Adapting authentic materials for language teaching

1. Scan the following list of words and identify synonyms for “authentic”: counterfeit, genuine, accurate, fake, original, pure, false, real, the real McCoy, trustworthy, fictitious, misleading, mock, supposed, valid, unfaithful, unreal, untrue, veritable, true-to-life. Can you think of word combinations with them? What may be authentic?

2. Remember your teaching practice and say:

1. Did you manage/ attempt to incorporate extra authentic materials, but for the regular textbooks? Which materials did you bring into the classroom?

2. How do you know they were authentic? Can you give a definition of authentic materials, paying attention to the purpose and the readers they were created for.

3. Judging from your experience, how can one select and accumulate authentic materials in their variety?

4. As soon as you have accumulated them, they may need adapting. Have you ever had experience in it? How did you do it? Can you descibe the strategies you used?

Vocabulary Enrichment

ambiguity arbitrary collocation authentic boldface caps cohesion between sentences counterpart discourse elaboration English language proficiency ESL vs. ESP explicit generalization hue implicitness italic itemizer literal prevalence primary or secondary connotation of a word pro-

redundancy restatement subordinate information subtle process superfluous to clarify to delete to eliminate difficult structures to emphasize to follow the guidelines to obscure the secondary meaning to omit to paraphrase to pose a problem to provide a clue to to simplify to substitute to subtract transition words type visuals

3. Make sure you can explain the following terms from the text:

authentic, collocation, connotation, discourse, English language proficiency, ESL, ESP, to paraphrase, secondary meaning, transition words, visuals.

4. Match the definitions with the proper words:

1. A figurative meaning of a word in addition to the literal meaning ………

2. Being beyond what is necessary, desirable, or sufficient ………

3. Clearly expressed or defined: specific ………

4. Difficult to detect or analyze : barely perceptible ……….

5. Not seeming to be based on a reason, system or plan ………

6. Of lower rank or class: inferior ………

7. The act, process, or state of cohering ………

8. The state of not being necessary or useful ………

9. To make dim or indistinct, to conceal by or as if by covering ………

10. To remove or get rid of sth ………

11. To take away (e. g. one number from another) by deducing ………

12. Uncertainty, doubt ………

5. Propose derivatives of the words and make up word combinations:

#	Verb	Noun	Adjective
			ambiguous
			authentic
		cohesion
		elaboration
		prevalence
		redundancy
			subtle
			superfluous
	to clarify
	to delete
	to eliminate
	to obscure
	to omit
	to simplify
	to substitute
	to subtract