Communicative Language Teaching

339 Words2 Pages
Communicative Language Teaching Communicative Language Teaching has two main strands: • Language is not just bits of grammar; it also involves language functions such as inviting, agreeing and disagreeing, suggesting, etc., which students should learn how to use. They also need to be aware of the need for appropiacy (that is how to speak in the right circumstances) when talking and writing. • This strand is developed from the idea that if students get enough exposure to language and opportunities for its use, and if they are motivated, then language learning will take care of itself. In other words, the focus of much communicative language teaching became what we have called Acctivation. Communicative Language Teaching has had a thoroughly beneficial effect since it reminded teachers that people learn languages not so that they “know” them, but so that they can communicate. Giving students different kinds of language, pointing them to aspects of style and appropiacy, and above all giving them opportunities to try out real language within the classroom humanised what had sometimes been too regimented. Above all, it stressed the need for Activation and allowed us to consider boomerang- and patchwork-type lessons where before they tended to be less widely used. Debate still continues, of course. Recent theory and practice have included: • The introduction of Discovery activities (where students are asked to “discover” facts about language for themselves rather than have the teacher or the book to tell them) • The Lexical Approach in which it is argued that words and phrases are far better building blocks for language than grammatical structure • Classroom stages being given new names to help us describe teaching and learning in different ways. • And the study of the difference between spoken and written language to
Open Document