Traditionally teachers display the learning outline at the beginning and conclusions at the end of didactic teaching sessions, and students may find it difficult to understand how teaching activities relate to learning objectives and what they should study for assessments. We introduced the "concept-sharing approach" in our…

Effective syllabus document design hinges on an alignment between learning objectives, teaching principles and curricular policy. Much of the work on syllabus design in the English Language Teaching (ELT) context focuses on the implementation of language teaching principles, such as those from the Communication Language Teaching (CLT) approach.…

This document reports on a workshop on coral species present in Thailand and on the status of coral taxonomy in central Indo-Pacific countries. The report discusses workshop aims, summarizes field and laboratory studies, provides a tentative checklist of hermatypic coral species from Thailand, assesses the status of coral taxonomy in participating…

In a discussion on amplified objectives in language evaluation, this paper delineates various strands of contextual input that constitute the design of a language program. Philosophical, sociocultural, and psychological aspects are included. Amplified objectives are discussed in the context of domain-referenced language testing and program…

Characteristics of a minicourse developed at Macquarie University in Australia, its application in Australia, and potential for countries in the Asia-Pacific region are discussed. A minicourse is defined as an entire course of studies for a group, similar to a conventional course but compressed into a few hours. The Australian minicourse is…

Reported here is information about a 2-week training course on the topic of early childhood education in Thailand. Sections include (1) background information on the status of preschool education in Thailand and data on program participants, (2) objectives of the course, (3) description of program activities and procedures, (4) review and…

Three principal types of goal structure are (1) cooperative; (2) competitive; and (3) individualistic. Specifically designed cooperatively structured group activities can improve group performance and attitudes in class. A writing class for English majors is briefly described and evaluated before and after goal structure was considered. Grade…