If you teach in Thailand, you know how big 7-Eleven is here. These guys may be bright when it comes to selling soda pop, but they're not too bright when it comes to producing a learning resouce students will use.

Allow me to explain.

About two years ago, 7-Eleven donated a whole slew of tapes with read-along-books, a series called 'Just For You', to my Thai high school in an effort to help them learn English. When I arrived on the scene here, I discovered these tapes/books were doing nothing but gathering dust on a library shelf. 'Why don't students use these?' I thought to myself. After examing the first book and its matching tape, it became obvious.

The 'setting' was New York City. The book was filled with pics of New York, the dialogues were from New York, even the sounds on the tape were from New York. My Thai kids don't care about New York. They want to see pictures of Thailand, hear dialogues from Thailand, and hear sounds from Thailand.
I examined other books and found more of the same. One book covered 'travel'. Was there a picture of Wat Arun in the book? No. Did I find a picture of the King inside its dusty covers? Nope. Did it have any pictures of Thailand AT ALL. No way. It was a 'story' about a vacation to Yellowstone Park, Wyoming, USA.

Is anyone interested in about 20 dusty books with matching tapes? Your students will learn to speak English while learning all about the US at the same time.

E