International Journal Of Literature And Languages
43
https://theusajournals.com/index.php/ijll
VOLUME
Vol.05 Issue02 2025
PAGE NO.
43-46
10.37547/ijll/Volume05Issue02-12
Developing student’s speaking skills by task
-based
language teaching methods
Raxmanova Maxfuza
Saparaliyevna, a senior teacher at the Uzbekistan State University of World Languages, Uzbekistan
Abidova Nasibabegim
A student of UzSWLU, Uzbekistan
Received:
16 December 2024;
Accepted:
18 January 2025;
Published:
20 February 2025
Abstract:
Language teaching is not just about teaching languages, it is also about helping students to develop
themselves as people. Task-based language teaching (TBLT) proposes the use of tasks as a central component in
the language classroom because they provide better contexts for activating learner acquisition processes and
promoting second language learning. Speaking skill is one of the crucial parts learning and teaching another
language. In the process of the learning speaking skills, the students learn to communicate in real situations. This
article discussed the methods which are helpful and effective for the students’ speaking skills related to the task
-
based language. Moreover, there are three phrases of task-based language: pre-task, task and language focus.
Keywords:
Teaching and learning language, task-based approach, pre-task, task and focus of language, types of
task, CLT
Introduction:
Nowadays, person who wants to learn
second language pays attention to every detail of the
language. To know how to write they learn the letters,
after that they learn how to read and for
communication and understanding natives they learn
pronunciation. The new language for being more
understandable, nowadays there are strategies that
are very vital in creating meaningful communication.
For teaching it, modern teachers use the Task Based
Language Teaching (TBLT) which offers students
material that they have to actively engage in the
processing of in order to achieve a goal or complete a
task. TBLT is a traditional approach which there are
three types (Grammar Translation, Audiolingual
Method and Direct Method). These approaches help to
manage the language learning process and being
focused. As a coin, everything has two as this point.
One side was learning to speak with grammar rules,
another side is being focused to language learning as
interaction. This approach will lead the students to talk
more during the class and outside the class in many
activities like to talk about themselves, to have a joke,
to give an idea, without thinking whether the structure
is correct or incorrect as they have fun in English class.
However, person’s personality also plays main
and
large role on the process, like how correctly or quickly
person answer or learn. Additionally, being risk-taker
and unafraid of making mistakes makes person
talkative and extrovert, but they do not realize their
mistakes. Being introvert helps to learn and practice
more and they will do fewer mistakes and they try to
do not repeat more, and this kind of people will be
proud of their language. For them do not doing
mistakes and practicing every day because of sounding
like natives gives them motivation.
However, nowadays some students give up when they
have various problems like lack of motivation or being
lazy because of unhealthy lifestyle. Language teachers
are in search of finding something that could create a
difference in their classroom.
The concept of TBLT was first introduced by Prabhu
(1987) in his Banglore Project in which he focused
on communication, not on explicit grammar teaching,
by engaging learners in doing „task‟. In the past 20
International Journal Of Literature And Languages
44
https://theusajournals.com/index.php/ijll
International Journal Of Literature And Languages (ISSN: 2771-2834)
years, task-based language teaching (TBLT) has
attracted the attention of second language acquisition
(SLA)
researchers,
curriculum
developers,
educationalists, trainers and language teachers
worldwide. To a great extent, the introduction of
TBLT into the world of language education has been a
„top
-
down‟ process (Bygate, Skehan & Swain, 2001).
The term was coined, and the concept developed, by
SLA researchers and language educators, largely in
reaction to empirical accounts of teacher-dominated,
form-oriented second language classroom practice.
Tasks have been widely used as vehicles to elicit
language production, interaction, negotiation of
meaning, processing of input and focus on form, all of
which are believed to foster second language
acquisition (Skehan, 1996)
Now I did search and learn deeper the phrase TBLT, the
meaning and when and what kind of situation the
teachers should use this term. Most people have a
question: What is the TBLT? “Task
-Based Learning (TBL)
is a lesson structure, a method of sequencing activities
in your lessons. Sometimes called 'task-based language
teaching', in TBL lessons, students solve a task that
involves an authentic use of language rather than
complete simple questions about grammar or
vocabulary.” There are examples
of task-based
learning, like creating a presentation, making videos,
writing a piece of text or acting out a skit. In addition,
there are advantages of task-based learning, Students
are at the center of learning. Students are working on
something that is personal and relevant to them.
Students gain practice in collaborating with others and
making group decisions. Students spend a lot of time
communicating each other. As mentioned before, task-
based language structure which includes, pre-task, task
(main task) and language focus (post task).
Stage 1
: The pre-task. The teacher introduces the new
topic and familiarizes students with situations, lexical
areas, texts like reading and listening. This engages the
pupils with the subject and introduces potentially
helpful terminology. After that, the instructor sets up
the activity and explains what it is.
Stage 2
: Task. Task-based learning is an approach to
language learning where learners are given interactive
tasks to complete. In order to do this, they need to
communicate. Once the task is complete, then the
teacher discusses the language used. The learners plan
an itinerary for a guest who is coming to stay with their
teacher. The task, according to Willis (1996), is a goal-
based activity that uses the learners' preexisting
linguistic resources to achieve the desired result.
Playing games and figuring out puzzles and issues are a
couple of examples.
Stage 3
: Post task. A more thorough examination of
some of the structures or particular characteristics
present in the language employed during the task cycle
is made possible by the framework's Post-Task phase,
or language focus. As previously stated, the teacher has
the ability to evaluate the students' progress at various
points during the learning process. Students assess
their performance during the post-task phase. This
could be accomplished by contrasting their task's
results with those of a fluent language user.
Additionally, the teacher's response and subsequent
practice of the language items that arose from the
exercise may be included.
In the past, linguists had a research about types of task.
According to N. S. Prabhu (who noticed that his
students could learn language just as easily with non-
linguistic problem as when they were concentrating on
linguistic questions while working in Bangalore), there
are three main categories of task. There are
information-gap, reasoning-gap and opinion-gap.
Information-gap: Activities that include communication
between two or more students are referred to as
information gap (or information exchange) activities.
They require students to verbally communicate various
bits of information to one another. It normally calls for
the decoding or encoding of information from or into
language and entails the transmission of supplied
information from one person to another, from one
form to another, or from one location to another. One
instance is pair work, when one partner tries to verbally
communicate a portion of the entire information (for
instance, an incomplete picture) to the other partner.
Completing a tabular representation using data from a
certain text is another example. The task frequently
include choosing pertinent material as well, and
students may need to fulfill requirements for accuracy
and completeness in their transfer.
Reasoning-gap activity: It entails using techniques of
inference, deduction, practical reasoning, or the sense
of links or patterns to derive some new information
from provided information. Making a teacher's
schedule based on the class schedules that are
provided is one example. Another is determining the
optimum course of action (e.g., shortest or least
expensive) for a given goal and given restrictions. Like
in an information-gap action, the activity inevitably
entails understanding and communicating information,
but the information that must be communicated differs
from that which was first understood. There is a piece
of reasoning which connects the two.
Opinion gap activity: Identifying and expressing a
personal choice, emotion, or attitude in reaction to a
particular circumstance is known as an opinion gap.
International Journal Of Literature And Languages
45
https://theusajournals.com/index.php/ijll
International Journal Of Literature And Languages (ISSN: 2771-2834)
Completing a tale is one example; participating in a
social problem conversation is another. There is no
objective process for proving that an outcome is right
or wrong, and there is no reason to expect the same
result from various people or on multiple occasions,
even when the activity may involve using factual
information and creating arguments to support one's
opinion.
As TBLT, modern teachers also use communicative
language teaching (CLT) that is a method of teaching
languages that places a strong emphasis on interaction
as the methods and the end aim of learning. The
communicative approach is predicated on the notion
that effective language acquisition requires the ability
to convey genuine meaning. Learners use the
communication skills while they study or practice the
target language by communicate with their partners,
friends or trainers. The ability to communicate in the
target language is the aim of language instruction,
according to CLT. This contrasts with earlier
perspectives that frequently placed a higher value on
grammatical proficiency. Also, CLT views the teacher
not as an instructor but as a facilitator. Additionally, the
technique is a non-methodical methodology that
focuses on building strong oral and verbal skills before
reading and writing, rather than using a textbook series
to teach the target language. CLT instructors select
lessons according to what they think will help students
improve their conversational skills in the target
language (TL). Because oral activities involve active
discussion and students' creative, unexpected
responses, CLT teachers prefer them to grammar drills
or reading and writing exercises. Depending on the
language class level, different activities are used. They
encourage cooperation, fluency, and TL comfort. In CLT
classrooms, the six exercises mentioned and described
below are frequently utilized.
New roles for instructors and students in the classroom
were also suggested by the kinds of classroom activities
suggested in CLT. Students were now required to
engage in cooperative learning activities instead of
individualistic ones in the classroom method of
education. Instead of looking to the teacher as an
example, students have to learn how to listen to their
peers in group or pair projects. They were supposed to
assume more accountability for their own education.
Teachers were now required to take on the roles of
monitor and facilitator. Instead of serving as a role
model for proper writing and speaking and primarily
tasked with ensuring that students generate a large
number of error-free sentences, the teacher needed to
adopt a new perspective on students' mistakes and of
her/his personal contribution to language acquisition.
There are different kind of practices in CLT, mechanical,
meaningful and communicative.
Mechanical practice: Students can successfully
complete a controlled practice task known as
"mechanical practice" even if they don't completely
comprehend the language they are using. Repetition
drills and substitution drills, which are intended to
practice the use of certain grammatical or other items,
are examples of this type of activity.
Meaningful practice: Meaningful practice is an activity
in which students must make meaningful decisions
when practicing, while still receiving language control.
To practice using prepositions to describe, for instance
locations: students may be provided with a street map
that shows the locations of different buildings.
Additionally, a list of prepositions such across from, on
the corner of, near, on, and next to is provided to them.
After that, they must respond to inquiries such "Where
is the book shop? "Where is the café?" and so forth.
Now that they must react based on where locations are
on the map, the exercise has value.
Communicative practice: Communicative practice is
defined as activities that emphasize language use in
authentic communicative contexts, when actual
information is shared and language usage is not entirely
predictable. For instance,
students may be required to sketch a map of their
neighborhood and respond to questions regarding the
locations of various locations, such as the closest café
or bus stop.
CONCLUSION
Both teachers and students of English benefit greatly
from task-based learning. Teachers must first
determine the general structure of the lesson.
However, because the major activity of a lesson is
mostly subjective and somewhat arbitrary, it can
occasionally be challenging to identify. After deciding
on a lesson's fundamental framework, it is possible to
think about the particular possibilities that should be
offered in each lesson sentence. Practically
implementing task-based learning requires careful
consideration of the many course components, and
task-based learning has traditionally relied on group
and pair work. Both task-based learning and
communicative language instruction will be used in the
classroom to assist students retain all of the material.
REFERENCE
Prabhu, N .S. (1987). Second language pedagogy.
Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Bygate, M., Skehan, P., & Swain, M. (Eds.). (2001).
Researching pedagogic tasks: Second language
learning, teaching, and testing. London, England:
Longman. Ellis, R. (2003). Task - based language
International Journal Of Literature And Languages
46
https://theusajournals.com/index.php/ijll
International Journal Of Literature And Languages (ISSN: 2771-2834)
teaching and learning. Oxford, England: Oxford
Skehan, P. (1996). Second Language Acquisition
research and task-based instruction. In: Willis, J. &
Willis, D. (Ed.).Challenge and change in language
teaching. Oxford: Heinemann
https://languages.dk/archive/Methods/manuals/TBL/
TBL UK.pdf
https://www.whatiselt.com/single-
post/2018/01/19/what-is-task-based-learning
-
:~:text=Post%2Dtask%3A,that%20emerged%20from%
20the%20task.
https://www.teacheracademy.eu/blog/task-based-
learning/
https://www.professorjackrichards.com/wp-
content/uploads/Richards-Communicative-
Language.pdf
