Teaching

Communicative language teaching
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia


Communicative language teaching (CLT), or the communicative approach, is an approach to language teaching that emphasizes interaction as both the means and the ultimate goal of study.
|Contents |
|[hide] |
|1 History|
|1.1 The audio-lingual method |
|1.2 The notional-functional syllabus |
|1.3 Learning by teaching (LdL) |
|2 Outline |
|3 Classroom activities |
|4 Critiques of CLT |
|5 Seealso |
|6 References |




History

Historically, CLT has been seen as a response to the audio-lingual method (ALM), and as an extension or development of the notional-functional syllabus. Task-based language learning, a more recent refinement of CLT, has gained considerable popularity.
The audio-lingualmethod
The audio-lingual method (ALM) arose as a direct result of the need for foreign language proficiency in listening and speaking skills during and after World War II. It is closely tied to behaviorism, and thus madedrilling, repetition, and habit-formation central elements of instruction. Proponents of the audio-lingual method felt that this emphasis on repetition needed a corollaryemphasis on accuracy, claiming that continual repetition of errors would lead to the fixed acquisition of incorrect structures and non-standard pronunciation.
In the classroom, lessons were often organized by grammatical structure and presented through short dialogues. Often, students listened repeatedly to recordings of conversations (for example, in the language lab) and focused on accuratelymimicking the pronunciation and grammatical structures in these dialogs.
Critics of the audio-lingual method asserted that this over-emphasis on repetition and accuracy ultimately did not help students achieve communicative competence in the target language. Noam Chomsky argued "Language is not a habit structure. Ordinary linguistic behaviour characteristically involves innovation, formation of newsentences and patterns in accordance with rules of great abstractness and intricacy". They looked for new ways to present and organize language instruction, and advocated the notional functional syllabus, and eventually CLT as the most effective way to teach second and foreign languages. However, audio-lingual methodology is still prevalent in many text books and teaching materials. Moreover, advocatesof audio-lingual methods point to their success in improving aspects of language that are habit driven, most notably pronunciation.
The notional-functional syllabus
Main article: Notional-functional syllabus
A notional-functional syllabus is more a way of organizing a language learning curriculum than a method or an approach to teaching. In a notional-functional syllabus, instruction isorganized not in terms of grammatical structure as had often been done with the ALM, but in terms of “notions” and “functions.” In this model, a “notion” is a particular context in which people communicate, and a “function” is a specific purpose for a speaker in a given context. As an example, the “notion” or context shopping requires numerous language functions including asking about prices or featuresof a product and bargaining. Similarly, the notion partywould require numerous functions like introductions and greetings and discussing interests and hobbies. Proponents of the notional-functional syllabus claimed that it addressed the deficiencies they found in the ALM by helping students develop their ability to effectively communicate in a variety of real-life contexts.
Learning by...