Communicative Tasks and the Language Curriculum

Abstract

Over the last 25 years the communicative task has emerged as a significant building block in the development of language curricula and also as an element for motivating process-oriented second language acquisition research. This paper reviews the influence of the communicative task on curriculum development and summarizes the research base for task-based language teaching. In the final part of the paper, an agenda for future research is set out. Over the last 25 years, the communicative task has evolved as an important component within curriculum planning, implementation, and evaluation. In task-based language teaching, syllabus content and instructional processes are selected with reference to the communicative tasks which learners will (either actually or potentially) need to engage in outside the classroom and also with reference to theoretical and empirical insights into those social and psycholinguistic processes which facilitate language acquisition. This approach to language teaching is characterized by the following features; 1. An emphasis on learning to communicate through interaction in the target language 2. The introduction of authentic texts into the learning situation 3. The provision of opportunities for learners to focus, not only on language, but also on the learning process itself 4. An enhancement of the learner’s own personal experiences as important contributing elements to classroom learning 5. An attempt to link classroom language learning with language activation outside the classroom Task-based language teaching has been an important addition to the conceptual and empirical repertoire of the second and foreign language teacher in the eighties, having influenced syllabus design, materials development, and language teaching methodology In this paper, I shall review the development of task-based language teaching (TBLT) In the first part of the paper, I shall provide an account of the theoretical and empirical basis for TBLT. I shall then discuss the influence of TBLT on curriculum development and classroom practice. In the final part of the paper, I indicate the ways in which I believe that the research agenda should be extended in the nineties