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Course planning and syllabus design
A number of different levels of planning and development are involved in developing a course or set of instructional materials based on the aims and objectives that have been established for a language program. In this chapter we will examine the following dimensions of course development:
• developing a course rationale
• describing entry and exit levels
• choosing course content
• sequencing course content
• planning the course content (syllabus and instructional blocks)
• preparing the scope and sequence plan
These processes do not necessarily occur in a linear order. Some may take place simultaneously and many aspects of a course are subject to ongoing revision each time the course is taught. The types of decision making that we will examine in this chapter are also involved in developing instructional materials and many of the examples discussed apply to both course planning and materials design.
The course rationale
A starting point in course development is a description of the course rationale. This is a brief written description of the reasons for the course and the nature of it. The course rationale seeks to answer the following questions:
Who is this course for?
What is the course about?
What kind of teaching and learning will take place in the course?
The course rationale answers these questions by describing the beliefs, values and goals that underlie the course. It would normally be a two- or three-paragraph statement that has been developed by those involved in planning and teaching a course and that serves to provide the justification for the type of teaching and learning that will take place in the course. It provides a succinct statement of the course philosophy for anyone who may need such information, including students, teachers, and potential clients. Developing a rationale also helps provide focus and direction to some of the deliberations involved in course planning. The rationale thus serves the purposes of:
• guiding the planning of the various components of the course
• emphasizing the kinds of teaching and learning the course should exemplify
• providing a check on the consistency of the various course components in terms of the course values and goals
(Posner and Rudnitsky 1986)
The following is an example of a course rationale:
This course is designed for working adults who wish to improve their communication skills in English in order to improve their employment prospects. It teaches the basic communication skills needed to communicate in a variety of different work settings. The course seeks to enable participants to recognize their strengths and needs in language learning and to give them the confidence to use English more effectively to achieve their own goals. It also seeks to develop the participants' skills in independent learning outside of the classroom.
In order to develop a course rationale, the course planners need to give careful consideration to the goals of the course, the kind of teaching and learning they want the course to exemplify, the roles of teachers and learners in the course, and the beliefs and principles the course will reflect.
Describing the entry and exit level
In order to plan a language course, it is necessary to know the level at which the program will start and the level learners may be expected to reach at the end of the course. Language programs and commercial materials typically distinguish between elementary, intermediate, and advanced levels, but these categories are too broad for the kind of detailed planning that program and materials development involves. For these purposes, more detailed descriptions are needed of students' proficiency levels before they enter a program and targeted proficiency levels at the end of it. Information may be available on students' entry level from their results on international proficiency tests such as TOEFL or IELTS. Or specially designed tests may to be needed to determine the level of students' language skills. Information from proficiency tests will enable the target level of the program to be assessed and may require adjustment of the program's objectives if they appear to be aimed at too high or too low a level.
An approach that has been widely used in language program planning is to identify different levels of performance or proficiency in the form of band levels or points on a proficiency scale. These describe what a student is able to do at different stages in a language program. An example of the use of proficiency descriptions in large-scale program planning was the approach used in the Australian Migrant Education On-Arrival Program.
In order to ensure that a language program is coherent and systematically moves learners along the path towards that level of proficiency they require, some overall perspective of the development path is required. This resulted . . . in the development of the Australian Second Language Proficiency Ratings (ASLPR). The ASLPR defines levels of second language proficiency as nine (potentially 12) points along the path from zero to native-like proficiency. The definitions provide detailed descriptions of language behavior in all four macro-skills and allow the syllabus developer to perceive how a course at any level fits into the total pattern of proficiency development. (Ingram 1982, 66)
Similarly, in 1982 the American Council on the Teaching of Foreign Languages published proficiency guidelines in the form of " series of descriptions of proficiency levels for speaking, listening, reading, writing, and culture in a foreign language. These guidelines represent a graduated sequence of steps that can be used to structure a foreign language program" (Liskin-Gasparro 1984, 11). The ACTFL Proficiency Guidelines (see Appendix 1) have been widely promoted as a framework for organizing curriculum and as a basis for assessment of foreign language ability, though they have also attracted controversy because they are not research-based (e.g., see Lowe 1986). Band descriptors such as those used in the IELTS examinations or the UCLES/RSA Certificate in Communicative Skills in English (Weir 1990, 149-179) can be similarly used as a basis for planning learner entry and exit levels in a program. (See Appendix 2 for an example of performance levels in writing, and Appendix 3 for band descriptors for oral interaction.")
Choosing course content
The question of course content is probably the most basic issue in course sign. Given that a course has to be developed to address a specific set of needs and to cover a given set of objectives, what will the content of the course look like? Decisions about course content reflect the planners' assumptions about the nature of language, language use, and language learning, what the most essential elements or units of language are, and how these can be organized as an efficient basis for second language learning. For example, a writing course could potentially be planned around any of the following types of content:
• grammar (e.g., using the present tense in descriptions)
• functions (e.g., describing likes and dislikes)
• topics (e.g., writing about world issues)
• skills (e.g., developing topic sentences)
• processes (e.g., using prewriting strategies)
• texts (e.g., writing a business letter)
Similarly a speaking course could be organized around:
• functions (expressing opinions)
• interaction skills (opening and closing conversations, turn taking)
• topics (current affairs, business topics)
The choice of a particular approach to content selection will depend on subject-matter knowledge, the learners' proficiency levels, current views on second language learning and teaching, conventional wisdom, and convenience. Information gathered during needs analysis contributes to the planning of course content, as do additional ideas from the following sources:
• available literature on the topic
• published materials on the topic
• review of similar courses offered elsewhere
• review of tests or exams in the area
• analysis of students' problems
• consultation with teachers familiar with the topic
• consultation with specialists in the area
Rough initial ideas are noted down as a basis for further planning and added to through group brainstorming. A list of possible topics, units, skills, and other units of course organization is then, generated. One person suggests something that should go into the course, others add their ideas, and these are compared with other sources of information until clearer ideas about the content of the course are agreed on. Throughout this process the statements of aims and objectives are continually referred to and both course content suggestions and the aims and objectives themselves are revised and fine-tuned as the course content is planned. For example, a group of teachers listed the following initial ideas about what they would include in a course on listening and speaking skills for a group of intermediate-level learners:
• asking questions
• opening and closing conversations
• expressing opinions
• dealing with misunderstandings
• describing experiences
. social talk
• telephone skills
• situation-specific language, such as at a bank
• describing daily routines
• recognizing sound contrasts
• using communication strategies
These topics then have to be carefully reviewed and refined and the following questions asked about them:
Are all the suggested topics necessary?
Have any important topics been omitted?
Is there sufficient time to cover them?
Has sufficient priority been given to the most important areas?
Has enough emphasis been put on the different aspects of the areas identified?
Will the areas covered enable students to attain the learning outcomes?
Developing initial ideas for course content often takes place simultaneously with syllabus planning, because the content of a course will often depend on the type of syllabus framework that will be used as the basis for the course (discussed later in this chapter).
Determining the scope and sequence
Decisions about course content also need to address the distribution of content throughout the course. This is known as planning the scope and sequence of the course. Scope is concerned with the breadth and depth of coverage of items in the course, that is, with the following questions:
What range of content will be covered?
Or what extent should each topic be studied?
For example, in relation to the course on listening and speaking skills re-tted to in the preceding section, one area of potential content identified was "describing experiences." But how much will be included in relation to this topic? And should two, four, or six class periods be devoted to it? The sequencing of content in the course also needs to be determined. This involves deciding which content is needed early in the course and which provides a basis for things that will be learned later. Sequencing may be based on the following criteria.
Simple to complex
One of the commonest ways of sequencing material is by difficulty level. Content presented earlier is thought to be simpler than later items. This is typically seen in relation to grammar content, but any type of course content can be graded in terms of difficulty. For example, in a reading course reading texts may be simplified at the beginning of the course and unsimplified at later levels. Or simple skills such as "literal comprehension" may be required early on, and more complex skills such as "inferencing" taught at a later stage.
Chronology
Content may be sequenced according to the order in which events occur in the real world. For example, in a writing course the organization might be based on the sequence writers are assumed to employ when composing: (1) brainstorming; (2) drafting; (3) revising; (4) editing. In a proficiency course, skills might be sequenced according to the sequence in which they are normally acquired: (1) listening; (2) speaking; (3) reading; (4) writing.
Need
Content may be sequenced according to when learners are most likely to need it outside of the classroom. For example, the rationale for the sequencing of content in a social survival curriculum is given as follows:
The topics and cross-topics in the curriculum are sequenced "in order of importance to students' lives, ease of contextualization and their relationship to other topics and cross-topics." The sequence is:
i. basic literacy skills
ii. personal identification
iii. money
iv. shopping
v. time and dates
vi. telephone
vii. health
viii. emergencies
ix. directions
x. transportation
xi. housing
xii. post office
xiii. banking/bills
xiv. social language
xv. clarification
(Mrowicki 1986, xi)
Prerequisite learning
The sequence of content may reflect what is necessary at one point as a foundation for the next step in the learning process. For example, a certain set of grammar items may be taught as a prerequisite to paragraph writing. Or, in a reading course, word attack skills may be taught early on as a prerequisite to reading unsimplified texts at later stages of the course.
Whole to part or part to whole
In some cases, material at the beginning of a course may focus on the overall structure or organization of a topic before considering the individual components that make it up. Alternatively, the course might focus on practicing the parts before the whole. For example, students might read short stories and react to them as whole texts before going on to consider what the elements are that constitute an effective short story. Or, students might study how to write paragraphs before going on to practice putting paragraphs together to make an essay.
Spiral sequencing
This approach involves the recycling of items to ensure that learners have repeated opportunities to learn them.
Planning the course structure
The next stage in course development involves mapping the course structure into a form and sequence that provide a suitable basis for teaching. One of the preliminary planning involved will have occurred while ideas for course content were being generated. Two aspects of this process, however, require more detailed planning: selecting a syllabus framework and developing instructional blocks. These issues are closely related and sometimes inseparable but also involve different kinds of decisions.
Selecting a syllabus framework
A syllabus describes the major elements that will be used in planning a language course and provides the basis for its instructional focus and content. For example, in planning a course on speaking skills based on the course content discussed earlier (in the section titled "Describing the entry and exit level"), a number of options are available. The syllabus could be:
• situational: organized around different situations and the oral skills needed in those situations
• topical: organized around different topics and how to talk about them in English
• functional: organized around the functions most commonly needed in speaking
• task-based: organized around different tasks and activities that the learners would carry out in English
In choosing a particular syllabus framework for a course, planners are influenced by the following factors:
• knowledge and beliefs about the subject area: a syllabus reflects ideas and beliefs about the nature of speaking, reading, writing, or listening
• research and theory: research on language use and learning as well as applied linguistics theory sometimes leads to proposals in favor of particular syllabus types
• common practice: the language teaching profession has built up considerable practical experience in developing language programs and this often serves as the basis for different syllabus types
• trends: approaches to syllabus design come and go and reflect national or international trends
In the 1980s and 1990s, the communicative language teaching movement led to a reexamination of traditional approaches to syllabus design and a search for principles for the development of communicative syllabuses (see Chapter 2). A communicative syllabus is either an attempt to develop a framework for a general language course, such as a Threshold Level syllabus, or one that focuses on communication within a restricted setting, such as English for Specific Purposes. Because many different syllabus approaches are available in developing "communicative" courses, many different syllabus frameworks can make a claim to be versions of a communicative syllabus: for example, competency-based, text-based, and task-based syllabuses. Other approaches to syllabus design are also possible and we will consider now the nature of these different syllabus options.
Grammatical (or structural) syllabus: one that is organized around grammatical items. Traditionally, grammatical syllabuses have been used as the basis for planning general courses, particularly for beginning-level learners. In developing a grammatical syllabus, the syllabus planner seeks to solve the following problems:
• to select sufficient patterns to support the amount of teaching time available
• to arrange items into a sequence that facilitates learning
• to identify a productive range of grammatical items that will allow for the development of basic communicative skills
Choice and sequencing of grammatical items in a grammar syllabus reflect not only the intrinsic ease or difficulty of items but their relationship to other aspects of a syllabus that may be being developed simultaneously. The syllabus planner is typically mapping out grammar together with potential lesson content in the form of topics, skills, and activities, and for this reason grammatical syllabuses often differ from one course to the next even when targeting the same proficiency level. Appendix 4 presents the grammatical syllabus underlying a typical first-year EEL course.
Grammatical syllabuses have been criticized on the following grounds:
• They represent only a partial dimension of language proficiency.
• They do not reflect the acquisition sequences seen in naturalistic second language acquisition.
• They focus on the sentence rather than on longer units of discourse.
• They focus on form rather than meaning.
• They do not address communicative skills.
These objections are true for traditional grammar-based courses and few language courses today are planned solely around grammatical criteria. Indeed, it is doubtful if they ever were. However, grammar remains a core component of many language courses. There are several reasons for this:
• caching a language through its grammar represents a familiar approach to teaching for many people. In many parts of the world, teachers and students expect to see a grammar strand in a course and react negatively to its absence.
• Grammar provides a convenient framework for a course: grammar can readily be linked to other strands of a syllabus, such as functions, topics,
or situations.
• Grammar represents a core component of language proficiency: communicative competence includes the ability to use grammar and therefore deserves a place in the curriculum.
Grammatical syllabuses thus continue to be widely used in language teaching. Typically, however, they are seen as one stream of a multiskilled or integrated syllabus rather than as the sole basis for a syllabus.
Lexical syllabus: one that identifies a target vocabulary to be taught normally arranged according to levels such as the first 500, 1,000, 1,500,2,000 words. We saw in Chapter 1 that vocabulary syllabuses were among the first types of syllabuses to be developed in language teaching. Today there is a large degree of consensus in English-language teaching concerning targets for vocabulary teaching at different levels and textbook and materials writers tend to keep materials within target vocabulary bands. Typical vocabulary targets for a general English course are:
Elementary level: 1,000 words
Intermediate level: an additional 2,000 words
Upper Intermediate level: an additional 2,000 words
Advanced level: an additional 2,000+ words
(Hindmarsh 1980; Nation 1990)
An example of a course planned systematically around lexical targets is the Collins Cobuild English Course (Willis and Willis 1988), of which Willis (1990, vi) comments:
The 700 most frequent words of English account for around 70% of all English text. That is to say around 70% of the English we speak and hear, read and write is made up of the 700 most common words in the language. The most frequent 1,500 words account for 76% of text and the most frequent 2,500 for 80%. Given this, we decided that word frequency would determine the contents of our course. Level 1 would aim to cover the most frequent 700 words together with their common patterns and uses. Level 2 would recycle these words and go on to cover the next 800 to bring us up to the 1,500 level, and Level 3 would recycle those 1,500 and add a further 1,000.
Because vocabulary is involved in the presentation of any type of language content, a lexical syllabus can only be considered as one strand of a more comprehensive syllabus.
Functional syllabus: one that is organized around communicative functions such as requesting, complaining, suggesting, agreeing. A functional syllabus seeks to analyze the concept of communicative competence into its different components on the assumption that mastery of individual functions will result in overall communicative ability. Functional syllabuses were first proposed in the 1970s as part of the communicative language teaching movement (see Chapter 2) and have formed the basis for many language courses and textbooks from that time. They were one of the first proposals for a communicative syllabus, that is, one that addresses communicative competence rather than linguistic competence. In Threshold Level English, basic functions were identified through analysis of the purposes for which learners use English, particularly younger learners up to the intermediate level using a language for social survival and travel purposes. This resulted in a widely used functional syllabus that consists of 126 functions grouped into the following categories (see Appendix 5):
• imparting and seeking factual information
• expressing and finding out attitudes
• deciding on courses of action
• socializing
• structuring discourse
• communication repair
Functional syllabuses such as Threshold Level provided the first serious alternative to a grammatical syllabus as a basis for general-purpose course design, and major courses published from the 1980s increasingly employed functional syllabuses, sometimes linked to a parallel grammatical syllabus. Because they often focus on communication skills, functional syllabuses are particularly suited to the organization of courses in spoken English. Functional syllabuses have proved very popular as a basis for organizing courses and materials for the following reasons:
• They reflect a more comprehensive view of language than grammar syllabuses and focus on the use of the language rather than linguistic form.
• They can readily be linked to other types of syllabus content (e.g., topics, grammar, vocabulary).
• They provide a convenient framework for the design of teaching materials, particularly in the domains of listening and speaking.
Functional syllabuses have also been criticized for the following reasons:
• There are no clear criteria for selecting or grading functions.
• They represent a simplistic view of communicative competence and fail
• The address of the Processes of communication.
• They represent an atomistic approach to language, that is, one that assumes that language ability can be broken down into discrete components that can be taught separately.
• They often lead to a phrase-book approach to teaching that concentrates on teaching expressions and idioms used for different functions.
• Students learning from a functional course may have considerable gaps in their grammatical competence because some important grammatical structures may not be elicited by the functions that are taught in the syllabus.
These objections can be regarded as issues that need to be resolved in implementing a functional syllabus. Since their inception and enthusiastic reception in the 1980s, functional syllabuses are now generally regarded as only a partial component of a communicative syllabus. Alternative proposals for communicative syllabus design include task-based and text-based syllabuses (discussed later in this section).
Situational syllabus: one that is organized around the language needed for different situations such as at the airport or at a hotel A situation is a setting in which particular communicative acts typically occur. A situational syllabus identifies the situations in which the learner will use the language and the typical communicative acts and language used in that setting. Situational syllabuses have been a familiar feature of language teaching textbooks for centuries (Kelly 1969) and are often used in travel books and books that focus on mastering expressions frequently encountered in particular situations. An example of a recent situationally organized textbook on English for travel is Passport (Buckingham and Whitney 1995), which contains the following situational syllabus:
1. On an airplane 10. In a restaurant
2. At an immigration counter 11. In a cafe
3. At a bank 12. In a bar
4. On the telephone 13. On a bus
5. On the street 14. In a store
6. In the city 15. At the post office
7. At home 16. At the cinema
8. At the doctors' 17. In a hotel
9. In an office 18. At the airport
Situational syllabuses have the advantage of presenting language in context and teaching language of immediate practical use. However, they are also subject to the following criticisms:
• Little is known about the language used in different situations, so selection of teaching items is typically based on intuition.
• Language used in specific situations may not transfer to other situations. Situational syllabuses often lead to a phrase-book approach.
• Grammar is dealt with incidentally, so a situational syllabus may result in gaps in a student's grammatical knowledge.
The role of situations in syllabus design has recently reentered language teaching, albeit in a different form from traditional situational syllabuses, with the emergence of communicative approaches to syllabus design and ESP. ESP approaches to curriculum development attribute a central role to the situation or setting in which communication takes place and to the following elements of the situation (Munby 1978; Feez 1998):
• the participants
• their role relations
• the transactions they engage in
• the skills or behaviors involved in each transaction
• the kinds of oral and written texts that are produced
• the linguistic features of the texts
Competency-based language teaching (see Chapter 5 and later in this section) is an approach to teaching that focuses on transactions that occur in particular situations and their related skills and behaviors. Text-based syllabus design (discussed later in this section) focuses on transactions, the texts that occur within transactions, and the linguistic features of the texts. The notion of situation has thus been incorporated as an element of more comprehensive approaches to syllabus design.
Topical or content-based syllabus: one that is organized around themes, topics, or other units of content. With a topical syllabus, content rather than grammar, functions, or situations is the starting point in syllabus design. Content may provide the sole criterion for organizing the syllabus or a framework for linking a variety of different syllabus strands together. "It is the teaching of content or information in the language being learned with little or no direct effort to teach the language separately from the content being taught" (Krahnke 1987, 65). All language courses, no matter what kind of syllabus they are based on, must include some form of content. But with other approaches to syllabus design, content is incidental and serves merely as the vehicle for practicing language structures, functions, or skills. In a typical lesson in a grammar-based course, for example, a structure is selected and then content is chosen to show how the item is used and to pro-vide a context for practicing the structure. In a topic-based syllabus, in contrast, content provides the vehicle for the presentation of language rather than the other way around. Maximum use is made of content to provide links and continuity across the skill areas. Claims made for the advantages of courses based on content-based syllabuses are:
• They facilitate comprehension.
• Content makes linguistic form more meaningful.
• Content serves as the best basis for teaching the skill areas.
• They address students' needs.
• They motivate learners.
• They allow for integration of the four skills.
• They allow for use of authentic materials.
(Brinton, Snow, and Wesche 1989; Mohan 1986)
Topic-based syllabuses have often been a feature of ESL programs in elementary or secondary schools where the teaching of English is integrated with science, mathematics, and social sciences, as well as of ESL programs for students at the university level. Brinton et al. (1989, 27) give the following example of how a content-based course can be organized:
In a theme-based course, a high-interest topic such as "culture shock" could serve as the organizing principle for a 2-week integrated skills course, with the linguistic focus of the instruction determined by the students' needs, their proficiency level, and (last but not least) the degree to which the content "maps" onto the course objectives.
This approach was used in a German university program described in Brinton et al. (1989) that was built around the following themes:
Television modern architecture
religious persuasion microchip technology
advertising ecology
drugs alternative energy
racism nuclear energy
Native Americans Dracula in myth, novel, and films
Issues that arise in developing a topic-based syllabus are:
• How are themes, topics, and content decided on?
• What is the balance between content and grammar or other strands in the syllabus?
• Are ESL teachers qualified to teach content-based courses?
• What should be the basis for assessment - learning of content or learning of language?
Although choosing appropriate content is an issue in the design of any language course, using topics as the overarching criterion in planning a course leaves other questions unresolved because decisions must still be made concerning the selection of grammar, functions, or skills. It may also be difficult to develop a logical or learnable sequence for other syllabus components if topics are the sole framework. Different topics may require language of differing levels of complexity and, as a consequence, it may not always be possible to reconcile the different strands of the syllabus. Appendix 3 in Chapter 8 describes how a topical syllabus was used in developing speaking materials.
Competency-based syllabus: one based on a specification of the competencies learners are expected to master in relation to specific situations and activities (see Chapter 5 for an extended discussion). Competencies are a description of the essential skills, knowledge, and attitudes required for effective performance of particular tasks and activities. For example, the work-skills curriculum in Mrowicki (1986) is organized according to topics and competencies.
The curriculum's language competencies are divided into topic and cross-topic areas. A topic refers to the context in which language is used. For example, the competency "Report basic household problems" is found in the topic "Housing." A cross-topic is a topic which can occur in other topic areas. For example, the competency "Read and write dates" from the cross-topic "Time and Dates" also occurs in the topics "Shopping" (reading expiration dates of food), "Health" (reading appointment times), "Banking and Bills" (reading the date due on bills), etc. (Mrowicki 1986, ix)
Examples of competencies related to the topic of "telephoning" are:
1. read and dial telephone numbers
2. identify oneself on the telephone when answering and calling
3. request to speak to someone
4. respond to request to hold
5. respond to offer to take message
Competency-based syllabuses are widely used in social survival and work-oriented language programs. Advantages and disadvantages of a competency-based approach are discussed in Chapter 5.
Skills syllabus: one that is organized around the different underlying abilities that are involved in using a language for purposes such as reading, writing, listening, or speaking. Approaching a language through skills is based on the belief that learning a complex activity such as "listening to a lecture" involves mastery of a number of individual skills or microskills that together make up the activity. Examples of skills that relate to different types of language use are:
Writing: creating a topic sentence
distinguishing between main ideas and supporting sentences
self-editing
listening: recognizing key information ,
using discourse markers to identify the flow of discourse
following rapid speech
speaking: recognizing turn-taking signals
introducing a topic
using communication strategies
reading: reading for gist
guessing words from context
reading and making inferences
Skills have traditionally been a central focus in language teaching and there have been attempts to identify the microskills underlying the use of the four macroskills of reading, writing, listening, and speaking as a basis for syllabus design (e.g., Munby 1978). Yalden (1983) gives the following example of a skills syllabus for the teaching of study skills:
Basic reference skills: understanding and use of
• graphic presentation, namely, headings, subheadings, numbering, indentation, bold print, footnotes
• table of contents and index
• cross-referencing
• card catalog
• phonetic transcriptions/diacritics
• bibliography
• dictionaries
Skimming to obtain
• the gist of the text
• a general impression of the text
Scanning to locate specifically required information on
• a single point
• more than one point
• a whole topic
Transcoding information presented in diagrammatic display, involving
• completing a diagram/table/graph
• constructing one or more diagrams/tables/graphs
Note-taking skills
• completing note-frames
• deletions
• use of diagrams
Appendix 6 contains a skills syllabus for listening and speaking from a national curriculum document in an EFL country. Claims made in support of skills-based syllabuses are:
• They focus on behavior or performance.
• They teach skills that can transfer to many other situations.
• They identify teachable and learnable units.
Skills-based syllabuses have the advantage of focusing on performance in relation to specific tasks and therefore provide a practical framework for designing courses and teaching materials. They may be more relevant to situations in which students have very specific and identifiable needs (such as preparing for university-level studies in English). Skills syllabuses have been criticized, however, on the following grounds:
• There is no serious basis for determining skills.
• They focus on discrete aspects of performance rather than on developing more global and integrated communicative abilities.
Task-based syllabus: one that is organized around tasks that students will complete in the target language. A task is an activity or goal that is carried out using language such as finding a solution to a puzzle, reading a map and giving directions, or reading a set of instructions and assembling a toy. "Tasks are activities which have meaning as their primary focus. Success in tasks is evaluated in terms of achievement of an outcome, and tasks generally bear some resemblance to real-life language use" (Skehan 1996, 20).
All teaching makes use of tasks of different kinds. A task-based syllabus, however, is one based on tasks that have been specially designed to facilitate second language learning and one in which tasks or activities are the basic units of syllabus design. While carrying out these tasks, learners are said to receive comprehensible input and modified output, processes believed central to second language acquisition. A number of second language acquisition theorists have proposed tasks as a basis for syllabus planning. Long and Crookes (1991, 43) claim that tasks: "provide a vehicle for the Presentation of appropriate target language samples to learners - input which they will inevitably reshape via application of general cognitive processing capacities - and for the delivery of comprehension and production opportunities of negotiable difficulty."
The basic claims made for a task-based syllabus are:
• Tasks are activities that drive the second language acquisition process.
• Grammar teaching is not central with this approach because learners will acquire grammar as a by-product of carrying out tasks.
• Tasks are motivating for learners and engage them in meaningful communication.
Two kinds of tasks have been proposed as a basis for syllabus design: pedagogical tasks and real-world tasks. Pedagogical tasks are based on SLA theory and are designed to trigger second language learning processes and strategies. The following are tasks of this kind:
• jigsaw tasks: These tasks involve learners in combining different pieces of information to form a whole (e.g., three individuals or groups may have three different parts of a story and have to piece the story together).
• information-gap tasks: Tasks in which one student or group of students has one set of information and another student or group has a complementary set of information. They must negotiate and find out what the other party's information is in order to complete an activity.
• problem solving tasks: Students are given a problem and a set of information. They must arrive at a solution to the problem. There is generally a single resolution of the outcome.
• decision-making tasks: Students are given a problem for which there a number of possible outcomes and they must choose one through negotiation and discussion.
• opinion exchange tasks: Learners engage in discussion and exchange of ideas. They do not need to reach agreement.
Although communicative activities of the type just described have long been a feature of communicative language teaching, advocates of task-based syllabuses propose them as the central feature of a syllabus rather than playing an incidental role. Real-world tasks are designed to practice or rehearse those activities that are found to be important in a needs analysis and that turn out to be important and useful in the real world. There is little difference between these kinds of tasks and those made use of in other situa-tionally based approaches to syllabus design, such as Competency-Based Language Teaching.
At present, however, task-based syllabuses have not been widely implemented in language teaching. Among the concerns they raise are:
• definition of task: Definitions of tasks are sometimes so broad as to include almost anything that involves learners doing something.
• design and selection of tasks: Procedures for the design and selection ot tasks remain unclear.
• development of accuracy: Excessive use of communicative tasks may en-* courage fluency at the expense of accuracy.
Although the notion of task appears useful as a component of methodologv it has yet to be widely adopted as a unit of syllabus design.
Text-based syllabus: one that is built around texts and samples of extended discourse. As already noted, this can be regarded as a type of situational approach because the starting point in planning a syllabus is analysis of the contexts in which the learners will use the language.
[This approach] starts with the texts which are identified for a specific context or which have been identified by students. This approach is often used when an overall context for language learning has been defined, such as in a specific workplace or a university or other further study context. Units of work are then developed in relation to the texts. For example, the spoken texts identified for a group of engineers in a workplace were: spoken instructions to field staff, presentations of report findings at meetings and telephone negotiations with contractors. (Burns and Joyce 1997, 17)
A text-based syllabus is a type of integrated syllabus because it combines elements of different types of syllabuses. Appendix 7 gives an example of the processes involved in developing a text-based syllabus. The following are examples of text types that can be used in planning a text-based syllabus (Feez 1998, 85-86):
exchanges simple exchanges relating to information and goods and services
complex or problematic exchanges
casual conversation
forms simple formatted texts
complex formatted texts
procedures instructions
procedures
protocols
information texts descriptions
explanations
reports
directives
texts that combine more than one text types
story texts recounts
narratives
Persuasive texts opinion texts
expositions
discussions
In teaching from a text-based syllabus a five-part cycle is proposed that involves:
1. building the context for the text
2. modeling and deconstructing the text
3. joint construction of the text
4. independent construction of the text
5. linking related texts
The following advantages are suggested for a text-based syllabus:
• It teaches explicitly about the structures and grammatical features of spoken and written texts.
• It links spoken and written texts to the social and cultural contexts of their use.
• It allows for the design of units of work that focus on developing skills in
relation to whole texts.
• It provides students with guided practice as they develop language skills for meaningful communication through texts.
(Feez 1998, v)
Criticisms of this approach are similar to those made of competency-based approaches, namely:
• It focuses on specific skills rather than a more general language proficiency.
• It may be impractical in many situations.
An integrated syllabus: Decisions about a suitable syllabus framework for a course reflect different priorities in teaching rather than absolute choices. The issue is, which foci will be central in planning the syllabus and which will be secondary? In most courses there will generally be a number of different syllabus strands, such as grammar linked to skills and texts, tasks linked to topics and functions, or skills linked to topics and texts. In arriving at a decision about which approach to syllabus planning to take, the course planners need to decide between macrolevel and microlevel planning units in the course. For example, a reading course might first be planned in terms of reading skills (the macrolevel planning category) and then further planned in terms of text types, vocabulary, and grammar (the microlevel planning category). A syllabus might be organized grammatically at the first level and then the grammar presented functionally. Or the first level of organization might be functional with grammar items selected according to the grammatical demands of different functions. In practical terms, therefore, all syllabuses reflect some degree of integration. Krahnke (1987, 75) concludes:
For almost all instructional programs, it is clear that some combination of types of instructional content will be needed to address the complex goals of the program….for most general teaching applications, whose goal is functional ability in broadly defined settings and structural knowledge and communicative ability in specific situations, a combination of functional, structural, situational, and skill-based instruction is the probable choice. On the other hand, in some second language teaching settings, skills and tasks can be more narrowly specified, instructional resources are richer, or specific structural or formal knowledge is not required by the program for students to succeed, and a combination of task-based, skill-based, situational, functional, and content instruction may be chosen.
Developing instructional blocks
So far we have described the processes used to make decisions about the content of a course as well as its syllabus framework. A course also needs to be mapped out in terms of instructional blocks or sections. An instructional block is a self-contained learning sequence that has its own goals and objectives and that also reflects the overall objectives for the course. Instructional blocks represent the instructional focus of the course and may be very specific (e.g., a single lesson) or more general (e.g., a unit of work consisting of several lessons). Planning the organizational structure in a course involves selecting appropriate blocks and deciding on the sequence in which these will appear. In organizing a course into teaching blocks one seeks to achieve the following:
• to make the course more teachable and learnable
• to provide a progression in level of difficulty
• to create overall coherence and structure for the course
Two commonly used instructional blocks are planning by modules and by units.
Modules: This is a self-contained and independent learning sequence with its own objectives. For example, a 120-hour course might be divided into four modules of 30 hours each. Assessment is carried out at the end of each module. Modules allow for flexible organization of a course and can give learners a sense of achievement because objectives are more immediately and specific. Care needs to be taken, however, to ensure that the course does not appear fragmented and unstructured.
Units: This teaching block is normally longer than a single lesson but shorter than a module and is the commonest way of organizing courses and teaching materials. It is normally a group of lessons that is planned around a single instructional focus. (Sometimes units are referred to as a scheme of work.) A unit seeks to provide a structured sequence of activities that lead toward a learning outcome. The factors that account for a successful unit include:
• Length: Sufficient but not too much material is included.
• Development: One activity leads effectively into the next; the unit does not consist of a random sequence of activities.
• Coherence: The unit has an overall sense of coherence.
• Pacing: Each activity within the unit moves at a reasonable pace. For example, if there are five activities in the unit, one does not require four times as much time to complete as the others.
• Outcome: At the end of the unit, students should be able to know or do a series of things that are related.
The following comments by a learner indicate that the organization of the course units was not successful:
We did lots of different things in the course and many of them were quite useful. But it's hard to see where all the separate things fit together. Also, I never knew quite what to expect, where we were going from day to day.
The issue of unit structure is also crucial in developing instructional materials. In planning an upper-intermediate-level course with a topical organization of units and an integrated syllabus (Richards and Sandy 1998), the following solutions were reached with respect to unit structure (see Appendix 8).
• Each of the two books in the series would have 12 units.
• Each unit would consist of 8 pages that divide into two 4-page lessons.
• Each unit is organized around a general theme such as creativity, communication, education and learning.
• Each lesson focuses on a topic related to the unit theme. For example:
Unit theme: creativity Lesson A: creativity and jobs Lesson B: creative products
Within each 4-page lesson, each page has a distinct focus in both terms of topic treatment and language focus. For example:
Lesson A
Page 1: Fluency activities introduce the topic of the first lesson through listening and oral work.
Page 2: Grammar exercises pick up an item that appears on page 1. Exercises provide controlled practice of grammar items leading to communicative practice.
Page 3- Fluency activities provide further listening and oral work on a topic related to the unit theme.
Page 4: Writing exercises on topics linked to the unit theme teach practical writing and composition skills.
Lesson B
Page 1: Fluency activities introduce the topic of the second lesson through listening and oral work.
Page 2: Grammar exercises provide controlled practice of grammar items leading to communicative practice.
Page 3: Fluency activities provide further listening and oral work.
Page 4: Reading activities develop reading skills and serve to initiate discussion.
With this unit structure two types of coherence are provided - horizontal and vertical. Horizontal coherence for a unit is created through the linked sequence of activities within each unit. Vertical coherence is created through the sequence that runs from the top of each page to the bottom with each page culminating in an appropriate activity to bring the page to closure.
Preparing the scope and sequence plan
Once a course has been planned and organized, it can be described. One form in which it can be described is as a scope and sequence plan. This might consist of a listing of the module or units and their contents and an indication of how much teaching time each block in the course will require. In the case of a textbook it usually consists of a unit-by-unit description of the course cross-referenced to the syllabus items included. Appendix 9 gives part of a scope and sequence plan for New Interchange 1 (Richards, Proctor, and Hull 1997).
Having considered the different processes involved in planning and developing a language program, we can now turn to issues that arise in creating conditions for effective teaching of the course.
A number of different levels of planning and development are involved in developing a course or set of instructional materials based on the aims and objectives that have been established for a language program. In this chapter we will examine the following dimensions of course development:
• developing a course rationale
• describing entry and exit levels
• choosing course content
• sequencing course content
• planning the course content (syllabus and instructional blocks)
• preparing the scope and sequence plan
These processes do not necessarily occur in a linear order. Some may take place simultaneously and many aspects of a course are subject to ongoing revision each time the course is taught. The types of decision making that we will examine in this chapter are also involved in developing instructional materials and many of the examples discussed apply to both course planning and materials design.
The course rationale
A starting point in course development is a description of the course rationale. This is a brief written description of the reasons for the course and the nature of it. The course rationale seeks to answer the following questions:
Who is this course for?
What is the course about?
What kind of teaching and learning will take place in the course?
The course rationale answers these questions by describing the beliefs, values and goals that underlie the course. It would normally be a two- or three-paragraph statement that has been developed by those involved in planning and teaching a course and that serves to provide the justification for the type of teaching and learning that will take place in the course. It provides a succinct statement of the course philosophy for anyone who may need such information, including students, teachers, and potential clients. Developing a rationale also helps provide focus and direction to some of the deliberations involved in course planning. The rationale thus serves the purposes of:
• guiding the planning of the various components of the course
• emphasizing the kinds of teaching and learning the course should exemplify
• providing a check on the consistency of the various course components in terms of the course values and goals
(Posner and Rudnitsky 1986)
The following is an example of a course rationale:
This course is designed for working adults who wish to improve their communication skills in English in order to improve their employment prospects. It teaches the basic communication skills needed to communicate in a variety of different work settings. The course seeks to enable participants to recognize their strengths and needs in language learning and to give them the confidence to use English more effectively to achieve their own goals. It also seeks to develop the participants' skills in independent learning outside of the classroom.
In order to develop a course rationale, the course planners need to give careful consideration to the goals of the course, the kind of teaching and learning they want the course to exemplify, the roles of teachers and learners in the course, and the beliefs and principles the course will reflect.
Describing the entry and exit level
In order to plan a language course, it is necessary to know the level at which the program will start and the level learners may be expected to reach at the end of the course. Language programs and commercial materials typically distinguish between elementary, intermediate, and advanced levels, but these categories are too broad for the kind of detailed planning that program and materials development involves. For these purposes, more detailed descriptions are needed of students' proficiency levels before they enter a program and targeted proficiency levels at the end of it. Information may be available on students' entry level from their results on international proficiency tests such as TOEFL or IELTS. Or specially designed tests may to be needed to determine the level of students' language skills. Information from proficiency tests will enable the target level of the program to be assessed and may require adjustment of the program's objectives if they appear to be aimed at too high or too low a level.
An approach that has been widely used in language program planning is to identify different levels of performance or proficiency in the form of band levels or points on a proficiency scale. These describe what a student is able to do at different stages in a language program. An example of the use of proficiency descriptions in large-scale program planning was the approach used in the Australian Migrant Education On-Arrival Program.
In order to ensure that a language program is coherent and systematically moves learners along the path towards that level of proficiency they require, some overall perspective of the development path is required. This resulted . . . in the development of the Australian Second Language Proficiency Ratings (ASLPR). The ASLPR defines levels of second language proficiency as nine (potentially 12) points along the path from zero to native-like proficiency. The definitions provide detailed descriptions of language behavior in all four macro-skills and allow the syllabus developer to perceive how a course at any level fits into the total pattern of proficiency development. (Ingram 1982, 66)
Similarly, in 1982 the American Council on the Teaching of Foreign Languages published proficiency guidelines in the form of " series of descriptions of proficiency levels for speaking, listening, reading, writing, and culture in a foreign language. These guidelines represent a graduated sequence of steps that can be used to structure a foreign language program" (Liskin-Gasparro 1984, 11). The ACTFL Proficiency Guidelines (see Appendix 1) have been widely promoted as a framework for organizing curriculum and as a basis for assessment of foreign language ability, though they have also attracted controversy because they are not research-based (e.g., see Lowe 1986). Band descriptors such as those used in the IELTS examinations or the UCLES/RSA Certificate in Communicative Skills in English (Weir 1990, 149-179) can be similarly used as a basis for planning learner entry and exit levels in a program. (See Appendix 2 for an example of performance levels in writing, and Appendix 3 for band descriptors for oral interaction.")
Choosing course content
The question of course content is probably the most basic issue in course sign. Given that a course has to be developed to address a specific set of needs and to cover a given set of objectives, what will the content of the course look like? Decisions about course content reflect the planners' assumptions about the nature of language, language use, and language learning, what the most essential elements or units of language are, and how these can be organized as an efficient basis for second language learning. For example, a writing course could potentially be planned around any of the following types of content:
• grammar (e.g., using the present tense in descriptions)
• functions (e.g., describing likes and dislikes)
• topics (e.g., writing about world issues)
• skills (e.g., developing topic sentences)
• processes (e.g., using prewriting strategies)
• texts (e.g., writing a business letter)
Similarly a speaking course could be organized around:
• functions (expressing opinions)
• interaction skills (opening and closing conversations, turn taking)
• topics (current affairs, business topics)
The choice of a particular approach to content selection will depend on subject-matter knowledge, the learners' proficiency levels, current views on second language learning and teaching, conventional wisdom, and convenience. Information gathered during needs analysis contributes to the planning of course content, as do additional ideas from the following sources:
• available literature on the topic
• published materials on the topic
• review of similar courses offered elsewhere
• review of tests or exams in the area
• analysis of students' problems
• consultation with teachers familiar with the topic
• consultation with specialists in the area
Rough initial ideas are noted down as a basis for further planning and added to through group brainstorming. A list of possible topics, units, skills, and other units of course organization is then, generated. One person suggests something that should go into the course, others add their ideas, and these are compared with other sources of information until clearer ideas about the content of the course are agreed on. Throughout this process the statements of aims and objectives are continually referred to and both course content suggestions and the aims and objectives themselves are revised and fine-tuned as the course content is planned. For example, a group of teachers listed the following initial ideas about what they would include in a course on listening and speaking skills for a group of intermediate-level learners:
• asking questions
• opening and closing conversations
• expressing opinions
• dealing with misunderstandings
• describing experiences
. social talk
• telephone skills
• situation-specific language, such as at a bank
• describing daily routines
• recognizing sound contrasts
• using communication strategies
These topics then have to be carefully reviewed and refined and the following questions asked about them:
Are all the suggested topics necessary?
Have any important topics been omitted?
Is there sufficient time to cover them?
Has sufficient priority been given to the most important areas?
Has enough emphasis been put on the different aspects of the areas identified?
Will the areas covered enable students to attain the learning outcomes?
Developing initial ideas for course content often takes place simultaneously with syllabus planning, because the content of a course will often depend on the type of syllabus framework that will be used as the basis for the course (discussed later in this chapter).
Determining the scope and sequence
Decisions about course content also need to address the distribution of content throughout the course. This is known as planning the scope and sequence of the course. Scope is concerned with the breadth and depth of coverage of items in the course, that is, with the following questions:
What range of content will be covered?
Or what extent should each topic be studied?
For example, in relation to the course on listening and speaking skills re-tted to in the preceding section, one area of potential content identified was "describing experiences." But how much will be included in relation to this topic? And should two, four, or six class periods be devoted to it? The sequencing of content in the course also needs to be determined. This involves deciding which content is needed early in the course and which provides a basis for things that will be learned later. Sequencing may be based on the following criteria.
Simple to complex
One of the commonest ways of sequencing material is by difficulty level. Content presented earlier is thought to be simpler than later items. This is typically seen in relation to grammar content, but any type of course content can be graded in terms of difficulty. For example, in a reading course reading texts may be simplified at the beginning of the course and unsimplified at later levels. Or simple skills such as "literal comprehension" may be required early on, and more complex skills such as "inferencing" taught at a later stage.
Chronology
Content may be sequenced according to the order in which events occur in the real world. For example, in a writing course the organization might be based on the sequence writers are assumed to employ when composing: (1) brainstorming; (2) drafting; (3) revising; (4) editing. In a proficiency course, skills might be sequenced according to the sequence in which they are normally acquired: (1) listening; (2) speaking; (3) reading; (4) writing.
Need
Content may be sequenced according to when learners are most likely to need it outside of the classroom. For example, the rationale for the sequencing of content in a social survival curriculum is given as follows:
The topics and cross-topics in the curriculum are sequenced "in order of importance to students' lives, ease of contextualization and their relationship to other topics and cross-topics." The sequence is:
i. basic literacy skills
ii. personal identification
iii. money
iv. shopping
v. time and dates
vi. telephone
vii. health
viii. emergencies
ix. directions
x. transportation
xi. housing
xii. post office
xiii. banking/bills
xiv. social language
xv. clarification
(Mrowicki 1986, xi)
Prerequisite learning
The sequence of content may reflect what is necessary at one point as a foundation for the next step in the learning process. For example, a certain set of grammar items may be taught as a prerequisite to paragraph writing. Or, in a reading course, word attack skills may be taught early on as a prerequisite to reading unsimplified texts at later stages of the course.
Whole to part or part to whole
In some cases, material at the beginning of a course may focus on the overall structure or organization of a topic before considering the individual components that make it up. Alternatively, the course might focus on practicing the parts before the whole. For example, students might read short stories and react to them as whole texts before going on to consider what the elements are that constitute an effective short story. Or, students might study how to write paragraphs before going on to practice putting paragraphs together to make an essay.
Spiral sequencing
This approach involves the recycling of items to ensure that learners have repeated opportunities to learn them.
Planning the course structure
The next stage in course development involves mapping the course structure into a form and sequence that provide a suitable basis for teaching. One of the preliminary planning involved will have occurred while ideas for course content were being generated. Two aspects of this process, however, require more detailed planning: selecting a syllabus framework and developing instructional blocks. These issues are closely related and sometimes inseparable but also involve different kinds of decisions.
Selecting a syllabus framework
A syllabus describes the major elements that will be used in planning a language course and provides the basis for its instructional focus and content. For example, in planning a course on speaking skills based on the course content discussed earlier (in the section titled "Describing the entry and exit level"), a number of options are available. The syllabus could be:
• situational: organized around different situations and the oral skills needed in those situations
• topical: organized around different topics and how to talk about them in English
• functional: organized around the functions most commonly needed in speaking
• task-based: organized around different tasks and activities that the learners would carry out in English
In choosing a particular syllabus framework for a course, planners are influenced by the following factors:
• knowledge and beliefs about the subject area: a syllabus reflects ideas and beliefs about the nature of speaking, reading, writing, or listening
• research and theory: research on language use and learning as well as applied linguistics theory sometimes leads to proposals in favor of particular syllabus types
• common practice: the language teaching profession has built up considerable practical experience in developing language programs and this often serves as the basis for different syllabus types
• trends: approaches to syllabus design come and go and reflect national or international trends
In the 1980s and 1990s, the communicative language teaching movement led to a reexamination of traditional approaches to syllabus design and a search for principles for the development of communicative syllabuses (see Chapter 2). A communicative syllabus is either an attempt to develop a framework for a general language course, such as a Threshold Level syllabus, or one that focuses on communication within a restricted setting, such as English for Specific Purposes. Because many different syllabus approaches are available in developing "communicative" courses, many different syllabus frameworks can make a claim to be versions of a communicative syllabus: for example, competency-based, text-based, and task-based syllabuses. Other approaches to syllabus design are also possible and we will consider now the nature of these different syllabus options.
Grammatical (or structural) syllabus: one that is organized around grammatical items. Traditionally, grammatical syllabuses have been used as the basis for planning general courses, particularly for beginning-level learners. In developing a grammatical syllabus, the syllabus planner seeks to solve the following problems:
• to select sufficient patterns to support the amount of teaching time available
• to arrange items into a sequence that facilitates learning
• to identify a productive range of grammatical items that will allow for the development of basic communicative skills
Choice and sequencing of grammatical items in a grammar syllabus reflect not only the intrinsic ease or difficulty of items but their relationship to other aspects of a syllabus that may be being developed simultaneously. The syllabus planner is typically mapping out grammar together with potential lesson content in the form of topics, skills, and activities, and for this reason grammatical syllabuses often differ from one course to the next even when targeting the same proficiency level. Appendix 4 presents the grammatical syllabus underlying a typical first-year EEL course.
Grammatical syllabuses have been criticized on the following grounds:
• They represent only a partial dimension of language proficiency.
• They do not reflect the acquisition sequences seen in naturalistic second language acquisition.
• They focus on the sentence rather than on longer units of discourse.
• They focus on form rather than meaning.
• They do not address communicative skills.
These objections are true for traditional grammar-based courses and few language courses today are planned solely around grammatical criteria. Indeed, it is doubtful if they ever were. However, grammar remains a core component of many language courses. There are several reasons for this:
• caching a language through its grammar represents a familiar approach to teaching for many people. In many parts of the world, teachers and students expect to see a grammar strand in a course and react negatively to its absence.
• Grammar provides a convenient framework for a course: grammar can readily be linked to other strands of a syllabus, such as functions, topics,
or situations.
• Grammar represents a core component of language proficiency: communicative competence includes the ability to use grammar and therefore deserves a place in the curriculum.
Grammatical syllabuses thus continue to be widely used in language teaching. Typically, however, they are seen as one stream of a multiskilled or integrated syllabus rather than as the sole basis for a syllabus.
Lexical syllabus: one that identifies a target vocabulary to be taught normally arranged according to levels such as the first 500, 1,000, 1,500,2,000 words. We saw in Chapter 1 that vocabulary syllabuses were among the first types of syllabuses to be developed in language teaching. Today there is a large degree of consensus in English-language teaching concerning targets for vocabulary teaching at different levels and textbook and materials writers tend to keep materials within target vocabulary bands. Typical vocabulary targets for a general English course are:
Elementary level: 1,000 words
Intermediate level: an additional 2,000 words
Upper Intermediate level: an additional 2,000 words
Advanced level: an additional 2,000+ words
(Hindmarsh 1980; Nation 1990)
An example of a course planned systematically around lexical targets is the Collins Cobuild English Course (Willis and Willis 1988), of which Willis (1990, vi) comments:
The 700 most frequent words of English account for around 70% of all English text. That is to say around 70% of the English we speak and hear, read and write is made up of the 700 most common words in the language. The most frequent 1,500 words account for 76% of text and the most frequent 2,500 for 80%. Given this, we decided that word frequency would determine the contents of our course. Level 1 would aim to cover the most frequent 700 words together with their common patterns and uses. Level 2 would recycle these words and go on to cover the next 800 to bring us up to the 1,500 level, and Level 3 would recycle those 1,500 and add a further 1,000.
Because vocabulary is involved in the presentation of any type of language content, a lexical syllabus can only be considered as one strand of a more comprehensive syllabus.
Functional syllabus: one that is organized around communicative functions such as requesting, complaining, suggesting, agreeing. A functional syllabus seeks to analyze the concept of communicative competence into its different components on the assumption that mastery of individual functions will result in overall communicative ability. Functional syllabuses were first proposed in the 1970s as part of the communicative language teaching movement (see Chapter 2) and have formed the basis for many language courses and textbooks from that time. They were one of the first proposals for a communicative syllabus, that is, one that addresses communicative competence rather than linguistic competence. In Threshold Level English, basic functions were identified through analysis of the purposes for which learners use English, particularly younger learners up to the intermediate level using a language for social survival and travel purposes. This resulted in a widely used functional syllabus that consists of 126 functions grouped into the following categories (see Appendix 5):
• imparting and seeking factual information
• expressing and finding out attitudes
• deciding on courses of action
• socializing
• structuring discourse
• communication repair
Functional syllabuses such as Threshold Level provided the first serious alternative to a grammatical syllabus as a basis for general-purpose course design, and major courses published from the 1980s increasingly employed functional syllabuses, sometimes linked to a parallel grammatical syllabus. Because they often focus on communication skills, functional syllabuses are particularly suited to the organization of courses in spoken English. Functional syllabuses have proved very popular as a basis for organizing courses and materials for the following reasons:
• They reflect a more comprehensive view of language than grammar syllabuses and focus on the use of the language rather than linguistic form.
• They can readily be linked to other types of syllabus content (e.g., topics, grammar, vocabulary).
• They provide a convenient framework for the design of teaching materials, particularly in the domains of listening and speaking.
Functional syllabuses have also been criticized for the following reasons:
• There are no clear criteria for selecting or grading functions.
• They represent a simplistic view of communicative competence and fail
• The address of the Processes of communication.
• They represent an atomistic approach to language, that is, one that assumes that language ability can be broken down into discrete components that can be taught separately.
• They often lead to a phrase-book approach to teaching that concentrates on teaching expressions and idioms used for different functions.
• Students learning from a functional course may have considerable gaps in their grammatical competence because some important grammatical structures may not be elicited by the functions that are taught in the syllabus.
These objections can be regarded as issues that need to be resolved in implementing a functional syllabus. Since their inception and enthusiastic reception in the 1980s, functional syllabuses are now generally regarded as only a partial component of a communicative syllabus. Alternative proposals for communicative syllabus design include task-based and text-based syllabuses (discussed later in this section).
Situational syllabus: one that is organized around the language needed for different situations such as at the airport or at a hotel A situation is a setting in which particular communicative acts typically occur. A situational syllabus identifies the situations in which the learner will use the language and the typical communicative acts and language used in that setting. Situational syllabuses have been a familiar feature of language teaching textbooks for centuries (Kelly 1969) and are often used in travel books and books that focus on mastering expressions frequently encountered in particular situations. An example of a recent situationally organized textbook on English for travel is Passport (Buckingham and Whitney 1995), which contains the following situational syllabus:
1. On an airplane 10. In a restaurant
2. At an immigration counter 11. In a cafe
3. At a bank 12. In a bar
4. On the telephone 13. On a bus
5. On the street 14. In a store
6. In the city 15. At the post office
7. At home 16. At the cinema
8. At the doctors' 17. In a hotel
9. In an office 18. At the airport
Situational syllabuses have the advantage of presenting language in context and teaching language of immediate practical use. However, they are also subject to the following criticisms:
• Little is known about the language used in different situations, so selection of teaching items is typically based on intuition.
• Language used in specific situations may not transfer to other situations. Situational syllabuses often lead to a phrase-book approach.
• Grammar is dealt with incidentally, so a situational syllabus may result in gaps in a student's grammatical knowledge.
The role of situations in syllabus design has recently reentered language teaching, albeit in a different form from traditional situational syllabuses, with the emergence of communicative approaches to syllabus design and ESP. ESP approaches to curriculum development attribute a central role to the situation or setting in which communication takes place and to the following elements of the situation (Munby 1978; Feez 1998):
• the participants
• their role relations
• the transactions they engage in
• the skills or behaviors involved in each transaction
• the kinds of oral and written texts that are produced
• the linguistic features of the texts
Competency-based language teaching (see Chapter 5 and later in this section) is an approach to teaching that focuses on transactions that occur in particular situations and their related skills and behaviors. Text-based syllabus design (discussed later in this section) focuses on transactions, the texts that occur within transactions, and the linguistic features of the texts. The notion of situation has thus been incorporated as an element of more comprehensive approaches to syllabus design.
Topical or content-based syllabus: one that is organized around themes, topics, or other units of content. With a topical syllabus, content rather than grammar, functions, or situations is the starting point in syllabus design. Content may provide the sole criterion for organizing the syllabus or a framework for linking a variety of different syllabus strands together. "It is the teaching of content or information in the language being learned with little or no direct effort to teach the language separately from the content being taught" (Krahnke 1987, 65). All language courses, no matter what kind of syllabus they are based on, must include some form of content. But with other approaches to syllabus design, content is incidental and serves merely as the vehicle for practicing language structures, functions, or skills. In a typical lesson in a grammar-based course, for example, a structure is selected and then content is chosen to show how the item is used and to pro-vide a context for practicing the structure. In a topic-based syllabus, in contrast, content provides the vehicle for the presentation of language rather than the other way around. Maximum use is made of content to provide links and continuity across the skill areas. Claims made for the advantages of courses based on content-based syllabuses are:
• They facilitate comprehension.
• Content makes linguistic form more meaningful.
• Content serves as the best basis for teaching the skill areas.
• They address students' needs.
• They motivate learners.
• They allow for integration of the four skills.
• They allow for use of authentic materials.
(Brinton, Snow, and Wesche 1989; Mohan 1986)
Topic-based syllabuses have often been a feature of ESL programs in elementary or secondary schools where the teaching of English is integrated with science, mathematics, and social sciences, as well as of ESL programs for students at the university level. Brinton et al. (1989, 27) give the following example of how a content-based course can be organized:
In a theme-based course, a high-interest topic such as "culture shock" could serve as the organizing principle for a 2-week integrated skills course, with the linguistic focus of the instruction determined by the students' needs, their proficiency level, and (last but not least) the degree to which the content "maps" onto the course objectives.
This approach was used in a German university program described in Brinton et al. (1989) that was built around the following themes:
Television modern architecture
religious persuasion microchip technology
advertising ecology
drugs alternative energy
racism nuclear energy
Native Americans Dracula in myth, novel, and films
Issues that arise in developing a topic-based syllabus are:
• How are themes, topics, and content decided on?
• What is the balance between content and grammar or other strands in the syllabus?
• Are ESL teachers qualified to teach content-based courses?
• What should be the basis for assessment - learning of content or learning of language?
Although choosing appropriate content is an issue in the design of any language course, using topics as the overarching criterion in planning a course leaves other questions unresolved because decisions must still be made concerning the selection of grammar, functions, or skills. It may also be difficult to develop a logical or learnable sequence for other syllabus components if topics are the sole framework. Different topics may require language of differing levels of complexity and, as a consequence, it may not always be possible to reconcile the different strands of the syllabus. Appendix 3 in Chapter 8 describes how a topical syllabus was used in developing speaking materials.
Competency-based syllabus: one based on a specification of the competencies learners are expected to master in relation to specific situations and activities (see Chapter 5 for an extended discussion). Competencies are a description of the essential skills, knowledge, and attitudes required for effective performance of particular tasks and activities. For example, the work-skills curriculum in Mrowicki (1986) is organized according to topics and competencies.
The curriculum's language competencies are divided into topic and cross-topic areas. A topic refers to the context in which language is used. For example, the competency "Report basic household problems" is found in the topic "Housing." A cross-topic is a topic which can occur in other topic areas. For example, the competency "Read and write dates" from the cross-topic "Time and Dates" also occurs in the topics "Shopping" (reading expiration dates of food), "Health" (reading appointment times), "Banking and Bills" (reading the date due on bills), etc. (Mrowicki 1986, ix)
Examples of competencies related to the topic of "telephoning" are:
1. read and dial telephone numbers
2. identify oneself on the telephone when answering and calling
3. request to speak to someone
4. respond to request to hold
5. respond to offer to take message
Competency-based syllabuses are widely used in social survival and work-oriented language programs. Advantages and disadvantages of a competency-based approach are discussed in Chapter 5.
Skills syllabus: one that is organized around the different underlying abilities that are involved in using a language for purposes such as reading, writing, listening, or speaking. Approaching a language through skills is based on the belief that learning a complex activity such as "listening to a lecture" involves mastery of a number of individual skills or microskills that together make up the activity. Examples of skills that relate to different types of language use are:
Writing: creating a topic sentence
distinguishing between main ideas and supporting sentences
self-editing
listening: recognizing key information ,
using discourse markers to identify the flow of discourse
following rapid speech
speaking: recognizing turn-taking signals
introducing a topic
using communication strategies
reading: reading for gist
guessing words from context
reading and making inferences
Skills have traditionally been a central focus in language teaching and there have been attempts to identify the microskills underlying the use of the four macroskills of reading, writing, listening, and speaking as a basis for syllabus design (e.g., Munby 1978). Yalden (1983) gives the following example of a skills syllabus for the teaching of study skills:
Basic reference skills: understanding and use of
• graphic presentation, namely, headings, subheadings, numbering, indentation, bold print, footnotes
• table of contents and index
• cross-referencing
• card catalog
• phonetic transcriptions/diacritics
• bibliography
• dictionaries
Skimming to obtain
• the gist of the text
• a general impression of the text
Scanning to locate specifically required information on
• a single point
• more than one point
• a whole topic
Transcoding information presented in diagrammatic display, involving
• completing a diagram/table/graph
• constructing one or more diagrams/tables/graphs
Note-taking skills
• completing note-frames
• deletions
• use of diagrams
Appendix 6 contains a skills syllabus for listening and speaking from a national curriculum document in an EFL country. Claims made in support of skills-based syllabuses are:
• They focus on behavior or performance.
• They teach skills that can transfer to many other situations.
• They identify teachable and learnable units.
Skills-based syllabuses have the advantage of focusing on performance in relation to specific tasks and therefore provide a practical framework for designing courses and teaching materials. They may be more relevant to situations in which students have very specific and identifiable needs (such as preparing for university-level studies in English). Skills syllabuses have been criticized, however, on the following grounds:
• There is no serious basis for determining skills.
• They focus on discrete aspects of performance rather than on developing more global and integrated communicative abilities.
Task-based syllabus: one that is organized around tasks that students will complete in the target language. A task is an activity or goal that is carried out using language such as finding a solution to a puzzle, reading a map and giving directions, or reading a set of instructions and assembling a toy. "Tasks are activities which have meaning as their primary focus. Success in tasks is evaluated in terms of achievement of an outcome, and tasks generally bear some resemblance to real-life language use" (Skehan 1996, 20).
All teaching makes use of tasks of different kinds. A task-based syllabus, however, is one based on tasks that have been specially designed to facilitate second language learning and one in which tasks or activities are the basic units of syllabus design. While carrying out these tasks, learners are said to receive comprehensible input and modified output, processes believed central to second language acquisition. A number of second language acquisition theorists have proposed tasks as a basis for syllabus planning. Long and Crookes (1991, 43) claim that tasks: "provide a vehicle for the Presentation of appropriate target language samples to learners - input which they will inevitably reshape via application of general cognitive processing capacities - and for the delivery of comprehension and production opportunities of negotiable difficulty."
The basic claims made for a task-based syllabus are:
• Tasks are activities that drive the second language acquisition process.
• Grammar teaching is not central with this approach because learners will acquire grammar as a by-product of carrying out tasks.
• Tasks are motivating for learners and engage them in meaningful communication.
Two kinds of tasks have been proposed as a basis for syllabus design: pedagogical tasks and real-world tasks. Pedagogical tasks are based on SLA theory and are designed to trigger second language learning processes and strategies. The following are tasks of this kind:
• jigsaw tasks: These tasks involve learners in combining different pieces of information to form a whole (e.g., three individuals or groups may have three different parts of a story and have to piece the story together).
• information-gap tasks: Tasks in which one student or group of students has one set of information and another student or group has a complementary set of information. They must negotiate and find out what the other party's information is in order to complete an activity.
• problem solving tasks: Students are given a problem and a set of information. They must arrive at a solution to the problem. There is generally a single resolution of the outcome.
• decision-making tasks: Students are given a problem for which there a number of possible outcomes and they must choose one through negotiation and discussion.
• opinion exchange tasks: Learners engage in discussion and exchange of ideas. They do not need to reach agreement.
Although communicative activities of the type just described have long been a feature of communicative language teaching, advocates of task-based syllabuses propose them as the central feature of a syllabus rather than playing an incidental role. Real-world tasks are designed to practice or rehearse those activities that are found to be important in a needs analysis and that turn out to be important and useful in the real world. There is little difference between these kinds of tasks and those made use of in other situa-tionally based approaches to syllabus design, such as Competency-Based Language Teaching.
At present, however, task-based syllabuses have not been widely implemented in language teaching. Among the concerns they raise are:
• definition of task: Definitions of tasks are sometimes so broad as to include almost anything that involves learners doing something.
• design and selection of tasks: Procedures for the design and selection ot tasks remain unclear.
• development of accuracy: Excessive use of communicative tasks may en-* courage fluency at the expense of accuracy.
Although the notion of task appears useful as a component of methodologv it has yet to be widely adopted as a unit of syllabus design.
Text-based syllabus: one that is built around texts and samples of extended discourse. As already noted, this can be regarded as a type of situational approach because the starting point in planning a syllabus is analysis of the contexts in which the learners will use the language.
[This approach] starts with the texts which are identified for a specific context or which have been identified by students. This approach is often used when an overall context for language learning has been defined, such as in a specific workplace or a university or other further study context. Units of work are then developed in relation to the texts. For example, the spoken texts identified for a group of engineers in a workplace were: spoken instructions to field staff, presentations of report findings at meetings and telephone negotiations with contractors. (Burns and Joyce 1997, 17)
A text-based syllabus is a type of integrated syllabus because it combines elements of different types of syllabuses. Appendix 7 gives an example of the processes involved in developing a text-based syllabus. The following are examples of text types that can be used in planning a text-based syllabus (Feez 1998, 85-86):
exchanges simple exchanges relating to information and goods and services
complex or problematic exchanges
casual conversation
forms simple formatted texts
complex formatted texts
procedures instructions
procedures
protocols
information texts descriptions
explanations
reports
directives
texts that combine more than one text types
story texts recounts
narratives
Persuasive texts opinion texts
expositions
discussions
In teaching from a text-based syllabus a five-part cycle is proposed that involves:
1. building the context for the text
2. modeling and deconstructing the text
3. joint construction of the text
4. independent construction of the text
5. linking related texts
The following advantages are suggested for a text-based syllabus:
• It teaches explicitly about the structures and grammatical features of spoken and written texts.
• It links spoken and written texts to the social and cultural contexts of their use.
• It allows for the design of units of work that focus on developing skills in
relation to whole texts.
• It provides students with guided practice as they develop language skills for meaningful communication through texts.
(Feez 1998, v)
Criticisms of this approach are similar to those made of competency-based approaches, namely:
• It focuses on specific skills rather than a more general language proficiency.
• It may be impractical in many situations.
An integrated syllabus: Decisions about a suitable syllabus framework for a course reflect different priorities in teaching rather than absolute choices. The issue is, which foci will be central in planning the syllabus and which will be secondary? In most courses there will generally be a number of different syllabus strands, such as grammar linked to skills and texts, tasks linked to topics and functions, or skills linked to topics and texts. In arriving at a decision about which approach to syllabus planning to take, the course planners need to decide between macrolevel and microlevel planning units in the course. For example, a reading course might first be planned in terms of reading skills (the macrolevel planning category) and then further planned in terms of text types, vocabulary, and grammar (the microlevel planning category). A syllabus might be organized grammatically at the first level and then the grammar presented functionally. Or the first level of organization might be functional with grammar items selected according to the grammatical demands of different functions. In practical terms, therefore, all syllabuses reflect some degree of integration. Krahnke (1987, 75) concludes:
For almost all instructional programs, it is clear that some combination of types of instructional content will be needed to address the complex goals of the program….for most general teaching applications, whose goal is functional ability in broadly defined settings and structural knowledge and communicative ability in specific situations, a combination of functional, structural, situational, and skill-based instruction is the probable choice. On the other hand, in some second language teaching settings, skills and tasks can be more narrowly specified, instructional resources are richer, or specific structural or formal knowledge is not required by the program for students to succeed, and a combination of task-based, skill-based, situational, functional, and content instruction may be chosen.
Developing instructional blocks
So far we have described the processes used to make decisions about the content of a course as well as its syllabus framework. A course also needs to be mapped out in terms of instructional blocks or sections. An instructional block is a self-contained learning sequence that has its own goals and objectives and that also reflects the overall objectives for the course. Instructional blocks represent the instructional focus of the course and may be very specific (e.g., a single lesson) or more general (e.g., a unit of work consisting of several lessons). Planning the organizational structure in a course involves selecting appropriate blocks and deciding on the sequence in which these will appear. In organizing a course into teaching blocks one seeks to achieve the following:
• to make the course more teachable and learnable
• to provide a progression in level of difficulty
• to create overall coherence and structure for the course
Two commonly used instructional blocks are planning by modules and by units.
Modules: This is a self-contained and independent learning sequence with its own objectives. For example, a 120-hour course might be divided into four modules of 30 hours each. Assessment is carried out at the end of each module. Modules allow for flexible organization of a course and can give learners a sense of achievement because objectives are more immediately and specific. Care needs to be taken, however, to ensure that the course does not appear fragmented and unstructured.
Units: This teaching block is normally longer than a single lesson but shorter than a module and is the commonest way of organizing courses and teaching materials. It is normally a group of lessons that is planned around a single instructional focus. (Sometimes units are referred to as a scheme of work.) A unit seeks to provide a structured sequence of activities that lead toward a learning outcome. The factors that account for a successful unit include:
• Length: Sufficient but not too much material is included.
• Development: One activity leads effectively into the next; the unit does not consist of a random sequence of activities.
• Coherence: The unit has an overall sense of coherence.
• Pacing: Each activity within the unit moves at a reasonable pace. For example, if there are five activities in the unit, one does not require four times as much time to complete as the others.
• Outcome: At the end of the unit, students should be able to know or do a series of things that are related.
The following comments by a learner indicate that the organization of the course units was not successful:
We did lots of different things in the course and many of them were quite useful. But it's hard to see where all the separate things fit together. Also, I never knew quite what to expect, where we were going from day to day.
The issue of unit structure is also crucial in developing instructional materials. In planning an upper-intermediate-level course with a topical organization of units and an integrated syllabus (Richards and Sandy 1998), the following solutions were reached with respect to unit structure (see Appendix 8).
• Each of the two books in the series would have 12 units.
• Each unit would consist of 8 pages that divide into two 4-page lessons.
• Each unit is organized around a general theme such as creativity, communication, education and learning.
• Each lesson focuses on a topic related to the unit theme. For example:
Unit theme: creativity Lesson A: creativity and jobs Lesson B: creative products
Within each 4-page lesson, each page has a distinct focus in both terms of topic treatment and language focus. For example:
Lesson A
Page 1: Fluency activities introduce the topic of the first lesson through listening and oral work.
Page 2: Grammar exercises pick up an item that appears on page 1. Exercises provide controlled practice of grammar items leading to communicative practice.
Page 3- Fluency activities provide further listening and oral work on a topic related to the unit theme.
Page 4: Writing exercises on topics linked to the unit theme teach practical writing and composition skills.
Lesson B
Page 1: Fluency activities introduce the topic of the second lesson through listening and oral work.
Page 2: Grammar exercises provide controlled practice of grammar items leading to communicative practice.
Page 3: Fluency activities provide further listening and oral work.
Page 4: Reading activities develop reading skills and serve to initiate discussion.
With this unit structure two types of coherence are provided - horizontal and vertical. Horizontal coherence for a unit is created through the linked sequence of activities within each unit. Vertical coherence is created through the sequence that runs from the top of each page to the bottom with each page culminating in an appropriate activity to bring the page to closure.
Preparing the scope and sequence plan
Once a course has been planned and organized, it can be described. One form in which it can be described is as a scope and sequence plan. This might consist of a listing of the module or units and their contents and an indication of how much teaching time each block in the course will require. In the case of a textbook it usually consists of a unit-by-unit description of the course cross-referenced to the syllabus items included. Appendix 9 gives part of a scope and sequence plan for New Interchange 1 (Richards, Proctor, and Hull 1997).
Having considered the different processes involved in planning and developing a language program, we can now turn to issues that arise in creating conditions for effective teaching of the course.