TASK, CONTENT AND PROJECT BASED INSTRUCTIONS IN TEACHING FIELD

Presented by: OMAR CRUZ CULLAR HORASIS TORO VARGAS

UNIVERSIDAD DE LA AMAZONIA EDUCATION FACULTY ENGLISH DEGREE PROGRAM FLORENCIA-CAQUET 2012

TASK, CONTENT AND PROJECT BASED INSTRUCTION: A NEED IN THE TEACHING FIELD

In the teaching field, there are many ways to teach something. These ways are called methodologies or approaches and each one of these approaches has its own strategies in order to work in a proper way. Nowadays there are three new methodologies that are causing a good impression among people related in teaching science; these methods are the task based instruction, content based instruction and project based instruction. It seems that these methodologies mix everything a learner needs in order to learn accurately and using his four skills at the same time, writing, listening, reading and speaking, involving the four skills in a methodology is the best strategy and these new methodologies absolutely mix them all. Some researchers have determined that the based instructions are not the best methods to implement because it is decontextualized and are useless. Several researches supports accurately the hypothesis, one of the main features of based instructions is to work in groups in order to enhance the communicative skills. According to Vigotsky, cooperative or collaborative learning stimulates the motivation in learners increasing the learning process interests in learners; therefore, working in groups allows students to learn from their more skilled classmates. This is also useful because between learners they correct each other mistakes made during their performance while using the four English skills. Working in groups also increases the affective learning and create self-confidence in learners enhancing the learning process. Working in groups reduces the affective filter between learners-learners and learners-teachers. In a class where the teacher is always pushing students to do some activity or exercise, the motivation level in them is going to be excessively low, it completely harms the students motivation. According to Stephen Krashen, there are three variables in the second language learning; motivation, self-confidence and anxiety. Krashen claims that learners with high motivation, self-confidence, a good self-image, and a low level of anxiety are better equipped for success in second language acquisition. Low motivation, low self-esteem, and debilitating anxiety can combine to 'raise' the affective filter and form a 'mental block' that prevents comprehensible input from being used for acquisition. In other words, when the filter is 'up' it impedes language acquisition. . On the other hand, positive affect is necessary, but not sufficient on its own, for

acquisition to take place. So we as teachers, gave the students the enough arguments of why learning is very important, we tell them the disadvantages of stop learning , so they can choose by themselves to work and participate on it just because they want to and not because we as teachers are forcing them to do so. In order to decrease the affective teacher argued by Krashen, we as teachers should be less mandatory and authoritarian with learners. Let them know and feel our wishes which are that they learn and for instance, they will work feeling supported by the teacher. The most important is that students participate in the activities planned by the teacher voluntarily. Krashens affective filter has some disadvantages, one of them is that maybe students misunderstand the role of the teacher and start messing around, in that case the teacher has to raise the filter again in order to clarify some concepts in learners; this strategy is a good one and is perfectly adaptable to any context. One of the main advantages of based instructions is that they can work properly in every context or can be adaptable to any existing situation. In the teaching field there are some methodologies that cannot be adapted, fortunately based instructions can. It does not matter the learners social, ethnical, religious, politic, cultural or economical condition. That is the strongest point of using based instructions in teaching field and we as teachers must definitely apply them and keep raising our theorical knowledge in order to put it into practice and improve our performance as second language teachers. We must also be always be studying in order to improve our teaching skills and methodologies. As conclusion, even using the based instructions does not guarantee that learners are going to learn, it depends in a 100% in the teachers ability to teach and to make himself be understood by learners. The teaching simplicity depends in the teacher creativity.

REFERENCES

Stephen Krashen (University of Southern California.) Expert in the field of linguistics, specialized in theories of language acquisition and developer of the Affective Filter hypothesis.

Lev Semyonov Vigotsky, reciprocal teaching, cooperative or collaborative learning (1978).