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making task.
Look at
a set
of advertisements and decide on the most
suitable place to rent.
b. Task Grading, Sequencing, and Integrating
Grading and sequencing tasks is necessary to help students feel at ease learning the tasks. It is not an easy process for it is not only the matter of sequence
tasks from simple to complex. A task developerdesigner has to take some considerations into account. This process will affect the order in which words,
words meanings, tenses, structures, topics, functions, skills, etc, are presented. Gradation can be done based on the complexity of an item, its frequency in
spoken or written English, and its importance for the learners Richards, Platt, and Weber, 1986, in Nunan, 2004.
Nunan 2004 summarizes the principles that are underlying on the instructional sequence outline above into:
Principle 1 scaffolding Lesson and materials should provide supporting framework within which
learning process takes place. Principle 2 task dependency
Within a lesson, one task should grow out of, and build upon the ones that have gone before.
Principle 3 recycling Repeating reintroducing language maximizes opportunities for learning
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Principle 4 active learning Learners learn best through doing- through actively constructing their own
knowledge rather than having it transmitted to them by their teacher. Principle 5 integration
Pedagogy should make explicit relationship between form, function, and meaning to the learners
Principle 6 reproduction to creation Learners should be encouraged to move from reproductive to creative language
use Principle 7 reflection
Learners should be given opportunities to reflect on what they have learned and how well they are doing.
c. Task Continuity
Nunan 2004 defines task continuity as the interdependence of tasks, tasks components, and supporting enabling skills within an instructional sequence.
There is an approach namely ‘psycholinguistic processing’ which reveals sequences tasks according to the cognitive and performance demands made upon
the learner. The steps of three phases require the learners to do activities which increasingly demanding, moving from comprehension-based procedures to
controlled production activities and exercises, and finally to require authentic communicative interactive.
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Table 2.3: The Ten Step Sequence of Psycholinguistic Approach Nunan, 2004:126
Phase Steps within phase
A. Processing comprehension 1. Read or study a text, no other
response required 2. Read and listen to a text and give
a non-verbal, physical response e.g. learner raise hand every
time key words are heard
3. Read or listen to a text and give a
non-physical, non-verbal
response e.g. check-off a box or grid every time key words are
heard
4. Read or listen to a text and give a verbal response e.g. write
down key words every time they are heard
B. Productive 5. Listen to cue utterances, or
dialogue fragments and repeat them,
or repeat
a complete
version of the cue 6. Listen to a cue and complete a
substitution or
transformation drill
7. Listen to a cue e.g. question and give a meaningful response
i.e. one that is true for the learner
C. Interactive 8. Role play e.g. having listened to
a conversation in which people talk about their family, students,
working from
role cards,
circulate, and
find other
members of their family 9. Simulationdiscussion
e.g. students in small groups share
information about
their own
families 10. Problem-solvinginformation gap
e.g. in an information-gap tasks, students are split into three
groups; each group listens to an incomplete
description of
a
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family; students recombine and have to complete a family tree,
identify which picture from a number of alternatives represents
the family, etc
d. Within Task Sequencing
Nunan 2004 sets out the standard of dividing any mini sequence into three phases; a pre-task, a task-proper phase, and a follow-up phase.
Pre-task phase: the teacher opens the lesson, orients the learners into the topic and rehearses essential language that will be required to complete the task. Pre-
task phase can be conducted by asking the students about the weather, for example, then lead them to the topic weather.
Task-proper phase: in this phase the students undertake the task. They may be grouped in three or four to discuss the task,
Follow-up phase: the students get a briefing from the teacher, they report the tasks, and get feedback from the teacher. In this phase the teacher also can pre-
orient the students into the next topic in the next cycle by asking the students, for example, reading the text in unit 2.
7. Task Development a. Definition of Task
A textbook usually consists of a number of units; a unit consists of a number of tasks. There are several definitions of tasks according to some experts.
Nunan 2004:4 defines task as a piece of classroom work which involves learners
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