The Balanced Curriculum (TBC) is an ideational approach to syllabus and curriculum design that provides a framework for teachers and students to easily see the kinds of focus which are needed in order to learn a language. The central concept of TBC is that language learning and teaching are made up of different elements which should all be balanced. | Trường Đại học Vinh Tạp chí khoa học, Tập 47, Số 1B (2018), tr. 57-70 THE BALANCED CURRICULUM A POST-METHOD APPROACH TO LANGUAGE LEARNING AND TEACHING Rob Waring Notre Dame Seishin University, Japan Received on 01/11/2017, accepted for publication on 21/4/2018 Introduction The Balanced Curriculum (TBC) is an ideational approach to syllabus and curriculum design that provides a framework for teachers and students to easily see the kinds of focus which are needed in order to learn a language. The central concept of TBC is that language learning and teaching are made up of different elements which should all be balanced. TBC has two main elements, input and output which could broadly be referred to as the receptive and productive modes. These are then each subdivided by whether the activity is language-focused or fluency-focused (see Figure 1). Input (Receptive) Building Language Building Fluency 1 Building knowledge language Awareness raising Output (Productive) 2 the Linking knowledge Accuracy focus about 3 Networking knowledge Comprehending input fluently 4 Experimenting with language Developing fluency Figure 1: The aims of the various aspects of The Balanced Curriculum In brief, the top half of TBC (Boxes 1 and 2) concerns either exposure to, or formally receiving, language knowledge and producing it correctly in controlled ways. The bottom half of TBC (Boxes 3 and 4) involves using the language that the student has limited (but sufficient) formal control over in meaningful and communicative ways with the aim of becoming more fluent at using it receptively and productively. Each of these boxes requires different activities or tasks and different mental processes to meet the learning objectives required for effective language acquisition. Let us look at each of the boxes in turn in more detail. The top half (Boxes 1 and 2) There is an essential difference between the top row and the bottom row in TBC. The aim of the two boxes at the top is to develop .
