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7 - From Needs Analysis to Task Selection, Design, and Sequencing

from Part III - The Task Syllabus and Materials

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  19 November 2021

By
Roger Gilabert  and
Aleksandra Malicka
Edited by
Mohammad Javad Ahmadian  and
Michael H. Long
Mohammad Javad Ahmadian
Affiliation:
University of Leeds
Michael H. Long
Affiliation:
University of Maryland, College Park
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Summary

Needs analysis has been proposed as a professional inquiry into second language learner needs that should inform task and syllabus design. These two areas, however, have been studied separately. We focus on the interface between learners’ needs and our macro and micro decisions during task and syllabus design. Needs analysis and its dimensions are defined by addressing important theoretical and methodological issues. We relate then relate needs analysis to the issue of how it may aid the highly complex decision regarding how tasks may be selected. We also inspect how needs analysis may directly and indirectly inform task design. Finally, we address the issue of how task sequencing may also be aided by needs analysis.

Keywords

needs analysisinterface between NA and task designtask selectiontask designtask sequencing.
Type
Chapter
Information
The Cambridge Handbook of Task-Based Language Teaching , pp. 226 - 249
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2021

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References

Further Reading

Baralt, M., Gilabert, R., and Robinson, P. (2014), eds. Task sequencing and instructed second language learning. London: Bloomsbury Academic.Google Scholar
Gilabert, R. (2005). Evaluating the use of multiple sources and methods in needs analysis: A case study of journalists in the Autonomous Community of Catalonia (Spain). In Long, M. H., ed. Second language needs analysis. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, pp. 182–99.Google Scholar
Gilabert, R. and Castellví, J. (2019). Task and Syllabus Design for Morphologically Complex Languages. In Schwieter, J. and Benati, A., eds. The Cambridge handbook of language learning. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, pp. 527–49.Google Scholar
González-Lloret, M. (2014). The need for needs analysis in technology-mediated TBLT. In González-Lloret, M. and Ortega, L., eds. Task-based language teaching. Vol. 6. Amsterdam: John Benjamins, pp. 23–50.Google Scholar
Long, M.H. (2005). Second language needs analysis. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Malicka, A., Gilabert, R., and Norris, J. M. (2017). From needs analysis to task design: Insights from an English for specific purposes context. Language Teaching Research, 23(1), 78–106.Google Scholar
Malicka, A. (2018). The role of task sequencing in fluency, accuracy, and complexity: Investigating the SSARC model of pedagogic task sequencing. Language Teaching Research, 24(5), 642–65.Google Scholar

References

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