Types of SyllabusDr. G. A. BakhshiBy: Sh. Tamizrad

Fall 2014

Content

Curriculum Vs. Syllabus

• Curriculum: a broad statement of the philosophy, purposes, design, and implementation of the entire language teaching program

• Syllabus: a specification and ordering of content of a course.

Graves (1996)

Characteristics of a syllabus

Synthetic Vs. Analytic

• Synthetic: language is segmented into discrete linguistic items for presentation one at a time.

• Analytic: language is presented whole chunks at a time without linguistic control.

(Long & Crookes, 1992)

Product-oriented Vs. Process-oriented

• Product-oriented: emphasizes the product of language learning. (structural approach, situational approach,

notional/functional approach)

Process-oriented: to enhance communicative skills, focuses on the specification of the learning task and activities that student will undertake. (procedural/task based approaches, learner-led syllabus, proportional

approach)

ESP

Language for specific purposes is concerned first and foremost with conveying factual information—the referential function of language.

Referential Vs. Instrumental

• Referential function of language: language used

to convey facts and knowledge

• Instrumental function of language: language used to get things done

Halliday (1973)

Social Functions

• Holmes (1998)

• Linde (1988)

• Pascal and Brown (2001)

Specifying course content is value laden and

reveals our notions of what language is and

how language is learned.

Hutchinson and Waters (1987)

General English Language Courses SyllabusBrown (1995) and Richards (1990)

• Structural: organized primarily around grammar and sentence patterns.

• Functional: organized around communicative functions, such as identifying,

reporting, correcting, describing.

• Notional: organized around conceptual categories, such as duration, quantity,

location.

• Topical : organized around themes or topics, such as health, food, clothing.

• Situational: organized around speech settings and the transactions associated

with them, such as shopping, at the bank, at the supermarket.

• Skills: organized around microskills, such as listening for gist, listening for specific

information, listening for inferences.

• Task- or activity-based: organized around activities, such as drawing

maps, following directions, following instructions.

EAPFlowerdew and Peacock (2001a)

• Lexico-grammatical: organized around structures and vocabulary.

• Functional-notional: organized around language functions and

notions.

• Discourse-based: organized around aspects of text cohesion and

coherence.

• Learning-centered: organized on what the learners have to do in

order to learn language items and skills, not the items and skills themselves.

• Skills-based: organized around particular skills.

• Genre-based: organized around conventions and procedures in genres

as units of analysis.

• Content-based: organized around themes.

White (1988) identifies three options:

• listing content (forms, situations, function, and topics),

• skills (language or learning),

• methods.

Task-based teachingPrahbu (1987)

Task-based teaching operates with the concept that, while the

conscious mind is working out some of the meaning content, a

subconscious part of the mind perceives, abstracts, or acquires

(or recreates, as a cognitive structure) some of the linguistic

structuring embodied in those entities, as a step in the

development of an internal system of rules. (pp. 69–70)

ESP Vs. General English

ESP:

• Long and Crookes (1992): task-based syllabuses in ESP specify real world tasks.

• Task in ESP they may be chosen for their relevance to real world events in the target environments.

General English:

• The precise definition of the tasks is not a primary concern.

• Teaching tasks are chosen for the pedagogical value,

Narrow-angled Vs. Wide-angled

• Dudley-Evans and St. John (1998): Where needs are limited, a narrow-angled course may be appropriate and the course can legitimately focus on a few target events and use content or topics from one discipline.

• Where the needs are more general, the course can focus on a wider range of target events and use content and topics from a range of disciplines.

Specific Vs. Specifiable