Second International Conference on Teaching English for Specific Purposes
“Synergies of Language Learning”
Faculty of Electronic Engineering, University of Niš, Serbia, 22-24 May, 2015
IMPLEMENTING CLT IN A LOCAL ESP CONTEXT
Basim Faraj
University of Benghazi
Al Marj, Libya
BACKGROUND
Learning foreign languages is increasing dramatically
 Accordingly, foreign Language teaching has been developed
and many theories and approaches have been suggested
 Grammar-translation – Direct method – Reading method –
Audio-lingual method – Universal grammar – Systemicfunctional grammar – Monitor theory ..etc
 Communicative Language Teaching (CLT ) has been
introduced to the field as a natural upgrade to all of what have
been done previously in language teaching.

“CLT” PERSPECTIVE

Communicative language teaching (Littlewood, 1981)
The focus was on learners’ message and fluency
Often taught through problem-solving activities and tasks which
required students to transact information
 Immersion program – teaching some non-language-related
subject, such as history or politics, in the L2
 Learners could become quite fluent in an L2 through exposure
without explicit instruction.



According to Savignon (2005), she stated that “The essence of
CLT is the engagement of learners in communication to allow
them to develop their communicative competence”.
COMMUNICATIVE COMPETENCE (CANAL, 1983)




Linguistic competence, it develops the students` knowledge
about new vocabulary and syntactic features of different word
classes.
Discourse competence, The pieces of reading and listening used
in the program has some discourse markers which also help
students to develop their discourse competence.
Socio-cultural competence, students interact with each other to
share ideas; this interaction needs a certain socio-cultural
competence to be successful. (possibility with native speakers)
Strategic competence, it helps students to use their own
strategies to guess the meaning of the new words they
encounter.
“CLT” PERSPECTIVE
Brown (2001), six interrelated characteristics as a description of CLT
the focus on all components of communicative competence
 learners should use target language for meaningful purposes
 fluency and accuracy are complementary principles
 learners should use the target language productively and
receptively
 learners should develop their lifelong language learning strategies
 the role of the teacher is to facilitate and guide the learning process.

LEARNING CONTEXT (TARGET POPULATION)
The program is designed for first year medical students
in Libya.
 Students are all Libyans (Culture and 1st language
background)
 18-20 years old
 Their level of English proficiency is nearly intermediate
 Almost all the students have basic computer skills.
 Importantly, they all have the same level of difficulty
dealing with their academic medical subjects which are
taught in English.

NEEDS ANALYSIS

“Discipline-specific language study has long been linked
to an expectation that learners’ needs should be analyzed
in order to select language components that match what
students require to succeed in their academic studies.”
(Kimball, 1998)

Based on my recent needs analysis study, three major
aspects have been considered in this project.
1.
2.
3.
Technology-enhanced language learning
Communicative Language Teaching (CLT)
Medical terminology
USING TECHNOLOGY IN LEARNING ENGLISH AS PERCEIVED BY
MEDICAL STUDENTS
No
19
statement
Do you think that using technology such as computers may
assist in learning English for medical studies?
Agree
Disagree
84.5%
10.3%
To some
extent
3.4%
I do not
know
1.7%
3.40% 1.70%
10.30%
Agree
Disagree
To some extent
I do not know
84.50%
TECHNOLOGY PERSPECTIVE

Apparently, the Internet increases the motivation on the part of
students and reduces the stress of in-class language sessions (Lai
& Kritsonis, 2006).

It enhances different language skills by practicing in a real
environment, and accessing various authentic materials which
help in learning process.
TECHNOLOGY PERSPECTIVE
This web-based program could be regarded as a simple
presentation of using technology in language education.
 Our purpose is to show our colleagues that;
1. Using new techniques in teaching could be quite helpful
for our students; particularly, when we design programs
ourselves.
2. The process of designing such programs is quite easy,
flexible, straightforward and does not need any
professional work at all.

TECHNOLOGICAL TOOLS
The program is simply a website (Google sites)
 English for medical purposes
 Word office & pdf for reading articles, assignments &
hyperlinks to other sources.
 YouTube for audio-visual files
 Hot potato for exercises
 Discussion board and blogs for class communication &
homework submission.

TEACHING APPROACH
 Focusing
on teaching all language skills (skills
integration)
 Communicative Language Teaching (CLT) has
been adopted as the main approach of teaching.
 The teacher`s role is managing on-class activities
just to ensure that students are fully engaged in
the lesson.
THE COURSE
“ENGLISH FOR MEDICAL STUDENTS”
The program in general is ESP (EMP).
 It consists of six different skills: Reading, Writing, Listening ,
Speaking, Vocabulary and Grammar.
 Medical terminology is considered heavily here because of its
significance in (EMP) particularly for those who are new in the
field in which all materials are delivered in English.
 Also, it is divided into different themes all related to the field of
Medicine. Ex. Human body, Infection, Heart disease etc.
 Each theme is covered over one session (4 weeks)

INTEGRATION
The Web-based program is fully integrated into the
course.
 In each two-hour class, students should spend one hour
learning directly from the website. The rest of class time
is for practicing and exercises.
 Two (subject matter) reading articles,
 One relevant audio-visual material.
 List of new terminology of the weekly topic.
 A sufficient number of exercises to ensure the students’
understanding.

STORYBOARD
Home page
Discussion
board
Introduction
Session 1
(Human body)
Overview
Announcement
Academic
Reading
Academic
Writing
Reading
articles
Audio-visual
clip
Blog
Class contact
Vocabulary
Oral
presentation
Listening to
lectures
New
vocabulary list
Exercise
Homework
CONCLUSION
“while these technological innovations facilitate computer-based
learning activities……, they are ultimately tools in the hands of
course authors who must use them creatively to maximize the
students' language learning experience and to enhance their
language acquisition for communicative purposes.”
(Chen, Belkada, and Okamoto, 2004)
Thank you
Any Questions and/or
Comments!!