The Communicative Approach

In 1970 teachers and linguistics were dissatisfied about the learning process of English as a second language. The Audio - lingual Method and the grammar – translation method weren’t successful to the learning and teaching approach. These methods didn’t interact the student with language in a realistic way, so students had difficult when they were exposed to real life situations.  Through this fact, teachers and linguistics developed the method that will make students participate to real situations activities and the language will be a way to interact to the world, the communicative approach.

The Communicative Approach

In the past, the learning process of a second language (L2) was restricted to rules of grammar and the student were guide by the teacher to learn a correct structure of the L2. The communicative approach changed the learning method, now students are more free to lead the classes and be more closed to the reality of the L2.

The interaction must to be simple and direct, student can speak in their first day if they want to. Read, write and listening are mechanisms are learning that are taught together.

Teachers become facilitator’s rather leading classes; the main point is to interact student to situations that they live. Dialogues are stimulated to be focus on their interaction to the world and the grammar is not evaluated separately.

The objective is to make students feel comfortable to the language and be able to communicate without the focus on grammar meaning and use. Even when students commit common errors of collocations, they are not corrected since in real life situations common error can happened all the time.

The pronunciation is as important as the speaking process. Songs and games make student feel more secure when they deal with exercises, the main goal is to students don’t be afraid of take a conversation.

Activities are taught in pair or groups, the interaction to language is preparing them to interact with the society.

Exercises:

1) Listen to a real conversation and take notes about what you're listenig and answer the questions:

a)What was the main point of the conversation?

b)How old do you think they were?

c)How many people were involved in the subject?

The communicative approach is a revolutionary approach which makes students interact with language not in a superficial way. Its focus is on grammar and its main goal is to prepare students for communication with the real world.

(Posted by: Ludmila)

Bibliography:

 1- SHASTRI, Dr. Pratima Dave. Communicative Approach To The Teaching Of English As A Second Language. Students First Edition
2- RICHARDS, Jack C. and RODGERS, .Theodore S. Approaches and Methods in Language Teaching, A description and analysis. Cambridge University Pree, 1986