An Assessment of the English Textbook Quality for grade XI Vocational School Students

This study aims at assessing the English textbook quality of “Bahasa Inggris” for grade XI vocational school students published by Ministry of Education and Culture and written by Mahrukh Bashir which involves four aspects of the textbook under study: (1) content, (2) learning activity, (3) language, and (4) graphic design. This research was descriptive qualitative research employing a content analysis method. The object of the research was an English textbook for second year of vocational school. The data source was the content of the English textbook. The data were collected by an assessment checklist scale as the instrument. The instrument was developed based on the adaptation of good textbook criteria proposed by Hutchinson & Waters (2000), Cunningsworth (1995) and BSNP (2014). Analyzing and interpreting documentary data (textbook) referred to content analysis. The data were collected, indentified, categorized and concluded. The research reveals four results. First, the content quality of the English textbook is categorized as good. The material covered all of basic competences which are demanded for first semester of vocational school and presented in details. However, it is found that the vocabularies, the texts and the topics are not relevant to the tourism students’ needs. The textbook does not provide authentic listening materials which is a highly demanded by the students. Second, learning activity of the textbook is categorized as fair. The learning activities are appropriate to the curriculum (scientific approach). It provided individual, pair and small group task activities, but the activities are not concerned with students’ subject matter. Third, the quality of language of the textbook is categorized as very good. The use of language fits to students’ development and level and uses standard English. And the last, graphic design of the textbook is very good. This is indicated by the consistency of the lay out, the proportional use of fonts and colors. But, it is found the illustrations could not give the understanding of the texts or information. For the lack of the textbook, the textbook developer should consider the students’ needs and context in developing textbooks. Teachers can adapt some textbooks or other electronic or printed material