ABSTRACT
The debate over focus-on-forms or focus-on-meaning has been a prominent theme in studies on second language acquisition during the last few decades. This chapter evaluates the communicativeness of five versions of commonly used college English textbooks in China. To implement the new Requirement, new college English textbooks have been compiled and old textbooks have been updated. To measure the statistical significance of the variations among the textbooks in terms of their preference for different types of learning activities, a Chi-square test of goodness of fit was performed. The continuum consists of five categories, namely, non-communicative learning, pre-communicative language practice, communicative language practice, structured communication and authentic communication. In terms of meaning-oriented activities, they tend to use controlled or structured authentic communication to practice certain knowledge points, rather than authentic communication with high unpredictability.
