Reconceptualizing language teaching: an in-service teacher education course in uzbekistan

By the end of this section, you will be able to...

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CHAPTER FOUR: PRACTICAL EXAMPLES OF USING COMMUNICATIVE COMPETENCE
A) understand how to better teach intended meanings (i.e., meaning-
in-use) based on interactive classroom activities; and,
B) interpret pragmatic meanings in different social contexts. This means 
knowing pragmalinguistics (i.e., meaning-in-use depending on time, space 
and social context) and sociopragmatics (i.e., societal shared rules and 
norms that make an utterance appropriate from the viewpoint of the max-
ims of quality, quantity, relevance and manner).
TASK IN CLASS
2
Topic: Researching different sociolinguistic categories (e.g., age, gen-
der, and nationality) about how people respond to the utterances hello, 
how are you,
and I heard you have problems these days.
Purpose: To understand how different categories of people respond 
to utterances hello, how are you, and I heard you have problems these days 
from the maxims of quantity and quality (see Grice, 1975, and chapter 1 
for a detailed discussion of maxims). Generally, the maxim of quantity im-
plies how many words/sentences different categories of people use to re-
spond to the utterances hello, how are you, and I heard you have problems 
these days
(i.e., language variation). On the other hand, the maxim of quality 
means to what extent a person who is responding is open/genuine, and 
thus telling the truth about his or her state of being. Usually, people (e.g., 
friends, relatives) respond to the utterance I heard you have problems these 
days
as follows: (i) shortly “no,” meaning this person does not want you too 
close to him or her. Thus, he or she is not open, even though he or she has 
a problem; or, (ii) people are very open and tell all his or her problems. The 
meaning of the utterance I heard you have problems these days depends on 
how people respond to your question. Thus, forms/structures and mean-
ings/semantics are meaningful while speaking takes place. Students doing 
this speaking activity will feel how form, rules, and dictionary meanings are 
deployed in real life situations to accomplish a communicative goal.
Focus: questioning people (i.e., other students, relatives, friends (via 
phone, for example)) by asking: hello, how are you, and I heard you have 
problems these days
.
Pre-work: none.
2
Please note that the proposed activity is one example out of many. This example is 
given to show how a teacher can organize class based on CLT via speaking activities. 
This activity will serve as a framework for organizing such classes with different topics, in 
different contexts in the future.

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140
RECONCEPTUALIZING LANGUAGE TEACHING
Activity: individual work. Students will explore how different categories 
of people respond to hello, how are you, and I heard you have problems these 
days
. The answers, with the permission of interlocutors, will be recorded 
with the help of mobile phones and then the content of these communi-
cations will be analyzed from the viewpoint of the maxims of quality and 
quantity. The findings of students will be presented one by one. 
Needed technology: mobile phones, laptop, and projector.