The ministry of higher and secondary specialized education of the republic of uzbekistan

1.2.3 TASK-BASED LANGUAGE TEACHING

After having read this section I understood that Task Based Language Teaching is one of the modern and innovative approaches among other teaching ones. Harmer defines that “TBLT is a branch of CLT as Communicative Language Teaching is a broad umbrella term”². It is effective teaching method that encourages language learners to develop their language and real life skills.

Nunan explained that TBLT is about “setting specific tasks for students so that they act as if they were using the language in real life”³. Tasks given to learners has educational value that emphasizes on using authentic language through meaningful tasks. Tasks may include activate fairy tales, collect old national songs, a visit to a doctor or make a telephone conversation and others. To tell the truth, before introduced and read the on Language Teaching I had confusion on using this approach in my teaching process. However, when I gave tasks to my students, I didn’t pay attention to main characteristic features of the task such as 1) meaning is primary; (2) there is a goal which needs to be worked towards; (3) task completion has some priority; and (4) there is a real-world relationship. It doesn’t mean I didn’t use them at all. Even I did not use “true” task in my lesson that I explained in my Home task one, I am sure three features of the task were implemented in the lesson. Because, when I gave the task to my students on the topic “ The book of our people” and divided them into small groups, they worked cooperatively and supported each other, felt confident while they were learning the language. The task was to perform poster presentation according to the topic. While doing the task they shared their findings on the topic, used L2 meaningfully and effectively, wrote important information, listened to each other. They had an opportunity to socialize as if they were in real life situation. By this way they improved their integrated and real life skills. One point that should have focused on the task features is having task priority. This side of the task I gave should be improved and reorganized. I realized that in order to achieve the goal of the lesson based on TBLT abovementioned features of the task should be taken into consideration. I consider that giving task is helpful for both teachers and students as they have clear direction to organize cooperative learning environment.

When I implement Task Based LanguageTeaching in my classes, as a teacher, I control (and observe their preparation) my class and students continuously. I correct their mistakes, give additional instructions during activities, monitor process and organize friendly atmosphere for learners. From this point of view I acted as a monitor, an advisor and a chairperson depending on procedure. And my students were very active participant in learning and performing process.