ABSTRACT AN EVALUATION OF TIME FOR ENGLISH 4, THE 4TH GRADE ENGLISH COURSEBOOK FOR PUBLIC SCHOOLS &Ouml / zdemir, Fatma Esra M.A., Department of English Language Teaching Supervisor : Prof. Dr. H&uuml / sn&uuml / Enginarlar September 2007, 119 pages The purpose of this study was to find out the how the fourth grade students in public schools and the fourth grade English teachers evaluated the English coursebook Time for English 4 in terms of purpose, approach, visual design, presentation of vocabulary and language, practice activities and exercises, supporting sources, and supporting materials. To fulfill this aim, a teacher questionnaire, a student questionnaire and a teacher interview was prepared by the researcher. The questionnaires were administered face to face to 102 randomly selected fourth grade students in Beypazari and 15 English teachers in the districts of Altindag, Beypazari, Ke&ccedil / i&ouml / ren, and Mamak. Six of the English teachers were also interviewed in order to obtain qualitative data. The interviews were recorded on a tape recorder and then transcribed. Quantitative data was analyzed by calculating the frequency counts, percentages, arithmetic means, and the standard deviations of the responses given to the questionnaires. Qualitative data obtained from the interviews was analyzed by using content analysis. According to the results of the study, both the teachers and the students were content with the coursebook. The level of satisfaction was higher among the students. Students identified two problems about the instructions and the songs in the coursebook. Teachers identified four more problems about the teacher&rsquo / s book, the number of vocabulary items, the number of units, and the presentation of the language items. Necessary suggestions were made for the solution of the problems to the relevant parties.

The purpose of the present study was to investigate the cultural load of the reading texts of the Spot On 8 ELT textbook published in Turkey, and to find out the teachers&rsquo / and students&rsquo / perceptions concerning the presence of native, target and other world cultures (C1, C2 and C3 respectively) in ELT textbooks. In order to fulfill these aims, a checklist, a teacher questionnaire, a student questionnaire, a teacher interview were developed by the researcher. Moreover, the impressionistic overview and the item frequency procedure were applied for the analysis of cultural content of the textbook. Quantitative data were analyzed by calculating the frequencies, percentages, and the Chronbach alpha. Qualitative data were analyzed by applying the coding system for the categorization of collected responses and content analysis. The results showed that the cultural load of the textbook was insufficient and that the percentage of cultural elements in the reading passages is significantly low. The teachers&rsquo / satisfaction with the textbook appeared to be relatively low and students showed neither high level of satisfaction with their textbook nor dissatisfaction with it. Overall, there is a serious mismatch between teachers&rsquo / and students&rsquo / perceptions of culture and the real cultural load of the textbook. The target culture prevails in the reading texts although teachers considered native and other world cultures to be important as well, and students showed equally low interest in target and other world cultures giving the preference dominantly to their native culture.