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Article published In: Teacher Education for Task-Based Language Teaching
Edited by Xavier Gutiérrez, Lara Bryfonski and Greg Ogilvie
[TASK 5:2] 2025
► pp. 177–202

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What impact can a TBLT teacher education course have?

A study of pre-service Spanish teachers

ORCiD logo with link | University of Alberta, Canada
ORCiD logo with link | University of Alberta, Canada
ORCiD logo with link | University of Alberta, Canada
 | University of Lethbridge, Canada
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Available under the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) 4.0 license.

For any use beyond this license, please contact the publisher at rights@benjamins.nl.

Open Access publication of this article was funded through a Transformative Agreement with the University of Alberta.

Published online: 5 February 2026
DOI logo with link
https://doi.org/10.1075/task.25004.gut
Abstract
Despite teachers’ overall positive perceptions about Task-Based Language Teaching (TBLT) (Ellis, R., Skehan, P., Li, S., Shintani, N., & Lambert, C. (2020). Task-Based Language Teaching: Theory and practice. Cambridge University Press. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar; (2022). How to teach an additional language: To task or not to task? John Benjamins. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar), support in the form of teacher education appears to be crucial in helping current and future teachers in their efforts to implement TBLT (Brandl, K. (2017). Task-based instruction and teacher training. In N. Van Deusen-Scholl & S. May (Eds.), Second and foreign language education: Encyclopedia of language and education. Springer. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar; (2022). Mediating innovation through language teacher education. Cambridge University Press. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar). This article examines the impact of a 13-week-long course for pre-service teachers of Spanish L2 on participants’ beliefs about and understanding of TBLT, and on their ability to design tasks. Drawing from (2016). ‘I’m still not sure what a task is’: Teachers designing language tasks. Language Teaching Research, 20(3), 279–299. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar and Ogilvie, G., & Dunn, W. (2010). Taking teacher education to task: Exploring the role of teacher education in promoting the utilization of Task-Based Language Teaching. Language Teaching Research, 14(2), 161–181. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar, data were collected using a pedagogical beliefs questionnaire, written reflections gathered throughout the course, the analysis of three pedagogical sequences, and the design of a task as the final project in the course. The quantitative and qualitative analysis of the data show that participants’ disposition towards using TBLT in their future teaching practice increased throughout the course and that 80% of the final tasks fulfilled all or most of (2009). Task-Based Language Teaching: Sorting out the misunderstandings. International Journal of Applied Linguistics, 19(3), 221–246. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar task criteria. The study contributes to the growing body of research on the role of teacher education in the diffusion of TBLT as a pedagogical innovation.
Article outline
  • Introduction
  • Literature review
  • The study
    • The TBLT course
    • Participants
    • Data collection instruments and procedures
      • Beginning of the course
      • Middle of the course
        • a.Analysis of lesson plans
      • End of the course
        • a.Pedagogical beliefs questionnaire
        • b.Reflection on TBLT principles and on pedagogical beliefs
        • c.Pedagogical sequence design and reflection
    • Data analysis
  • Findings
    • Research question 1: Influence of the TBLT course on participants’ disposition toward TBLT
      • Reflection on previous L2 learning experiences
      • Reflection on TBLT principles
      • Reflection on pedagogical beliefs
      • Pedagogical beliefs questionnaire
    • Research question 2: Understanding of TBLT principles
      • Analysis of lesson plans
      • Task design
    • Summary of findings
  • Discussion
  • Conclusion
  • Acknowledgements
  • Notes
  • References
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