Characteristics of Communicative Approach

Communicative Language Teaching (CLT) is a unified but broadly based, theoretically well informed set of tenets about the nature of language and language learning and teaching. From the earlier seminal works in CLT (Widdowson, 1978; Breen & Candlin, 1980; Savignon, 1983) up to more recent teacher education textbooks (Brown, 2000; Richard-Amato, 1996; Lee & VanPatten, 1995; Nunan 1991a), enough definitions have been offered by those specialists. For the sake ofsimplicity and directness, Brown (2001) offers the following six interconnected characteristics as a description of CLT:

1. Classroom goals are focused on all of the components (grammatical, discourse, functional, sociolinguistic, and strategic) of communicative competence. Goals therefore must intertwine the organizational aspects of language with the pragmatic.

2. Language techniques are designed to engage learners in the pragmatic, authentic, functional use of language for meaningful purposes. Organizational language forms are not the central focus, but rather aspects of language that enable the learner to accomplish those purposes.

3. Fluency and accuracy are seen as complementary principles underlying communicative techniques. At times fluency may have to take on more importance than accuracy in order to keep learners meaningfully engaged in language use.

4. Students in a communicative class ultimately have to use the language, productively and receptively, in unrehearsed contexts outside the classroom. Classroom tasks must therefore equip students with the skills necessary for communication in those contexts.

5. Students are given opportunities to focus on their own learning process through an understanding of their own styles of learning and through the development of appropriate strategies for autonomous learning.

6. The role of the teacher is that of facilitator and guide, not an all-knowing bestower of knowledge. Students are therefore encouraged to construct meaning through genuine linguistic interaction with others.

(Brown, 2001: 43)

These six characteristics underscore some major departures from earlier approaches. In some ways those departures were a gradual product of outgrowing the numerous methods that characterized a long stretch of history. In other ways those departures were radical. Structurally (grammatically) sequenced curricula were a mainstay of language teaching for centuries. CLT suggests that grammatical structure might better be subsumed under various functional categories. In CLT we pay considerably less attention to the overt presentation and discussion of grammatical rules than we traditionally did. A great deal of use of authentic language is implied in CLT, as we attempt to build fluency (Chambers, 1997). It isimportant to note, however, that fluency should never be encouraged at the expense of clear, unambiguous, direct communication. Much more spontaneity is present in communicative classrooms: Students are encouraged to deal with unrehearsed situations under the guidance, but not control, of the teacher. The importance of learners’ developing a strategic approach to acquisition is a total turnabout from earlier methods that never broached the topic of strategies-based instruction. And, finally, the teacher’s facilitative role in CLT is the product of two decades or more of slowly recognizing the importance of learner initiative in the classroom.

Some of the characteristics of CLT make it difficult for a nonnative speaking teacher who is not very proficient in the second language to teach effectively. Dialogues, drills, rehearsed exercises, and discussions (in the first language) of grammatical rules are much simpler for some nonnative speaking teachers to contend with. This drawback should not deter one, however, from pursuing communicative goals in the classroom. Technology (such as video, television, audiotapes, the Internet, the web, and computer software) can aid such teachers. Moreover, in the last decade or so, we have seen a marked increase in English teachers’ proficiency levels around the world. As educational and political institutions in various countries become more sensitive to the importance of teaching foreign languages for communicative purposes (not just for the purpose of fulfilling a “requirement” or of “passing a test”), we may be better able, worldwide, to accomplish the goals of communicative language (Brown, 2001: 43).