5 Steps to Design Kick-Ass Tasks for Your Students

Task design is essential for students to learn consistently, yet we often leave it to luck.

As teachers, we’re so busy planning, marking and teaching that we rarely design our tasks. We often just look for any activity that’s related to the lesson aim, and make do.

Students need tasks to guide their thinking, as what they think about determines what they’ll learn and remember.

As psychologist Dan Willingham says in his book, ‘Why Don’t Students Like School?’;

“Memory is the residue of thought”.

As a language teacher, my tasks should encourage the students to think about (and use!) the target language.

Here are five principles to follow when you design tasks for your lessons.

1. Your Tasks Should Support Your Aims

Check: what will your task encourage students to think about? What language will it likely get them to produce?

• Tell or act out a short story or anecdote ( “I woke up this morning with a really bad cold… AHHH-CHOOO! I went to the doctor and…”).
• Play a short audio clip.
• If it’s too flashy, it might be so engaging that it distracts them and changes the subject.