Task-based Learning: What’S the Pedagogical Rationale for Travel and Tourism Classrooms?

This paper takes the position that task-based activities offer certain advantages over lectures, especially when considering learning in the travel and tourism industry. A total of 39 female Japanese students participated in the task-based simulation (20 in the first iteration and 19 in the second). The first mini-task had students listen to an audio recording of a ground controller giving instructions to airplanes with a fill-in-the-blank text. The classroom was then set-up like an airport in preparation for the second task, which had students playing the roles of ground control, tower control or airplane pilots. Planes were either sitting at gates awaiting instructions or circling the airport waiting to land. The job of the controllers was to get all of the planes airborne or to their gates. A posttest questionnaire revealed that students not only enjoyed the tasks, but through their participation, they learned more than they would have in a lecture-based classroom. The implication for teachers is that the travel and tourism industry offers many potential opportunities to create tasks to keep students engaged in the process of learning.