HORIZONTAL AND VERTICAL CONNECTION OF TEXTS IN THE TEXTBOOKS FOR LEARNING FOREIGN LANGUAGES

Abstract

The largest part of the contemporary foreign language textbooks are composed of teaching units consisting of a text, thematic dictionary, grammar part, lexical exercises and grammar exercises. Each of these parts should be synchronized with all other parts, i.e. the text should contain as much as possible grammar occurrences explained in the grammar part of the given unit, the thematic dictionary and the text of the unit should regard the same or closely related topic, the lexical exercises should as well cover that topic and the grammar exercises should confirm the knowledge acquired from the grammar information of the given unit. Thus, we said that the text, as a starting component of the teaching unit, should have horizontal connection to the rest of the teaching unit. That horizontal connection is a characteristic or a tendency in all contemporary textbooks, including those used form teaching Macedonian language as a foreign language to foreigners. Another important characteristics of the texts from textbooks as well as all texts for reading for students is the interesting content. It is very common to disregard the importance of these criteria: students to learn new words and not to be amused. However, the memorization of new words and learning grammar structures as well as the whole progress in language learning and the (not) giving up factor depend on the emotions that students develop to the education. There are several ways to achieve interesting text content. One of them is to construct vertical connection of the text: each following text of the next teaching unit to be a new episode of the series, i.e. the life of the characters to be described throughout the whole textbook. In this paper we demonstrate that on two selected textbooks. The first one is the textbook Польська мова за 4 тижні (textbook for Polish language for Ukraine students) and the second one is the textbook Вивчаємо македонську – Учиме македонски (textbook for Macedonian language for Ukraine students). The vertical connection of the texts is actually a challenge for the author of the textbook. In this way, the author must pay attention to the horizontal connection of the material, but he has an additional obligation which is not easily achievable and requires for him to possess a talent of a writer and dramaturge. However, in theory, in the learning of foreign languages, the psychological feelings of calmness and satisfaction could contribute to better memorization of the vocabulary. Hence, if the textbook has vertical connection of the texts, the student will learn each following lesson what more is happening to the characters, that he feels he knows already, as watching a new episode of a TV show. This makes the learning funnier and more productive.