What is TBLT?: Korean Secondary School English Teachers’ Interpretation of Task-based Language Teaching

Task-Based Language Teaching (TBLT) has posed significant challenges for English teachers in Korea due to various societal, contextual, and cognitive constraints. This study explored conceptual-level constraints by examining how Korean English teachers interpret TBLT. A total of 65 secondary English teachers participated in an online survey utilizing a narrative frame. They were asked to explain the concepts of TBLT and a task in their own words, provide an example of a task, and describe the teacher’s role in TBLT. Content analysis revealed that the majority of teachers struggled to distinguish TBLT from other communicative L2 teaching methods, often interpreting TBLT as the use of tasks at the technique level. Nevertheless, their understanding of a task included key features such as real-life relevance, the importance of task completion, and the presence of a communication gap. Furthermore, the teachers identified the facilitator role as central to their responsibilities in TBLT. These findings reveal both similarities and differences in Korean English teachers’ interpretations of TBLT compared to those of teachers in other Asian countries, indicating a reinterpretation of TBLT within the Korean context.