Introduction

Task-based language teaching (TBLT) and task-supported language teaching (TSLT) are often seen as incompatible as they draw on different theories of language learning and language teaching. The position I will develop in this chapter, however, is that both approaches are needed, especially in instructional contexts where ‘pure’ task-based teaching may be problematic for various reasons. I argue the case for a modular curriculum consisting of separate (i.e. non-integrated) task-based and structure-based components. I will discuss different curriculum models in the light of what is known about how a second language is learned. The model that I support assumes the importance of developing fluency first. It consists of a primary task-based module implemented with focus-on-form (Long, 1991) and, once a basic proficiency has been achieved, supported by a secondary structural module to provide for explicit accuracy-oriented work to counteract learned selective attention (N. Ellis, 2006), one of the main sources of persistent error.

I will also address the content and grading of the task-based and structural modules. I will consider the factors involved in the vertical and horizontal grading of tasks and argue that, for the time being, syllabus designers will have to draw on their experience and intuition as much as on theory and research to make decisions about how to sequence tasks. I suggest that the structural component is best used as a checklist rather than as a syllabus so as to allow teachers to address selectively those features that are found to be problematic for their students when they perform tasks.

Two Kinds of Syllabus

In the 1970s, the traditional structural syllabus, consisting typically of an inventory of grammatical items, was challenged when new models of language (Halliday, 1973; Hymes, 1971) emerged, resulting in proposals for a communicative syllabus based on a functional view of language. The notional syllabus proposed by Wilkins (1976) drew heavily on these models of language. It listed semantic and functional categories – such as possibility and requesting – along with the linguistic means for realising these in language use.