Communicative Language Teaching
1. Where does communicative language teaching come from?
Its origins are many, insofar as one teaching methodology tends to influence the next.
The communicative approach could be said to be the product of educators and linguists
who had grown dissatisfied with the audio-lingual and grammar-translation methods of
foreign language instruction. They felt that students were not learning enough realistic,
whole language. They did not know how to communicate using appropriate social
language, gestures, or expressions; in brief, they were at a loss to communicate in the
culture of the language studied. Interest in and development of communicative-style
teaching mushroomed in the 1970s; authentic language use and classroom exchanges
where students engaged in real communication with one another became quite popular.
In the intervening years, the communicative approach has been adapted to the
elementary, middle, secondary, and post-secondary levels, and the underlying
philosophy has spawned different teaching methods known under a variety of names,
including notional-functional, teaching for proficiency, proficiency-based instruction,
and communicative language teaching.
2. What is communicative language teaching?
Communicative language teaching makes use of real-life situations that necessitate
COMMUNICATION. The teacher sets up a situation that students are likely to
encounter in real life. Unlike the audio-lingual method of language teaching, which
relies on repetition and drills, the communicative approach can leave students in
suspense as to the outcome of a class exercise, which will vary according to their
reactions and responses. The real-life simulations change from day to day. Students'
motivation to learn comes from their desire to communicate in meaningful ways about
meaningful topics.
3. How do the roles of the teacher and student change in
communicative language teaching?
Teachers in communicative classrooms will find themselves talking less and listening
becoming active facilitators of their students' learning. The teacher sets up the
exercise, but because the students' performance is the goal, the teacher must step back
and observe, sometimes acting as referee or monitor. A classroom during a
communicative activity is far from quiet, however. The students do most of the
speaking, and frequently the scene of a classroom during a communicative exercise is
active, with students leaving their seats to complete a task. Because of the increased
responsibility to participate, students may find they gain confidence in using the target
language in general. Students are more responsible managers of their own learning
(Larsen-Freeman, 1986).
4. Communicative Language Teaching in the Saudi Context
The problem with this kind of language teaching is that it is an approach; not a
method. The difference between an approach and a method is explained above;
methods are fixed teaching systems whereas approaches form the theory and leave the
teaching system to the creativity and innovation of the teacher. This fact, although may
be regarded as advantageous by imaginative teachers, creates a problem in the Saudi
context. Frankly speaking, imaginative teachers are at scarce in the Arab world in
general and in Saudi Arabia in particular. Teachers in such contexts opt for clearly
designed material and procedures for they do not prefer to shoulder the burdens of
looking on their own for ways and techniques of teaching, if they have the ability to do
so.
Moreover, whether we are examining lower or higher education schools in Saudi
Arabia, we find that the structure of such schools is not designed for group work which
is a major requirement of this method. That is, they are not acquainted with aids or
facilities through which the application of such an approach would be successful.
Teachers would end up paying from their own pockets preparing classes for the
application of this approach. Moreover, administrative aspects are also involved such
as loading classes with large numbers of students; a fact that would kill any effort
towards language teaching in general, let alone applying this approach.
Even if we assume that we have highly qualified teachers with 100% creativity, and
that our schools are modernized as to cope with new horizons in teaching, it is difficult
to assume that Saudi students are ready to take part in the learning process.
5. CLT can be understood as a set of principles about the
 goals of language teaching,
 how learners learn a language and
 the roles of teachers and learners in the classroom. Discuss.
A. The goals of language teaching
CLT sets as its goals the teaching of communicative competence.
COMMUNICATIVE COMPETENCE includes the following aspects of
language knowledge:
• knowing how to use language for a range of different purposes and functions
• knowing how to vary our use of language according to the setting and the
participants (e.g. knowing when to use formal and informal speech or when to
use language appropriately for written as opposed to spoken communication)
• knowing how to produce and understand different types of texts (e.g.
narratives, reports, interviews,
conversations)
• knowing how to maintain communication despite having limitations in one’s
language knowledge (e.g.through using different kinds of communication
strategies).
B. How learners learn a language
Our understanding of the processes of second language learning has changed
considerably in the last 30 years and CLT is partly a response to these changes in
understanding. Earlier views of language learning focused primarily on the
mastery of grammatical competence. Language learning was viewed as a process
of mechanical habit formation. Good habits are formed by having students
produce correct sentences and not through making mistakes. Errors were to be
avoided through controlled opportunities for production (either written or
spoken).
By memorizing dialogs and performing drills the chances of making mistakes
were minimized. Learning was very much seen as under the control of the
teacher.
In recent years language learning has been viewed from a very different
perspective. It is seen as resulting from processes of the following kind:
• Interaction between the learner and users of the language
• Collaborative creation of meaning
• Creating meaningful and purposeful interaction through language
• Negotiation of meaning as the learner and his or her interlocutor arrive at
understanding
• Learning through attending to the feedback learners get when they use the
language
• Paying attention to the language one hears (the input) and trying to incorporate
new forms into one’s developing communicative competence.
• Trying out and experimenting with different ways of saying things
C. The roles of teachers and learners in the classroom
The type of classroom activities proposed in CLT also implied new roles in the
classroom for teachers and learners.
Learners now had to participate in classroom activities that were based on a
cooperative rather than individualistic approach to learning. Students had to
become comfortable with listening to their peers in group work or pair work
tasks, rather than relying on the teacher for a model. They were expected to take
on a greater degree of responsibility for their own learning. And teachers now had
to assume the role of facilitator and monitor.
Rather than being a model for correct speech and writing and one with the
primary responsibility of making students produce plenty of error free sentences,
the teacher had to develop a different view of learners’ errors and of her/his own
role in facilitating language learning.