LANGUAGE COURSE MANAGEMENT

Effective and successful language course needs careful management. Language course management includes four main steps: course design, course promotion, course implementation, and course evaluation. Language course design is a dynamic and negotiated process between the course manager and the learner. After the negotiation, the objective of the course based on the learners’ needs can be formulated, the suitable approach is adopted, the course materials, the methods and media, and the course tuition are determined. The role of course promotion is essential to achieve the success of the language course. The course promotion should be interesting, promisisng to attract the learners’ motivation to join the course. The course designer, the tutor, and administrator sould do their best in serving the learners. To make the bettrment of the language course conducted the course designer should conduct learner assessment and course evaluation.


Introduction
Every language course involves several parties such as the course manager, the course designer, the tutors, the administrators, and the learners.Sometimes the course manager is also the course designer.He or she wants, of course, the language course conducted successfully.To run the language course well, the course manager needs effective and careful management.
The course manager should be able to describe clearly the types of work of each party involved in the language course.In other words, he or she should be able to manage the specific details about the language course in order to function effectively and efficiently.The main concern of this paper is to share opinion on language course management that deals with four main steps namely: course design, course promotion, course implementation, and course evaluation.

Course Design 2.1 The Notion of Course Design
One of the most important aspects of course preparation is course design.Course design or pre-course planning is the immediate step to do after the course designer carries out a needs analysis.A course design consists of the terms "course" and "design".A course is a planned sequence of learning expereiences, occupying several learning sessions and involving some forms of assessment of the learners' work (Rowntree (1986) cited by Bunyi (1995: 126).Design is the overall plan, picture, framework or structure with which to work in creating the final product (Bunyi, 1995: 127).Further, she defines course design as the planning and writing of a framework to guide the teaching and learning of a unit.
Similar opinion on course design is proposed by Hutchinson and Waters (1997: 65).They state that course design is the process by which the raw data about a learning need is interpreted in order to produce an integrated series of teaching-learning experiences, whose ultimate aim is to lead the learners to a particular state of knowledge.In addition, they point out that course design is a negotiated process and dynamic process.The former refers to a process of negotiation between individuals and society.Society sets the targets and the individuals must do their best to get as close to that target as possible.The latter implies that the course design needs to have built-in feedback channels to enable the course to respond to development.

Course Design Process
Taba (1962) quoted by Dubin and Olshtain (1990: 2) states that course design processes include (1) diagnosis of needs, (2) formulation of objectives, (3) selection of content, (4) organization of content, (5) selection of learning experiences, (6) determination of what to evaluate, and what means to evaluate.Bunyi (1995: 128) proposes that there are five major steps in the course design process namely: (1) situation analysis, (2) objectives formulation, (3) content derivation, (4) selection of appropriate methods and media, (5) determination of evaluation procedures and schedule.
Combining Taba's ideas and Bunyi's opinions, the course design processes comprise (1) situational analysis, (2) diagnosis of needs, (3) objectives formulation, (4) selection and organization of content, (5) selection and or-ganization of learning experiences, (6) selection of appropriate methods and media, (7) deterrmination of what to evaluate, what means to evaluate, and schedule.

Approach to Course Design
In order to achieve the objectives of the course, it is necessary to adopt the most suitable approach.Hutchinson and Waters (1997: 65-67) point out that there are four approaches in language course design; (1) language-centred approach, (2) skills-centred approach, (3) learning-centred approach, and (4) learner-centred approach.Languagecentred approach fails to recognize the fact that learners are human beings, and learning is not a straightforward, logical process.The skillscentred approach is founded on two fundamental principles; one theoretical, the other pragmatic.The basic theoretical hypothesis is that underlying any language behavior are certain skills and strategies, which the learner uses in order to produce or comprehend a discourse.The pragmatic basis for ths skillscentred approach is derived from a distinction made by Widdowson (1981) between goal oriented courses and process-oriented courses.This approach viewes the learner as a user of language rather than a learner of language.
A learning-centred approach indicates that the concern is maximize learning.Learning, as an internal process, is seen as a process in which the learners use what knowledge or skills they have in order to make sense of the flow of new information.The learnercentred approach is based on the principle that learning is totally determined by the learner.

Practical Points of Language Course Deisign in Practice
There are several practical points of course design namely: (a) rationale, (b) goal and objectives, (c) approach, (d) curriculum and syllabus, (e) method and media, (f) time schedule, and (g) tuition.Rationale in language course design should be able to show the importance and the benefits after joining the course.Objectives can be behavioral objectives, skills-based objectives, and contentbased objectives (Richards, 1997: 5-6).Behavioral objectives are stated in iterms of behavior, describing the behavior to be performed and the conditions under which the performance expected to occur, and are stated in a standard of acceptable performances.
Skills-based objectives are differentiated between macroskills and microskills.The macroskills are listening, speaking, reading and writing skill.The microskills are the subs of each macroskills.In specifying microskills, the language course designer tries to describe the competencies that account for functional abilities in a given skill.Besides those objectives, many language course specify objectives in relation to content.
The approach adopted in a language course should take into account the objectives of the course.The approach and objectives of the course are important, because teaching methods and techniques, teaching materials, and assessment can be determined from these two aspects.
Curriculum is concerned with making general statements about language learning, the learning purposes and experience, and the role relationships between tutors and learners.Syllabus refers to a subpart of curriculum which is concerned with a specification of units to be taught.In addition, syllabus focuses more narrowly on the selecting and grading of language teaching materials.In designing syllabus, there are three main points that should be considered namely: (1) analysis of the language (its components, rules, skills, microskills, functions, notions, aspects, use), (2) information about the learners (the kind of academic and experience background, motivation, demographic backgraound, learning strategy, learning styles, and types of learner), and (3) beliefs about lan-guage learning (behaviorism, mentalism, cognitivism).
Syllabus can be differentiated into product-oriented syllabus and process-oriented syllabus.Product-oriented sylabus are those in which the focus is on the knowledge and skills which the learners should gain as the results of the course, while process-oriented sylabus are those which focus on the learning experiences.The former suggests a synthetic language teaching strategy in which the different parts of language are taught separately step by step so that the acquisition is a process of gradual accumulation of parts until the whole structure of language has been built up.The latter is organized in terms of purposes for which learners are learning language and the kinds of language perfomance necessary to meet those purposes (Nunan, 1997: 27-28).
Method applied and media chosen should consider the approach adopted and the kind and types of learners.From the language teaching method, the tutor can derive the suitable teaching tehniques.Of course, in determining teaching techniques, he/she should also take into account the language teaching materials used in the course.
Time schedule should be negotiated to the learners, so that the tutor and the learners are able to enjoy the language course conducted.Usually the time schedule covers the day, the time, subject of the course, the place, and the name of the tutor.In making a time schedule, it is necessary to consider the type of the language course carried out, whether intensive or nonintensive program.The length of the course is also important to take into consideration.A language course which is too long can be boring language course, while one that is too short can be "unsatisfactory".
Another important point that must be negotiated between the language course designer and the learners is the course tuition.The course tuition is the tuition for the tutor and his/her transportation, the cost for the maintenance of setting and facilities, teaching materials, testing, and certificate fee.

Course Promotion
Course promotion is an essential point in language course management.If our promotion is not interesting and promising, the course designer will not get "the consumer" of the course.The points of the course that can attract consumers are among others the course program, the benefits after joining the course, the strategic place, the professional and experienced tutors, the affordable fee, and the available media.
Course promotion can be done in several ways.The most common way is by distributing leaflets about the language course offered.The course manager can also promote their course through magazines, newspaper, radio and television broadcast as well.

Course Implementation
Course implementation deals much with the methodology detremined during the course.Other things considered in coure implementation are the resources availalle and how these are utilized, how the course relates to and respond to the wider community, how constraints are solved by limited resources, and the decisions of administrators affecting what happens in the classroom.
Methodology in the course implementation can be characterized as the teaching procedures, learning activities, learning tasks, and learning experiences.All of these are justified according to the objectives the tutor has set out to achieve and the teaching materials he/ she has set out to teach in the course.A central component of methodology is how the tutors view their roles and the learners' roles in teaching-learning process.Clark (1987: 96) views the tutors' roles based on three educational value systems namely, classical humanism, reconstructionism, and progressivism.In classical humanism, the tutor has roles as an instructor, explainer, transmitter of knowledge, and corrector of errors.Reconstructionism suggests the roles of the tutor as a model, organizer, manager of learning experiences.Progressivism argues that the roles of the tutor as facilitator of learning, negotiator of course content and process, as responder to learners' needs, and encourager of learners' responsibilty.
The learners are involved in the teaching-learning process of the course.They should not be passive recipients of the course, but must be active in the teaching-learning process of the course.The role of the learner will therefore relate to approaches to learning, attitudes to learning, preferred learning styles and strateries, preferred learning activities, and how learners characterize effective teaching and learning in the course (Richards, 1997: 13).

Language Course Evaluation
A particular concern in the field of language course is to know whether the course manager and teachers are doing the right thing and whether their activities will lead to outcomes they want to achieve.To know this they need to conduct some evaluation.Evaluation is a continum process aimed at giving preliminary suggestions and feeback for improvement.In a broad sense, evaluation is a process to examine and judge the worth, quality, significance, degree or condition of a certain matter.Evaluation can be understood as a continum process ranging from informal to formal observation.Weiss (1972) in her book, Evaluation Research Methods of Assessing Progrm Effectiveness cited by Srijono (2000:33) states that evaluation is an elastic word that stretches to cover judgments of many kinds dealing with education, social welfare, health, housing, mental health, legal services, economic development, and many other fields.Evaluation relies on intuition, opinion, or trained sensibility.A similar view on evaluation is proposed by Murphy (1985: 1) who argues that evalua-tion is concerned with making judgments in the field of education.Murphy (1985:3-15) points further that evaluation is concerned with describing what is there, and placing some value judgment on what is found.It is to produce assessment, accountability and awareness.In general, evaluation deals with the systematic gathering of information for purposes of decision making.
Evaluation is a matter of judging the fitness of something for a particular purpose.Evaluation is, then, concerned with relative merit.There is no absolute good or bad -only degree of fitness for the required purpose (Hutchinson and Waters, 1997: 96).A language course is an accountable language teaching.The course learners and sponsors, if there is any, are the investors.In the language course they want to see the return on their investment of time and/or money.The course manager is accountable for these investors.This accountability demands more procedures and better evaluation.Usually in a language course there are two kinds of evaluationnamely, learner assessment and course evaluation.

Learner Assessment
Evaluation of the learners reflect not just the learners' performance but to some extent the effectiveness of the course too.The results of learners assessment enable sponsors, course manager, and learners to decide whether and how much tuition is required.There is a need to assess the learners' performance at several strategic points of the course, for example at the beginning, during, and the end of the course (Hutchinson and Waters, 1997: 144).That is why, as a rule, there are three basic types of leaners' assessment.

Placement Tests
These tests are used to "place" learners in the language course most suited to their needs and competence.The aim of a placement test is to determine the learners' state of knowledge before the language course begins.Placement test is only an approximate guide and a good placement test should also reveal the positive factors in testing.It should show not only the learners' weaknesses, but also their potentials for learning.

Achievement Tests
These tests should reflect the nature and content of the course itself.They test how well the learners/candidates are keeping up with the syllabus.They should test what the learners have learnt or what the tutors have taught.

Proficiency Tests
These tests are desgined to assess whether the learners/candidates will be able to perform the language tasks required of them.They assess whether or not the learners can cope with the demands of a particular situation.There is no pass/fail distinction, but rather a scale of degrees of proficiency in the tasks such as (1) non-user, (2) intermittent user, (3) extremely limited user, (4) limited user, (5) modest user, (6) competent user, (7) good user, (8) very good user, and (9) expert user.

Language Course Evaluation
Since the language course exists to satisfy a particular eductional need, course evaluation helps to show how well the course is actually fulfilling the need.Course evaluation is the evaluation of the language course itself.According to Hutchinson and Waters (1997: 144) course evaluation helps to assess whether the course objectives are being met -whether the course is doing what it was designed to do.Alderson and Waters (1983) cited by Hutchinson and Waters (1997: 152-5) propose that there are four main aspects of language course evaluation; (a) What should be evaluated?,(b) How can the language course be evaluated?, (c) Who should be involved in the evaluation?, and (d) When (and how often) should evaluation take place?.
The answer to the first aspect is everything of significance, for example, the syllabus, the course materials, the teaching procedures and techniques, the media used, the learning activities, the learning tasks, the learning experiences, the testing procedures, logistical/administrative arrangements, and the course evaluati-on system.In short, can it answer the question, "Is the language course conducted fulfilling the learners' learning and using needs?" Most language courses are evaluated by using test results, questionnaires, discussions, interviews, and informal means.The information got, if it is extensive must be summarirized, then it needs to be discussed with all interested parties, afterwards drawing some conclusions drawn to decide what next to do.
The group involved in language course evaluation can be the language course institution, the tutors, the learners, and the course sponsors.Each group may have their own perception of value about the course based on their interest and concern.It is important to carry out course evaluation occur (a) in the first week of the course, (b) at regular intervals throughout the course, (c) at the end of the course, and (d) (if possible) after the course.

Conclusion
Language course management is crucial for the course manager.The success or failure of a language course is much determined by language course management.Careful management influences the effectiveness, effeciency, and the success of conducting a language course.