Trainee EFL teachers’ development and implementation of tasks in young learner classrooms

Abstract This study investigated the impact of educating Austrian EFL teachers-in-training about the concept of task, on the premise that this understanding would be a significant prerequisite for them to effectively implement TBLT in their young learner classrooms. Participants were trainee teachers enrolled in a Master’s program, where TBLT was a module of one of their courses. The course content centered around Ellis and Shintani’s (2014) task principles, and emphasized an active, experiential understanding of TBLT theory and its relevance to teachers’ own teaching practices. Participants designed, used and evaluated a language task in their classes. Results showed that most teachers developed tasks that met the prespecified criteria and effectively evaluated the challenges in their task implementations, providing valuable suggestions for future improvements.