(1) A point worth remembering is that adaptation of materials does not necessarily imply that the textbook is defective. Adaptation is needed simply to make the materials more tailored to the needs of the learners or the particular teaching context.
(2) In general, textbook adaptation, like textbook evaluation, can be done in three steps. The first step is macro adaptation, which is ideally done before the language programme begins. The second step of adaptation is adapting a unit. This could be reordering the activities, combining activities, omitting activities, rewriting or supplementing exercise material, etc. The third step is adaptation of specific activities in a unit. Occasionally an activity is regarded as valuable, but it is not well-designed or it is not feasible for a particular class. If the teacher does not want to give up the activity, he or she needs to adapt it.
(3) There are some suggestions for adapting materials:
① Adding: The notion of adding is quite straightforward, it means putting in more materials while taking into account of time allocation. We can add by either extending or expanding. The former is done when we supply within the same framework or following a similar model in the textbook, e. g. adding a reading passage of the same topic and of the same linguistic features, or adding more grammar exercises to consolidate the knowledge, etc. The latter is done when we develop a new task or adding a new skill practice. For example, the original textbook only have practice on individual sounds and you feel the need to add some practice on stress and intonation as you find that students who can pronounce individual sounds correctly do not necessarily have good natural pronunciation. In this case, you expand the pronunciation practice by developing it in new directions.
② Deleting or omitting: Deleting is clearly the opposite of adding. Deletion can also happen at two levels: the first is to simply subtract the current material by reducing the amount; the second is by abridging the current material or dropping it out completely. For example, you may reduce the number of exercises in grammar in this trait as you feel that your students do not have much difficulty understanding and using the new grammar or you may want to drop the discussion task at the end of the unit as you do not think that your learners have adequate language to discuss such sophisticated topics.
③ Modifying: Modifying again involves two kinds. One is called rewriting, the other is called restructuring. Rewriting can be applied to any aspect of the content in a textbook. For example, you may want to rewrite the comprehension questions to make them more thought-provoking, or rewrite part of a reading text to make it a listening task before reading takes place, etc. Restructuring mainly refers to the management of activities or tasks according to the context of your own teaching. If your class is too big for a board game introduced in the textbook, you may want to restructure the activity by making it into team work.
④ Simplification: Simplification is one type of modification. It is mainly applied to texts, often to reading passages. For example, we can make complex sentences into shorter simple ones if we find they are too difficult for the students. Similarly, if we find a text containing too many new words, we can replace some of them with words that students have already learnt, etc.
⑤ Reordering: This refers to changing the order of the tasks in a unit or changing the order of units in a course book. The latter in particular can be difficult to do since the change may result in changes in the order of presentations of grammatical structures or vocabulary which are planned to be sequenced for learning.
(4) Bear in mind that adaptation should lead to greater appropriacy. If the content of a unit in a textbook is not appropriate for the age group you are teaching, you may need to make the topic more relevant by personalising it, individualising it or localising it.