Chapter 1
A brief history of language teaching
• The concerns of language teaching methods in
the past
• How they have prompted modern method
innovations
• Change in language teaching methods
reflecting recognition of changes in the kind of
proficiency earners need (reading
comprehension to oral proficiency)
• Bilingualism and multilingualism is the norm
rather the exception. (60%)
• Latin was the dominant language of education,
commerce, religion, and government in the
Western world 500 years ago.
• Because of political changes in Europe in 16th
century (French, Italian, English), Latin
displaced as a language of spoken and written
communication.
• Latin became an subject in the school curriculum
instead of a living language.
• Then, the study of classical Latin and an analysis
of its grammar and rhetoric became the model
for foreign language study from the 17th to the
19th centuries.
• Grammar schools introduced Latin grammar
through rote learning of grammar rules, study of
declensions and conjugations, translation, and
practice in writing sample sentences.
• In 16th century, Roger Asham and Montaigne had
made specific proposals for curriculum reform
and for changes in the way Latin was taught, so
were Comenius and Johan Locke in 17th century.
• When “modern” languages began to be the
subjects of the schools, textbooks consisted of
statements of abstract grammar rules, list of
vocabulary, and sentences for translation. This
approach to foreign language teaching became
known as the Grammar-Translation Method.
• Grammar Translation was the offspring of
German scholarship, according to one of its
critics, was “to know everything about
something rather than the thing itself.”
The principal characteristics of
Grammar Translation Method
• The goal of foreign language study is to learn a
language in order to read its literature or in
order to benefit from the mental discipline
and intellectual development that result from
foreign language study.
• Reading and writing are the major focus; little
or no systematic attention is paid to speaking
or listening.
• The sentence is the basic unit of teaching and
language practice. Much of the lesson is devoted
to translating sentences into and out of the target
language, and it is this focus on the sentence that
is a distinctive feature of the method.
• Accuracy is emphasized.
• Grammar is taught deductively– that is , by
presentation and study of grammar rules, which
are then practiced through translation exercise.
• The students’ native languages is the medium
of instruction.
Innovations in 19th century
• Increased opportunities for communication
among Europeans created a demand for oral
proficiency in foreign languages.
• Individual language teaching specialists reformed
the teaching of modern languages with a specific
method. (Whlhelm Vietor in Germany, Paul Passy
in France, Henry Sweet in England, Phonetics –
the scientific analysis and description of the
sound systems of languages was established)
• Viietor, Sweet, and other reformers in the late
nineteenth century shared many beliefs about
the principles on which new approach to
teaching foreign languages should be based,
which are the following:
1. The spoken language is primary and that this
should be reflected in an oral-based
methodology
2. The findings of phonetics should be applied to
teaching and to teachers training
3. Learners should hear the language first,
before seeing it in written form
4. Words should be presented in sentences, and
sentences should be practiced in meaningful
contexts and not be taught as isolated,
disconnected elements
5. The rules of grammar should be taught only
after the students have practiced the grammar
points in context – that is, grammar should be
taught inductively
6. Translation should be avoided, although the
native language could be used in order to
explain new words or to check comprehension
• These principles provided the theoretical
foundations for a principled approach to
language teaching, one based on a scientific
approach to the study of language and of
language learning.
The direct method
• L. Sauveur (1826-1907) used intensive oral
interaction in the target language and
employed questions as a way of presenting
and eliciting language, which was a referred to
as the Natural Method.
• He and other scholars believed in Natural
Method and argued that a foreign language
could be taught without translation or the use
of
• the learner’s native language if meaning was
conveyed directly through demonstration and
action.
• A language could best be taught by using it
actively in the classroom. Rather than using
analytical procedures that focus on
explanation of grammar rules in classroom
teaching.
• Teacher must encourage direct and
• Spontaneous use of the foreign language in
the classroom. Learners would then be able to
induce rules of grammar.
• The teacher replaced the textbooks in the
early stages of learning. Speaking began with
systematic attention to pronunciation.
• Known words could be used to teach new
vocabulary, using mime, demonstration, and
pictures.
The principles and procedures of
Direct Method
• Classroom instruction was conducted
exclusively in the target language.
• Only everyday vocabulary and sentences were
taught.
• Oral communication skills were built up in a
carefully graded progression organized around
question-and-answer exchanges between
teachers and students in small, intensive
classes.
• Grammar was taught inductively
• New teaching points were introduced orally
• Concrete vocabulary was taught through
demonstration, objects, and pictures; abstract
vocabulary was taught by association of ideas.
• Both speech and listening comprehension
were taught
• Correct pronunciation and grammar were
emphasized
The disadvantages of
• It required teachers who were native speakers
or who had nativelike fluency in the foreign
language.
• It was largely dependent on the teacher’s skill,
rather than on a textbook, and not all teachers
were proficient enough in the foreign
language tot adhere to the principles of the
methods
• Wasting time in explanation
• Translation would have been a much more
efficient technique
• Direct Method was used in noncommercial
schools and then consequently declined.
• Henry Sweet stated that it offered innovation at
the level of teaching procedures but lacked a
thorough methodological basis. He suggested
that the development of sound methodological
principles that could serve as the basis for
teaching techniques. In
• the 1920s and 1930s, applied linguists systematized the
principles proposed earlier by the Reform Movement
and so laid the foundations of Audiolingualism in the
United States and the Oral Approach or Situational
Language Teaching in Britian.
• The Direct Method can be regarded as the first
language miethod to have caught the attention of
teachers and language teaching specialists, and it
offered a methodology that appeared to move
language teaching into a new era– the methods era.
Innovations and new directions
• What should the goals of language teaching
be ? Should a language course try to teach
conversational proficiency, reading,
translation, or some other skill?
• What is the basic nature of language, and how
will this affect the teaching method?
• What are the principles for the selections of
language content in language teaching?
• What principles of organization, sequencing,
and presentation best facilitate learning?
• What should the role of the native language
be?
• What processes do learners use in mastering a
language , and can these be incorporated into
a method?
• What teaching techniques and activities work
best and under what circumstances?
The importance of the knowledge of
approaches and methods
1. The study of approaches and methods
provides teachers with a view of how the
field of language teaching has evolved.
2. Approaches and methods can be studied not
as prescriptions for how to teach but as a
source of well-used practices, which teachers
can adapt or implement based on their own
needs.
• Experience in using different teaching
approaches and methods can provide
teachers with basic teaching skills that they
can later add to or supplement as they
develop teaching experience.