Analytic syllabus design, internal syllabus, FonF
1. Five components of task that can be evaluated by the learner: 1. its objectives; 2.
content; 3. procedure; 4. learner's contribution to the task; 5. the role of the classroom
situation in relation to the task. (197).
1. Task evaluation should be part of teaching and learning work in the language class as a
reflexive means for revealing individual learning processes and, thereby, facilitating them
in more informed intervention. Therefore the task evaluation cycle can be seen as a
positive and highly relevant language learning activity in itself. (193)
1. Means criteria to evaluate a task: i) the extent to which it addresses learner definition
of progress; ii) the extent to which it is developmental towards the demands of the target
language and its use; iii) the extent to which it is open to diversity and change in learner
knowledge and capability. (192).
1. The validity of any task has to be discovered during its use. (203).
1. The direct learner involvement in choices and decisiosns concernign their purposes and
needs in the language, about the content to be worked on, and about working procedures
in tasks require learners to make judgements about the new language and relate it - as
they see it - to their own language. The new language and its use are things about which
decisions have to be made as an essential par of the evaluation cycle itself. The language
therefore becomes something which has to be planned for and directly related to learning
rather than something merely received. (203).
1. A languag learning task can be regarded as a springboard for learning work. In a broad
sense, it is a structured plan for the provision of opportunities for the refinement of
knowledge and capabilities entailed in a new language and its use during communication.
Such a workplan will have its own particular objectives, appropriate content to be worked
upon, and a working procedure. <...> A simple brief practice exercise is a task, and so
also are more complex and comprehensive workplans which require spontaneous
communication of meaning or the solving of problems in learning and communicating.
(187).
1. Learning outcomes from any task have to be seen as a function of the interaction
between features of our workplan, variables in learner contributions to the task, aspects of
the actual situation in which the task is undertaken, and variation in learners' perceptions
of each of these three things. (188).
1. Any task-in-process may generate a range of diverse changes in knowledge and
capability, and evaluation of outcomes related only to the criteria of workplan objectives
can actually hide more than it will reveal. The achievement of those 'successful' outcomes
predicted by workplan may not necessarily be caused by any other variables not included
in the plan. If we assume that our task somehow caused the successful outcomes we
sought, we may be led to the deception that any 'failures' which also emerged can be
primarily attributed to learners or situational conditions. (189).
1. Workplans or tasks conceived, designed, and produced by designers and prepared by
instructors can only provide opportunities for change in knowledge and capabilities and
for successful and unsuccessful outcomes in relatively unpredictable and broad measure.
(189).
1. Focus on learning outcomes alone can provide a check on task validity and offer
information which may be formative in terms of subsequent refinement of the task or the
development of new tasks. But the inevitable diversity of actual task outcomes and the
opacity of the true origins of these outcomes will render our evaluation partial and
possibly misleading. (189).
1. It explores task validity in terms of how it is actually realized and the routes it actually
provides for learning work towards various learning outcomes. (190).
2. Even the 4 concepts underping any language curriculum or major assumptions, even
though very implicit at more detailed level, must be clearly articulated: societal purpose
for language training (context and mandate), language, learning and teaching principles.
By clearly defining those 4 concepts, the operations can be more professional and
effective in research, instructional, or evaluational endeavors. (211).
2. Language teaching policy is better to the extent that it identifies as clearly as possible
both its objectives and the content of teaching, and justifies its priorities on rational
grounds, that is, why it emphasizes why or the other content area or this or that objective
to a greater or lesser extent. Examples of objectives reflecting policy making level:
Proficiency, Knowledge, Affect, Transfer (212).
2. Greater diversity of objectives is possible and should be envisaged. (215).
2. Teaching strategies (crosslingual - interlingual, crosscultural - intracultural, analytical non analytical, language - message centered, formal - functional, participatory,
experiential, implicit, non-cognitive, intuitive, automatic, etc. (217).
3. The aim of facilitating student progress makes continual evaluation an indispensable
part of language programs. (262)
4. The evaluation of a project should in most - if not all -cases proceed on the basis of
specified criteria by which the success or effectiveness of the project can be judged.
Evaluation necessarily entails making judgements about past and / or future actions and
this implies the existance of criteria or expectations against which such judgements are
made. The failure to spell out criteria at the outset can lead to disagreements at a later
stage about what constitutes 'success'. (39).