More on what is Task-based Learning

As I´ve already mentioned, TBL focuses on the content of what´s discussed rather than the forms for discussing it. The concept is to assign students meaningful tasks, that is, tasks which promote meaningful interaction and mimic real-world activities. It values task-completion above language proficiency, or focus on specific language forms for completing the task. And it aims to engage for students by making the tasks themselves interesting. And finally, tasks themselves contain a clear and obtainable objective.

So really it´s about the formatting and the objectives. Instead of more traditional "PPP" formats of starting with a "warmer", then "pre-teaching" vocabulary and grammar, then "doing" vocabulary or grammar exercises and finishing with a speaking activity, we format our classes around an interactive activity which is interesting to students and which contains a clear objective. The basic process will always be as follows:

1. The set-up for the task is provided or what´s needed to perform task is discussed or modeled
2. The task is performed in pairs or groups
3. The task is formally concluded either by reporting results to the class or by class discussion
4. The teacher does some type of follow-up--either by teaching, correction, homework or other activities related to and backing up the task

As you can see, it´s not a complicated process. It can be gone through once each class or several times for each class (i.e. multiple, short activities). Either way, the process should be the same and along each step of the process, the objectives should be clearly spelled out to learners. What is extremely important to understand is that the objectives can NOT be simply: "to learn something". Learning is a natural result of EVERYTHING you do in class, so you can´t think too much about what your students will learn. Instead think, what will they do? What will they say? And most importantly, why will they say and do it? Once you see activities in this light, you begin to rethink how you present activities and new language. But to do so, you have to reprogram yourself; this time think of objectives almost like you would a game or a challenge. To give you an idea of what those "challenges" could be, here are a list of general examples of objectives for any activity:

• find differences
• find similarities
• give a rationale
• solve a problem
• form a plan
• agree on a given number of specific ideas
• find extremes (e.g. the best, the worst, the most interesting, etc.) in the/a group
• formulate a survey
• analyze results of a survey
• discover more (formulate questions)
• test another member of the class or another group
• find missing information to complete a text
• win (a game)
• formulate a theory
• redesign something
• research and share something
• listen and decide something (e.g. if you agree, is your situation different, etc.)
• read and decide something (e.g. missing information, what will happen next, etc.)
• create something (e.g. a project, a product, etc.)

I´m sure that none of these are new to you. What makes these things special is that they, or other objectives like them, are a part of every single activity--they´re not just something you do now and again. Again, objectives can be short-term (the result of a short activity) or very long-term (over the course of a class). What´s important is that they are explicitly given because they really motivate students to complete each task (think of it as added-value).

In addition, they should be realistic, yet challenging. Creating objectives, when adapting coursebook materials, takes practice but once you get the hang of it, it´s extremely rewarding.