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摘 要

任务型教学也称任务型语言教学, 在近二十年里成为第二语言习得和课堂教学中的一个热点课题。它把语言使用与教学方法的基本思想结合起来,并在实践中产生较大影响。本文探讨了我国中学英语中的任务型教学并评估它在教学中的有效性,主要试图探索它在语法教学中的优势。

关键词：任务型教学；应用；教学优势

Contents

1. Introduction 1

2. Literature Review 2

2.1 Definition of TBI 2

2.2 Previous Studies on Task-based Instruction 3

3. Basic Steps and Design Principles 3

3.1 Basic Steps of Task-based Instruction 3

3.2 Task Design Principles 4

4. Application of TBI to Grammar Teaching in Middle School 4

4.1 Application to Grammar Teaching 5

4.2 Discovery and Discussion 7

5. Pedagogical Implications 8

6. Conclusions 10

Works Cited 11

Appendix 1 12

Appendix 2 14

Appendix 3 16

1. Introduction

As the international status being promoted, English has been widely used over these years. It also acts as a second language and a compulsory course in middle schools. English teaching has been a long-term study conducted by researchers and educators. There are the dominant language teaching methods at different times. Most of these approaches are introduced by a large number of books. The traditional grammar-translation method was used for a long time. After that different kinds of teaching methods sprung up constantly, such as content-based approach, lexical approach, situational teaching method and so on. As the educational system develops, a task-based instruction has been introduced to classroom teaching gradually. Task-Based instruction can be considered as a methodology developing from the classroom processes.

The English curriculum standard in the part of teaching advice has explicitly pointed out that the teacher should avoid teaching language knowledge simply, but tries his/her best to use the task-based instruction. According to the general goals of curriculum and teaching content, teachers should creatively design actual teaching activities which are close to students and attract their active participation. As a result, students can learn English and accomplish tasks though thinking, investigation, discussion and cooperation.

I was working as a trainee in two classes of a middle school in my last undergraduate year. One is made up of 42 students and the other is made of 40 students. Miss Zhu has told me that most of the students have mastered the basic knowledge of vocabulary and grammar. As one of three compulsory subjects, English has been attached great importance to by schools and teachers, as well as parents. Teachers give a lot of homework every day in order to examine whether students master what they have learned at school. They are about 13 to 14 years old and all in adolescence. So it is difficult to organize and control them. In the process of classroom teaching, English teachers usually give them free time for discussion, dialogues, role-play etc. If they were sure not to be asked to perform tasks, some of them would be talking about other things which had nothing to do with the subject rather than do the right task. Some students may even spend the time doing their homework especially while others were giving a performance. In addition, the free time was so limited that students were usually unable to make full use of it to complete these tasks. As a result, the results of the tasks were often not satisfying and below what were expected.

Directly from my teaching experience and observation in the classroom teaching, I find students in class lack of enthusiasm in performing tasks, such as dialogues and group discussions. Many researchers believe the fact that Chinese are reluctance to communicate may be related to the traditional culture of our country. It is inherited from Confucian tradition. (Ellis, 2009) Ellis (2009: 224) also points out that the task may contain two aspects. One is “input – providing”, including listening and reading and the other is “output – prompting”, involving speaking and writing. However, due to China"s national conditions, teaching mode still sticks to traditional teaching method. It over emphasizes the knowledge of grammar and vocabulary and ignores the applied language expression in the dialogues. A typical example is the College Entrance Examination, which pays little attention to speaking.

So teachers should distribute the limited time in class to the students, letting them practice their spoken English as much as possible. Avoid the dumb English, which is very terrible for English learners.

2. Literature Review

2.1 Definition of TBI

Nunan regarded tasks as basic items in the language acquisition, just as the blocks in the building. The classroom activities involve learners" understanding, operation, product and interaction with the target language (Nunan, 1989:5). Breen (1987) defined tasks as a series of activities, which range from easy activities to the more difficult ones. Learners can improve their language competence during the process of completing them.

Specifically, a task is an activity that requires learners to engage in meaningful negotiations and natural communications. Real-life language may be used in the process of completing a variety of tasks, such as giving directions, making dialogues, writing letters etc. (Richards and Rodgers, 2005). Tasks are considered as the basic step of analyzing after setting goals, education activities and evaluations. (Van den Branden, 2006: 12)

With the regard to TBI, it is an approach based on the use of tasks as the central part of the language teaching. The methodology centers on a series of tasks students perform. Skehan believed that TBI works as an instruction where learners are given a series of tasks to finish in class. It can be assumed that performing tasks will take natural acquisition mechanisms, extend the potential internal language system and promote the development forward. (Skehan, 1998:95)

2.2 Previous Studies on Task-based Instruction

The primary theory of TBI can be traced back to the Language Acquisition Theory of Krashen. The theory is composed of five parts. The kernel of Krashen"s theory is the comprehensible input hypothesis that gives an explanation for the way people acquire language. Krashen firmly believed that comprehensible input is very necessary and significant for successful language acquisition. We acquire language by understanding input materials which are a bit higher than our current level of abilities.

Namely, “I” refers to learners’ current level of abilities and “I 1” means the level which is a bit higher than the current one.

Social Constructivism Theory thinks that learning and development are both activities which need social and cooperative work. It is significant and necessary for learners to emphasize contextualized learning and make sense of their environment. They may assimilate former comprehension with new concepts and thoughts in the new contexts. At this point，it can be said that the affective factor has long been lacking in the traditional Chinese EFL classroom．

3. Basic Steps and Design Principles

3.1 Basic Steps of Task-based Instruction

Willis (1996) provides the framework of TBI, as the following illustrates:

1) Pre-task: Teacher leads in a topic by the means of free-talk, brain-storming ideas, showing pictures, telling stories, singing chants, lip-contact, funny games, relating personal experiences etc. Then he/she interprets useful words and phrases in details and gives some exercises. At last, teacher makes sure that all the students understand the meaning of the subject and master the application to the new words and key sentences.

2) Task cycle (while-task, during-task): (1) Task: After understanding the text, students work in pairs to act out the dialogue with the monitor of the teacher. (2) Planning: Different groups of students are carefully prepared to perform their tasks to the whole class in the form of oral or written report. It can make students compare their own performance with classmates’ and broaden their horizons; (3) Report: Students report their tasks.

3) Language focus (post-task): (1) Analysis: Students analyze the presentations of other groups and give some advice; (2) Practice: Teacher gives some tests to make sure whether students have grasped the new knowledge. Practical activities include the matching games, right and wrong judgments, the team competitions, filling in the blanks, dialogues, role-play, retelling the texts and so on. At this stage, the students evaluate their work and analyze the language features, which are called the consciousness-raising activities, aiming for the useful language acquisition. (Willis, 1996: 39-115)

3.2 Task Design Principles

Nunan (1999) proposes five teaching principles of TBI

1. The Authenticity Principle

In the task design, task input materials used should come from real life. Meanwhile, scenes as well as specific activities to fulfill the tasks should be close to the real life in which students have more access to real language information. As a result, the language skills they use in the classroom or real life can be effectively applied.

2. The Form-function Principle

The biggest shortcoming of traditional language practice is the decontextualized language. Students may know different language forms, but can’t appropriately express the meaning and function. The form-function principle makes clear of the relationship of language forms and function, as well as the relationship of language and context, and enhances learners’ understanding of language appropriateness.

3. The Task Dependency

This principle involves the relationship between tasks, task steps and procedures in the classroom. It tells how to make the design achieve coherence and fluency in teaching and logic during the implementation process. In class, the teacher arranges a series of tasks and every task represents a ladder, making learners to achieve higher levels of language proficiency.

4. Learning by Doing Principle

Students stimulate their potentiality through learning and practice. Learners master language use through continuous communications in the classroom, even though they still need to strengthen their grammar learning and vocabulary memory.

5. Scaffolding Principle

Scaffolding is a process to set up a situation where children can entre the topic easily and successfully. Then teacher pulls back it gradually and offers children enough space to develop and grow. (Bruner, 1983:60)

4. Application of TBI to Grammar Teaching in Middle School

4.1 Application to Grammar Teaching

A. Experimental Hypothesis

The experiment assumes that task-based Instruction is suitable for Middle School English Grammar teaching. TBI offers a great number of chances to students to communicate and practice. As a result, task-based instruction is more useful for improving the efficiency of English Teaching than the classic teaching approach and can attain better teaching achievements.

B. Participants and Basic Information

The participants in this experiment were students in Grade 9 from Yushan Middle School in Kunshan. There were 42 students in Class 1, which works as the experimental class and 40 in Class 2, working as the controlled class. All of them have received at least six years’ courses of English at school. After three months of study, the infinitive would be tested as the target grammar, because it is challenging for Chinese students to master its usage.

C. Teaching Treatment

The two classes were taught by their present teacher, Miss Zhu. The time of each class was 45 minutes. The teaching contents and progresses of the two classes were also consistent. The only difference was the approaches used in the class teaching.

In the experimental class, the teacher uses the task-based language teaching, each task is composed of three parts: pre-task, task cycle and language focus. Here lists the first lesson teaching plan of Unit 4 Oxford Junior English (Fun with English 9A) published by the Oxford Press (2003) in order to show the teaching process in the experimental class.

TV Programmes

Step One Pre-task

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