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Perceptual Mismatches in The Interpretation of Task-Based ELT Materials A Micro-Evaluation of A Task-Based English Lesson
Perceptual Mismatches in The Interpretation of Task-Based ELT Materials A Micro-Evaluation of A Task-Based English Lesson
To cite this article: John Harper & Handoyo Puji Widodo (2020) Perceptual mismatches
in the interpretation of task-based ELT materials: a micro-evaluation of a task-based
English lesson, Innovation in Language Learning and Teaching, 14:2, 114-132, DOI:
10.1080/17501229.2018.1502773
Introduction
Attempts at trying to explain what actually occurs in a language classroom must take into account the
possibility of perceptual mismatches. These mismatches may occur between teachers and students
(see Karabuga 2015; Kumaravadivelu 1991, 1994). They may also occur between curriculum and
materials designers on the one hand and teachers on the other (see Lee 2015; Littlejohn 2011,
Widodo, 2015a). The recognition of the discrepancies between what is taught and what is learned
is certainly not new (see Allwright 1984). As early as 1995, Nunan argued that a difference in ‘peda-
gogical agenda’ may account for such discrepancies (135). Echoing this sentiment, Lee (2015)
suggests that teachers need to make special efforts to match methods and materials to learning
styles (see also Karabuga 2015; Nation and Macalister 2010; Peacock 2001). Wong (2011), noting
that learners often cannot identify the objectives of their lessons, argues for the implementation
of strategies to ensure learners’ awareness of lesson goals and thus to increase learners’ focus on
learning outcomes (see also Block 1996). Moreover, Kim, Jung, and Tracy-Ventura (2017), in reporting
on a semester-long longitudinal study, find that a pedagogical innovation (i.e. a task-based course in
South Korea) may result in an initial mismatch that is minimized as learners become more familiar
with the pedagogical approach.
As the preceding comments reveal (and as is well known), gaps between teachers and learners’
perceptions lead to investigations into what the causes of the gaps might be. Logically, course
materials come into play in such investigations. From one point of view, the materials of particular
lessons (and therefore the activities based on them) could be said to constitute the entirety of a par-
ticular course in a piece-by-piece fashion – even though these materials and activities are ultimately
expected to meet the objectives and lead to the specified outcomes of the course as a whole (see
Crabbe 2003; Freeman 1996; Richards 2013; Widodo 2017). If particular materials within particular
lessons are viewed as the building blocks of an entire course, it would seem necessary to consider
perceptual mismatches concerning materials in some detail.
This study will take the view of Guerrettaz and Johnston (2013) – specifically, that ‘materials’
consist of ‘any artifacts that prompt the learning and use of language in the language classroom,’
‘including pictures, realia, and virtual artifacts such as [websites] and computer programs’ (779; see
also Richards 2001; Tomlinson 2012; Widodo and Savova 2010). Guerrettaz and Johnston note that
the effect of materials is greatly influenced by students’ interpretations of them (see also Nunan
1996). Such a view suggests, rightly no doubt, that ‘materials-in-action’ may provide more or less
than what is stated in the original goals of the materials (Littlejohn 2011, 181). Ultimately, then, a con-
clusion may be drawn that ‘materials-in-action,’ regardless of their stated goals, will be altered, for
better or for worse, according to the classroom situation resulting from the interaction among the
‘three major elements in the equation: the materials, the teacher and the learners’ (Maley 2011,
379; see also Crabbe 2007; Van den Branden 2009).
The study reported here involves a micro-evaluation of a lesson based on the principles of task-
based learning and teaching (henceforth, TBLT). It investigates possible perceptual mismatches
between the classroom teacher and the students of the course. Prior to a discussion of the study
itself, a brief overview of TBLT as it relates to the study is necessary.
Conceptualizing a task
TBLT is often not considered a methodology but rather a ‘curricular content’ (Kumaravadivelu 2006,
65) or an ‘approach’ (see Ellis 2009, 2011). As a cursory glance at the TBLT literature indicates,
definitions of the term task abound and appear not to lend themselves to any universal agreement
(see Kumaravadivelu 2006). Ellis (2003) and Nunan (2004) provide extensive surveys of the various
definitions of the term task as it relates to TBLT. It is beyond the scope of this article to engage in
a lengthy discussion of task definitions and the analyses of them. Hence, the current discussion
will be limited to some of the more prominent and agreed upon features of tasks as they relate to
the present study.
Nunan (2004), taking from Long (1985), discusses both ‘target tasks’ and ‘pedagogical tasks’ (1).
Pedagogical tasks, those implemented within classrooms and thus the type logically employed in
most academic settings, are defined as follows:
[A] pedagogical task is a piece of classroom work that involves learners in comprehending, manipulating, produ-
cing or interacting in the target language while their attention is focused on mobilizing their grammatical knowl-
edge in order to express meaning, and in which the intention is to convey meaning rather than to manipulate
form. (2004, 4)
Drawing on Skehan’s (1998) work, Ellis (2009) provides the following criteria for a task:
1. The primary focus should be on ‘meaning’ (by which is meant that learners should be mainly con-
cerned with processing the semantic and pragmatic meaning of utterances).
2. There should be some kind of ‘gap’ (i.e. a need to convey information, to express an opinion or to
infer meaning).
3. Learners should largely have to rely on their own resources (linguistic and non-linguistic) in order
to complete the activity.
116 J. HARPER AND H. P. WIDODO
4. There is a clearly defined outcome other than the use of language (i.e. the language serves as the
means for achieving the outcome, not as an end in its own right) (223; see also Ellis 2011, 212;
Richards 2001; Widodo 2012).
Clearly, the authors coincide in the view that tasks require a focus on meaning. Such a view, inci-
dentally, does not necessarily rule out a focus on form but rather suggests that, if learners’ ‘natural
language learning capacity’ is to be ‘nurtured,’ a focus on meaning must be given priority (Ellis
2009, 222; see also Ellis 2005; Nation 2007). Another essential component of tasks is the presence
of a clearly defined non-linguistic outcome (Andon and Eckerth 2009; Lin and Wu 2012). This
focus on outcomes, however, does not overlook the processes in which learners engage in order
to reach a desired outcome. As Nunan (2004) points out, TBLT takes in large part from experiential
learning, an approach which prioritizes ‘process rather than product’ (12). Hence, while tasks ask lear-
ners to reach a particular goal, they also emphasize ‘interactional processes … that arise in naturally
occurring language use’ along the path toward goal attainment (Ellis 2009, 227). Finally, in complet-
ing a task, learners are expected to make good use of ‘their own resources.’ Granted, through listen-
ing and/or reading activities, teachers may help to provide learners with some of the linguistic
resources necessary for task completion (see Ellis 2003, 2009; Foster 2009; Nunan 1991), yet task com-
pletion will not be possible simply through the use of recycled language (Andon and Eckerth 2009).
Literature review
Ellis (2011) makes the distinction between macro-evaluations and micro-evaluations of TBLT. A macro-
evaluation is one that investigates how well a program/project has met its goals and/or how a
program/project may be improved. Such studies, according to Ellis, are ‘carried out for accountability
and/or developmental purposes’ (215). A micro-evaluation, on the other hand, consists of ‘a narrow
focus on some specific aspect of the curriculum or the administration of the programme’ (Ellis, 2011,
216). Ellis goes on to note that issues tackled in a macro-evaluation (e.g. issues related to materials,
teachers, learners) may also be the focus of a micro-evaluation. A macro-evaluation of the materials of
a course might be narrowed down to a study of how effective and efficient a given task is (Ellis 2011).
Micro-evaluations, then, are of value in that they may provide information for macro-evaluations.
Additionally, such evaluations may aid in what Kumaravadivelu (2001) refers to as a ‘pedagogy of par-
ticularity’ – that is, to a teacher’s taking a closer look at problems and then looking for solutions to
those problems.
Macro-evaluation of TBLT
A number of macro-evaluations of TBLT-based programs have been carried out (e.g. Andon and
Eckerth 2009; Gatbonton and Gu 1994; Jeon and Hahn 2006; Lin and Wu 2012; Prabhu 1987; Pyun
2013). These studies deal with a variety of issues relevant to the furthering of a TBLT-based curricu-
lum. In a discussion focused on perceptual mismatches in TBLT-oriented classrooms, however, the
work of Carless (2003, 2004), Watson Todd (2006), and McDonough and Chaikitmongkol (2007)
would seem to merit special consideration.
Carless (2003) reported case studies of three primary school teachers in Hong Kong. While the tea-
chers were asked to implement a task-based curriculum, they were not involved in the design of the
curriculum or of the tasks included in it and hence encountered difficulties that the designers had not
foreseen. Also, tasks did not always appear to fit students’ interests – perhaps because the ‘perspec-
tives’ of the students ‘were not a focus’ (Carless 2004, 645). Perceptual mismatches would thus seem
to have resulted from the lack of inclusion of the ‘active participants in the classroom drama’ in the
design process (Nunan 1996, 53). Watson Todd (2006) examined a TBLT-based project in Thailand in
which teachers’ opinions were the driving force behind a movement from a ‘strong’ version of TBLT to
a ‘weak’ version (see Skehan 1996). The author acknowledges, however, that the lack of student input
INNOVATION IN LANGUAGE LEARNING AND TEACHING 117
was a drawback in ongoing curriculum revision. McDonough and Chaikitmongkol (2007) investigated
an all-inclusive curriculum design project carried out at Chiang Mai University (Thailand). The teachers
designed the course. Tasks were designed around students’ real-world interests. Data for the study
included the opinions of both teachers and students. Perceptual mismatches between curriculum
designers and teachers were non-existent since the teachers were the curriculum designers; percep-
tual mismatches between teachers and students were identified through the research method.
In short, the findings of the studies discussed above would seem to reveal that, in the implemen-
tation of an innovation (in these cases, a TBLT approach), the learner cannot be ‘left standing in the
wings’ (Nunan 1988, 88). Of particular relevance to the present study is the finding that TBLT
methods, in spite of some opinions to the contrary (see summary in Butler 2011), do not stand out
as being inappropriate within an Asian context. Ultimately, students need to have the chance to
understand an approach before they can benefit from it (see Cheng 2000; Kim, Jung, and Tracy-
Ventura 2017).
The study
The present classroom-based study investigates the micro-evaluation of TBLT materials. It took place
at the English Language Center (ELC) of Shantou University (Guangdong Province, China) during the
Spring Semester of 2017. As one goal of the study was to look into mismatches between the instruc-
tor’s stated purpose of the lesson and the students’ perception of the purpose of the lesson, the
instructor (one of the authors of this article) first described his goals for the lesson (see Appendix 1).
As another goal of the study was to investigate the ways in which classroom dynamics (i.e. the inter-
play among instructor, students, and materials) might lead to results different from those originally
intended, the entire lesson was observed by an external observer (EO) (a member of the ELC not
affiliated with the course in any way) who documented his thoughts concerning lesson purpose
118 J. HARPER AND H. P. WIDODO
(see Appendix 2). On the day of the lesson, tasks carried out with students working collaboratively
were recorded.
The research questions that guided the study were the following:
(1) What perceptual mismatches might exist between the instructor’s original learning goals for TBLT
materials and the students’ interpretation of the ‘materials-in-action’?
(2) How might classroom dynamics (teacher–student and student–student interactions) add to or
take away from the pre-established learning goals of TBLT materials?
Institutional context
As mentioned previously, the study reported here was carried out at the ELC of Shantou University, a
key provincial university in Guangdong Province, China. The ELC offers a four-level, four-semester
required program for all non-English majors. Classes meet twice a week for 90 minutes each time;
students earn a total of 16 credit hours. The principle of integrated skills is present throughout the
entire program. In keeping with the College English Curriculum Requirements of 2007 set by the
Chinese Ministry of Education, the ELC has established the Five Golden Rules of English Learning: profi-
ciency, autonomy, sustainability, intercultural communication, and critical thinking skills.
Within this framework lies the Global Law English (hereafter, GLE) Program, the program within
which the present study was conducted. The GLE Program, as the name suggests, is geared
toward students of International Law. For these students, the program replaces normal ELC require-
ments. Like the General English Program, GLE consists of four-levels (and hence four semesters), and
students earn 16 credit hours. A focus on integrated skills is still present, and the Golden Rules still
apply. The biggest differences between the GLE Program and the General English Program lie in
course content and syllabus design. As not all students of GLE intend to become lawyers (see
below), the content of GLE courses maintains some aspects of General English (GE), with law-
related matters being tied to General English themes. Hence, a topic such as work eventually leads
to a lesson based on a gender discrimination case, and a topic such as sports eventually leads to a
lesson dealing with the legal considerations surrounding sports doping. These law-related lessons
are taught through interactive, cooperative tasks. Such tasks, by encouraging students to make
use of prior knowledge, to negotiate meaning in group work, and to go through the process of reach-
ing a group decision, should aid students in their future endeavors regardless of their final choice of
profession (see Dovey 2006).
Participants
The participants in the study were students of Global Law English 2 (GLE-2) at Shantou University. All
participants were second-semester freshmen who had studied together in their previous English
class (i.e. GLE-1) and who typically studied together in many, though not all, of their major
courses. As a major in International Law requires a relatively high score on the Chinese College
Entrance Exam (gaokao), and as it also gives special importance to the English requirement of the
exam, students of GLE-2, though not above the high-intermediate level, tend to have a slightly
higher level of English proficiency than do most other second-semester freshmen at Shantou Univer-
sity. On an IELTS-based placement exam, for example, GLE-2 students scored, on average, 4.85 while
the university average was 4.33 (a 12% difference). It should be noted, however, that 11 of the 30 GLE-
2 students scored from 5.5 to 6.5 on the same exam. In short, the results reveal that GLE-2 students,
regardless of having a slightly higher-than-average level of English proficiency within the institutional
context, still need a substantial amount of training in order to reach a high level of proficiency in inter-
national terms.
It is precisely due to scores on the Chinese College Entrance Exam that students of GLE-2 may
have chosen their major. A GLE-1 during-course needs analysis of the same students revealed
INNOVATION IN LANGUAGE LEARNING AND TEACHING 119
that only two members of the class felt certain that the profession of law was in their career path.
Though all 30 students of the class signed a consent form in which they agreed to have the
lesson observed and evaluated, one happened to be absent on the day of the micro-evaluation;
one requested not to complete a post-lesson questionnaire; and one simply forgot to submit the
questionnaire. Finally, then, though 29 students participated in the study, only 27 submitted
questionnaires. Of the 29 students present on the day of the evaluation, 24 were females and
five were males.
The lesson
The subject of this micro-evaluation was a TBLT-based law lesson. As the textbook unit focused on
animals, the lesson revolved around a legal case in which an American family attempted to adopt
a pot-bellied pig as a pet even though doing so was against a city ordinance. The lesson began
with three schema-building tasks (see Nunan 2004). First, students worked in small groups to
choose from a short list of possible pets the one that they would most likely choose and the one
that they would least likely choose. This warm-up task was followed by a reading of the legal case
and group work calling for students to piece together the facts of the case. Next came a listening
task in which students, after listening to an authentic video, worked in groups to identify some of
the advantages and disadvantages of raising a pot-bellied pig. The reading and listening tasks
were both intended to provide students not only with the context of the main task but also with lin-
guistic resources necessary for its completion.
The main task of the lesson, The Board Meeting, consisted of a simulation in which students, acting
as members of the city council, needed to use the skills of negotiation, persuasion, and compromise
in order to decide whether or not the family would in fact be able to adopt a pot-bellied pig. Students,
working in pairs, were asked to prepare arguments for both sides of the case (to amend or not to
amend the city ordinance). After eight minutes of preparation time, pairs were assigned positions
in the case, and pairs were combined so that those in favor of amending the city ordinance joined
those who were against amending the city ordinance. Negotiation ensued in what was essentially
a debate. When a one-minute warning was given, groups needed to reach some sort of agreement.
Ultimately, all the in-class discussion and focus group discussion (FGD) data were qualitatively
classified, coded, and analyzed through a micro-textual lens. In this analysis, we identified themes
and made meaning of them. We used lexical choices to assign meanings to the data. For focused
data analysis, we reduced sets of data in order to look at relevant data representing our research
questions. After close textual examination, two emergent themes of the data were identified, with
both being related to the instructor and the students’ perceptions of the lesson. These themes
were (1) learning goals and task design and (2) focus on meaning and negotiation of meaning
(with incidental focus on form).
Excerpt #1: students discussing the best or the worst pet (in-class discussion #1, 19 May 2017)
Clearly, the students’ emphasis in this segment is on meaning. S2 (Line 1) feels that the snake
is the worst pet. S1, on the other hand, does her best to turn the conversation to the undesir-
able nature of pigs as pets, a point which she accentuates with the phrase ‘No, no, no, no’
(Line 5). Not quite satisfied, S2 throws in a challenge (see Line 6). But since his point is not
understood, negotiation of meaning takes place in Lines 6–8, with S2 resorting to a very
careful paraphrase of his sentence in Line 6. S2’s paraphrase indicates the type of ‘interac-
tional modifications’ that provide learners with ‘opportunities to modify and restructure
their interaction with their interlocutors until mutual comprehension is reached’ (Kumaravadi-
velu 1994, 34).
Incidentally, although the questionnaire revealed a general agreement that the lesson focused
more on meaning and less on form, and although transcripts from the lesson and from focus
group interviews appeared to support this finding, not all members of the focus group believed
that such a focus should be the case. When the EO elicited opinions concerning the warm-up activity,
the following exchange took place:
1) EXTERNAL OBSERVER (EO): So … what do you think? So … did you focus on meaning (ideas) or
language or both?
2) S1: I focus more on meaning … yes.
3) EO: Yes. Why?
4) S1: I pay more attention to my oral speaking. I think language is just a kind of tool to make
people understand us.
5) EO: As long as your classmates understand you, that’s OK.
6) S1: Yes. I don’t … I don’t pay much attention to grammar.
7) S2: Yeah.
8) EO: And how about you, Tracy.
9) S3: I focus more on meaning. And if you focus on vocabulary, or grammar, or pronunciation, I
think the communication will be less (laughs).
10) EO: Break down.
11) S4: And I think much about pronunciation because I think if you pronounce the word for the … .
12) EO: Wow. That’s very interesting.
13) S4: Well … or better, it can be understand your meaning in the sentence more. But if you have
bad pronunciation, maybe I don’t want to listen to what you say.
(laughter from S1–S3)
122 J. HARPER AND H. P. WIDODO
1) S: If I don’t take a class, I will prefer to say that the topic of ideal pet is not worth discussion
because … .
2) EO: Why?
3) S: Because … uhmm … for many people … uhmm … what called ideal is different … and I can’t
find a suitable word to describe what kind of pet is ideal for me.
1) EO: How much did you enjoy oral summary? Because … uhh … does [the instructor] always ask
you to do oral summary?
2) S1–S3: Yes.
3) EO: Do you like it?
4) S1 [same student who commented on ideal pet]: I don’t like oral summary.
5) EO: Why?
6) S1: Because it is hard for me to summarize. It is not that … uhh … . I think it’s too long … it’s so
long that you ask me to summarize it in a few words … I think … oh, my God … it’s too hard. But
… uhh … summary maybe can make me more clear about the main point … .
484). Yet another interpretation may lie in a lack of tolerance for ambiguity, a built-in feature of the
process focus of experiential learning (see Kolb and Kolb 2005). The student in question is not com-
fortable with the ambiguous nature of the term ideal (see Excerpt #3), nor is she comfortable working
with her fellow group members to piece together the main points of a reading text through a process
that calls for some uncertainty (see Excerpt #4). Viewed from this perspective, the learner’s skepticism
concerning activities with gaps may reflect inadequate training in the skill of adopting ‘a flexible
approach to learning’ (Ellis 2005, 220).
Ultimately, S4’s apparent lack of enthusiasm for the given tasks could be explained through a
simple law of averages. Not all students will be engaged with every learning task (see Lee 2015; Tom-
linson 2013a). However, as Tomlinson (2011) points out, the designer of materials (and, by extension,
of lessons based on those materials) ‘needs to know as much as possible about the target learners
and about what is likely to attract their attention’ (8–9) (see Widodo 2015b). Logically, then, Excerpts
#3 and #4 would seem to reveal not only that S4 lacks training in regard to experiential learning
approaches but also that her own preferred learning style and her particular orientation toward
language study (e.g. correctness-oriented, fluency-oriented, etc.) have not been adequately taken
into account (see Karabuga 2015; Lee 2015; Skehan 2002).
form, came to the forefront when spontaneity was critical. Such was the case during the debate phase
of the lesson – as the following excerpt will reveal:
S1, S3 (SIDE A: Amend the ordinance and let the Schuiling family keep the pig.)
S2, S4, S5 (SIDE B: Do not amend the ordinance and do not let the Schuiling family keep the pig.)
Excerpt #6: board meeting members (in-class discussion #3, 19 May 2017)
The striking aspect of this exchange, compared to those in other extracts, is the complete absence of
negotiation of meaning and focus on form, and it should be noted that all of the recorded Board
Meeting debates of the lesson followed a similar pattern. Granted, the extract above does show
one instance of self-correction (hence, a focus on form). S4 (Line 16) uses the term audience
instead of ordinance. Following suit, S1 (Line 17) first uses the word audience but later self-corrects
and pronounces the term ordinance. This one instance suggests that the students involved in the
exchange are not necessarily oblivious to language form but are simply more interested in driving
home their meanings in order to gain an advantage in the debate. In other words, the nature of
the task seems to call for the putting aside of other aspects of language learning in order to give pre-
ference to a pure focus on meaning.
As the Board Meeting served as the main task of the lesson, it might be said to fall into what Nation
(2007) refers to as the fluency development strand of language learning. By the time of the debate,
learners had already become familiar with vocabulary which, beforehand, might have been
unknown to them (e.g. amend, ordinance). Also, the topic of pets had been discussed during all of
the preceding activities, and the topic of pig ownership had been at the center of the reading
task, the listening task, and the pre-task preparation for the Board Meeting. Viewed in such a light,
the main task would appear to have led learners to make use of newly acquired knowledge and
126 J. HARPER AND H. P. WIDODO
to put into practice the previously existing components of their respective linguistic repertoires. In
other words, the urgency called for in the debate, along with the students’ familiarity with debate
content, created a situation in which the main task naturally became a fluency activity.
Pedagogical implications
Our findings have three pedagogical implications: (1) learning goals as a shared vision, (2) task design
as the optimization of student engagement, and (3) negotiation of meaning as knowledge co-con-
struction. To begin with, it is important for teachers and students to negotiate learning goals as a
shared vision. This shared vision can build learning ownership because students are entrusted to
make a decision on what, how, and why to learn (Dörnyei and Kubanyiova 2013). For this reason,
in the implementation of task-based learning goals, teachers can spell out their expectations at
the beginning of the class, and they can encourage students to voice their interests and needs.
Because both teachers and students play a crucial role in policing classroom agendas, such as
materials, shared visions need to be negotiated as an articulated classroom policy (Widodo 2017).
Secondly, teachers are task designers who are responsible for maximizing student learning experi-
ence and for fostering student engagement in different learning tasks. In our finding, one of the par-
ticipants was concerned about the task of oral summary as a cognitively and linguistically demanding
task. This suggests a pre-task cycle, which puts emphasis on providing students with sufficient lin-
guistic resources as they engage in the actual task. Moreover, our findings showed that most of
the students enjoyed having in-class discussion in that they thought a discussion task as a learning
platform for enriching their linguistic resources and knowledge because they could learn from each
other. In other words, task design plays a pivotal role in optimizing students’ engagement inside and
outside of the classroom.
Lastly, task-based learning activities create a negotiation of meaning because such negotiation is
part of knowledge co-construction between teacher and students and students and their peers or
discussion partners. In this negotiation of meaning, our findings revealed that, to some extent, stu-
dents focused on incidental form because of communication breakdown. This indicates that linguistic
resources, such as vocabulary, grammar, and pronunciation, are a catalyst for knowledge co-construc-
tion or knowledge sharing. For this reason, balancing form-focused learning tasks and meaning-
focused learning tasks is badly needed inasmuch as both content and language are always inte-
grated. For example, when students discuss the ideal pet as content knowledge, they need
sufficient linguistic resources such as lexis or vocabulary to communicate that content knowledge.
Conclusion
This article has presented a classroom-based study on a TBLT-based English lesson in which general
English and Global Law English were integrated. In this article, as our findings showed, learning goals
and task design and focus on meaning and negotiation of meaning with incidental focus on form
were two salient issues in the task-based language lesson. Nevertheless, one student did not seem
to value the ideal pet as a preferred topic or oral summary as a task because of a lack of linguistic
resources (see the discussion of the ideal pet) and required skills such as paraphrasing (for oral
summary). Additionally, when students were engaged in group discussion tasks, they were con-
cerned with language accuracy (e.g. grammar and pronunciation). This is because the students felt
that linguistic resources (e.g. a form-focused task) played an important role in the construction of
meaning so that meaning was easily understood. The majority of students were concerned about
meaning, a necessary component of the TBLT-based lesson. A full completion of the lesson,
however, would have required additional steps in the task cycle: (1) an addressing of ‘problems’
that learners faced during task completion and (2) an attempt at dealing with these ‘problems’
through post-task activities. Logically, if such steps had been taken, and if the norms of task
implementation throughout the course had led learners to expect these additional steps, those
INNOVATION IN LANGUAGE LEARNING AND TEACHING 127
students who emphasized form over meaning in the during-task phase of the lesson would have
been more likely to direct their attention toward meaning while completing the task itself. The carry-
ing out of these steps would no doubt have called for an adjustment in time allocation. Needless to
say, the classroom teacher and course designer will need to consider such adjustments in other TBLT-
based lessons within the same course. Hence, the micro-evaluation discussed here reveals that a
close study of a particular lesson (i.e. of one piece of many in the entirety of a course) may effectively
serve as a means of addressing issues that may relate to the course as a whole.
Disclosure statement
No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.
Notes on contributors
John Harper is a Senior Lecturer and Associate Director of the English Language Center of Shantou University. He has
been involved in the ELT field for some 25 years. During that time, he has worked in Colombia, Taiwan, Peru, Mexico,
and China. He has been involved in curriculum and assessment design in each country. Harper’s particular interests in
ELT are English for Specific Purposes, motivation, curriculum and materials design, and assessment.
Handoyo Puji Widodo has taught English in China, Indonesia, and the USA. His areas of specialization include language
teaching methodology, language curriculum and materials development, systemic functional linguistics (SFL) in
language education, and teacher professional development. His work has been grounded in socio-semiotic, socio-cog-
nitive, sociocultural, and critical theories of language pedagogies.
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Appendices
Appendix 1. Instructor goals
INNOVATION IN LANGUAGE LEARNING AND TEACHING 131
In general, the students were actively involved in a variety of learning tasks that encouraged them to engage in a
negotiation of meaning although they discussed the use of language incidentally to some extent.
132 J. HARPER AND H. P. WIDODO