European Syllabuses in English as a Foreign Language1

Characteristic movements in European traditional EFL teaching show a closer link with communication approaches than is found in America, and a rejection of linguistic selection of items. The Council of Europe movement is linked with function, with communication and, indeed, with traditional rhetoric. A broadly semantic, or "notional" syllabus has been proposed, based on the semiotic act. An inventory of language functions has been devised and a threshold defined below which the learner can not function successfully in the language. The threshold inventory and subsequent units form a common core of language functions to be learnEd. Following Wilkins (1972), common core proposals distinguish semantico-grammatical categories and categories of communicative function, both of which a syllabus must embrace. The methods implied in the teaching are situational, inductive and communicative. There is clear evidence that these proposals will succeed at both lower levels (elementary) and at the upper levels, but the middle ranges at present seem to resist the notional approach, in theory. There are serious implications for teacher training. The strong socio-linguistic tone of communicative teaching involves teachers in judgements of items, materials, and methods which emphasise the richness and the responsibility of the teaching art

Agreement · Communicative language teaching · Function (biology) · Grammar · Language education · Linguistics · Notional amount · Pedagogy · Selection (genetic algorithm) · Situational ethics · Syllabus · Artificial Intelligence · Computer Science · Discourse Analysis in Language Studies · EFL/ESL Teaching and Learning · Psychology · Second Language Learning and Teaching · Social Psychology

• How To Do Things With Words

  J L Austin, John Austin•How to do things with words•1975

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