SYLLABUS DESIGN AS AN

ELEMENT OF CURRICULUM

DEFINITION

At its simplest level a syllabus can be described as a statement of what is to be learnt. It reflects language and linguistic performance. (Hutchinson and Waters (1987:80) The syllabus is "... that subpart of curriculum which is concerned with a specification of what units will be taught." (Allen 1984:61)

A syllabus is a "a pre planned, preordained, pre sequenced inventory of linguistic specifications imposed in most cases on teachers and learners" and ....... this is a "widely recognized" perspective (Kumaravadivelu 1993: 72)

 syllabus

is simply an outline and time line of a particular course. It will typically give a brief overview of the course objectives, course expectations, list reading assignments, homework deadlines, and exam dates. It is typically available on the first day of a college course, and a student is expected to know what is in the syllabus throughout the course. The purpose of the syllabus is to allow the student to work their schedule for their own maximum efficiency and effectiveness. It helps to avoid conflicts with other courses, and it prevents someone from accusing a professor of unfairly adding assignments in mid-term.

Principles of a Syllabus design

This is the 'content' of the programme or unit; the topics, issues or subjects that will be covered as it proceeds. In selecting content for inclusion, you should bear the following principles in mind: a) It should be relevant to the outcomes of the curriculum. An effective curriculum is purposive, clearly focused on the planned learning outcomes. The inclusion of irrelevant topics, however interesting in themselves, acts as a distraction and may confuse students.

b) It should be appropriate to the level of the programme or unit. An effective curriculum is progressive, leading students onward and building on what has gone before. Material which is too basic or too advanced for their current stage makes students either bored or baffled, and erodes their motivation to learn. c) It should be up to date and, if possible, should reflect current research. In some disciplines it is difficult to achieve the latter until students reach postgraduate level, but in many it is possible for even first year undergraduates to be made aware of current research topics

TYPES OF SYLLABUS
Two

umbrella terms with further sub divisions

Product oriented syllabus Process oriented syllabus

 In

Product-oriented syllabi what is focalised is what the learners will know as a result and at the end of the instruction session. They are straightforward in the sense that what is taught/ presented (language content ) is what is intended to be learnt ( language product). Such syllabi typically include a selection of graded linguistic items to be 'learnt' by the learners.

 In

Process-oriented syllabi on the other hand, the focal point is the pedagogic processes leading to the language outcome which, though anticipated, it is all too often not predetermined and even unexpected.

PRODUCT ORIENTED SYLLABUS

Grammatical-Structural: One of the most common types of syllabus. The content of language teaching is a collection of graded complexity forms and structures of the target language. Grammatical linguistic items are presented in sequence and are supposedly learnt by the learners before moving on to the next one. Examples include nouns, verbs, adjectives, statements, questions, subordinate clauses, and so on.

This is a book / pencil etc. That is a bag / pen ..etc. These are books / pencils ..etc. Those are bags / pens .etc. Is this .? Yes, it is.

Is that ..? No, it isnt. The criteria of selecting the items of grammatical/structural syllabus are frequency of the items, their simplicity, learnability and teachability.

DISADVANTAGES
misrepresents the complex phenomenon: Language not only can 1 form realise more than 1 function, but 1 function can be realised by more than 1 form = complex to design syllabus. students. acquire gram. items in a particular order (inbuilt syllabus) assumes learners should be grouped according to stage of grammar proficiency, and that theyll all progress uniformly learners need to use certain lang. structures almost immediately (e.g. Wh. questions.) learners need exposure to different contexts and over an extended period of time, not only when the items become learnable lang. acquisition is more global than a linear process

Lexical: A lexical syllabus uses vocabulary as the building blocks. Teaching is organised round high frequency vocabulary and phrases from language in use to build up broadened vocabulary areas.
A

list of lexis, chunks, collocations or short sentences to be learned

DISADVANTAGES
Words

of high frequencies are usually low in information and content, like the, of, and. commonest chunks are only appropriate for the low level learners. pre-set list of lexis has some restrictive effect on the choice of topics.

The

The

Functional-Situational-Notional

The language content is a collection of the functions that are performed when language is used, or of the notions that language is used to express. Examples of functions include: agreeing, apologizing, requesting etc; examples of notions include size, age, colour, and so on.

The primary purpose of a situational language teaching syllabus is to teach the language that occurs in real situations. The language occurring in the situation involves a number of functions. Examples of situations include: seeing the dentist, making an appointment, buying clothes, meeting people at a party and so on. It was suggested by Finocchiaro and Brumfit that this type of syllabus placed 'the students and their communicative purposes at the centre of the curriculum'. (Nunan 1988)

THE NOTIONAL-FUNCTIONAL SYLLABUS

UNIT 1 NOTIONS AND FUNCTIONS - Introducing your family - Expressing possession EXPONENTS - This is my ... - What's your father's name? - My father's name is...

- Expressing existence - Counting

- What is there in your bag? - There's a... - There are... - Numbers: 1-20

DISADVANTAGES
The

grading of functional items becomes much more complex (is apologising easier than requesting?) Simply a change of label (instead of learning the simple past, learners might now be required to talk about the things you did last weekend) Dress-rehearsal methodology (replicate in class real communication) has a danger: students may not be able to transfer what theyve learned to new situations but will only be able to perform in the limited situations which theyve rehearsed Will be limited for students whose needs were not encompassed by the situations in the syllabus

PROCESS ORIENTED SYLLABUS

A Task-based syllabus is designed round a sequence of purposeful tasks which learners have to carry out in the classroom, with emphasis being placed on the communication of meaning. Even though the primary purpose of the tasks is other than language learning, language competence is developed nonetheless, through the very process of performing the task.

Examples of activities that provide learners with the skills necessary for successful communication in real (or real-like) life situations are: asking for information, checking understanding, making a decision, writing a poem and so on. Again there seem to be no strict control of or limits on the discourse that may occur. It should be noted that the difference between situation and taskbased teaching lies in that whereas the former emphasises on a specific language content intended to be a specific predetermined language product, in the latter the focus is on the process of doing things, the language used being not only the secondary purpose of the tasks but often un planned, too. A task is an activity or action which is carried out with meaningful language

e.g. filling in a form, writing down telephone messages, writing letters and postcards to friends,

DISADVANTAGES:
The

tasks must be suitable for the language learners not too difficult and not too simple, so in this case how to make a balance about these two tendencies comes ambiguously.

Aspects of task difficulty should be considered so that task implementation can have a positive effect on learning and teaching. But it is too difficult to cover all aspects thoroughly.

skill-based syllabus. skill-

The primary purpose of skill-based instruction is to teach the specific language skill that may be useful or necessary in using language. Skills are things that people must be able to do to be competent in a language. Unlike situational syllabi where functions are grouped together into specific language use settings, skill-based syllabi group linguistic competencies (pronunciation, vocabulary, grammar and discourse) together into generalised types of behaviour, such as listening to spoken language for the main idea, writing well-formed paragraphs, specific purpose writing, and so forth.

contentcontent- based syllabus. In a syllabus of this

type the primary purpose of instruction is to teach some content or information using the language that the students are also learning. The subject matter is primary, and language learning occurs incidentally to the content learning. Task-based and content-based teaching converge in that in both language learning being the secondary purpose is only indirectly achieved. They are different, however, in that content based language teaching is concerned with information (other than the language itself), while task-based teaching is concerned with communicative processes (in the target language). Cross-curricular lessons and activities are practical examples of content-based teaching

THE PROPORTIONAL APPROACH

The proportional syllabus basically attempts to develop an "overall competence". It consists of a number of elements with theme playing a linking role through the units. This theme is designated by the learners. It is expected initially that form will be of central value, but later, the focus will veer towards interactional components ; the syllabus is designed to be dynamic, not static, with ample opportunity for feedback and flexibility. The shift from form to interaction can occur at any time and is not limited to a particular stratum of learner ability. As (Yalden :87) observes, it is important for a syllabus to indicate explicitly what will be taught, "not what will be learned". This practical approach with its focus on flexibility and spiral method of language sequencing leading to the recycling of language, seems relevant for learners who lack exposure to the target language beyond the classroom.