THE COMMUNICATIVE APPROACH
This approach has preserved quite a lot of characteristic features from both the cognitive and the natural approaches. The representatives of the Communicative Approach (CA) acknowledge that structures and vocabulary are important but they emphasize the acquisition of linguistic structures or vocabulary as well. When we communicate we use the language to accomplish some function such as arguing, persuading and promising. We carry out these functions with a social context.
1.1. Characteristics of communicative classes:
Communicative language teaching is
• content based
language is a tool for getting information about the world. In this approach message is more important than the form. Interdisciplinary or in another word: cross-curricular approach, by which content can be integrated into English teaching, is based on a lot of authentic materials taken from various text types such as newspapers, journals, pamphlets, guidebooks etc. These texts cover a wide range of topics, so in addition to broadening your students’ minds, they will build up their vocabulary as well. • intercultural
Foreign language learning is often foreign culture learning. In order to understand just what foreign culture learning is, one needs to understand the nature of acculturation and culture shock. A person's world view, selfidentity, and systems of thinking, acting, feeling, and communicating can be disrupted by a change from one culture to another
• holistic
It means that the whole personality of the learner must be developed during language teaching. This term related to communicative language teaching, will focus teachers attention on the fact that students’ ways of thinking should also be developed. • experiential
The students are supposed to experience that the target language acquired is very useful in life. Authentic texts such as brochures, instructions, cookery books etc. make students feel how practicable their knowledge in English is.
• learner-centred
Learners’ needs are very important in communicative language. Activities are chosen according to the various learning styles and they also must be age relevant.
The goal of communicative language teaching is to make students communicatively competent. Let us examine what the term communicative competence means.
1.1. Defining Communicative Competence
The term "communicative competence" was coined by Dell Hymes (1967, 1972) -a sociolinguist who was convinced that Chomsky's (1965) notion of competence (see Chapter Two) was too limited. Communicative competence, then, is that aspect of our competence that enables us to convey and interpret messages and to negotiate meanings interpersonally within specific contexts.
In the 1970s, research on communicative competence distinguished between linguistic and communicative competence (Hymes 1967, Paulston 1974) to highlight the difference between knowledge "about" language forms and knowledge that enables a person to communicate functionally and interactively.
Seminal work on defining communicative competence was carried out by Michael Canale and Merrill Swain (1980), now the reference point for virtual discussions of communicative competence vis-á-vis second language teach in Canale and Swain's (1980), and later in Canale's (1983) definition, four :different components, or subcategories, make up the construct of communicative competence. The first two subcategories reflect the use of the linguistic stem itself.
(Brown 1994: 226-250)
(1) Grammatical competence is that aspect of communicative competence that encompasses "knowledge of lexical items and of rules of morphology, syntax, sentence-grammar semantics, and phonology" (Canale and Swain 1980:29). It is the competence that we associate with mastering the linguistic code of a language, the
"linguistic" competence of Hymes and Paulston, referred to above.
(2) The second subcategory is discourse competence, the complement of grammatical competence in many ways. It is the ability we have to connect sentences in stretches of discourse and to form a meaningful whole out of a series of utterances. Discourse means everything from simple spoken conversation to lengthy written texts (articles, books, and the like). While grammatical competence focuses on sentence-level grammar, discourse competence is concerned with intersentential relationships.
The last two subcategories define the more functional aspects of communication.
(3) Sociolinguistic competence is the knowledge of the socio-cultural rules of language and of discourse. This type of competence "requires an understanding of the social context in which language is used: the roles of the participants, the information they share, and the function of the interaction. Only in a full context of this kind can judgments be made on the appropriateness of a particular utterance (Savignon 1983: 37).
(4) The fourth subcategory is strategic competence, a construct that is exceedingly complex. Canale and Swain (1980: 30) described strategic competence as "the verbal and nonverbal communication strategies that may be called into action to compensate for breakdowns in communication due to performance variables or due to insufficient competence." Savignon (1983:40) paraphrases this as "the strategies that one uses to compensate for imperfect knowledge of rules-or limiting factors in their application such as fatigue, distraction, and inattention." In short, it is the competence underlying our ability to make repairs, to cope with imperfect knowledge, and to sustain communication through "paraphrase, circumlocution, repetition, hesitation, avoidance, and guessing, as well as shifts in register and style" (Savignon 1983: 40-41).
Strategic competence occupies a special place in an understanding of communication. Actually, definitions of strategic competence that are limited to the notion of "'compensatory strategies" fall short of encompassing the full spectrum of the construct. In a follow-up to the previous (Canale and Swain, 1980) article, Swain (1984:189) amended the earlier notion of strategic competence to include "communication strategies that may be called into action either to enhance the effectiveness of communication or to compensate for breakdowns." (my italics) Similarly, Yule and Tarone (1990: 181) refer to strategic competence as "an ability to select an effective means of performing a communicative act that enables the listener/reader to identify the intended referent." So, all communication strategiessuch as those discussed in Chapter Five-may be thought of as arising out of a person's strategic competence. In fact, strategic competence is the way we manipulate language in order to meet communicative goals.
Total Physical Response (TPR)
The idea of TPR originates from James Asher, who found that adults’ second or foreign language learning could have similar developmental patterns to that of children’s language acquisition. A baby spends a lot of months listening to the people around it long before it says a word. In Krashen’s The Natural Approach (1983) the students listen to the teacher using the target language communicatively from the beginning of the instruction throughout the course. The teacher helps her students to understand her by using pictures and occasional words in the students’ native language and by being as expressive as possible. In TPR students listen and respond to the spoken target language commands of their teacher.
The goal of TPR is to have the students enjoy their experience in learning to communicate in a foreign language. The TPR was developed in order to reduce the stress people feel when studying foreign languages and encourage students to persist in their study beyond the beginning level of proficiency.
The principles of TPR:
- the teacher is the director of all student behaviour, the students are imitators of her nonverbal model, in 10-20 hours of instruction students will be ready to speak;
- interaction is between the teacher and the whole group of students and with individual students;
- the method is introduced in the students’ native language, after the introduction rarely would the mother tongue be used ;
- grammatical structures and vocabulary are emphasized over other language areas;
- pronunciation is developed through listening mostly;
- culture is the lifestyle of people who speak the language natively;
- skills: understanding the spoken word should precede its production, the spoken language is emphasized over written language, students often do not learn to read the commands they have already learnt to perform until after 10 hours of instruction;
- formal evaluations can be conducted by commanding individual students to perform a series of actions;
- teachers should be tolerant of errors and only correct major errors, even these should be corrected gently;
- the syllabus is multi-strand.
Activities characteristic of the method:
- using commands to direct behaviour
- role reversal (Students command their teacher and classmates to perform some actions. Students will want to speak after 10 to 20 hours of instruction.
Students should not be encouraged to speak until they are ready.)
Community Language Learning
The Community Language Learning method takes its principle from the more general Counselling-Learning approach developed by Charles A. Curran. Curran studied adult learning for many years. A language counsellor means someone who is a skilful understander of the struggle students face as they attempt to internalize another language. By understanding students’ fears and being sensitive to them, he can help students overcome their negative feelings and turn them into positive energy to further their learning.
The goals of teachers are to make their students to learn how to use the target language communicatively. They want their students to learn about their own learning to take responsibility for it.
The principles of Community Language Learning:
- the teacher is a counsellor who recognizes how threatening a new learning situation can be for adult learners so he understands and supports his students in their struggle to acquire the target language;
- the student-teacher interaction in the Community Language Learning method changes within the lesson and over time, this method is neither student nor teacher centred but; rather teacher-student centred, with both being decision makers in the class; building a relationship with and among students is very important;
- where possible, literal native equivalents are given to the target language words that have been transcribed, this makes their meaning clear and allows students to combine the target language words to create new sentences;
- active vocabulary is very important as conversations in the target language can replace native language conversations;
- the focus shifts from grammar to sentence formation, language is for communication;
- pronunciation is developed by reading out loud;
- culture is integrated with language;
- the most important skills are the receptive ones and speaking the language, reading and writing are worked on;
- whatever evaluation is conducted it should be in keeping with the principles of the method, a classroom test should be more of an integrative test than a discrete point one, students are asked to write a paragraph rather than being asked to answer a question which deals with only one point of the language at a time; students often self-evaluate to become aware of their own progress;
- errors are corrected in a non threatening way, the teacher repeats correctly what the student has said incorrectly;
- the syllabus is designed primarily by the students.
Activities characteristic of the method:
- transcription (The teacher transcribes the students’ tape-recorded target language conversation.)
- reflective listening (The students relax and listen to their own voices speaking the target language on the tape.)
- human computer (The student is “in control” of the teacher when she tries to say the word or phrase. The teacher repeats the phrase as often as the student wants to practise it. The teacher does not correct the student’s mispronunciation in any way.)
- small group tasks (The small groups make new sentences with the words on the transcript. Afterward the groups share the sentences they made with the rest of the class.)
Suggestopedia
One of the alternative methods based on language acquisition belonging to the natural approach is Suggestopedia. The originator of the method, Georgi Lozanov asserts that we set up psychological barriers to learning. Suggestopedia has been developed to help students eliminate the feeling that they cannot be successful and to help them overcome the barriers to learning. Learning is facilitated in a relaxed, comfortable environment. A student can learn from the environment even if his attention is not directed to it. The student must trust and respect the teacher’s authority and activate his imagination. The teacher is supposed to increase her students’ confidence that they will be successful learners. The more confident the students feel, the better they will learn. When students’ attention is off the form of the language and on the process of communicating, students will learn best. The texts students work from contain lengthy dialogues in the target language. Next to the text is a translation in the learners’ mother tongue. There are some notes on the structures in the conversation as well. The teacher presents the dialogue during two concerts; the first phase of this presentation is the receptive phase. In the first concert the teacher reads the dialogue, matching her or his voice to the rhythm and pitch of the music. In this way, the “whole brain” of students becomes activated. The learners follow the target language dialogue as the teacher reads it out loud. They can also check the translation. In the second concert the students simply relax while the teacher reads the dialogue at a normal rate of speed. After this phase the students read over the dialogue again before they go to sleep and again when they get up the next morning. In the activation phase students engage in various activities including dramatizations, games, songs and question-and-answer exercises.
The goal of the method is to accelerate the process by which students learn to use a foreign language for everyday communication. This is to be done by breaking down the psychological barriers learners bring with them to the learning situation.
The principles of Suggestopedia:
- the teacher is the authority in the classroom, who must be trusted and respected by the students – once the students trust the teacher, they feel secure, they can be more spontaneous and less inhibited;
- all types of interactions are to be found in case of the method, however first it is the teacher that initiates interactions with the whole group of students and with individuals right from the beginning of a course; in the beginning of the course the students can only respond nonverbally, later the students have more control of the target language and can respond more appropriately, and even initiate interaction themselves. Students interact with each other from the beginning in various activities directed by the teacher;
- native language translation is used to make the meaning of the dialogue clear, the teacher uses the mother tongue in lesson when necessary; as the course proceeds, the teacher uses the native language less and less;
- vocabulary is emphasized, the success of the method can be put down to the large number of words that can be acquired;
- grammar is dealt with explicitly but minimally, students will learn best if their conscious attention is focused not on the language forms but on using the language;
- pronunciation is developed by reading out loud;
- the culture which students learn concerns the everyday life of people who speak the language. The use of the fine arts is also common in Suggestopedia;
- speaking communicatively is emphasized, students also read the target language and write, for example compositions;
- evaluation is conducted on students’ normal in-class performance and not through formal tests;
- at the beginning levels, errors are not corrected immediately since the emphasis is on students communicating their intended meaning; when errors occur the teacher uses delayed correction;
- the syllabus used in the method is functional.
Activities characteristic of the method:
- peripheral learning (This activity is based on the idea that we perceive much more in our environment than that to which we consciously attend. By putting posters on the classroom walls students will absorb the necessary facts effortlessly. Posters are changed from time to time to provide grammatical information that is appropriate to what the learners are studying.)
- choose a new identity (Learners choose a target language name and a new profession or trade. In someone else’s shoes the learners will be less inhibited while using the target language.)
The Silent Way
According to cognitive psychologists and transformational generative linguists language learning does not take place through mimicry since people can create utterances they have never heard before. That is the reason why language must not be considered a product of habit formation, but rather a rule formation. Language acquisition must be a procedure where people use their own thinking processes, or cognition to discover the rules of the language they are acquiring. The emphasis on human cognition led to the name “cognitive code” being applied to a new general approach to language teaching. Caleb Gattegno’s Silent Way did not emerge from the cognitive code approach it shares certain principles with it. In the Silent Way teaching should be subordinated to learning.
The goal of the method is to enable students to use the language for selfexpression to express their thoughts, perceptions and feelings. In order to do this they need to develop independence from the teacher, to develop their own inner criteria for correctness.
The principles of the Silent Way:
- the teacher is a technician or engineer, only the learner can do the learning but the teacher can focus the students’ perceptions, force their awareness;
- for much of the students-teacher interaction the teacher is silent; he is still very active setting up situations to force awareness; when the teacher speaks it is to give clues not to model the language; student-student verbal interaction is desirable and is encouraged;
- the students’ native language can be used to give instructions when necessary to help a student improve his/her pronunciation; the native language is also used during the feed-back sessions; - vocabulary is restricted at first;
- there is a focus on the structures of the language, although explicit grammar rules may never be supplied;
- pronunciation is worked on from the beginning, it is important that students acquire the melody of the language;
- all four skills are worked on from the beginning of the course, although there is a sequence in that students learn to read or write what they have already produced orally; the skills reinforce what students are learning;
- the culture as reflected in people’s own unique world view is inseparable from their language;
- the teacher never gives a formal test, he assesses student learning all the time; the teacher must be responsive to immediate learning needs; the teacher does not praise or criticize student behaviour since this would interfere with students developing their own inner criteria; the teacher looks for steady progress, not perfection;
- students’ errors are seen as a natural, indispensable part of the learning process, errors are inevitable since the students are encouraged to explore the language; the teacher uses student errors as a basis for deciding where further work is necessary;
- there is no fixed linear, structural syllabus, instead the teacher starts with what the students know and builds from one structure to the next; the previously introduced structures are continually being recycled.
Activities characteristic of the method:
- sound-colour chart (The chart contains blocks of colour, each one representing a sound in the target language. The chart allows students to produce sound combinations in the target language without doing so through repetition.)
- teacher’s silence (The teacher gives just as much help as is necessary and then is silent. Even in error correction the teacher will only supply a verbal answer as a last resort.)
- peer correction
- rods (Rods can be used to provide visible actions or situations for any language structure to introduce it, or to enable students to practice using it.)
- self correction gestures (The teacher indicates for example that each of his fingers represents a word in a sentence and uses this to locate the trouble spot for the student.)
- word chart
- Fidel charts (The teacher points to the colour coded Fidel charts in order that students can associate the sounds of the language with their spelling.)
- structured feed-back (The teacher accepts the students’ comments in a non-defensive manner hearing things that will help give him direction for where he should work when the class meets again.) (Larsen-Freeman 1986: 51-72)
The Audio-Lingual Method
The Audio-Lingual Method, which belongs to the cognitive approach of language teaching, was developed in the United States during WW II. There was a great demand for people speaking foreign languages for military purposes. They had to be prepared for their tasks in shortcut intensive courses. Some of the principles used in this method are similar to those of the direct method but many are different, based upon the conceptions of the Grammar Translation Method.
The goal of Audio-Lingual Method is to enable students to use the target language communicatively. In order to do this, students need to over-learn the target language, to learn to use it automatically without stopping to think. This aim can be achieved by students’ forming new habits in the target language and overcoming the old habits of their native language.
The principles of the method are:
- the teacher is like an orchestra leader, directing and controlling the language behaviour of her/his students; she provides her students with a good model for imitation;
- the target language is used in the classroom not the students’ native language;
- a contrastive analyses between the students’ native language and the target language will reveal where a teacher should expect the most interference;
- there is student-student interaction in chain drills or when students take different roles in dialogues, but this interaction is teacher-directed because most of the interaction is between teacher-student and is initiated by the teacher;
- new vocabulary and structures are presented through dialogues, the dialogues are learnt through imitation and repetition, grammar is induced from the examples given: explicit grammar rules are not provided;
- cultural information is contextualized in the dialogues or presented by the teacher;
- the oral/aural skills receive most of the attention, pronunciation is taught from the beginning, often by students working in language laboratories;
- students are evaluated on the bases of distinguishing between words in a minimal pair or by supplying an appropriate word form in a sentence;
- student errors are to be avoided through the teacher’s awareness of where the students will have difficulty;
- the syllabus is structure-based.
Activities characteristic of the method:
- dialogue memorization
- expansion-drill (This drill is used when a long dialogue is giving students trouble. The teacher brakes down the line into several parts. Following the teacher’s cue, the students expand what they are repeating part by part until they are able to repeat the entire line. The teacher begins with the part at the end of the sentence and works backward from there to keep the intonation of the line as natural as possible. This directs more student attention to the end of the sentence, where new information typically occurs.)
- repetition drill
- chain drill (The teacher begins the chain of conversation by greeting a student or asking him a question. That student responds, then turns to the student sitting next to him and the chain will be continued. The chain drill allows some controlled communication, even though it is limited.)
- single-slot substitution drill (The teacher says a line, usually from the dialogue. Next, the teacher says a word or a phrase- called a cue. The students repeat the line the teacher has given them substituting the cue into the line in its proper place. The major purpose of this drill is to give the students practice in finding and filling in the slots of a sentence.)
- multiple-slot substitution drill (The teacher gives cue phrases, one at a time that fit into different slots in the dialogue line. The students have to recognise what part of speech each cue is where it fits into the sentence and make other changes such as subject-verb agreement.)
- transformation drill (Students are asked fro example to transform an affirmative sentence into a negative one.)
- question and answer drill
- use of minimal pairs (The teacher works with pairs of words which differ in only one sound eg. ship – sheep.)
- gap-filling
The Direct Method
Since the Grammar Translation Method was not very effective in preparing students to use the target language communicatively, the Direct Method became popular. In the Direct Method no translation is allowed. The Direct Method receives its name from the fact that meaning is to be connected directly with the target language without going through the process of translating into he students’ native language. The method itself belongs to the natural approach of language teaching.
The goal of language learning is communication. In order to achieve this goal, students should learn to think in the target language.
The principles of the method:
- the initiation of the interaction goes both ways, from teacher to students and from students to teacher although the latter is often teacher-directed, at the same time student-student interaction is used as well;
- the native language should not be used in the classroom;
- the teacher should demonstrate not explain or translate;
- the teacher and the students are more like partners in the teaching/learning process;
- it is desirable that students make a direct association between the target language and meaning;
- students should learn to think in the target language as soon as possible;
- vocabulary is acquired more naturally if students use it in full sentences rather than memorising word lists;
- pronunciation should be worked on right from the beginning of language instruction;
- lessons should contain some conversation activity – some opportunity for students to use language in real contexts;
- students should be encouraged to speak as much as possible;
- grammar should be taught inductively;
- there may never be an explicit grammar rule given;
- the syllabus is based on situations or topics not on linguistic structures;
- learning a language involves learning the behaviour culture of the people living in the target country;
- culture consisting of the history of the people who speak the target language and the geography of the country or countries where the language is spoken and information about the daily lives of the speakers in the target language are studied;
- vocabulary is emphasized over grammar;
- work on all four skills (reading, writing, speaking and listening) occurs from the start, oral communication is seen as basic;
- there is no formal evaluation in the class, students have to use the language using both oral and written skills;
- the teacher tries to get students to self-correct whenever possible.
Activities characteristic of the method:
- reading aloud
- conversation practice
- gap filling exercise
- dictation
- map drawing (The students are given a map with the geographical features unnamed. Then the teacher gives the students directions. (Following the teacher’s
The Grammar Translation Method
The Grammar Translation Method has had different names but it has been used by language teachers for a long time. It was called Classical Method as it was first used in the teaching of the classical languages, Latin and Greek. Its aim was to help students read foreign language literature and it was also hoped that through studying the grammar of the target language students would become familiar with the grammar of their native language and that of the target language. In the 19th century the Classical Method was known as the Grammar Translation Method. According to the Grammar Translation Method the fundamental purpose of learning a foreign language is:
- to be able to read literature written in the target language;
- to provide students with good mental exercise which helps develop their minds;
- to give the learners grammatical rules and examples to memorize them;
- to make them apply the rules to other examples;
- to teach the students to write in both their native and the target languages through translation. (Bárdos 2005: 46)
The method itself belongs to the cognitive way of language teaching. The basic principles of the method:
- characteristic interaction in the teaching process is a Student – Teacher interaction;
- teacher’s roles are very traditional, the teacher is the authority in the classroom;
- literary language is considered superior to spoken language, culture is considered as consisting of literature and the fine arts, behaviour culture is ignored;
- passive vocabulary and grammar are emphasized at cost of pronunciation
- reading and writing are the primary skills much less attention is given to speaking and listening;
- the language that is used in class is mostly the students native language, the meanings of new words are made clear by translating them into the students native language;
- evaluation is accomplished on the basis of written tests in which students are expected to translate from their native language to the target one or vice versa, questions about the foreign culture have to be answered as well;
- culture is viewed as consisting of literature and the fine arts;
- error correction is very important, the teacher always supplies the students with the correct answer
- the syllabus is structure-based . Activities characteristic of the method:
- translation of a literary passage
- reading comprehension
- finding antonyms and synonyms
- gap-filling exercises
- memorization
- using words in sentences
- compositions.
