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CLT - Communicative Language Teaching
Communicative Language Teaching, or CLT, is an umbrella term for myriad approaches to foreign language teaching with a focus on, duh, communication! Be careful, though! You can say that a method is "communicative" yet it can actually have no communication - for instance if learners listen to a video on the history of a holiday and then answer questions on a worksheet or if everybody is doing the same thing, then it is not communicative. A communicative approach takes specific types of instructional design as well as a general setting whereby communication is at the heart. You will a definition and a few examples below and the section on Task-Based Learning should provide you with more ideas.
What is it?
Read the text below - this is the original text on what communicative language teaching is.
- Communication is the main goal of teaching and learning: language is studied to be capable of communicating messages either orally or in writing. Communication involves much more than just exchanging information. It also means expressing emotion, articulating thoughts, and eliciting a reaction from the interlocutor.
- Learner needs are central to effective teaching. Both initial and ongoing needs analysis are essential to select the language that needs to be taught and to plan the teaching process.
- Language learning is organised around four skills (two oral: listening, speaking; and two written: reading and writing)
- Learning is a pathway from the known to the unknown, from the simple to the complex, and from the general to the specific.
- The language syllabus is organised around a series of communicative intentions which enable effective use of the target language in situations that involve communication. Different functions such as, asking for directions, describing experiences, discussing plans are used, at least partially, to organise the syllabus. Speech acts are accomplished by speakers who act upon interlocutors through their words. Each speech act, like for example asking, instructing, or affirming, can be expressed differently depending on the context, and the situation.
- Students must use the target language in meaningful ways. The class must facilitate the ability of the learner to communicate in the language, exchange information, and accomplish speech acts.
- Speaking activities involve interaction between learners and give opportunities for interpretation, expression of opinions and negotiation of meaning, in addition to information transfer or regurgitation.
- In order to communicate effectively, one must know not only how a language works (grammar), but also what parts of the language to use and when, depending on the situation, the context, the interlocutor and the communication intention.
- Form-focused practice and meaning-focused experience – accuracy and fluency – are both given importance.
- Teaching/learning is organised around real-life situations. Situations are suggested that make it possible to use language to transmit information, implying choices of what needs to be said and how to say it.
- Priority is given to such authentic materials selected from real-life sources (newspaper articles, radio programs, advertising, excerpts from books, video clips, and so forth), above all to reflect the meaning and themes being covered.
- Vocabulary is taught in context rather than through memorisation of lists of words. Vocabulary is introduced not in a rigid progression, but rather following a spiral approach as authentic documents are studied.
- The learner becomes a communicator engaged in the negotiation of meaning and also takes responsibility. The teacher alternates as a ‘model,’ a ‘facilitator,’ an ‘organiser,’ an ‘advisor,’ a ‘co-communicator,’ etc.
- Pair and group work become important. The teacher fosters, encourages, and orchestrates the work of the learners. Learning is now described as ‘learner-centred’ and ‘learner-focused’.
- Teachers are given the responsibility to adopt approaches and techniques that suit their learners: no ‘method’ is prescribed.
- CLT thus involves a broader array of content and activities than earlier approaches (e.g. authentic materials, realistic situations, language presented in context, meaningful practice in all four skills, interaction in pairs and small groups). Lessons no longer all follow the same pattern but will have different weighting. Lessons are grouped into larger, holistic ‘teaching units’ of maybe 3–7 lessons, which offer balanced coverage of all of these aspects, with lessons linked together by topic themes and language themes.
Piccardo, E., & North, B. (2019). The action-oriented approach: A dynamic vision of language education (Vol. 72). Multilingual Matters. pp. 128-130
Turned into a Dialogue
The AI tool Twee was used to turn this original text into a dialogue. Compare the two versions. Is anything missing? Consider whether using gen AI to transform text abets in losing meaning.
Now take a little quiz.
Click on the picture below to go to the British Council website. Use the search function to look up any terms you feel like you don't quite understand or see how to apply to your teaching.
Information Gap Example
One common communicative activity is an information gap. But watch out! Do you know what an information gap is? Here is an example. What do you have to do? What makes this an information gap? How would you introduce such an activity to a class of third graders? How can you use this for differentiation? How would you give instructions (in English, of course as following instructions is an A1 aim)?
Download this document here.
- Think of a lesson you saw. Go through the criteria above. Was it a communicative lesson?
- Beginners of English cannot simply "communicate" so you need some instructional design techniques like the information gap. What is an information gap? Can you give a few examples other than the one you see here? Can you also describe some other communicative settings for beginners?
- Give examples of how to turn activities into communicative tasks. Take any page from any textbook. Look at the exercise. Do you have some instructional design ideas on how to make it communicative?
- Why is it not so useful to ask your learners to "discuss" in English, especially in the 3rd and 4th grades? Think about where you have used this or heard teachers use it and what the alternatives might be.