An Evaluation of The Dialogic Tasks of The First-Year Secondary School Textbook “At the Crossroads” From the Perspective of Critical Pedagogy

Abstract

The present study evaluates the effectiveness of the dialogic tasks in the first-year Algerian secondary school textbook “At the Crossroads” from the perspective of critical pedagogy. A checklist consisting of twelve questions was designed and used in the analysis of the textbook “At the Crossroads”. This analysis has revealed that the textbook under study does not foster adequately even critical thinking and learners’ autonomy, which are shared goals of critical pedagogy and the competency-based approach. Moreover, the relationship between the dialogic tasks of the textbook with real life problems of the students is not well articulated. Furthermore, the crucial issues of cross-cultural awareness and dialogism in the textbook tasks are weakly addressed. These results of the checklist-based analysis have been compared to the views of a sample of fifty secondary school teachers in the district of Jijel chosen on the basis of convernience through the use of a questionnaire designed for this purpose. The analysis of the results of the teachers’ questionnaire has confirmed ,at least partly, the results of the checklist-based analysis in that the dialogic tasks in the first year secondary school textbook “ At the Crossroads’ have been judged to be discrepant with the aims , the principles, and the standards of critical pedagogy even with regard to those aspects that form the focus of the competency-based approach, namely critical thinking and learners’ autonomy. Moreover, the level of dialogicity of the tasks, their relevance to students’ lives, and the development of a cross – cultural awareness have been found to be weakly addressed in the textbook from the vintage point of the teachers who participated in the study.