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material in lessons to a class with a wide range of proficiency. Every day
teachers have to consider questions like the following:
" Is this material too difficult for my learners?
" Is there something new for my learners to learn in this activity?
" Will everyone in the class be able to cope with this activity?
All of these questions relate to needs analysis. Needs analysis involves look-
ing at what the learners know now, what they need to know by the end of
the course, and what they want to know. It has been suggested several
times in this book that doing needs analysis is like doing research or
assessment. Because of this, good needs analysis is reliable, valid and
Teaching and Curriculum Design 199
practical. Teachers themselves are very good sources of needs analysis infor-
mation because they typically know their learners well, have seen them
perform various tasks and have seen the results of those tasks. Teachers
intuitions can be reliable, valid and practical. It is always good in research and
in needs analysis however to draw on more than one source of
information.
There are now many web-based tools that can be used in needs analysis.
It is now possible to run texts through a vocabulary-level checker to see what
the vocabulary load is going to be. A very good example of this can be found
on Tom Cobb s website (www.lextutor.ca); on the same website there are
various tests that can be used to measure where learners are in their vocabu-
lary knowledge.
It is important that teachers keep checking their own intuitions of learn-
ers language knowledge against the results of tests and careful observation of
the learners using language.
Principles
Every day teachers have to consider questions like the following:
" Will this be a good activity for my learners?
" Are my learners doing enough reading?
" Is it good to get learners to memorise words and phrases?
" Should I do the same activity again?
" Should my learners be doing homework?
All of these questions can be answered by looking at principles of teaching
and learning. Information about teaching and learning can come from
research, but such information can also come from teachers experience and
observation of teaching and learning. It is always good to check these two
sources against each other. On some occasions, what seems to be good teach-
ing practice may actually have a negative effect on learning. The research on
interference (Nation, 2000) is a good example of this. Teaching a group of
closely related words together actually makes learning 50 per cent to 100 per
cent more difficult, even though intuitively we feel that is a good idea to
bring similar items together. On the other hand, teachers intuitions about
the importance of repetition and meaningful input are well supported by
research.
Part of the professional development of teachers involves keeping up with
current research findings. It is thus useful for teachers to attend conferences,
take part in workshops, and be familiar with at least one professional journal.
There are now several very good professional journals that are available
free on the web. You can find links on this web site: http://iteslj.org/links/
TESL/Journals_on_the_Web/.
200 Teaching and Curriculum Design
A good goal to have when reading articles from such journals is to ask the
question, what principles of teaching can I draw from this article? The next
question is, of course, how can I apply this principle in my teaching?
A very pleasing development in the field of applied linguistics over the last
10 to 20 years has been the reduction in the advocacy of methods of
language teaching. This is clearly a sign of maturity in the field. There is no
one right answer to how languages should be taught or learnt. Different
environments require different approaches, and different teachers and learners
are comfortable with different approaches. Rather than looking for the
magic method, it is better to work at the level of principle, seeing how
the same principles can apply in different situations. If research or experience
shows that a principle is no longer valid, then this does not require the
abandonment of the whole way of teaching, but simply requires some
adjustments to what is being done.
Environment analysis, needs analysis and principles make up the three
outer circles of the curriculum design diagram. These three parts of the
curriculum design process provide data and guidance for the parts of the inner
circle of the diagram. Without the information from the outer circles, setting
goals, deciding on the content and sequencing of items in the course, decid-
ing what activities and lesson formats to use, and monitoring and assessing,
learners progress would be uninformed, ad hoc processes.
Goals
Not all teachers set language learning goals for the activities they use in
class. Beginner teachers are primarily concerned with making sure that the
learners have something to do and that they are happy while doing it. It is
a brave teacher who asks, is this activity resulting in any useful learning?
Technique analysis and the detailed investigation of particular techniques
are largely neglected research areas. It is likely however that these areas will
gain more attention as interest in task-based syllabuses grows. The setting
of performance objectives was also a move in the direction of technique
analysis, but was largely concerned with the product rather than the process
which achieved that product.
Technique analysis draws strongly on the application of principles of
teaching and learning. One possible model of technique analysis involves
looking at the learning goals of a particular technique and activity, the men-
tal conditions which are needed to achieve these goals (this is where
principles of learning and teaching most apply), the observable signs that
these mental conditions might be occurring, and the design features of the
technique which set up these mental conditions (Nation, 2001: Chapter 3).
Here is a brief technique analysis of the very common technique of
getting learners to answer comprehension questions after they have read a
text. The analysis has been put in the form of a table (Table 14.1) because this
Teaching and Curriculum Design 201
Table 14.1 A technique analysis of the activity of answering comprehension questions
Goals Conditions (signs) Features
Comprehension Understanding of the text Questions which involve the
of the text (Correct answers to the required degree of
questions) comprehension of the text
(Providing the answers to the If the questions are in the same
questions quickly) order as the information in the
(Answering without having to text, answering them will be
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