Last year brought me a number of transformative opportunities for teaching and learning, as I had the privilege of being invited to engage directly with the ambitious project of revising Panama’s national English curriculum. This work challenges me to balance innovative frameworks with the practical realities of classroom instruction, providing both rewarding insights and unique obstacles to overcome.
In this project, I am serving as technical specialist, leading the development of standards aligned with the Common European Framework of Reference for Languages (CEFR) to foster progressive learning outcomes. I am also working and learning from other academic specialists concentrated on the pedagogy of the CEFR, particularly focused on the integration of the action-oriented approach to learning, which prioritizes engaging students in real-world tasks where language use is purposeful and mirrors authentic communication scenarios. Leading the revision of Panama’s national English curriculum has allowed me to bridge innovative pedagogical strategies with practical classroom applications.
Central to this transformation is the integration of the CEFR. For Panama, this required tailoring the CEFR’s principles to reflect the unique cultural, linguistic, and educational realities of the country, ensuring its frameworks addressed local needs while maintaining alignment with international standards.
While communicative language teaching (CLT) has long been a cornerstone of language instruction, Panama’s new curriculum, with its embrace of the action-oriented approach, positions learners as active social agents in real-world communication scenarios. This shift, deeply rooted in CEFR principles, expands on the current practice of education by achieving alignment with international standards while honoring Panama’s distinct cultural and educational context. The action-oriented approach encourages educators to create purposeful, real-world tasks that empower students as active participants in their learning (COE, 2001).
For those new to the approach, it provides a chance to rethink classroom dynamics and instructional strategies. For seasoned practitioners, it validates and refines practices already making an impact. Whether you are just beginning to explore the principles of the action-oriented approach or already a seasoned practitioner, you may find this approach a natural extension of communicative learning. It has the power to elevate and transform classroom tasks, fully engaging and motivating learners while fostering deeper success in language acquisition.
Understanding the CEFR and Its Role in Meaningful Communication
Since its introduction in 2001, the CEFR has been implemented through the communicative language approach (Canale and Swain, 1980), which emphasizes scaffolded practice to help learners complete meaningful language tasks. This method is an effective starting point for language development; however, its full potential is often unrealized when lessons become narrowly focused on topics or specific grammar points.
When communicative teaching achieves its full potential, it offers learners opportunities to engage with language in relevant, meaningful ways—a key goal of the CEFR. Communication, at its core, is action-oriented; people communicate to express ideas, share thoughts, and convey information. Classroom tasks and activities should reflect this reality by fostering real, meaningful, and relevant communication (Piccardo, 2022). The action-oriented approach builds on the communicative approach, pushing educators to focus more deeply on practical application and authentic interaction.
Communicative Language Teaching in Practice
Most language educators are familiar with the carefully scaffolded tasks that organize teaching, from presentation of language to the productive use of language to accomplish a task or complete a project (Ellis, 2003). A variety of activities commonly used in communicative learning create natural gaps in information, encouraging authentic purposes for communication. Some examples appear in Figure 1.
Figure 1: Examples of CLT Activities
| Activity | Description |
| Find Someone Who | Students ask questions to discover who matches a given description |
| Interviews | Students ask questions to uncover information they do not already know |
| Mingle and Match | Students exchange information on cards to find a matching partner |
| Listen and Draw | One student describes something for another to draw, with clarifications exchanged as needed |
These tasks are excellent for introducing or practicing language items and can be designed to be meaningful and relevant to students. However, the action-oriented approach requires educators to take these activities a step further by viewing students as social agents rather than passive recipients of structured learning sequences.
Shifting to the Action-Oriented Approach
The action-oriented approach transforms communicative activities by emphasizing authenticity, relevance, and real-world application (Hunter, 2021). It reframes students as active participants who engage in meaningful tasks reflective of the domains they will encounter in everyday life. The CEFR identifies four domains of communication
- Personal: Informal interactions, such as describing one’s bedroom or hobbies.
- Public: Activities in shared spaces, like buying a bus ticket or asking for directions.
- Occupational: Professional communication, including job interviews and workplace collaboration.
- Educational: Formal learning settings, such as delivering presentations or participating in academic discussions.
Each domain provides opportunities to design tasks that are relevant to learners. For example, a task in the occupational domain could involve role-playing a job interview, while a public-domain activity might simulate ordering food at a food stand. By focusing on tasks tied to these domains, the action-oriented approach ensures learning is purposeful and engaging.
Figure 2: Examples of Action-Oriented tasks aligned to specific contexts, domains, and communicative needs
Real-World Applications: Designing Lessons with Purpose
Regardless of whether educators are following a textbook or designing lessons organically, the action-oriented approach can enhance learning by centering it around real-world, meaningful communication. Figure 2 shows examples of how this approach can be applied.
Incorporating these types of tasks allows teachers to meet specific standards and objectives while making learning relevant to students’ lives.
CEFR Descriptors: Guiding Progression
A key benefit of the CEFR is its “can-do” descriptors, which help teachers understand what learners are capable of at various levels and identify pathways for development. These descriptors provide a road map for creating tasks that align with students’ current abilities while challenging them to grow. For example:
At A1, learners might identify basic objects or express simple preferences.
By B1, students should be able to handle more complex tasks, like negotiating or expressing detailed opinions.
By leveraging these descriptors, teachers can scaffold lessons to ensure that students build confidence and competence progressively. In Panama, this process has been central to bridging the CEFR’s theoretical frameworks with practical, culturally relevant classroom applications that are action oriented. Tailoring learning experiences to reflect the linguistic diversity and unique educational goals of Panamanian students has helped ensure that lessons resonate deeply while maintaining alignment with global standards. Further, providing sequenced standards at level, aligned to specific domains and scenarios relevant to Panama, ensures opportunities for action-oriented practice, with support scaffolding for teachers.
For example:
At the A1 level, learners may learn to express simple preferences by describing the colors of flowers in the schoolyard, which would be a suitable topic for younger students in a rural setting.
In an urban environment, this may involve describing the colors of rooftops visible from the classroom windows.
At the B1 level, students could discuss the impact of tourism on the environment and suggest sustainable ways to promote tourism, a topic relevant to both rural and urban students.
This integration demonstrates how the action-oriented approach can adapt to specific contexts, offering valuable insights for educators worldwide.
Bringing It Together: The Panama Context
In Panama, integrating the action-oriented approach into the national English curriculum was a multifaceted process. It required aligning CEFR principles with the cultural and linguistic diversity of the country while addressing local educational priorities. This involved developing tasks that mirrored real-life scenarios Panamanian students would likely encounter, from describing the vibrant and diverse rainforests and communities across the country to participating in discussions about the importance of Panama as a member of the global community.
Collaboration among educators, technical specialists, and policymakers was key to ensuring that these adaptations met both local and international standards. The result is a curriculum that empowers students as active participants in their learning, equipping them with the skills to thrive in multilingual and multicultural contexts. This experience in Panama underscores the potential of the action-oriented approach to transform not only individual classrooms but also broader educational systems.
By adopting an action-oriented approach, educators can explore the full potential of the CEFR, transforming classrooms into spaces where language learning is practical, purposeful, and deeply engaging. For Panama, this shift not only modernizes the national curriculum but also strengthens the bridge between education and the real world. Through this approach, students become confident communicators and proud representatives of their heritage, equipped to thrive in global and local contexts. Ultimately, action-oriented language teaching ensures that learning transcends the classroom, enabling students to connect, collaborate, and contribute meaningfully in a multilingual world.
References
Canale, M., and Swain, M. (1980). “Theoretical Bases of Communicative Approaches to Second Language Teaching and Testing.” Applied Linguistics, 3, 29–59.
COE. (2001). Common European Framework of Reference for Languages: Learning, Teaching, Assessment. Council of Europe.
Ellis, R. (2003). Task-Based Language Learning and Teaching. Oxford University Press.
Hunter, D. (2021). “Developing an Action-Oriented Pathway in the Classroom.” Webinar. Common European Framework of Reference for Languages (CEFR). www.coe.int/en/web/common-european-framework-reference-languages/newsroom/-/asset_publisher/rg3sWjrNNmPK/content/webinar-developing-an-action-oriented-pathway-in-the-classroom-?_com_liferay_asset_publisher_web_portlet_AssetPublisherPortlet_INSTANC
Piccardo, E. (2022). “The Action-Oriented Approach: From theory to practice.” Online workshop. Common European Framework of Reference for Languages (CEFR). www.coe.int/en/web/common-european-framework-reference-languages/newsroom/-/asset_publisher/rg3sWjrNNmPK/content/the-action-oriented-approach-from-theory-to-practice?_com_liferay_asset_publisher_web_portlet_AssetPublisherPortlet_INSTANCE_rg3sWjrNN
Sara Davila is an English language education specialist with over two decades of experience. She collaborates with institutions and organizations worldwide to create engaging and effective learning by supporting curriculum auditing, revision, and reform. She is a passionate advocate for 21st-century learning approaches that explore and integrate technological thinking. Currently, she’s consulting with Quality Leadership University and the US Embassy in Panama to support the revision and implementation of the national English curriculum.