Rhymes In Elt Textbooks For Primary School Students—A Comparative Study On Textbooks From China And The UK

In China’s newly-released National English Curriculum Standards for Compulsory Education(2022 edition)(shortened as the Curriculum Standards hereinafter),it is stipulated that the English curriculum should be concentrated on students’ core competencies,aiming to develop students’ linguistic competence,cultural awareness,thinking quality,and learning ability.According to the course content suggestions provided by the Curriculum Standards,“rhyme” is a recommended text type for primary school students.Although many studies have discussed the significant roles of rhymes in children’s English learning,few of them,regretfully,have explored rhymes from the perspective of textbook development.Therefore,in line with the Curriculum Standards and from the perspective of textbook development,this study first explored teachers’ attitudes towards rhymes in ELT textbooks.Then,it analyzed and compared rhymes in two sets of primary school ELT textbooks(English from China and Cambridge Global English from the UK),hoping to explore their advantages and shortcomings and provide suggestions for the forthcoming development of ELT textbooks for primary school students in China.This study combined quantitative and qualitative research methods,using instruments such as a questionnaire survey,semi-structured interviews,and text analysis to address three research questions: 1)What are the attitudes of Shanghai primary school teachers towards rhymes in their ELT textbooks? 2)How are rhymes included in the selected ELT textbooks?3)What are the characteristics of rhymes in the selected ELT textbooks regarding teaching purposes and teaching designs? The findings revealed that primary school English teachers generally held a positive attitude towards the roles of rhymes in English teaching.However,they thought there were still some problems in teaching designs and integrating core competencies into rhymes.Secondly,in terms of frequency,rhymes in the domestic textbook series appear less frequently than those in the foreign one.However,their distribution in the five grades of the domestic series is basically in line with the requirements of the Curriculum Standards.Lastly,from the aspect of teaching purposes,rhymes in the domestic series focus more on fostering students’ linguistic competence,paying less attention to the development of learners’ cultural awareness,thinking quality,and learning ability;meanwhile,the teaching designs of rhymes in the domestic series are generally abstract and simplistic,lacking specific guidance for teachers and students.In contrast,rhymes in the foreign series adopt a comprehensive teaching purpose.Their teaching designs are more diversified,flexible,and detailed,which can fully activate students’ multiple senses and improve their comprehensive English ability.Based on the Curriculum Standards,the study provided some suggestions for both primary school English teachers and prospective textbook writers for primary schools.Nonetheless,due to time and energy limitations,this study only compared two sets of textbooks,so it is hoped that future research can further enlarge the sample size,conducting more in-depth research into English rhymes in more contexts.