Shall tasks be “open” or “closed”?
As a teacher, we face the choice of giving tasks to our students, and to be a good teacher, it is important for us to design the tasks properly.
I have lots of experience in giving tasks to my students. But most of the tasks are closed due to the requirement of the syllabus or the approaching tests for my students. While I also tried once or twice giving them open tasks and it was really successful.
I love the kind of trial and surely we always slide between the two extremes of “open” and “closed”; the principle shall be “the tests we design are up to our purposes”.
It is better to combine both creativity and constraints, and it is possible to put it into practice in our own classroom. We can do it if we want to J
3 条评论:
Hi, Shuhua,
I agree with you that in China it is difficult to totally depend on "open'tasks because of demanding teaching material as well as the constraints of the syllabus.
With the communicative teaching method widely adopted, many language teachers have tried in their own teaching context to devise some tasks and materials.
But I still think it is difficult to achieve total "open" or "liberate' tasks in our teaching context at present.
I think one reason is that teachers as well as students are both on the way of changing attitudes toward "open'tasks. As is assumed, IT should be creatively applied in the teaching to add value, but the majority of teachers and students don't find the great benefit of IT enhanced class.
There is a long way for us to go. Do you agree?
I love your suggestion that we should combine “open” and “closed” tasks, but it is really very challenging to do so. I think we can go on our discussion later on.
I agree with Tang in that 'open' or 'liberated' task is only a form. any form shall serve the purpose of our teaching and learning.
发表评论