Content introduction chapter I. Communicative language teaching prioritizes developing students’ communication and interaction skills

1.3 Features of Communicative Approach
Meaning is paramount. Dialogues, if used, enter around communicative functions and are not normally memorized. Contextualization is a basic premise. (Meaning cannot be understood out of context. Teachers using this approach will present a grammar topic in a meaningful context. Example: If the new topic to teach is Present Continuous, the teacher will not mime the action of ‘walking’ and ask: What am I doing? I am walking. Instead, the teacher will show, say, pictures of her last trip and tell the students something like: I have pictures of my vacation. Look, in this picture I am with my friends. We are having lunch at a very expensive restaurant. In this other picture, we are swimming at the beach. Language learning is learning to communicate and effective communication is sought. (When learners are involved in real communication, their natural strategies for language acquisition will be used, and this will allow them to learn to use the language.) Drilling may occur, but peripherally. Comprehensible pronunciation is sought. Translation may be used where students need or benefit from it. Reading and writing can start from the first day. Communicative competence is the desired goal (i.e., the ability to use the linguistic system effectively and appropriately). Teachers help learners in any way that motivates them to work with the language. Students are expected to interact with other people, either in the flesh, through pair and group work, or in their writings. The Communicative Approach is about helping students develop communicative competence, which means the ability to use proper grammar and linguistic structure in different real-life contexts and the ability to adapt to different situations. In this light, Authentic Material is key to helping students develop their grammar and vocabulary while exposed to listening, speaking, reading, and writing activities.Authentic Material allows teachers to supplement or eventually replace the boring ESL textbook. The following is a compilation of authentic material sources most commonly used in the classroom: Ad Banners, advertisements, billboards. Catalogs, college and university brochures, flyers, travel brochures.Movies, scripts, commercials. Radio shows, newspapers, Internet websites, magazines, TV shows. Social media, YouTube, phonebooks. Ticket stubs, manuals, menus, maps. Greeting cards, horoscopes. It has been noticed that the goal of the most of the methods is to make the students able to communicate in the target language. But in the 1970s, the educators tried to find out whether they were going to meet the goal of the students in a right way or not. It had been observed that students were able to write and read the sentences in target language correctly. But when it came to communicate in the target language, they failed to do so. It made clear to the observer that to make the students able to communicate in the target language, it required more than mastering only the linguistic structures. It had been accepted by the educators that to be able to communicate in the target language, communicative competence is required with linguistic competence. There had been a shift from the linguistic structure centered approach to communicative approach in the late 1970s and 80s. CLT is an approach to teach foreign or second language which emphasizes on communicative competence. It also emphasizes on interaction as a means to teach language. Communicative Language Teaching replaced the Situation Language Teaching which had been used to teach English as a second or foreign language. It had been considered as the major British approach. The focus of SLT approach was on to teach the basic structures of language. But in the 1960s, the educators realized that language taught on the basis of situational learning would have been of no use. Because to teach the meaning, carried out from the utterances was more required as it expressed the intentions of the speaker or writer. In the mid of 1970s, the scope of Communicative Language Teaching has extended. Both American and British proponents now see it as an approach that aim to make communicative competence the goal of language teaching and develop procedure for the teaching of four language skill that acknowledge the interdependence of language and communication. The success of a communicative activity can be determined by the extent to which learners are dependent on the teacher. Tasks should be devised in a manner that learners gain autonomy and independence while learning. The role of the teachers is to give clear and to the point instructions and provide the appropriate environment for learners to interact and exchange information. Communicative activities are motivating. Learners should be at ease and have fun while doing the communicative tasks. Communicative tasks are realistic. Real communication situations should be the focus instead of isolated structures with no real-life reference. While in teacher-led classrooms learners were expected to be quiet and listen to the teacher and then, when asked, to respond to the teacher in unison with the correct answer, communicative tasks require learners to take initiatives and provide their responses ( instead of a response) to contribute to the success of learning.Communicative activities are meaningful: they are carried out to fulfil specific purposes such as booking a plane, hotel ticket, inviting somebody to a party, answering an invitation letter, shopping.Performance in communicative tests reflects an underlying competence that is linguistic, sociolinguistic, pragmatic, strategic…Communicative activities should consider this multi-dimensional nature of language. Authentic material can be used at different levels. The table below will guide you on what materials fit best with your classroom. The style of English used in Authentic Material is natural and communicates whatever the material was created for, rather than teaching a particular structure. For this reason, some critics indicate that the Communicative Approach does not place sufficient emphasis on grammar rules, so the method could not properly teach grammatical. Placing too much emphasis on games or authentic material can lead to a fun and engaging lesson, but the students do not learn anything of value. This is common when people take a sub-par TEFL certification course that lacks comprehensive training in lesson planning. Teachers need to be proficient in grammar rules and have the ability to structure a lesson plan that properly follows each stage.
One of the benefits of the Communicative Approach and related approaches under the Communicative Language Teaching (CLT) umbrella is that teachers can integrate a grammar or vocabulary lesson with receptive and productive language. With the Communicative Approach, a grammar lesson can be integrated with a speaking lesson creatively. Authentic material such as movies, newspapers, comics, and songs is key to supporting English language learning in an enjoyable and meaningful context to students. However, as these comprehensive lesson plans show, authentic material is supported with activities that reinforce practice of grammar structure. The Communicative Approach is used in different classroom settings worldwide. It is easier to implement in well-managed language programs with a maximum of 15 students. With proper training and a bit of experience, it can get easier to implement in large classes of 40+ students where Direct Method or Audio-lingual (known as Army-style method) are more commonly used. TESOUL graduates have written extensively on how the the Communicative Approach helped them adapt to any classroom situation in the world! Contextualization is a fundamental premise. (Meaning cannot be understood out of context. Teachers using this approach will teach a grammar structure in a meaningful context. Example: If the new topic to teach is Present Continuous, the teacher will not mime the action of ‘walking’ and ask: What am I doing? I am walking. Instead, the teacher will show, say, pictures of her last trip and tell the students something like: I have pictures of my vacation. Look, in this picture I am with my friends. We are having lunch at a very expensive restaurant. In this other picture, we are swimming at the beach.Communicative competence is the desired goal (i.e., the ability to use the linguistic system effectively and appropriately).Teaching Vocabulary on usual basis is highly recommended. This will make your students produce more, as well as enhance their receptive skills especially reading. In CLT approach meaning is given prime importance. The main focus of the approach is to make the learners able to understand the intention and expression of the writers and speakers. In this approach, it is believed that communicative functions are more important rather than linguistic structures. Littlewoold states that one of the most characteristics features of communicative language teaching is that it pays systematic attention to functional as well as structural aspects of language, combine these into a more fully communicative view. Each language has limited number of sentence patterns. Mastering only those sentence patterns does not help the learners to communicate in the target language. The learner needs to learn the communication functions of those structures. While using CLT approach in teaching language, the target language is used in the classroom. The target language is a vehicle for classroom communication, not just the object of study. Because if the learners continue to use their native languages, they are not able to communicate in the target language. Is believed that native language should be used judiciously. Appropriate use of language is emphasized rather than accuracy. Accuracy comes at the later stage. It is believed that when the learners learn to use the language appropriately accuracy comes automatically. Language should be taught by integrating all language skills and not by only one skill. It means communication approach is not limited to only speaking skill ; reading and writing skill should be developed. Language can not be learnt through rote memorization. It cannot be learnt in isolation.