What is communicative language teaching?

Communicative language teaching (CLT) is a label that is often used to describe courses and it seems to be a label that has become so over-used and easily used that it has perhaps begun to lose its meaning. When asked in a recent seminar what the characteristics of community language were, there did seem to be a definite reticence to offer answers. I found this somewhat surprising given the widespread use of the term.

What would happen to your school if it did not describe the courses given there are communicative language courses? Would you lose business? Would people automatically think that your courses were of a lower quality? What would happen to me as a teacher if I told people that I did not believe in the principles of CLL? Would I be cast out of the people friendly language teaching community? A outcast, a pariah?

But, if I am not confidently sure of what the principles or characteristics of CLL are, how can I claim to believe in them? I would be doing nothing better than paying lip service. Here then, is an attemopt at a taxonomy of the characteristics of CLL to guide my own assessment of my courses and teaching.

A taxonomy of the characteristics of communicative language learning.

• Learners learn through communicating in the target language rather than overt teaching of atomised particles of the language.
• Authentic texts are used.
• Activities are done for reasons of meaning rather than form.
• Interaction is meaning focussed rather than form focussed.
• Comprehensible communicative competence is the aim: activities are aimed at fluency rather than accuracy and by extension, over learning.
• Feedback given by the teacher is related to the communication information gap and not to the language point in question. That is, meaning is paramount.
  Language is presented subtly.
• Learners are given opportunities to focus on the learning process as well as the language items.
• An attempt is made to link classroom learning with language use outside the classroom.
  Target language is properly contextualised.
• Communication starts immediately, rather than after long periods of grammar, vocabulary or drills.
• Sequencing of presentation is dictated by function or need and not linguistic complexity.
• Communicative competence is reached through trail and error - mistakes are considered a part of the learning process.

The teacher cannot control or otherwise predict what language the learners use to communicate.

Caveats

Although there is an emphasis on fluency and achieving communicative competence, this should not be to the exclusion of other features such as language analysis, controlled practice and semi-authentic rather than authentic texts.

Finally, there does seem to be little agreement as to what CLL is because it does seem to have become a sort of umbrella term that is used to describe a variety of methods.

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