types of syllabus

Syllabuses in ELT

Syllabi are not totally distinct from each other. All actual language teaching syllabuses are integrated product of two or more of the types of syllabi presented here. In other words, although different language teaching syllabuses are introduced here as though each can be employed on its own, in practice, these syllabuses rarely occur independently of each other. For a particular course, one type of syllabus usually dominates, while other types of content might be integrated with it. For instance, there is minimal distinction between the skill-based and task-based syllabuses. In fact, the way in which the instructional content is employed in the real teaching procedure is the determining element in choosing a syllabus. The characteristics, advantages, and disadvantages of individual syllabuses are investigated in a nutshell as follows.

A procedural syllabus

The procedural syllabus was proposed by Prabhu (1980). Prabhu’s 'Bangalore Project' was based on the premise that structure can be best learned when attention is concentrated on meaning. The focus shifts from the linguistic aspect to the pedagogical one focusing on learning or the learner. The tasks and activities are designed and planned in advance but not the linguistic content. In this syllabus tasks are graded conceptually and grouped by similarity. Within such a framework the selection, ordering and grading of content is not so much considerable for the syllabus designer. Arranging the course around tasks such as information- and opinion-gap activities helps the learner perceive the language subconsciously while consciously focusing on solving the meaning behind the tasks.

A process syllabus

The actual syllabus is designed as the teaching and learning proceeds. This type of syllabus was supported by Breen (1984a:1984b) whereby a framework can be provided within which either a pre-designed content syllabus can be publicly analyzed and evaluated by the classroom group, or a developing content syllabus can be designed in an on-going way. It supports a frame for decisions and alternative procedures, activities and tasks for the classroom group. It explicitly attends to teaching and learning and particularly the possible interrelationships between subject matter, learning and the potential contributions of a classroom.

by Mohammad Mohseni Far, M.A., Shahid Chamran University, Iran.

http://www3.telus.net/linguisticsissues/syllabi

"A structural (formal) syllabus." The content of language teaching is a collection of the forms and structures, usually grammatical, of the language being taught. Examples include nouns, verbs, adjectives, statements, questions, subordinate clauses, and so on.

"A notional/functional syllabus." The content of the language teaching is a collection of the functions that are performed when language is used, or of the notions that language is used to express. Examples of functions include: informing, agreeing, apologizing, requesting; examples of notions include size, age, color, comparison, time, and so on.

"A situational syllabus." The content of language teaching is a collection of real or imaginary situations in which language occurs or is used. A situation usually involves several participants who are engaged in some activity in a specific setting. The language occurring in the situation involves a number of functions, combined into a plausible segment of discourse. The primary purpose of a situational language teaching syllabus is to teach the language that occurs in the situations. Examples of situations include: seeing the dentist, complaining to the landlord, buying a book at the book store, meeting a new student, and so on.

"A skill-based syllabus." The content of the language teaching is a collection of specific abilities that may play a part in using language. Skills are things that people must be able to do to be competent in a language, relatively independently of the situation or setting in which the language use can occur. While situational syllabi group functions together into specific settings of language use, skill-based syllabi group linguistic competencies (pronunciation, vocabulary, grammar, and discourse) together into generalized types of behavior, such as listening to spoken language for the main idea, writing well-formed paragraphs, giving effective oral presentations, and so on. The primary purpose of skill-based instruction is to learn the specific language skill. A possible secondary purpose is to develop more general competence in the language, learning only incidentally any information that may be available while applying the language skills.

"A task-based syllabus." The content of the teaching is a series of complex and purposeful tasks that the students want or need to perform with the language they are learning. The tasks are defined as activities with a purpose other than language learning, but, as in a content-based syllabus, the performance of the tasks is approached in a way that is intended to develop second language ability. Language learning is subordinate to task performance, and language teaching occurs only as the need arises during the performance of a given task. Tasks integrate language (and other) skills in specific settings of language use. Task-based teaching differs from situation-based teaching in that while situational teaching has the goal of teaching the specific language content that occurs in the situation (a predefined product), task-based teaching has the goal of teaching students to draw on resources to complete some piece of work (a process). The students draw on a variety of language forms, functions, and skills, often in an individual and unpredictable way, in completing the tasks. Tasks that can be used for language learning are, generally, tasks that the learners actually have to perform in any case. Examples include: applying for a job, talking with a social worker, getting housing information over the telephone, and so on.

"A content-based-syllabus." The primary purpose of instruction is to teach some content or information using the language that the students are also learning. The students are simultaneously language students and students of whatever content is being taught. The subject matter is primary, and language learning occurs incidentally to the content learning. The content teaching is not organized around the language teaching, but vice-versa. Content-based language teaching is concerned with information, while task-based language teaching is concerned with communicative and cognitive processes. An example of content-based language teaching is a science class taught in the language the students need or want to learn, possibly with linguistic adjustment to make the science more comprehensible.

In general, the six types of syllabi or instructional content are presented beginning with the one based most on structure, and ending with the one based most on language use. Language is a relationship between form and meaning, and most instruction emphasizes one or the other side of this relationship.

http://www.ericdigests.org/pre-928/design.htm

Notional/functional syllabus

A notional/functional syllabus

The chief emphasis of this syllabus is upon the communicative purpose and conceptual meaning of language i.e. notions and functions. In other words, the content of the language teaching is a number of thefunctions that are performed on using the language, or of the notions that language is utilized to express. Functions can be exemplified by instances such as inviting, requesting, agreeing, apologizing; and notions embrace age, color, size, comparison, time, etc. Besides, grammatical items and situational elements are considered at subsidiary level of importance. As ppposed to the hypothesis of structural and situational syllabuses which lies in the fact that it is most often in search of ‘how’ or ‘when’ and ‘where’ of language (Brumfit and Johnson, 1979:84), the functional/notional syllabus seeks for ‘what is a learner communicates through language’.

An important point regarding notional-functional syllabus is that the needs of the students have to be explored and analyzed by different types of interaction and communication a learner may be involved in. Accordingly, needs analysis is central to the design of notional-functional syllabuses. Needs analysis should be taken into account so as to establish the necessary objectives. Apart from needs analysis that has an implicit focus on the learner, this type of syllabus proposes a new list consisting of notions and functions that become the main focus in a syllabus. White (1988:77) argues that "language functions do not usually occur in isolation" and there are also difficulties of selecting and grading function and form.

situational syllabus, skill-based syllabus

A situational syllabus

With this type of syllabus, the essential component of organization is a non-linguistic category, i.e. the situation. The underlying premise is that language is related to the situational contexts in which it occurs. The designer of a situational syllabus tries to predict those situations in which the learner will find him/herself, and applies these situations, for instance; seeing the dentist, going to the cinema and meeting a new student, as a basis for selecting and presenting language content. The content of language teaching is a collection of real or imaginary situations in which language occurs or is used. A situation usually includes several participants who are involved in some activity in a particular setting. The language used in the situation comprises a number of functions combined into a plausible part of available discourse. The main principle of a situational language teaching syllabus is to teach the language that occurs in the situations.

In this syllabus, situational needs are important rather than grammatical units. The major organizing feature is a list of situations which reflects the way language and behavior are used everyday outside the classroom. Thus, by connecting structural theory to situations the learner is able to induce the meaning from a relevant context. One advantage of the situational approach is that motivation will be heightened since it is "learner- rather than subject-centered" (Wilkins.1976: 16).

skill-based syllabus

Skills are abilities that people must be able to do to be competent enough in a language, rather independently of the situation or context in which the language use can occur. In this syllabus, the content of the language teaching involves a collection of particular skills that may play a role in using language. Although situational syllabuses combine functions together into specific settings of language use, skill-based syllabi merge linguistic competencies (pronunciation, vocabulary, grammar, and discourse) together into generalized types of behavior, such as listening to spoken language for the main idea, writing well-formed paragraphs, delivering effective lectures, and so forth. The chief rationale behind skill-based instruction is to learn the specific language skill. Another less important objective might be to develop more general competence in the language, learning only incidentally any information that may be available while utilizing the language skills.

A structural or formal syllabus

This is recognized as the traditional syllabus which is often organized along grammatical lines giving primacy to language form. The focus is on the outcomes or the product. It is, in fact, a grammatical syllabus in which the selection and grading of the content is on the basis of the complexity and simplicity of grammatical items.  In other words, it specifies structural patterns as the basic units of learning and organizes these according to such criteria as structural complexity, difficulty, regularity, utility and frequency. The learner is expected to master each structural step and add it to his/her grammar collection. It makes ample use of highly controlled, tightly structured and sequenced pattern practice drills.

structural syllabus:  A syllabus in which grammatical structures form the central organizing feature. A structural syllabus proceeds from simple grammatical structure to more complex grammatical structure. An example might be something like: Present progressive -> Comparatives -> Simple past -> Past progressive. The main faults of structural syllabuses is that they tend to ignore meaning and a lot of really useful language is neglected at the beginning because it is viewed as structurally too complex (If I were you, I would).

Structural syllabuses can be contrasted to functional syllabuses, which are organized according to the functions that language has (greeting, asking advice, disagreeing).

http://bogglesworldesl.com/glossary/structuralsyllabus.htm

What is grammatical syllabus?

Grammatical syllabus refers to the syllabus in whish grammatical criteria will be used to break the global language into discrete units. The items will be graded according to the grammatical complexity and simplicity of the items, their frequency, their contrastive difficulty in relation to the learner’s first language, situational need, and pedagogic convenience. (Wilkins,1976)

The problem faced in determining the grammatical content are more those of selecting and grading. The linguistic criteria that are most often cited in relation to the grammatical content of teaching are: simplicity, regularity, frequency and contrastive difficulty. Judgements of the simplicity are mostly made according to the “learnability”. Criteria of regularity request that the most productive linguistic structures should be taught before those of low productivity. The notion of frequency is self-evident. Contrastive difficulty refers to the degree of difficulty in relation to the learners’ first language. From this point of view, we can say that the syllabus that results from the application of these criteria will be grammatical syllabus.

4.      Merits of grammatical syllabus

(1)   It is “economic”. In natural learning, such as learning one’s first language, the amount of time and motivation devoted to learning is great. However, in classroom study, there is very much less time available, and often less motivation compared with the “natural learning”. Therefore, learning time should be organized carefully for efficiency. This means preparing a program of study-syllabus-so that bits of the total corpus of knowledge are presented one after another for gradual, systematic acquisition, rather than all at once. Also it means preparing an organized, balanced plan of classroom teaching /learning procedures through which the learners will be enabled to spend some of their time concentrating on mastering one or more of the components of the target language on their way to acquiring it as a whole. Thus we can benefit from the grammatical syllabus.

(2)   It is “systematic”. Language is highly systematic in grammatical syllabuses. Language is produced in accordance with a complex system of rules. As for the approaches to language teaching is such syllabus, according to Prabhu (1987), are base on “internalization of the grammatical system through planned progression, pre-selection and form-focused activity”.

(3)   It is “easy”. For teachers, it is easier to mater teaching methods and to operate them in class under such syllabus, for the teaching skills are comparatively easy. And it is easy to evaluate how learners go on with their learning, because the evaluation criteria are simpler than that of other syllabuses. As for learners, all they need to do is to memorize the rules and make grammatically correct sentences. Therefore, it is a little bit easier. Learners do not need to master many learning strategies.