This paper is concerned with the multimodal visual analysis of selected second language (l2) English textbooks written by Nigerian authors for the teaching of English phonemes in secondary schools. The paper compared the multimodal visual resources used by the various authors for the teaching of English phonemes, to know if they make use of similar semiotic mode; how the audio-visual mode was used effectively, and the implication of English textbooks without audio-visual mode. The data for this paper were extracted from the selected textbooks and analysed using Halliday’s (1976) three metafunctions of language, which was developed in Kress and Van Leeuwen’s (1996; 2006) Grammar of Visual Design (GVD). Findings showed that the authors of the selected textbooks used different multimodal resources such as images, verbal texts and instructions to discuss the selected phonemes. We found out that while NCE and MBE used images to support the verbal texts in order for learners to understand the effective ways of learning English phonemes, NOSEC and EFEL did not make use of images, they only gave verbal texts and created rooms for teachers to guide the learners. In sum, none of the selected textbooks used audio-visual resources in form of CD-ROMs to aid learners’ understanding.
Keywords: Audio Visual, Multimodality, metafunction, phonemes, textbooks
