英语教学理论与方法7.pptVIP

英语教学理论与方法 6. Task-based Approaches INTRODUCTION As with content-based instruction, a task-based approach aims to provide learners with a natural context for language use. As learners work to complete a task, they have abundant opportunity to interact. Such interaction is thought to facilitate language acquisition as learners have to work to understand each other and to express their own meaning. By so doing, they have to seek clarification. By interacting with others, they get to listen to language which may be beyond their present ability, but which may be assimilated into their knowledge of the target language for use at a later time. As Candlin and Murphy (1987:1) note, ‘The central purpose we are concerned with is language learning, and tasks present this in the form of a problem-solving negotiation between knowledge that the learner holds and new knowledge.’ Experience The following lesson is one that has been adapted and expanded from Prabhu (1987). It takes place in Southern India. The class consists of 40 ten-year-old children who are advanced beginners in English. As we enter the classroom, the teacher is speaking: ????‘We are going to do a lesson today on timetables. OK?’ The teacher draws the columns and rows of a class timetable on the blackboard. At the head of the first column, she writes 9:30-10:15. The students understand that the teacher has written the duration of the first class period of the day. ??What should I write here?” asks the teacher, pointing to the head of the second column. The students respond, ‘Ten fifteen.’ And then ‘Eleven o’clock,’ as the teacher moves her finger across the top row. The teacher points in turn to the top of each column and the students chorus the time that each class period begins and ends. ?Then the teacher asks: ‘Who will write the names for the days of the week here?’ Several students raise their hands. The teacher calls on one. ‘Come,’ she says. The student she has called on comes to the front of the room, ta