Communicative syllabus design

Patricia A. Porter

Introduction: Definitions and framework

In designing second language teaching programs that aim to promote
communicative competence, educators usually approach the task
in one of two ways (Long 1984; Richards 1984; Stern 1981): one
route is through the syllabus, the way the content of language teaching
is selected and organized; the other is through theories of learning
and pedagogical procedures. Because the syllabus is an important
starting place for program development, an understanding of how
syllabus designs have changed and multiplied over the past twenty
years aids in our awareness of the variety of program options in com-
municative language teaching today.
First, a clarification of terms is in order, beginning with "com-
municative". Communicative language teaching is generally identified
as an outgrowth of sociolinguistics and its emphasis on the way lan-
guage is used in socially appropriate ways. Although Richards and
Rodgers (1986) link the roots of communicative language teaching
specifically to the notional-functional approach developed in Europe
in the 1970s, the scope of communicative language teaching is quite
broad today. (See the chapters in this volume by Fathman and
McGroarty.) In terms of this discussion of communicative syllabus
design, Howatt's distinction between the strong and weak versions
of communicative language teaching further clarify "communicative":
the weak version generally entails "learning to use" English, with
learners being provided with language samples and then given oppor-
tunities to use this language for communicative purposes; the strong
version involves "using English to learn it", with learners beginning
with communication and then developing the necessary language
to succeed (Howatt 1984:279). This distinction is important in that
it helps us differentiate among the current types of syllabus design
which will shortly be described.
The term syllabus itself has come into use relatively recently in
North America. As Stern has pointed out (1984), the terms more

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130 Patricia A. Porter

widely used here have been "course of study", "curriculum", and

"program". However, most second language educators now use the
term "curriculum" as something broader than syllabus. For example,
Stern defines curriculum as referring "not only to subject matter
or content, but also to the entire instructional process including
materials, equipment, examinations and the training of teachers, in
short all pedagogical measures related to schooling or the substance
of a course of study" (1983:394). Allen draws a similar distinction,
viewing curriculum as a consideration of "the whole complex of
philosophical, social and administrative factors which contribute to
the planning of an educational programme", while syllabus refers
to "that subpart of curriculum which is concerned with a specification
of what units will be taught..." (1984:61).
This definition of syllabus as units to be taught is consistent with
Richards and Rodgers' definition of syllabus as "the selection of
language items that are to be used within a course or method", with
these items including both the subject matter (what to talk about)
and the linguistic matter (how to talk about it) (1986:20-21). In
their view, syllabus is part of design, one of the three major com-
ponents of methodology, the others being approach (the theories
about the nature of language and language learning that serve as sources
of practices and principles in language teaching), and procedure (the
actual techniques, practices, and behaviors that are observable in the
classroom). Besides the syllabus, the other features of design are the
objectives of instruction, the learning and teaching activities, and
the roles of learners, teachers, and instructional materials. What
differentiates methods from each other at the syllabus level, according
to Richards and Rodgers, is what is chosen as the relevant subject
matter and language to be presented and what principles are used in the
sequencing of that content. For example, an ESP course or a junior
high school "sheltered English" mathematics course would be more
subject matter focused than linguistically focused, while a structurally
based method such as the Audiolingual Method would be more lin-
guistically focused.
Most language teaching professionals have definitions of syllabus
consistent with this one. For example, Wilkins defines syllabuses as
"specifications of the content of language teaching which have been
submitted to some degree of structuring or ordering with the aim
of making teaching and learning a more effective process" (1981:
83). Johnson offers this definition: "A syllabus is in general terms

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 Communicative syllabus design 131

a list of items we wish to teach" (1981:2). McKay (1980) also em-

phasizes that the syllabus focuses on what is to be learned and in
what order; however, she sees method as separate from syllabus and
focusing on how a language is learned, rather than viewing method
as an overarching construct as do Richards and Rodgers.
While some definitions imply that syllabus content is a list of lin-
guistic units, others are less specific about the meaning of "content".
A further complication with syllabus definition is that, as pointed
out by Stern (1984), the term syllabus varies from a narrow conception
in which methodology is expressly eliminated (e.g., McKay 1980;
Widdowson 1984) to a much broader use in which syllabus encom-
passes content, objectives, learning experiences, and evaluation pro-
cedures — design and procedure, in Richards and Rodgers' view (e.g.,
Candlin 1984). As used here, syllabus will be defined in the narrower
sense, that is, of content, sequence, and rationale only.
As a framework for communicative syllabus design, I propose an
initial division into those types which are based on language content
and those which are based on something other than language content.
(See Figure 1.) Within the language content types, I follow Richards
and Rodgers' distinction between linguistic-based syllabuses and subject
matter syllabuses, where content is topical, rather than based on some
linguistic units of analysis. The three types of linguistic-based syllabuses
are structural, notional/functional, and "combination" syllabuses.
The two major types of non-language-based syllabuses are process
syllabuses and task-based syllabuses. This overall distinction into two
types is consistent with Breen's recent division of syllabuses between
propositional plans as opposed to process plans (1987). This figure
and the following discussion further parallels the historical develop-
ment of syllabus types, with the language-based on the left being the
older and the non-language-based the more recent developments.
Just how these types are related to the weak and the strong view of
communicative language teaching and how they mesh with Richards
and Rodgers' distinction between the a priori syllabus and the a
posteriori syllabus will be considered in the following description
and discussion of these various syllabus types.

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132 Patricia A. Porter

Syllabus types

Language based Non-language based

Linguistically based Subject-matter based

Structural Notional/functional Combination Content based Process Task based

Figure 1. Language-based and non-language-based syllabus types

Language-based syllabuses
The two types of language-based syllabuses are those that are based
on analysis of language as linguistic units (e.g., the structural, the
notional/functional, or a "combination" of these) and those that are
based on content or subject matter. Both types are a priori syllabuses,
in Richards and Rodgers' distinction (1982), because units of language
are preselected and ordered as a basis for what is given to the students.
For the most part, the first type, those based on linguistic units, tend
to be more closely associated with the weak version of communi-
cative language teaching: students are given the "units" to be practiced
and then are put in some communicative situation to use and mani-
pulate those units. The content-based syllabus tends to be more closely
linked to the strong version of communicative language teaching:
students immediately perceive language as meaningful; the focus
is on the content and not on the units.

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 Communicative syllabus design 133

Linguistic-based syllabuses
Structural syllabus
The structural or grammatical syllabus is the one perhaps most familiar
to practitioners in the field today, and a number of articles have des-
cribed and critiqued it (e.g., Byrd 1983; McKay 1980; Swan 1981;
Valdman 1980; Widdowson & Brumfit 1981; Wilkins 1972). With
roots in the analysis of classical languages, the structural syllabuses
in use since the end of World War II were largely influenced by the
descriptive analysis of structural linguists such as Fries (1945) and
Lado (1964), and thus represented a view of language as a formal
collection of subsystems of phonology, morphology, syntax, and lexis.
The structural syllabus is typically a listing of grammatical patterns
or features, often with related appropriate vocabulary. For example,
Book 1 of Side by Side (Molinsky & Bliss 1989) lists linguistic units
such as these, with each lesson featuring one or more units: to be,
to be + location, the present continuous tense, possessive adjectives,
possessive nouns, yes/no questions and short answers, there is/there
are, singular/plural. The sequencing of the structures is typically based
on such criteria as simplicity, regularity, frequency, and contrastive
difficulty. Language teaching materials based on the structural syllabus
are still used widely today (e.g., Molinsky & Bliss 1989; O'Neill, Anger
&Davy 1981;Yorkey«?fa/. 1984).
The continued popularity of the structural syllabus is based on its
economy, according to Widdowson and Brumfit (1981): a limited
set of rules can lead to a very large amount of operational skill. In
addition, a structural syllabus has the practical advantage that linguists
and teachers are familiar with it, and there is a great deal of information
available, including textbooks and linguistic research on errors.
A relatively recent conception of how the syntactic system of
the language can fit into the syllabus is described by Brumfit (1983).
He takes a broader view of syllabus design than that of simply content
and sequence, stating that the syllabus must specify a starting point
and the ultimate goals of instruction as well as the sequence of events
for arriving at those goals; additionally, the criteria for sequencing
are to be based on a theory of language acquisition, as well as on
administrative needs or other variables of the educational setting.
He suggests a syllabus with two components: what can be systematized
serves as the basis for syllabus development and what cannot be
systematized serves as a spiral around this core (1980). For the core,

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134 Patricia A. Porter

he suggests the syntactic system of the language in that it is generative

and therefore economical.

Notional/functional syllabus
A second type of language-based syllabus which is based on linguistic
units, here termed the "notional/functional", is equally familiar.
The relevant analysis of language with this syllabus is semantic, rather
than structural, based on the emerging sociolinguistic view in the
early 1970s that language is in fact a means of communication. The
focus shifted from the formal nature of language to the way this
language system is used in socially appropriate ways in differing situa-
tions, and from a concern with linguistic competence to a concern
with communicative competence (e.g., Hymes 1972), that is, a con-
cern for what learners need to be able to do with language (e.g., ask
for directions, give opinions, write memoranda).
The notional/functional syllabus has its basis in the work of Wilkins
(1972, 1976) and Van Ek and Alexander (1980a, 1980b) for the
Council of Europe in developing a syllabus for adult foreign/second
language education. In its original conception, the syllabus has two
notional categories: 1) semantical-grammatical categories (time,
quantity, space, matter, case, deixis) and 2) communicative functions
(modality, moral evaluation, suasion, argument, rational enquiry
and exposition, personal emotions, emotional relations, and inter-
personal relations) (Wilkins 1972). Each of the functional categories
has specific utterance functions: for example, "suasion" includes
persuading, suggesting, advising, recommending, begging, and urging;
"personal emotions" includes expressing pleasure, expressing hope,
expressing displeasure, expressing dissatisfaction.
One well-known textbook based on a notional/functional syllabus
lists items such as the following as the chapters around which lessons
are based: asking for information (question techniques, answering
techniques, getting more information); getting people to do things
(requesting, attracting attention, agreeing and refusing); talking about
past events (remembering, describing experiences, imagining) (Jones
& von Baeyer 1983). Examples of current materials based solely on
a notional/functional syllabus are Strategies (Abbs & Freebairn 1975),
Functions of English (Jones 1978), Functions of American English
(Jones & von Baeyer 1983), and Speaking Naturally (Tillitt & Bruder
1985).

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 Communicative syllabus design 135

One common concern that teachers often express about the no-
tional/funcational syllabus is that learners will not be able to see
the general patterns of the language. Canale and Swain, who favor
a communicative syllabus which is functionally based, insist that such
a syllabus need not be grammatically disorganized, and suggest that
grammar items can be selected on these criteria: their complexity,
their generalizability and transparency with respect to functions,
their role in facilitating acquisition of another form, their acceptability
in terms of perceptual strategies, and their degree of markedness in
terms of social and geographical dialects (1980:21-22). They favor
the functional syllabus at all levels because it has face validity for
students (and teachers) and thus improves motivation; furthermore,
they feel it provides for a more natural integration of knowledge
of the second language culture, the second language, and of knowledge
of language in general.
Most educators are quick to point out the difficulty of selection
and sequencing with a notional/functional syllabus (e.g., McKay 1980;
Johnson 1982): it is impossible to teach all the notions and all the
functions of the language in the same way that one can teach all the
structures. The solution has been to approach selection from the
standpoint of learner needs and to examine the situations in which
learners will use the language, to see what settings, roles, and topics
are attached to them, and then to identify important notions and
functions and corresponding language forms that are associated with
them (e.g., Munby 1978). As Johnson points out, however, though
this works well for clearly specified groups of learners, it is not
apparent how to proceed in the case of an audience learning the lan-
guage for general purposes (Johnson 1981:7). The Council of Europe
writers solved this problem by developing a common core of notions
and functions felt to be relevant to all learners and by setting up
a system under which learners could study common core units as
well as specialized ones according to their needs (van Ek & Alexander
1980a, 1980b).

Combination syllabuses
A third type of language-based syllabus is what I have labeled a "com-
bination" syllabus, which incorporates at least some elements of
a structural syllabus and/or some of a notional/functional and/or some
other element beyond this. Textbooks based on such combinations

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136 Patricia A. Porter

of elements became very popular in the United States in the early

1980s, with publishers aiming to please those who were reluctant
to give up the structural syllabus because of its economy and/or
familiarity, yet wanted to teach more "communicatively" by including
functional material. I have opted to place the functional, competency-
based syllabus in this category, along with Allen's syllabus incor-
porating an experiential component and Yalden's proportional syllabus.
Each of these will be briefly described.
The functional competency-based syllabus has been used for adult
immigrant training in the U.S. and in refugee camps abroad since the
early 1980s. The extent of its current use in the U.S. is made clear
by Auerbach: "By the end of 1986, any refugee who wishes to receive
federal assistance will be required to be enrolled in competency-based
program" (1986:412). Although there is great variety among such
syllabuses, since the terms "functional" and "competency-based"
are defined in various ways, the common feature of such syllabuses
is their emphasis on observable behaviors (competencies) that are
necessary for living in society, such as filling out forms and writing
checks (thus the term "life skills" for these competencies). As defined
by Grognet and Crandall (1982:3),
A competency based curriculum is a performance-outline of language tasks
that lead to a demonstrated mastery of the language associated with specific
skills that are necessary for individuals to function proficiently in the society
in which they live.

As developed for ESL programs, the syllabus is designed to teach

language as a function of communication about concrete tasks: the
focus is on just those language forms and skills required by specific
situations in which the learners will function. Additionally, emphasis
is on overt behaviors rather than on knowledge or the ability to talk
about language and skills (Auerbach 1986). For example, the table
of contents for Basic English for Adult Competency (Keltner, Howard,
& Lee 1983) indicates that "the students will show orally, in writing,
or through demonstration that they are able to use the language needed
to function in the following situations", and among the situations
listed are "time: tell time by the hour and half hour; identify periods
of time in days, months, and years". Moreover, the table of contents
lists the "basic structures" that are to be learned to perform these
behaviors, for example, imperative, be (present), be + adjective, subject
pronouns, possessive adjectives, and "wh" questions (what, where,

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 Communicative syllabus design 137

how, how old, how many). Competency texts generally include either
language functions or language forms or sometimes both as a part
of the content, thus their classification as combination syllabuses.
This syllabus type has been the target of a great deal of criticism,
a major criticism being the degree to which the content promotes
the socialization of immigrants for specific roles, i.e., limited working
class roles, in the existing socioeconomic order (Auerbach 1986:411).
For example, students are taught skills such as reading directions or
following orders in a job, but may not be taught skills such as changing
or questioning the nature of that job (Kozol 1980). Additionally,
critics argue that the performance-based, behavioral orientation of
competency-based materials precludes critical thinking and conflicts
with student-centered learning; also, the focus on mastery learning
may be incompatible with what we know about second language
acquisition (Auerbach 1986). Among other concerns expressed by
Tollefson is the basis on which competencies are chosen for inclusion
into the program: there is no way to determine what such competencies
are nor a way to choose among them (Tollefson 1986:652; see also
Auerbach and Burgess 1985).
Another example of a combination syllabus is the "variable focus
model" developed by Allen (1984) for use in subject-related ESL
modules for high school students. Here, the combination is that of
structural, functional, and experiential elements, all centered around
a communicative setting (a topic, theme, or task). The experiential
component is fluency oriented, meaningful, and organized according
to the task or message (1984:69). The model is called variable focus
because the three areas can alternate, can be balanced, or can be
asymmetrically incorporated.
Such a variable focus is also possible in Yalden's "proportional"
or "balanced" syllabus (1983), but the elements here are a combina-
tion of structures and communicative functions, with the relative
amount of each — the proportion or the balance — changing over
the duration of the course of study. The framework which provides
support for these two components is the ideational layer of meaning:
here, topics, general notions, situations, and themes, which would
come out of a needs survey taken as part of the process of planning
the syllabus.
The proportional shift over the course of study works this way: at
the very beginning level, Yalden recommends a brief structural phase,
focusing on the formal and ideational layers of meaning only; here,

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138 Patricia A. Porter

learners get some basic knowledge of the systematic side of language,

since at this point they cannot be expected to solve communication
problems or engage in much interaction. Then throughout the major
part of the instructional process, there is a "balance" of the formal
component and the communicative function component, the latter
including functional, discourse, and rhetorical components. Over time
the proportion of time devoted to the formal component decreases
and that devoted to the functional component increases. Finally,
at the advanced level when communicative performance skills are
well established, the syllabus provides for a specialized phase in which
the focus might be on difficult formal features, especially in written
English. The model could then be extended to subject area learning.
Although at this point materials based on Yalden's and Allen's
ideas are not generally available in the marketplace (see Nunan 1988
for a description of a curriculum design related to Yalden's syllabus),
a large number of textbooks combining a structural and notional/
functional syllabus are. For example, the In Touch series (Castro,
Kimbrough, Lozano, & Sturtevant 1980) follows a "functional ap-
proach, giving priority to basic communicative needs so students
can immediately see the relevance and usefulness of the language they
are learning" (Students' Book 1, back cover), but it is clear that a
structural syllabus also underlies the materials. One series claims to
be the first course that integrates grammar, functions, and life skills
(Anger, Fuchs, Pavlik & Segal 1987) and many others have joined
the ranks by now.

Content-based syllabuses
A great deal of communicative language teaching in a diversity of
settings today is based on language not as linguists analyze it, as in
the previously described syllabus types, but as the academic and
technical world divides it up, i.e., into subjects and topics. Thus,
another major type of language-based syllabus is what I am calling
content based. In this type, subject matter content such as mathema-
tics, psychology, literature, or science, or a set of topics within such
content, is selected and sequenced as the basis of the syllabus. An
ESP course, for example, might be developed from a syllabus focused
solely on the content of the field, without regard to sequencing of
linguistic units, either structures or functions. One such example
is a text based on engineering content, Basic Engineering Communi-

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 Communicative syllabus design 139

cation Skills: An English Language Course for Technician Level En-

gineering Students, published by the Ministry of Education in Sri
Lanka (1985). The table of contents lists topics such as these: hydro-
projects — small scale: general background and hydrology, civil works,
turbines, electrical power, economics and running costs; hydro-projects
— large scale: at the power station, the urban consumer. The text
has no functional or grammatical component, even though there a
few very brief "language guidance" sections. For a comprehensive
review of ESP programs see Selinker, Tarone, and Hanzeli (1981)
and Hutchinson and Waters (1987).
Content-based syllabuses have been widely used in elementary
and secondary schools in immersion programs in Canada and in
bilingual and ESL programs in the U.S. (For thorough discussions,
see Cantoni-Harvey, part III, 1987; Genesee 1987; Mohan 1987.)
Immersion programs, such as those developed in Canada, could be
said to use content-based syllabuses in that the second language is
used to teach regular academic subjects. As Genesee (1987:15) points
out, immersion programs are designed to create the
same kinds of conditions that are thought to occur during first language ac-
quisition; namely, there is an emphasis on creating a desire in the students
to learn the language in order to engage in meaningful and interesting communi-
cation, and thus second language learning in immersion is often incidental
to learning about mathematics, the sciences, the community, and one another.

Although students in French immersion programs do have language

arts instruction, the teaching of grammar, when it does occur, is more
like instruction given to native speakers than like that to non-native
speakers.
Two quite recent approaches to syllabus design in elementary and
secondary schools that seem to be gaining popularity in the United
States are "sheltered English" and Chamot and O'Malley's Cognitive
Academic Language Learning Approach (CALLA). Sheltered English
involves content instruction in subjects such as mathematics, social
studies, science, and language arts, but with teacher talk and instruc-
tional tasks modified to allow for comprehensible language (Freeman
& Freeman 1988). Clearly, Krashen's view (1985) of the importance
of comprehensible input as the determining factor in second language
acquisition and Terrell's "Natural Approach" (1982) have influenced
this content-based design. Recent research into the importance of
learning strategies has influenced the CALLA design of Chamot and

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140 Patricia A. Porter

O'Malley (Rubin & Wenden 1987; Chamot & O'Malley 1987). Their
CALLA is designed for intermediate and advanced students with
limited English in upper elementary and secondary grades who are
being prepared to enter mainstream content-area instruction (1987).
Unlike immersion and sheltered English programs, CALLA is not
actually intended to teach the subject matter and thus be a substitute
for mainstream content-area instruction; it is designed to provide
English language development related to science, mathematics, and
social studies by using concepts drawn from these three content areas.
The three components of the CALLA model are: curriculum based on
mainstream content areas, English language development integrated
with content subjects, and instruction in the use of learning strategies
(Chamot & O'Malley 1987:231).
Content-based approaches have also been used recently at the post-
secondary level, especially in the teaching of academic writing. (For
a review and critique of five different approaches, see Shih 1986.)
Examples of some other applications of a content-centered syllabus
are: sheltered psychology classes offered to English and French
immersion students at the University of Ottawa (Wesche 1985);
learning French through a civilization course (Lafayette & Buscaglia
1985); a topic-centered course on American Indians at the University
of Turin (Cortese 1985); use of writing-across-the-curriculum texts
designed for native speakers, such as Behrens and Rosen (1985); an
"adjunct model" approach, in which students enroll in a regular
academic course such as history, psychology, or biology and simul-
taneously enroll in an ESL "adjunct" course in which they work on
literacy skills based on the content of the academic course (Snow
&Brinton 1985).

Non-language-based syllabuses
Syllabuses which take as the "what" of syllabus design something
other than structures, functions, a combination of such linguistic
units, or subject matter can be considered non-language based. These
are the process syllabus and the task-based syllabus. This is not to
say that language is not a part of these syllabuses; in any language
class there will be language content. The point is that the content
which is to be selected and sequenced and turned into a syllabus is
not the language itself. Like the content-based syllabus, these syllabus

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 Communicative syllabus design 141

types can be said to be consistent with the strong version of communi-

cative language teaching in that the starting point is meaning, rather
than form.
The process syllabus and the task-based syllabus represent the
most recent developments in the field of language teaching, motivated
by changing views of language, teaching methodology, and learner
contributions (Breen 1987). For example, our view of communicative
competence has now extended to include strategic competence (Canale
& Swain 1980); consequently, in Breen's view, "the underlying ability
to negotiate may be seen as the catalyst for the learning and refinement
of language knowledge itself" (1987:158). Additionally, the con-
tinued dissatisfaction with audiolingual methodology has led to much
interest in alternative methodologies (e.g., Stevick 1976; Blair 1982)
and new ways to implement syllabuses in the classroom (e.g., Yalden
1983). Third, learners are currently viewed as making their own con-
tributions to the learning process in terms of what they choose to
learn (e.g., Allwright 1984) and in terms of their learning strategies
and preferences (e.g., Rubin & Wenden 1987).

Process syllabuses
The process syllabus, a "learner-generated syllabus", as described by
Breen and Candlin in various articles (e.g., Breen 1984; Breen & Candlin
1980; Candlin 1984; Breen 1987) falls under Richards and Rodgers'
category of an a posteriori syllabus. These educators see the pre-
selection of items to be learned by the student as totally unfounded,
emphasizing that each student brings with him/her a definite expecta-
tion of what the learning process is all about: any material taken
into the classroom is interpreted and restructured by both the teacher
and the students. Breen and Candlin argue that rather than basing
a syllabus on a repertoire of the target language (whether structures,
functions, or communication events or situations), a syllabus should
be based on a repertoire of communication or on the capacity for
communication: the focus should be on "the skills and abilities which
learners initially bring to communication and which they have to
engage during communication" (Breen 1984:52), rather than on
systems of knowledge external to learners (i.e., target repertoires of
language). The what of syllabus design should not be language, but
should be learning a language.

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142 Patricia A. Porter

What does such a syllabus look like, then? Breen's answer is that
the syllabus consists of different levels of questions requiring class-
room decisions and an index of possible alternative procedures,
activities, and tasks which students are to choose by consensus. At
the top level are questions about how classroom language learning will
proceed, that is, questions about participation, procedure, and subject-
matter (students and teacher together decide who does what with
whom, on what content, with what resources, when, how, and why);
at the other levels are alternative procedures to be chosen from and
agreed upon, then alternative activities to be selected from, and finally
alternative tasks to be chosen within the activities. Evaluation of
the chosen tasks, activities, and procedure is continual. This framework
of questions and catalog of alternative procedures, activities, and tasks
may be predesigned; the actual process syllabus which is worked out
in the class is designed as the teaching and learning proceeds and
is in this sense an a posteriori syllabus.
In his arguments in favor of the process syllabus, Candlin points
out that such an interactive syllabus "suggests a model which is social
and problem solving in its orientation rather than one which transmits
preselected and often predigested knowledge" (1984:34). Candlin
also emphasizes the importance of this type of syllabus in curriculum
change, for by writing down as a syllabus an account of how learners
and teachers react to, make choices about, and work through materials,
we are able to see what is relevant and useful to the society of the
classroom and to the world outside.
In sum, a process syllabus is characterized by "a set of problem
solving tasks which have the purpose of creating conditions for value-
identification, meaning-negotiation, and comprehensible input by
the learner" (Candlin 1984:42-43). Such a task-based approach, in
his view, honors the evidence from second language acquisition research
(e.g., see Long 1984), it honors current views of the nature of language
(e.g., see Leech 1983), and it places control of syllabus development
in the hands of the learners, where it rightly belongs.

Task-based syllabuses
The task-based syllabus also features problem-solving tasks, but it is
quite different in other respects from Breen and Candlin's design.
The best known example of this type is the procedural syllabus de-
veloped by N.S. Prabhu for the Bangalore Project which has been·

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 Communicative syllabus design 143

described by Brumfit (1984b), by Johnson (1982), and by Prabhu

(1987). The project arose out of a dissatisfaction with the structural
syllabus widely used in South India and involved the development
of new materials as a way of getting at pedagogical innovation, rather
than changes in classroom organization, class size, or classroom
technology. Prabhu's thinking about syllabus design is similar to Breen
and Candlin's in that he feels that there is likely to be conflict between
the predetermined syllabus imposed on the learner and the way the
learner can use that syllabus. Also like Breen and Candlin, Prabhu
values the learner's natural interest in problem solving and pre-occupa-
tion with meaning.
At the basis of Prabhu's syllabus is the belief that form is best
learned when the learner's attention is focused on meaning; consequent-
ly, the materials developed for the Bangalore Project are a series of
problems, requiring the use of English, which have to be solved by
the learner (Brumfit 1984b; Johnson 1982; Prabhu 1987). Among
the problem-solving tasks are reading maps, interpreting railway time-
tables, solving simple mysteries, interpreting rules, following drawing
instructions, and comprehending dialogs (Brumfit 1984b; Johnson
1982; Prabhu 1987). The problems are not based on any overt lang-
uage syllabus or linguistic preselection; sequencing of the tasks is
"intuitive" and based on their conceptual difficulty, with similar
tasks being grouped together. The materials have no explicitly lang-
uage-focused activities: learning comes about, according to Prabhu,
as students have to interpret and use language data to solve the pro-
blems. (The name of the syllabus derives from the procedures students
follow in solving the problems.)
The procedural syllabus is similar to the process syllabus in that
there is no syntactic or semantic syllabus imposed on the learners
and thus teachers and students are free to interact in a way natural
to the task at hand and use language appropriate for the task at hand.
The designs are also similar in their task content. The major difference,
however, is in the area of negotiation and learner control: in Breen
and Candlin's design, the procedures, participant structures, activities,
and tasks are all open to negotiation. In Prabhu's design, there is
no negotiation whatsoever about which materials will be used or
about how they will be used.
Among the questions syllabus designers have raised about the pro-
cedural syllabus is whether or not it does in fact have a built-in lin-

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144 Patricia A. Porter

guistic syllabus. The syllabus includes sub-tasks or rehearsal tasks

which teachers introduce as preparation for the main tasks. According
to Prabhu, one of the aims of rehearsal is "to ensure that strategies
for tackling the task (as well as the language that will be needed for
the purpose) will, when needed, be available for recall and re-applica-
tion" (cited in Johnson 1982:141). Thus, in Johnson's view, whether
or not there is an overt or covert mapping out of language items
depends on just how much rehearsal or pre teaching is needed or
permitted.
Another conception of a task-based syllabus is provided by Long
(1985). In an attempt to formulate a second language teaching program
design which links methodology and syllabus, he suggests the task
as a meaningful and viable unit of analysis for identifying learners'
needs, defining syllabus content, organizing language acquisition
opportunities, and measuring student achievement. The syllabus comes
about in this way: a needs analysis is done to obtain an inventory of
target tasks which are necessary for an individual to function adequate-
ly in a particular target domain (e.g., occupational or academic).
These tasks are then classified into task types (for example, a target
task such as "selling something" might be classified into task types
such as "selling a train ticket" and "selling an airline ticket"). Then
from the task types, pedagogical tasks are derived, these specifying
the participants, context, and complexity of the task (for example:
travel agent and middle aged couple meet in travel agency; middle
aged couple immediately like the tour proposed by the agent). Certain
of these tasks are then selected and sequenced to form a task syllabus.
In Long's syllabus, selection would be made on the basis of ensuring
that pedagogical tasks adequately represent the task types; grading
would be based on the degree of difficulty of the tasks themselves —
in terms of the difficulty of accomplishing the task and not the com-
plexity of the linguistic demands of the task. Long's task-based syllabus
has models of language use accompanying performance of target
tasks that will be provided to learners. But the models serve as targets,
not pieces of language to be accurately replicated by the learners.
Like Prabhu's syllabus, the focus is on problem solving, and learner
success is measured by task accomplishment, not target-like linguistic
production. However, Long's tasks would be selected according to
learner need, whereas Prabhu's are not. Long has worked on designing
prototype task-based teaching materials and conducted some small-

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 Communicative syllabus design 145

scale studies of the use of pedagogic tasks and is positive about the
outcomes; however, he is hesitant at this point to advocate task-based
language teaching as the solution to the program design problem.

Conclusion
One of the things that this description of syllabus types shows is the
great diversity in points of view about what the content of a language
teaching program should be. Two cautions about the limitations of
this description are in order. First, the boundaries among types are
not as clear as I have represented them: a language-based syllabus may
include features of a non-language-based syllabus. For example, the
engineering ESP text previously cited as content based (Ministry
of Higher Education, Sri Lanka, 1985) includes a series of tasks such
as taking measurements, drawing graphs, and writing reports of experi-
ments. Another example is the CALLA model developed by Chamot
and O'Malley (1987), which is also content based but includes in-
struction in the use of learning strategies. Second, because of length
limitations, it has not been possible to discuss the complex interaction
of approach, procedures, and other elements of design as they in-
terrelate to syllabus. As is well known, no matter what the syllabus
and the teaching materials developed from the syllabus, what actually
goes on in the classroom is mediated by the teacher and the learner
and what gets learned in the classroom is not necessarily the same
as what teachers and course designers intend (e.g., Allwright 1982).
What do these syllabus types suggest about current views of com-
municative language teaching itself? The most recent developments
in syllabus design - content-based, process, and task-based syllabuses -
represent the strong version of communicative language teaching,
implying a primary focus on meaning, on communication. The process
and task-based prototypes, however, suggest that there is currently
an even "stronger" view of communicative language teaching, one
that includes a focus on the process of learning. For many years lan-
guage teachers and researchers have been talking about the contri-
butions of the learner to the language learning process, yet with
language-based syllabuses the learner focus has been primarily in the
area of needs analysis and content selection. In their critiques of lan-
guage-centered and skill-centered approaches to ESP design, Hutchinson
and Waters point out that in these approaches the learner is still viewed

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146 Patricia A. Porter

"as a user of language rather than as a learner of language" and that

the focus is on the processes of language use rather than processes of
language learning (1987:70). The syllabus of a truly innovative and
learner-centered approach must include attention to learning processes.
The question that remains is how such new syllabus designs can
be implemented in the face of the constraints of particular educational
settings and the expectations of learners and teachers strongly in-
fluenced by established educational practices. I would agree with
Clark (1985) that a true process syllabus assumes an unrealistically
high level of expertise of teachers and self-knowledge of learners.
Yet I would argue that the task-based syllabus with a learning com-
ponent as described by Breen (1987) is a pathway to educational
innovation: it can provide the source of security that teachers and
learners need in the form of a predetermined syllabus and materials.
But it can also provide attention to the learning process itself. Once
teachers and learners are familiar with the task-based design and
begin to feel more comfortable with a focus on learning processes,
then the switch to a true process-based syllabus with all its incumbent
alternatives, negotiation, and decision making can be implemented.

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