PLANNING LESSONS

The planning paradox

In lessons, there is a complex interactive system. Each classroom has
its own climate and dynamits, so teachers should be aware of them.
Preparing loose lesson plans are better than the linear ones, because
loose patterns eases the interaction while linear ones usually hinder
the learning.
The planning continuum
Most of the teachers plan their lesson before the class and they
create detailed plans. Some teachers go to the class without
planning, and this is not means that he or she is unprepared. They
plan and let the lesson to flow on its own nature. This may require
teachers to be equipped with their teaching style and experience.
Also some teachers follow the coursebook directly while others take
notes about the activities of the lesson.
Using plans in class
It would not be true to think that planning a lesson is done with
scripting or memorizing and etc. For teachers especially in training, it
is sensible to follow the plan and take notes, but it is important to be
capable of modifying the lesson when it is necessary.
There are MAGIC MOMENTS and it means that there are moments
that a topic produce interest by students, it is not predicted and it is
crucial to be aware of that moments. Sometimes students may start
to use some new grammar and vocabulary which we had not planned
to introduce, in such a case, we may wonder what to do next and we
can say SENSIBLE DIVERSION to this situation. Also, even if we plan
the lesson there may be UNFORESEEN PROBLEMS. For example an
activity may take more time than we expected.
Pre-planning and planning
This is a kind of stage that happens before the lesson which is
planned consciously or unconsciously by the teacher. In this pre-
planning stage, we collect ideas or materials.
Student needs
There are lots of ways to conduct what students need and want, we
can say need analysis for this situation. For example; discussing with
students, introducing the topics, asking their needs with feedback,
and ask questions in the lessons. All wants and needs may differ, the
point is to gather information to conduct the lesson
Making the plan
In pre-planning phase, we can benefit from some parameters. For
instance, we can analyze the syllabus and therefore we can conduct
different kinds of topics or activities in our minds.

Making the plan formal: background elements

The most important element is aim. Aim should be related to focus. It
is a kind of map that we indicate our destinations. The best classroom
aims are specific and directed, and they should be measured. We can
say specific, measurable, achievable, realistic and timed. All these are
necessary for an effective teaching.(SMART)
The other element is Class profile. Age, gender, occupations, class
time and etc. It is important to analyze the students mood. For
example if a lesson starts at 7.45 am they may be quiet and
unmotivated since they wake up early.
The other element is assumptions. List the assumptions on which the
lesson will base means that what we assume about the students’
knowledge or what can they do or do not.
And the other element is personal aims. This may be expected from
teachers by trainers and it is believed that this provokes the
development and reflection.
Skill and language focus;
inform the reader about the particular skill or linguistic
feature you are going to focus on in your lesson. Defining
the lesson and and write it.
For example, if you are going to conduct a reading
lesson then you should write "Reading" in that section or
if you are going to conduct a grammar teaching and
teach must/mustn't to your students then you should
write "must/mustn't" in that section. Hope the
explanation will help you.
highlighting what language and skills the students will be focusing on.
Also we can list seperately as structures, functions, vocabulary or
pronunciation items. Therefore, we can clearly see what the students
are going to study.
Timetable fit: Indicating the role of the lesson with a longer program
helps observers to see what teacher has thought about the lesson
and coherence of the curriculum. Duration is important.
Potential learner problems and possible solutions; For instance,
students may not be able to learn about the necessities of the lesson
materials for activity 3. The possible solution for this may be
reminding the importance of materials by showing them until they
learn it.
Process-oriented Syllabuses
A process-oriented syllabus focuses on the skills and processes
involved in learning language.
There are 2 main process oriented syllabusses. These are Procedural
and task-based syllabuses.
Procedural and task-based syllabuses share similar principles, they
emphasize classroom processes that facilitate learning. In contrast to
syllabuses focused on linguistic items or communicative skills, these
approaches prioritize tasks and activities in the classroom rather than
predefined outcomes.

In Procedural syllabuses and in all process oriented syllabuses there

are no items, behaviours or products to be learned, instead these are
interested with the tasks.
Prabhu provides the following three task ‘types’
Information-gap activities include the flow of information between
people or forms, and frequently involve the use of language for
encoding or decoding.
Reasoning-gap activities generate new knowledge by inference,
deduction, reasoning, or pattern perception
Opinion-gap activities include expressing personal preferences,
feelings, or attitudes in response to a specific situation.

Task-based syllabuses
Candlin (1987) provides a pedagogic rationale.
Long (1985) looks to SLA research.
There are different definitions of task, one of them is;
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 shelms, making an
airline reservation…In other words, by "task" is meant the hundred
and one things people do in everyday life.

According to Candlin good tasks should

- promote attention to meaning, purpose, negotiation
- encourage attention to relevant data
- draw objectives from the communicative needs of learners
- allow for flexible approaches to the task, offering different
routes, media, modes of participation, procedures
- allow for different solutions depending on the skills and
strategies drawn on by learners
- involve learner contributions, attitudes, and affects
- be challenging but not threatening, to promote risk-taking
- require input from all learners in terms of knowledge, skills,
participation
- define a problem to be worked through by learners, centred on
the learners but guided by the teacher
- involve language use in the solving of the task
- allow for co-evaluation by the learner and teacher of the task
and of the performance of the task
- develop the learners’ capacities to estimate consequences and
repercussions of the task in question
- provide opportunities for metacommunication and
metacognition (i.e.
- provide opportunities for learners to talk about communication
and about learning)
Doyle maintains that tasks will need 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 to the student to generate the
product

Shavelson and Stern (1981) suggest that in planning

instructional tasks, teachers need to consider:
◦ 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 the goals for the task
◦ 5 the abilities, needs and interests of the students
◦ 6 the social and cultural context of instruction.
 Long, who uses needs analysis as his point of departure, offers
the following procedure for developing a task-based syllabus:
The purpose of a needs identification is to obtain information
which will determine the content of a language teaching
programme, i.e. to provide input for syllabus design.
Inventories of tasks that result from the type of analysis
described above are necessary for this purpose, but insufficient.
They are only the raw data and must be manipulated in various
ways before they are transformed into a syllabus usable in
classroom teaching. The steps in this process are as follows:
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 form a task
syllabus.

Task-based syllabus designers face the challenge of task difficulty being

influenced by various factors, including learner characteristics. Also what is
difficult for one learner may not be difficult for another
Most of the applied linguists who have explored the concept of
communicative language teaching in general, and task-based syllabus
design in particular, have addressed the issue of difficulty.

1. They include 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, and
6. the amount and type of background knowledge required

Content syllabuses
The content syllabus differs from task-based syllabuses in that it is
designed analytically. It utilizes experiential content derived from
well-defined subject areas like science, social studies, or specialized
academic/technical fields

While the relevance of this content might seem obvious, many

learners are confused by content-oriented courses, thinking they
have strayed into a settlement rather than a language programme.
In such cases, it is important for teachers to negotiate with the
learners and demonstrate the relationship between language and
content
The so called 'natural approach' has been most comprehensively
described by Krashen and Terrell (1983). Like Long's task-based
proposal, the principles underpinning the approach are claimed to be
based on empirical research and can be summarized as follows:
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 Terrell 1983: 58)

Syllabus design and methodology

Widdowson : a syllabus is the:
. . . specification of a teaching programme or pedagogic agenda
which defines a particular subject for a particular group of learners.
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.
The structural syllabus places a strong emphasis on internalizing
language structures, yet it may hinder practical communication
abilities. The functional-notional syllabus, in contrast, emphasizes
imitating real dialog in classroom activities, acting as a "dress
rehearsal" for real-life interactions.
Widdowson proposes the following methodological solution:
[the methodology] would engage the learners in problem-solving
tasks as purposeful activities but without the rehearsal requirement
that they should 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 outcomes.
GRADING TASKS
Candlin (1987) offers the following factors as likely to be
significant in determining difficulty:
cognitive load (the complexity of the mental operation to be carried
out; for instance Candlin suggests that tasks which require learners
to follow a clear chronological sequence will be easier than a task in
which there is no such clear development)
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)
particularity and generalizability (the extent to which the tasks
follow a universal or stereotyped pattern)
- code complexity and interpretive density (the complexity of the
language particularly in terms of the sorts of processing constraints
described by SLA researchers and the extent to which the learners
are required to interpret what they hear or read)
- content continuity (the extent to which the content relates to the
real-world interests or needs of the learners)
- process continuity (the coherence, continuity, and
interrelatedness of tasks)
Product-Oriented Syllabuses
-We can divide product syllabuses into 2 categories.
-Analytic and Synthetic
-Wilkins-
Synthetic language teaching is a step-by-step approach and language
parts are taught separately in order to gradually build up the entire
structure.
Analytic syllabuses focus on the purposes of language learning and
the necessary language performance, organizing content accordingly.
Purposes and functions are important for the target structure.
It can be possible to design solely these syllabuses but in reality we
usually design these syllabus. They can be mixed.
Grammatical syllabuses-Structural syllabuses
It is the most common syllabuse type. In here, the selection and
grading of syllabus input is done using the concepts of grammatical
simplicity and complexity. What is grammatically complex will not
necessarily be difficult to learn, and grammatically simple does not
mean necessarily be that which is easy to learn.
We teach one grammatical sentence to learners to learn another
grammatical structure. This is the main idea of the grammatical
syllabus.
Assumptions of grammatical syllabus:
Each thing is learned sequentially,
An additive manner,
Add to the learner's prior knowledge after being mastered
independently.
The assumption of grammatical syllabus in terms of language
transfer
They assume that once they have a mastery of the given structrure in
the classroom, they will be able to use them in the real
communication easily.
If we are going to present the language in a context, it is quite
challenging for us to isolate and present the topic of the day as
discrete item. This is one of the challenges of the grammatical
syllabus.
How can we control the input? It is a dilemma if we want to use grammatical syllabus. As a
solution, we can abandon structural grading, we can use the list of graded structures, or
not to determine the language to which learners are exposed, but to determine the items
which will be the focus in class. Also it is important to focus on what students should be
able to do with the language, so it is the tasks rather than the language which are graded

Critics about grammatical structure

There is more than one aspect to language
Lack of form and function
There is difference between form and function. Form is the rule of
the grammatical structure, function is how we use it to perform a
task or etc.
Focusing only linguistic structures is not correct, we need to focus on
communicative purposes too
Function –Request
Form - Can you please open the window?

Form - The see seems so beautiful

Function – We may swim – We can watch the view
 Some of the questions addressed by SLA researchers of interest
to syllabus planners are as follows:
◦ Why do learners at a particular stage fail to learn certain
grammatical items which have been explicitly (and often
repeatedly) taught?
◦ Can syllabus items be sequenced to make them easier to
learn?
◦ What learning activities appear to promote acquisition?
◦ Is there any evidence that teaching does, in fact, result in
learning?

There are a number of complications which arise when we attempt

to apply SLA research to syllabus design.
much of this work assumes that we shall start out with groups of
learners who are at the same stage of grammatical proficiency, and
that learners in a given group will all progress uniformly.
Some structures need to be learned immeadiately such as wh-
questions. These can be seen as memorized fırmulae even if they are
beyond the learners’ stage of development.

Since language development is a global, simultaneous process rather than a

linear mastery of one structure at a time, grammatical grading may distorts the
learner's available language and can hinder acquisition.

The arguments against grammatically structured syllabuses are

summarized by Long
Functional-notional syllabuses

Functions refer to the communicative purposes of language, while notions

represent the conceptual meanings expressed through language.

benefits of adopting a functional-notional orientation

It sets realistic learning tasks
It provides for the teaching of everyday, real-world language
It leads us to emphasise receptive activities before rushing learners
into premature performance
It recognizes that the speaker must have a real purpose for
speaking, and something to talk about
Communication will be intrinsically motivating because it expresses
basic communicative functions.
It enables teachers to exploit sound psycholinguistic, sociolin-
guistic, linguistic and educational principles.
It can develop naturally from existing teaching methodology.
It enables a spiral curriculum to be used which reintroduces
grammatical, topical and cultural marerial.
It allows for the development of flexible, modular courses.
It provides for the widespread promotion of foreign language
courses.

Criticizing functional-notional syllabuses

Transitioning from structurally-based syllabus design to functional-notional
criteria makes item selection and grading more complex.
Designers need to include items that will help learners to carry out the
communicative purposes for which they need the language. To identify these
purposes, needs analysis is crucial alongside linguistic analysis, also when
designing functional-notional syllabuses, simplicity and difficulty alone should
not dictate item grading.

Invoking grammatical criteria, it is possible to say that simple Subject + Verb +

Object (SVO) structures should be taught before more complex clausal
structures involving such things as relativization. Grading functional items is
complex since it's challenging to objectively determine whether one, like
"apologizing," is simpler or more difficult than another, such as "requesting."

Analytic syllabuses
Language is presented whole chunks at a time without linguistic control
Synthetic syllabuses
Language is segmented into discrete linguistic items for presentation one at a
time
Syllabuses can be synthetic or analytic.
Functional-notional syllabuses, is considered synthetic( by widdowson) but
initially it seemed as analytic.
FOR EXAMPLE Instead of learning about ‘the simple past’ learners might now
be required to 'talk about the things you did last weekend’.
Analytic syllabuses, which do not involve linguistic grading, often begin with
experiential content rather than linguistic considerations. This content can be
defined by situations, topics, themes, or academic subjects. One example of
analytic syllabus is content based syllabus.
Defining syllabus design
Curricula in language learning focus on:
Principles and guidelines for language learning
Goals, activities, and strategies for effective learning
Evaluation of learners' progress and proficiency
Establishing roles and responsibilities of teachers and learners
syllabuses are based on classroom-level experiences and inform ongoing
modifications to the curriculum.

curriculum design has been viewed as a supporting element of syllabus design.

The planning, implementing , evaluating, managing, and administration of
educational programs are all aspects of "curriculum." "Syllabus" concentrates
more intently on the selection and grading of content.

Syllabus design is considered as primarily concerned with the selection and

grading of content, whereas methodology is concerned with the selection of
learning tasks and activities.
Syllabus design concern with the what of a language program
Methodology concern with the how
detailed account of the various syllabus components which need to be
considered in developing language courses
1 the situations in which the foreign language will be used, including the topics
which will be dealt with;
2 the language activities in which the learner will engage;
3 the language functions which the learner will fulfil;
4 what the learner will be able to do with respect to each topic;
5 the general notions which the learner will be able to handle;
6 the specific (topic-related) notions which the learner will be able to handle;
7 the language forms which the learner will be able to use;
8 the degree of skill with which the learner will be able to perform.
The role of the classroom teacher
Bell (1983) asserts that teachers largely serve as consumers of
syllabuses developed by applied linguists and governmental organizations.
Their responsibility is to carry out them
Points of departure
The first question to confront the syllabus designer is where the content is to come from in the first
place.

The challenges associated with selecting and sequencing content and learning
experiences would be simplified if there was clear agreement on language
teaching objectives, extensive knowledge of language learning, the ability to
teach the entire language, and comprehensive descriptions of the target
language.