Course & syllabus Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 3000 words

Course & syllabus - Essay ExampleThe importance of considering twain are stressed and explained, as well as the difficulties wantd. A greater emphasis on needs, aims, objectives and attainment outcomes began when the Council of Europes Modern Languages Project attempted to remedy the over-emphasis on teaching methods in the mid-seventies (Stern, 1989 212). This was a positive step but it became apparent later on, that treatment and evaluation related factors too needed to be considered for a more balanced overture. However, the focus of attention in this paper is on the needs, aims, objectives and culture outcomes. Needs depth psychology A needs analysis is a systematic collection and analysis of all subjective and objective information necessary to define and validate defensible curriculum purposes (Brown, 1995 36). Often, a needs assessment is not undertaken for devising language courses. It is generally thought that it is not possible to be specific in identifying needs. Ho wever, it has been shown to be not only possible, but also useful in side of meat language classrooms to support problem solving and as a basis for aims, courses, and materials and to provide a concrete illustration of how analysis of data post be performed, and how a tight and direct link can be maintained between needs, aims, and materials, and what actually occurs in the classroom (Seedhouse, 1993). ... According to Brown (1995, ch. 2), they generally involve two things, firstly making basic decisions such as identifying the types of people involved, the information needed and points of view, and second gathering information such as types of questions, instruments, choosing procedures and other factors. For providing such information, Richards (2001 63-64) recommends a number of strategies such as conducting a literature survey and conducting interviews. This would help to find out information such as the situations in which English is used most frequently, in which difficultie s are encountered, perceived difficulties, frequencies of errors, suggestions, opinions, and so on. The Council of Europe model suggests the approach should be systematic and centred on the learner (Richterich & Chancerel, 1977). The Munby (1978) model also advocates the same but also suggests considering features pertaining to the tooshie situation in which the language will be used. The information gleaned from this analysis is then fed as input for processing both language skills and meaning, i.e. for identifying the micro-skills and functions that would be required. Muby also mentions a number of other variables that should be considered, but these are recommended for after, not before, the syllabus is specified. However, all the pertinent information should ideally be gather beforehand as part of the needs analysis not when the syllabus is finalised. Hutchinson & Waters (1987) formed a number of specific questions in their framework for target situation analysis, and based on these, further questions for analysing learning needs. These are listed in the table below. These questions are useful to ensure that all the important aspects