How do I feel about this? Absolutely positive.
For those teachers who know the methodology; the technology; in what order to give lexical topics, grammatical topics, phonetics — for those who know all these, they don’t even need a textbook.
I’ll show you how I can conduct an RFL (Russian as a foreign language) lesson without a textbook.
First, I’ll make a list of words that we need to learn during the lesson. It’s desirable, of course, if it’s not just a list of words but some topic — for example, “City” or “School,” “Toys,” “Family” — so that the words are related to each other.
Then I mentally divide the whole lesson into four parts: listening, speaking, reading and writing. In terms of time, this is usually a quarter of the lesson for each type of speech activity.
Then I’ll think about what exercises to fill this topic with — what exercises I’ll have for listening. Maybe I’ll bring some videos to the students for the lesson, or maybe I’ll bring some songs. It all depends on the topic, and it all depends on the level and what they have covered. Then I will think about what exercises we will have for speaking on this topic. I will decide how we will practice (drill) words. Often listening and speaking exercises can be combined, so I will think about how to do this. I will look at what exercises we will practice words with, and in what dialogues we will use them for reinforcement. This is all about the oral part.
In the second half of the lesson, we will pay more attention to reading and writing. I will select exercises for reading. Personally, I like to read short dialogues so that later I can use them as a model for independent questions and answers.
I already have some kind of technology in my head. I already know: “Aha, this is an exercise for speaking, and this exercise is for writing.” If you do not yet know which exercises are designed for which type of speech activity, then watch my webinar about this — here is the link.
Let’s continue. For a lesson without a textbook, we need to know in what order to give the task, how to monitor its completion, and what are the criteria for whether the topic has been learned or not. You must understand why we need each specific task, what skill it teaches. And here we go back to the beginning again — study the profession, the technology of education. Yes, everything is very technological, and everything is described in different methodological books. For example, in the book by Akishina-Kagan “Learning to Teach,” all types of exercises are described, and why exactly we do them in the RFL lesson.
Then I look at the time. How much time do I have for each type of speech activity. Usually my lessons last 60 minutes. It turns out that we listen for 15 minutes, speak for 15 minutes, read for 15 minutes and write for 15 minutes.
If you do not know what exercises there are and for what purposes they are intended, then most likely you are a beginner teacher. In this case, you only know how to open brackets. There is nothing wrong with that; you will learn everything. In your case, you need a textbook. In the textbook, you will at least read and translate the dialogue. Reading the dialogue from the textbook in roles is already good — you will do something that is different from the brackets.
If you have a weekend school, you are your own boss and you decide in your school which textbooks to study from, or to refuse them altogether. Then before you refuse, think about what you will work with.
If there is a very large flow of students, and everyone has different programs (in my case, six groups of different ages and levels on one day), it is better to take something ready-made for each group, to spend less time preparing lessons.
And yes, I know that in the USA some schools really refuse textbooks. They have a curriculum that indicates what topics they cover; the teachers themselves fill the lesson. But you must understand what you are doing, what exercises to fill this lesson with. Even where to get these exercises.
In some countries there are banks with exercises. For example, in the U.S. teachers create their own exercises, then share them in these banks. There you can sort by subject, by topic. But there is very little for free in such banks — the main access is paid. And, most likely, the school where the teachers work pays for all this pleasure. This is how the experience is exchanged. And it all works great. But, when working with such sites, in addition to access, you also need to check the exercises themselves. Firstly, to what extent does this exercise correspond to the level of your students? Lexical and grammatical. Secondly, there may be mistakes, typos.
Result: It is quite possible to teach without textbooks.
Well then, the last question is this: If I am so smart and generally believe that it is possible to work without textbooks, then why do I write these textbooks? I will answer now. The thing is that, firstly, I was not always so smart. I study, I look at what my colleagues are doing — colleagues who teach other languages besides Russian as a foreign language — and what is new in the methodology. I read scientific articles, and at the same time I teach myself. In my opinion textbooks are needed in two cases, the first of which is for beginning teachers who have not yet gained experience, who still need to study a little to work out the technical side of the issue — which exercises are needed for what, how to control so that they tick off each item on the list of what needs to be done. The second case is when teachers are very busy, and they have absolutely no time to create their own programs. In this case, a textbook is very convenient — you take it, everything is already written there, everything that needs to be done is already there. See for yourself which is better. You can teach quite normally without textbooks.
