Process-oriented syllabuses

The shift from the focus on the outcomes of instructions to the process
through which knowledge and skills might be gained
Process-oriented syllabuses
Aim:

At the end of this module, you should be

familiar with, and able to describe and
review critically, different proposals of syllabi
specified in terms of Process
Process- oriented syllabuses
Module content
1. Introduction
2. Procedural syllabuses
3. Task based syllabuses
4. Content syllabuses
5. The natural approach
6. Syllabus design and methodology
7. Grading tasks
Process-oriented syllabuses

1. Introduction
Tendency to separate product-oriented syllabus design issues from
process-oriented ones mostly by British school of applied linguistics –
focus tends to be either on process or on product, but not on both -
against Widdowson, Candlin, and Breen’s efforts to present a more
balanced view
However, understanding that planning, implementation, and evaluation
of curriculum should be seen as an integrated set of processes would
render unnecessary to think in terms of either product-oriented or
process-oriented approach
Context, environment, and purpose for which language is taught are
crucial factors in specifying both outcomes and process
Process-oriented syllabuses

1. Introduction (Cont.)
‘It is not that the structural syllabus denies the eventual
communicative purpose of learning but that it implies a
different means to its achievement. It is often suggested that
the designers of such syllabuses supposed that the language
was of its nature entirely reducible to the elements of formal
grammar and fail to recognise the reality of use. But this is a
misrepresentation. Such syllabuses were proposed as a means
towards achieving language performance through the skills of
listening, speaking, reading and writing…
Process-oriented syllabuses

1. Introduction (Cont.)
‘… That is to say, they were directed towards a communicative goal
and were intended, no less than the F/N syllabus as a preparation
for use. The difference lies in the conception of the means to this
end. Structural syllabuses are designed on the assumption that it is
the internalisation of grammar coupled with the exercise of
linguist skills in motor-perceptual manipulation (usage) which
affords he most effective preparation for the reality of
communicative encounters (use).’

(Widdowson 1987:68 in Nunan 1988)

2 Procedural syllabuses
Richards, Platt, and Weber (1985) describe both procedural and task
based syllabuses as
‘… a syllabus which is originated around tasks, rather than in terms of
grammar or vocabulary. For example, the syllabus may suggest a variety
of different kinds of tasks which the learners are expected to carry out
in the language, such as using the telephone to obtain information;
drawing maps based on oral instructions; performing actions based on
commands given in the target language; giving orders and instructions
to others, etc. It has been argued that this is a more effective way of
learning a language since it provides a purpose for the use and learning
other than simply learning language items for their own sake.

Richards, Platt, and Weber (1985: 289) in Nunan (1988:42)

2 Procedural syllabuses

2.1 Features
• Procedural syllabuses and Task based syllabuses bear
some differences, but are governed by similar
principles
• They are concerned with the classroom process which
stimulate learning
• The syllabus consists of specification of tasks and
activities that Ss will engage in
2 Procedural syllabuses

2. 2 ‘The Bangalore Project’ by N. S. Prabhu

• Five-year project: small number of elementary and
secondary English classes in India.

• Relevance: relevant for adult ESL programs like Literacy

Volunteers of America (LVA) because of its transition from
direct instruction to communicative competence through
"meaning making" in real contexts.
2. ‘The Bangalore Project’
2.3 Some important excerpts

‘Attempts to systematize inputs to the learner through a linguistically

organized syllabus, or to maximize the practice of particular parts of
language structure through activities deliberately planned for that
purpose were regarded as being unhelpful to the development of
grammatical competence and detrimental to the desired preoccupation
with meaning in the classroom … it was decided that teaching should
consequently be concerned with creating condition for coping with
meaning in the classroom, to the exclusion of any deliberate regulation
of the development of grammatical competence or a mere simulation
of language behaviour.’
(Prabhu 1987: 1 -2) in Nunan (1988:43)
2. ‘The Bangalore Project’

2.3 Some important excerpts (Cont.)

• ‘… the issue was thus one of the nature of grammatical knowledge to
be developed: if the desire form of knowledge was such that it could
operate subconsciously, it was best for it to develop subconsciously as
well.’ (op. cit.: 14-15)

• ‘… while the conscious mind is working out some of the meaning-

content, a subconscious part of the mind perceives, abstracts, or
acquires (or recreates, as a cognitive structure) some of the linguistic
structuring embodied in those entities, as a step in the development
of an internal system of rules. (op. cit.: 59 – 60)
2 Procedural syllabuses

2.4 Three task types - used in Bangalore Project

• information-gap activity: involves a transfer of given
information from one person to another – or from one form to
another, or from one place to another – generally calling for the
decoding or encoding of information from or into language.

• Reasoning-gap activity: involves deriving some new information

from given information through process of inference, deduction,
practical reasoning, or a perception of relationships or patterns.

• Opinion-gap activity: involves identifying and articulating a

personal preference, feeling, or attitude in response to a given
situation.
2 Procedural syllabuses
2. 5 Criticism
• Syllabus designer does not provide guidance on the
selection of problems and task, nor does he/she show
how these might relate to the learners’ real-world
language needs
• (in other words): syllabus designer gives premier focus
to learning process and they hardly, if at all, attempt
to relate learning processes to outcomes
3 Task-based syllabuses
Point of departure
Selection of tasks as a basic building block,
mostly justified for pedagogic and
psycholinguistic reasons
3 Task-based syllabuses
Two definitions of ‘Task’
(1) ‘… a piece of work undertaken for oneself or for others, freely or for
some reward. Thus, examples of tasks include painting a fence,
dressing a child, filling out a form, buying a pair of shoes, making
an airline reservation … in other words, by ‘task’ is meant the
hundred and one things people do in everyday life.’ (Long 1985:89
in Nunan 1988:45)
(2) ‘… an activity or action which is carried out as the result of
processing or understanding language (i.e. as a response). For
example, drawing a map while listening to an instruction and
performing a command … A task usually requires the teacher to
specify what will be regarded as successful completion of the task.’
(Richards, Platt, and Weber 1985: 289 in Nunan 1988:45)
3 Task-based syllabuses
3.1 Twenty criteria for judging the worth of ‘Task’
Candlin (1987) suggests that Good Tasks should:
1. Promote attention to meaning, purpose, negotiation
2. Encourage attention to relevant data
3. Draw objectives from the communicative needs of learners
4. Allow for flexible approaches to the task, offering different routes,
media, modes of participation, procedures
5. Allow for different solutions depending on the skills and strategies drawn
on by learners
6. Involve learner contributions, attitudes, and affects
7. Be challenging but not threatening, to promote risk-taking
8. Require input from all learners in terms of knowledge, skills,
participation
3 Task-based syllabuses
3.1 Twenty criteria for judging the worth of ‘Task’
(Cont.)

9. Define a problem to be worked through by learners, centred on the

learners but guided by the teacher
10. Involve language use in the solving of the task
11.Allow for co-evaluation by the learner and teacher of the task and of
the performance of the task
12. Develop the learners’ capacities to estimate consequences and
repercussion of the task in question
13. Provide opportunities for metacommunication and metacognition
(i.e. to talk about communication and to talk about learning)
14. Provides opportunities for language practice
15. Provide leaner-training for problem-sensing and problem-solving (i.e.
identifying and solving problems)
3 Task-based syllabuses
3.1 Twenty criteria for judging the worth of ‘Task’
(Cont.)

16. Provide sharing of information and expertise

17. Provide monitoring and feedback, of the learner and the task
18. Heighten learners’ consciousness of the process and encourage
reflection (i.e. to sensitize learners to the learning processes in
which they are participating)
19. Promote a critical awareness about data and the process of
language learning
20. Ensure cost-effectiveness and a high return on investment (i.e. the
effort to master given aspects of the language should be
functionally useful, either for communicating beyond the
classroom, or in terms of the cognitive and affective
development of the learner)
3 Task-based syllabuses
3.2 Doyle’s critical view
Doyle (1983:161 in Nunan 1988:46) suggests that a task needs to
specify the following:
1. The products students are to formulate
2. The operations that are required to generate the product
3. The resources available t the student to generate the product
3 Task-based syllabuses
3.3 Shavelson and Stern’s comprehensive view
Shavelson and Stern (1981 in Nunan 1988:47) suggest six elements
teachers need to consider in planning instructional tasks:
1. The subject matter to be taught
2. Materials, i.e. those things the learner will observe/ manipulate
3. The activities the teacher and learners will be carrying out
4. Th goals for the task
5. The abilities, needs and interest of the students
6. The social and cultural context of instruction
According to Nunan (1988:47), this is could form the basis for a
comprehensive curriculum model - it just needs a little rearrangement ,
and the addition of assessment and evaluation components
3 Task-based syllabuses
3.4 Long’s procedure for developing task-based
syllabus
According to Long (1985:91 in Nunan 1988:47), to enable Shavelson
and Stern’s data usable in classroom it is necessary to:
1. conduct a needs analysis to obtain an inventory of target tasks.
2. classify the target tasks into task types
3. from the task types, derive pedagogical tasks
4. select and sequence the pedagogical tasks to from a task syllabus

Nunan 1988:47: how to determine level of difficult to grade task, as

this may vary from student to student?
3 Task-based syllabuses
3. 5 Some factors for determining task difficulty
Applied linguists exploring communicative language teaching and task
syllabus identified a variety of factors, which include:
1. The degree of contextual support provided to the learner
2. The cognitive difficulty of the task
3. The amount of assistance provided to the learner,
4. The complexity of the language which the learner is required to
process and produce
5. The psychological stress involved in carrying out the task
6. The amount and type of background knowledge required
4. Content syllabuses
Nunan (1988:48)
Content syllabus differs from task-based syllabuses in that the
experiential content is usually derived from some fairly well-defined
subject area
The subject might be from other subjects in a school curriculum (e.g.:
science or social studies) or specialist subjects relating to an academic
or technical field (e.g.: mechanical engineering, medicine, or
computing)
4. Content syllabuses
4.1 Some advantages of selecting content from
other subjects
• The syllabus is given a logic and coherence –
analytic syllabuses are little more than a random
collection of task.
• The logic of the subject may provide a non-
linguistic rationale for selecting and grading
content
4. Content syllabuses
4.2 Australia’s experience
• Content oriented: typical of much of the teaching in adult ESL classes
• Skills and knowledge = point of departure – syllabus designers and
teachers feel this is important for new arrivals
• Units of work: labelled ‘health’, ‘education’, and social services’.
• Relevance: though seemingly obvious, many students find content-
oriented courses confusing. They feel such courses have strayed them
into settlement rather than language programme
• How to overcome: important for teachers to negotiate with the
learners and demonstrate the relationship between language and
content
4. Content syllabuses
4.3 Mohan (1986) view
• Content-bases syllabuses facilitate learning not merely through
language but with language

“We cannot achieve this goal if we assume that language learning ad

subject-matter learning are totally separate and unrelated operations.
Yet language and subject matter are still standardly considered in
isolation from each other.”
(Mohan 1986:iii in Nunan 1988:49)
4. Content syllabuses
4.4 Mohan’s knowledge framework for organising knowledge
and learning activities

• Knowledge framework: consists of a specific, practical

side and a general, theoretical side
• Specific side: description, sequence, and choice
• General side: classification, principles, and evaluation
• Any topic can be exploited in terms of the six
categories
• Knowledge structure of a topic is revealed through
some types of questions.
4. Content syllabuses
4.5 Types of questions for knowledge structure of a topic
(A)Specific practical aspects (particular examples, specific cases within the topic)
1. Description who, what, where? What persons, materials,
equipment, items , settings?
2. Sequence what happens? What happens next? What is the
plot? What are the processes, procedures, or routines?
3. Choice what are the choices, conflicts, alternatives,
dilemmas, decisions?
4. Content syllabuses
4.5 Types of questions for knowledge structure of a topic
(Cont.)
(B) General theoretical aspects (what are the general aspects, principles, and values in
the topic material?)
1. Classification What concepts apply? How are they related to each
other?
2. Principles What principles are there? (cause-effect, means-end,
methods and techniques, rules, norms, strategies?)
3. Evaluation What values and standards are appropriate? What
counts as good or bad?

(Adapted from Mohan 1986: 36-7 in Nunan 1988:50)

4. Content syllabuses
4.6 The knowledge framework in classroom
• How is reflected: through activities called ‘combinations of action and
theoretical understanding’, and which are realised through action
situations.
• Any action situation contains the elements listed in the knowledge
framework: description, sequence, choice, classification, principles,
and evaluation.
• The action situations can be presented to learners through the
familiar pedagogical tools of pictures sequences and dialogues.
4. Content syllabuses
4.5 Criticising content-oriented syllabuses
• Perry 1987:141 (in Nunan 1988:51-2) questions the two basic
assumptions.
Assumption 1: the knowledge structures … are the relevant structures
Criticism: What evidence is there that there are three, and only three
relevant practical knowledge structures?

Assumption 2: moving from the practical to the theoretical is the

direction most desirable for teaching and learning.
Criticism: is this direction best for all learners, or do some learn better
when they begin from a theoretical base? The level of maturity of the
learner, individual learning strategies and previous learning experience
may play important roles in optimal sequencing.
5 The Natural Approach
• Natural Approach: most comprehensively described by Krashen and
Terrel (1983)
• Principles: based on empirical research and summarises as:
1. The goal of the Natural Approach is communication skills
2. Comprehension precedes production
3. Production emerges (i.e. learners are not forced to respond)
4. Activities which promote subconscious acquisition rather than
conscious learning are central.
5. The affective filter is lowered
(After Krashen and Terrel 1983:58 in Nunan:51)
5 The Natural Approach
5. 1 Krashen and Terrel typology
The most learning goals can be divided into one of two categories,
which can be subdivided into oral and written modes:
1. Basic personal communication skills
2. Academic learning skills
‘The approach is designed to develop basic personal communication
skills – both oral and written. It was not developed specifically to teach
academic learning skill, although it appears reasonable to assume that
a good basis in the former will lead to greater success in the latter.’
(Krashen and Terrel 1983:67 in Nunan 1988:52)
5 The Natural Approach
5. 2 Criticising the Natural Approach
Nunan (1988:52) highlights two important weaknesses of the
assumptions on which the Approach bases:
1. The the assumption that language consists of a single underlying
psychological skills, and that developing the ability, say, to
understand the radio will assist the learner to comprehend
academic lectures.
2. The assumption that learning takes place in a social vacuum, and
that social aspects of the learning environment (in particular, the
classroom) are irrelevant to what and how learners learn.
5 The Natural Approach
5. 2 Criticising the Natural Approach (Cont.)
Breen 1985:149 suggests that:
‘How things are done and why they are done have particular
psychological significance for the individual and for the group.
The particular culture of a language class will socially act in
certain ways, but these actions are extensions or
manifestations of the psychology of the group… What is
significant for learners (and teacher( in a classroom is not only
their individual thinking and behaviour, nor, for instance, their
longer-term mastery of a syllabus, but the day-to-day
interpersonal rationalisation of what is to be done, why, and
how.’
(in Nunan 1988:52)
6. Syllabus design and methodology
• Syllabus is
“… specification of teaching programme or pedagogic
agenda which defines a particular subject for a
particular group of leaners. Such a specification
provides not only a characterization of content, the
formalization in pedagogic terms of an area of
knowledge or behaviour, but also arranges this content
as a succession of interim objectives.”
(Widdowson 1987:65, in Nunan 1988:52-3)
6. Syllabus design and methodology
6. 1 Widdowson criticism to structural and
functional-notional syllabuses
• Structural and functional-notional syllabuses exhaust the possibilities
for the syllabus designer. Both types assume certain methodological
practices.
• Structural syllabus: tends to promote activities which serve to
internalize the formal properties of language. The weakness is that
learners may not be able to use their linguistic knowledge in actual
communication;
• Functional-notional syllabus: tends to promote activities which
attempt to replicate in class ‘real’ communication. Classroom
activities become a ‘dress rehearsal’ for real-life encounters.
6. Syllabus design and methodology
6. 2 Widdowson’s methodological solution to ‘dress
rehearsal’ methodology
According to Widdowson, the methodology
“… would engage the learners in problem-solving tasks as
purposeful activities but without the rehearsal requirement
that they would be realistic or ‘authentic’ as natural social
behaviour. The process of solving such problems would
involve a conscious and repeated reference to the formal
properties of the language, not in the abstract dissociated
from use but as a necessary resource for the achievement of
communicative outcome.”
(Widdowson 1985:71-2 in Nunan 1988:5)
6. Syllabus design and methodology
6. 2 Widdowson’s view Vs Breen’s view
While Widdowson views process considerations as belonging to
methodology, Breen says that process considerations (i.e. the means rather
than the ends) can properly be considered the province of syllabus design.

“An alternative orientation would prioritise the route itself: a focusing upon
the means towards the learning of a new language. Here the designer would
give priority to the changing process on learning and potential of the
classroom – to the psychological and social resources applied to a new
language by learners in the classroom context. One result of this change of
focus would be that the syllabus could become a plan for the gradual
creation of the real syllabus of the classroom, jointly and explicitly
undertaken by teacher and learners. Such a plan would about designing a
syllabus and, therefore, a guide and servant for the map-making capacities of
its uses. Primarily it would be a plan for the activity of learning within the
classroom group.”
(Breen 1984:532 in Nunan 1988:54)
7 Grading tasks
• Standard texts on language teaching: tend to categorize activities
according to the demand these make on learners.
• Generally: receptive skills make fewer demands than productive sills
• Communicative language teaching focuses on meaning and uses more
authentic materials, which contain a range of linguistic structures,
therefore grammatical criteria alone can not be used a yardstick of
difficulty.
• Nunan 1985: typology of activity types in which difficulty is
determined by the cognitive and performance demands made upon
the learner. It exploits traditional comprehension/ production
distinction and adds an interaction element
7 Grading tasks

7. 1 Typology of activity types

No response Non-verbal
Processing Physical
Response Verbal
Non-physical
Repetition
Material Productive Drill
Source Response
Meaningful practice

Rehearsal
Simulated
Interactive Role play

Discussion
Real
Problem-solving
Figure 1: Activity type categorised according to learner responses (Nunan 1985, in Nunan 1988:55)
7 Grading tasks

7. 1 Typology of activity types (Cont.)

Based on the typology, it is possible to take a given text or piece of
source material such dialogue, a map or chart, a radio weather report,
a newspaper article, etc. and exploit it by devising activities at different
levels of difficulty.
At a basic level, with an aural text, learners might be required to
respond non-verbally bay raising their hand every time a given key
word is heard.
With much more advanced learners, using the same text, learners
might engage in a discussion and answer in small groups a set of
questions requiring inferences to be derived from the text.
7 Grading tasks

7. 2 Determining level of difficulty

• With ESP and content-based syllabuses grading is with reference to
the concepts associated with the subject. However, whether such
conceptual grading is appropriate for second language learner is a
matter to consider taking into account the subjects being used as the
source of the experiential content. In fact, it will also depend on the
extent to which the learner is familiar with the subject.
• In Mohan’s knowledge framework, task difficulty is determined by
cognitive complexity. On the specific side, tasks would be graded
simpler to more complex in the following order: tasks involving
descriptions – sequence – choice. On the theoretical side they would
vary from classification to identification of principles and then
evaluation.
7 Grading tasks

7. 2 Determining level of difficulty (Cont.)

• Brown and Yule (1983): listening tasks can be graded with reference
to speaker, intended listener, and content.
1. Speaker: Listening to one speaker is simpler than listening to two,
and listening to two is simpler than listening to three, and so forth.
2. Intended listener: particularly ‘authentic’ text which are not
addressed to the listener may be boring to the learner and
therefore difficult to process
3. Content: Brown and Yule confess that surprisingly little is known
about what constitute ‘difficult’ content. According to Nunan
(1984), there is an interaction between linguistic difficulty of a text
and the amount of background knowledge which the listener or
reader is able to exploit in comprehending the text
7 Grading tasks

7. 2 Determining level of difficulty (Cont.)

• Brown and Yule (1983): Speaking tasks
“Taking short turns is generally easier than long terns. Talking to a
familiar, sympathetic individual is less demanding than talking to an
unfamiliar, uninvolved individual or group. Something one knows about
and has well-organised in memory is naturally easier to talk about than
anew topic or experience which has little internal organisation in itself.”
(Brown and Yule 1983:107 in Nunan 1988:58)
Text type: straight descriptions will be easier than instructions, which
will be easier than storytelling. Providing and justifying opinions will e
the most difficult. Also, within each genre, the number of elements,
properties, relationships, and characters will have an effect on
difficulty.
7 Grading tasks

7. 2 Determining level of difficulty (Cont.)

figure 2: Factors determining difficult of listening texts (Brown and Yule 1983:107 in Nunan 1988:59

description description/ storytelling opinion –

instruction expressing

More many elements, properties, relationships, characters or

difficult which may be difficult to distinguish from each other

Less few elements, properties, relationships, characters or

difficult factors which are a=easily distinguished one from the next
7 Grading tasks

7. 2 Determining level of difficulty (Cont.)

Candlin (1987): Factors likely to be significant in determining difficulty

1. Cognitive load (the complexityy of the mental operation to be

carried out; task which require learners to follow a clear
chronological sequence will be easier than a task in which there is
no such clear development)
2. Communicative stress (the stress caused by the context, which will
be determined by such things as the learner’s knowledge of the
subject at hand and relationship with the other individuals taking
part in the interaction)
3. Particularity and generalizability (the extent to which the tasks
follow a universal or stereotyped pattern)
7 Grading tasks
7. 2 Determining level of difficulty (Cont.)
Candlin (1987): Factors likely to be significant in determining difficulty

4. Code complexity and interpretative density (the complexity

of the language particularly in terms of the sorts of processing
constraints describes by SLA researchers and the extent t
which the learners are required to interpret what they hear or
read)
5. Content continuity (the extent to which the content relates
to the real-world interest or needs of the learners)
6. Process continuity (the coherence, continuity, and
interrelatedness of tasks)
7 Grading tasks
7. 2 Determining level of difficulty (Cont.)
Long (1987): suggests kinds of tasks determining difficulty

According to Long,
1. tasks requiring a one way transfer of information should precede
those requiring a two-way exchange
2. convergent tasks should precede divergent ones
3. task in the ‘here and how’ should precede ones involving displaced
time and space
4. intellectual content
7 Grading tasks
7. 2 Determining level of difficulty (Cont.)
Anderson and Lynch (1988): factors which influence difficulty

According to Nunan (1988:60), Anderson and Lynch suggest the most

comprehensive range of factors which influence listening tasks as
follow:
1. The sequence in which the information is presented
2. The familiarity of the listener with the topic
3. The explicitness of the information contained in the text
4. The type of input
5. The type and scope of the task to be carried out
6. The amount of support provide to the listener
Conclusion
• We have looked at proposals which focus on processes
rather than the product of such processes;
• This does not mean that process syllabuses do not include
the specification of what should the learner be able to do as
a result of instruction;
• If and when grammatical, functional, and notional elements
are considered, this happens as a second-order activity.
• With the adoption of procedural, task-based, content-based,
and other non-linguistic approaches to syllabus design, the
distinction between syllabus design and methodology
becomes blurred .