The Syllabus is Dead, Long Live the Syllabus: Thoughts on the State of Language Curriculum, Content, Language, Tasks, Projects, Materials, Wikis, Blogs and the World Wide Web

Abstract

In the 1990s, second and foreign language education entered the so‐called post‐method condition, marking the end of the search for a global pedagogy applicable to all learning contexts. Just as language pedagogy – the design and implementation of learning tasks – became flexible and localised, so have corresponding curricular concepts and procedures followed suit, leading to the beginning of a post‐syllabus condition. Supported by developments in CALL (Computer‐Assisted Language Learning), the move to a learner‐centred focus, and the deployment of authentic target language texts and artefacts, language learning and teaching are becoming increasingly local, nimble, relevant and specific. At the same time, the latest educational and communication technologies (wikis, blogs, Skype, Second Life and the like) are having a strong impact on what constitutes the local in terms of a particular learning community.

Instructional Pragmatics: Bridging Teaching, Research, and Teacher Education

“…Instructional pragmatics has arisen from actual teachers' needs and is characterized here as a fast-expanding vibrant sub-field of interlanguage pragmatics. In this ''post-method'' era (Pennycook 1989;Kumaravadivelu 2003Kumaravadivelu , 2006Shaw 2009), it is never a straight-forward task to identify ''best practices'' for teaching L2 pragmatics in the given instructional context. Because teachers are the primary agents in this effort, they are entitled to be more informed about interlanguage pragmatics and professionally prepared to teach and assess pragmatics, as well as to reflect on their own instructional and assessment practices effectively.…”

Saudi University Students’ Perceptions towards Virtual Education During Covid-19 Pandemic: A Case Study of Language Learning via Blackboard

“…Similarly, Zhao and McDougall (2008) claimed that asynchronous online communication provides those students who may have linguistic anxieties with more time for understanding and composing in the communication process. The reason for this variation in the research findings on VLLEs is that the teaching and learning of languages is localised and context-based (Shaw, 2009). Kumaravadivelu (2003, p. 33) argues that pedagogical strategies should be "location-specific, classroom oriented and innovative strategies".…”

Language Teachers’ Philosophies of Teaching: Bases for Development and Possible Lines of Investigation

“…These questions in the contexts just mentioned are consistent with the idea that language teachers should have a well‐worked‐out set of views and values concerning their work and their practice as teachers, and this should go beyond a mere statement of methodological preferred practices (particularly, as the field is now supposed to be in a ‘post‐method’ condition; cf. Shaw 2009). Professionals with plenty of experience (or who have been fortunate enough to have favorable conditions of employment in which reflection or articulation of beliefs were possible) likely already have some positions, or principles.…”