Around Me.
We have used the principle of addition by adding on more occupations that
suit pupils proficiency level. Besides, we also have added occupation that
could bring moral values towards people such as mechanic. By adding this
kind of occupation, teacher can elicit values such as to appreciate people
around them and to study well in order to get better job in the future. This will
help pupils to appreciate people around them better no matter what are they
working as and of course, to strive for excellence in their studies. On top of
that, we also added colourful pictures in the pop-up book regarding the
occupations. According to Cameron (2012), the use of pictures can enable
teacher to extend pupils imagination and experience far beyond the
classroom. Therefore, I believe that it is our responsibility as a teacher to
bring up these imagination and experiences in the classroom by using
pictures to depict everything that cannot be brought to the classroom to teach
a lesson.
On the other hand, we also have modified the text from the textbook to
teach writing skill. To do so, we have restructured the dialogue text found in
the textbook into simple sentences. During the practice stage, we will have
the fill-in-the-blanks activity which the pupils have to fill in the blanks with the
simple sentences that they have learnt in the previous stage.

2.3

Technical skills and knowledge involved in producing, developing,

presenting and evaluating materials
Preparing a pop-up book needs creativity in assembling all the raw
materials. Creating a pop-up book is something new for us. For that, we have
done few researches on how to create a pop-up book. To do so, we have
looked up for tutorials on YouTube channels. Apart from that, we also have
taken durability into consideration. To do this, we have decided to wrap the
cover of our pop-up book so that it could withstand for a longer period of time.
Therefore, personal confidence and competence are factors that will
determine an individual teachers willingness to embark on materials
development thus making it possible to create and design an innovative

teaching and learning materials for effective learning process to occur in a

classroom (McGrath, 2012).
2.4

Strength, weaknesses and effective solutions to the teaching-learning

materials for the future
After we have completed the pop-up book, we found out that using
pop-up book in teaching English will widen the channels of communication
between teacher and their pupils. Factors such as the physical appearances,
user-friendliness, durability and ability to be exploited promote more
interaction between teacher and pupils. Such contention is supported by
Allwright (2013) who stated that the systematic utilisation of pop-up book in
the classroom ensure the application of classroom-oriented communication
techniques and allow the growth of specific learning abilities and enhance
intellectual skills of pupils.
Although it promotes communicative language learning, however, in
terms of its visibility, we realised that it can only be seen to those pupils who
is seating in front of the classroom as the size of our pop-up book is only A3
size. Therefore, we suggested that in the future, we can put the pop-up book
at the centre of the classroom so that it is visible to every pupil. To add on, for
a larger group of pupils, we could probably add on the size of our pop-up
book to double A3 size.
As a whole, to come up with a good teaching material, it all depends
on the determination, passion and willingness of a teacher to give their very
best for their pupils (Nunan , 2008).

3.0

Conclusion
In conclusion, designing materials for teaching and learning requires a lot of
thinking. To be a good do-it-yourself teacher, I realised that I have to weigh up the
benefits and factors when designing our own materials as to whether it is worth the
time and effort. Thus, it can be concluded that, materials play a vital role in teaching
and learning as well as the process of designing it so that lesson can be produced
effectively and efficiently.