ELTWeekly Vol. 4 Issue#28 | July 9, 2012 | ISSN 0975-3036
This paper has been submitted for publication by Prof. Jinendra Jain.
Abstract
English Language Teaching resides in among many methods and approaches. The span is spread from Grammar Translation method to the recent method Communicative Language Teaching method, participatory approaches and multiple intelligence. The different techniques of ELT have seen several changes, upheavals and transitions. The trend of Language teaching and learning started from writing on dry leaves, then with chalk and duster with black board and then with most modern technological tools like computer, mobiles and satellite and with internet. But, in spite of all this, the ability of ‘Communication’ of the people (learners) has not been that improved which was much expected the way technology developed. The present article focusses chiefly as to how the learners can develop their communicative ability.
CLT : Need of the Time
Since English is internationally acclaimed as a world language, it has become the language of trade, and academics. And it gradually spread almost in all walks of life. People felt the need of learning the communicative language to express their day-to-day needs and emotions and feelings. Though all methods from Grammar -Translation method to 1970 had the chief goal to teach the learners how to communicate in the target language but the question is – Was that goal achieved properly ? – This was analyzed by the educators and academicians. It was immensely felt by the teachers that the students can communicate in the classroom, can produce few sentences but they cannot converse in the real life situations as accurately as they do in the classrooms.
Widdowson (1978) is worth to be quoted here –
“Being able to communicate required more than mastering linguistic structures. Students may know the rules of linguistic usage, but be unable to use the language.”
In the light of the above-mentioned quotation, the learners have rather greater responsibilities than what they perform in the class.
Wilkins (1976) rightly says-
“Communication requires students perform certain functions as well such as promising, inviting and declining invitations within a social context.”
Communication, in fact, knows when and how to say what to whom and to train the students like that is very much necessary today. In fact, the learners are in the need of it.
CLT Today
Communicative Language Teaching is spread almost everywhere in all walks of life, in every street around us with a variety of labels and names. It has been widely known as communicative competence, communicative skills, or Spoken English or skills of English etc. Today, CLT considers spoken skills as active. It has also sidelined the productive / receptive code because it analyses the language learning and teaching process to be more pragmatic and practical. It means that there is the collaboration of meaning between the speaking and listening in the way the learners use a language. Moreover, Communicative Language Teaching is related to such practical issues of learning and teaching processes. It actually focuses more on the communicative aspects of any language therefore this approach appeals to the learners of wider area.
Savignon’s model showed how a learner expands his learning. This model highlighted socio-cultural, strategic, discourse and grammatical competencies integrated to each other to share in the cohesive whole of communicative competence. Today, Communicative Language Teaching is widely acknowledged that this approach can only be relied upon. With the help of this approach, the learners can learn to communicate. Actually, CLT is learner-centered and not teacher centered. The learners perform active role while learning the language. It almost includes all possible activities that can boost up the learners’ courage to get involve into them actively and start responding accordingly. Communicative Language Teaching emphasizes interaction as both the means and the ultimate goal of learning a language. CLT is considered too as an extension or development of the notional functional syllabus which includes communicative activities. Task based language learning is also a refined offshoot of CLT.
CLT is usually characterized as a broad approach to teaching, rather than as a teaching method with a clearly defined set of classroom practices.
As such, it is most often defined as a list of general principles or features. David Nunan (1991) rightly states the following characteristics of CLT:
(1) An emphasis on learning to communicate through interaction in the target language.
(2) The introduction of authentic texts into the learning situation.
(3) The provision of opportunities for learners to focus, not only on language but also on the Learning Management process.
(4) An enhancement of the learner’s own personal experiences as important contributing elements to classroom learning.
(5) An attempt to link classroom language learning with language activities outside the classroom.
As a matter of fact, the practitioners of CLT make it a point of research whether there is any connection between the language as it is taught in their class and as it is used outside the classroom. Actually, CLT should take the form of pair work and group work that require negotiation, cooperation and communication among learners, fluency based activities that encourage learners to develop their confidence, role-plays wherein the learners practice and develop language functions and they also learn as to how judiciously they can have the communicative use of grammar focused activities. The following activities a teacher can carry out in his/her classroom to make the lesson communicative –
(1) Role play
(2) Interviews
(3) Information Gap activities
(4) Games
(5) Surveys
(6) Pair work
(7) Learning by teaching
If the teacher understand the learner’s needs, the communicative approach can become a grand success in the classroom.
Techniques of Communicative Language Teaching
Communicative Language Teaching isn’t that easy to be grasped by any teacher, it varies teacher to teacher and situation to situation. A highly capable teacher with insight can understand the situation, can comprehend the need of the learners and then he/she can modify his/her techniques of teaching. There are several acclaimed authors who suggest their opinions and techniques as to how a teacher can put Communicative Language Teaching into practice.
Diane Larsen Freeman is worth to be quoted at this juncture-
“The sole aim of all the methods of English Language Teaching is to make students talk in English, to communicate in English, and to communicate in English means mastering not only linguistic structures but certain functions of the language also like promising, inviting, declining invitations within a social context.”
Diane Larsen Freeman suggests few ways of teaching English in a communicative way like distributing handouts, prediction games, Language cards, a picture strip stories. Menus and Time tables can also be used to make the class communicative.
Scrambled sentences are also basics to be used to start with.
Dr.Geetha Nagraj is of the same view in her book ‘English Language Teaching’ –
“The language learning and teaching process should be form based to meaning based, there should be a shift from teacher fronted to learner centered classes.”
She suggests the activities like information gap, feedback form filling, mind engaging tasks, retrieving text order.
Now-a-days, Task Based Language(TBL) learning is attracting the teachers’ attention with the help of which they can ask the learners to involve themselves in pair-work and group-work. Dave Willis and Jane Willis in their article ‘Task-Based Language Learning’ explain a few aspects of TBL that can be used to make a classroom communicative. They also add that numerous activities can be included to make a task communicative which can be carried out in the target language. Out of these two authors, one of them – Jane Willis (1996) defines a Task as : “A task is an activity where the target language is used by the learner for a communicative purpose (goal) in order to achieve an outcome”
Jo McDonough and Cristopher Shaw express their useful ideas about communicative skill in their book ‘Materials and Methods in ELT’; they are of the opinion about Speaking skill –
“Speaking is not the oral production of written language, but involves learners in the mastery of a wide range of sub-skill which added together, constitute an overall competence in the spoken language.”
As these authors say that speaking skill involves several sub-skills, a learner has to achieve mastery over many situations wherein communication is needed. But even in that case they too assert this that people often form judgments about one’s language competence from one’s speaking. And in order to ameliorate one’s communicative ability one can try the following activities:
(1) Predicting activities
(2) Simplifying activities
(3) Asking for feedbacks
Though, filling in questionnaires and guessing unknown information, problem solving activities, opinion gap activities, simulation etc.
CLT with Technology
Today, Communicative Language Teaching has been very much seriously taken and enhanced by the help of various technological tools. Technology has facilitated the language to reach to every learner. There are varieties of tools that can be easily accessed by the learners to obtain different and easy readymade material based on communicative way of learning the language. Online ELT resources are growing rapidly; newsletters on ELT should be used by the teacher for the sake of the learners. Recently, a new addition in online ELT resources is there i.e. ‘Communication weekly edited by Dr. Tarun Patel and Neha Joshi.
‘Communication Weekly’ is useful for the learners to make their communicative ability sound.
In language teaching, communication has been on everyone’s lips today. And this is also an undeniable fact that communication is the only way of being communicative. In order to enhance communicative ability, today the teachers can try task-based language learning and content based language learning.
Conclusion
Though there is no single most excellent way to teach language, CLT has made a mark in the field of language teaching. The word communication has been widely acknowledged all over the world. And to improve learners’ communicative ability, a teacher should be equipped with his / her own insight and be aware with needs of the learners. If the teacher understands his ware, he/she can do a lot with the Communicative Language Teaching. A teacher can make himself / herself updated with the help of latest news on CLT and conferences and seminars and the learners can whole heartedly welcome the teachers’ suggestions of making the class learner centered so that the acquired knowledge of the teacher can reach to the receiving end with the help of CLT, the teachers are the torch bearers for the learners who want to learn the art of communication.
References
• Chomsky, Noam (1957), Syntactic Structures
• Doff, Adrian (1996), Teach English: A training Course for Teachers, Cambridge University Press.
• Doff, Adrian and Christopher Jones (2008), Language in Use, Cambridge University Press.
• Harmer, Jeremy (2006), How to Teach English, 1st Edition, 89
• Hymes, Dell (1960), Linguistic Anthropology.
• Larsen-Freeman, Diane (2004), Techniques and Principles in Language Teaching, Second Edition, OUP
• Mc Donough, Jo and Christopher Shaw (2003), Materials and Methods in ELT a teacher’s guide, second edition, Blackwell Publishing, 135
• Nagraj, Geetha (2008), English Language Teaching: Approaches, Methods, Techniques, Second Edition, Orient Longman, 43.
• Nunan, David (1993), Introducing Discourse Analysis. London: Penguin
• Ur, Penny (2007), Grammar Practice Activities, Cambridge University Press.
• Willis, J. (1996), A Framework for Task-Based Learning, London: Longman.
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