University of Mosul Methodology

College of Education for Humanities Course instructor : Dr. Omar A. Ilias

Department of English Second semester 2019-20
M.A. candidates

A seminar on communicative language teaching

(Part two)
Presented by Naktal Hareth
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Content of the seminar

Introduction
Techniques associated with CLT
Linguistic competence
Communicative competence
Fluency , accuracy and appropriacy
Introduction
Communication is a process by which we interact in social contexts . In
order to communicate learners need knowledge of linguistics forms ,
meanings and functions . They also need to know the different forms and
that one form can serve different varieties of function . They have to
choose among these forms the one which is suitable and appropriate for a
situation . CLT can be best understood as a set of principles about the
goals of language teaching , how learners learn a language , the roles of
the teacher and the learners and the kind of activities that best facilitate
learning . The goal for most methods is to teach learners how to
communicate via the target language .some observed that learners can
produce sentence accurately in class , but they cannot use it appropriately
when they communicate outside . Moreover , others noticed that in order
to communicate , learners need more than linguistic structure , they need
interaction with others . Therefore , in order to communicate we need
linguistic competence and communicative competence . CLT aims to
make communicative competence the goal of language teaching .

Techniques / classroom activities associated with CLT

Communicative language teaching use any activity that engages learners

in authentic communication :

1- Authentic materials .
To overcome the problem that students cannot transfer what they
learn in the classroom to the outside world and use it in the real
world , and to expose students to use language naturally in social
contexts , supporters of communicative language teaching use
authentic language materials . Teachers use materials from real life
situations in order to bring language faculty into operation .for
students with lower proficiency in the target language , teachers
use simple authentic materials , topics that are desirable or items
that do not contain a lot of language .
2- Scrambled sentences .
The students are given a passage in which sentences are scrambled
( the passage may have been worked with or not ) . they are asked
to unscrambled these sentences so that the passage restores its
order . this type of exercise helps students to learn about coherence
and cohesion of language , they know how sentence are comboined
together . in addition , they may be asked to unscrambled the lines
of a mixed-up dialogue or arrange pictures in order write lines that
accompany the pictures .
3- Language game .
Students find a game enjoyable if it is properly designed . It gives
students valuable communicative practice . A game that is truly
communicative has three features : information gap , choice and
feedback . It is a collaborative activity , its purpose for students to
obtain information that is unknown to them . Students work in
pairs and interact to supply each other with information .
4- Picture strip stories .
One student in a small group is given a strip story , he shows the
first picture to the rest members of the group and asks them what
the second picture will look like . there is an information gap , they
do not know what the picture contains . moreover , they receive
feedback not only on the form but on the content as they compare
the picture with their prediction .
5- Role-play .
Role-play is very important in CLT as it provide students with
opportunity to practice communication in different social contexts
and different social roles . It is an oral activity usually done in pairs
, its main goal is to develop students' communicative abilities In a
certain setting . Here the teacher sets the scene and ask students
questions and then the students reply to these questions .
 6- Group work .
It is a collaborative activity which foster communication in the
target language . Student are assigned in groups , the teacher gives
each group the same task to complete . The members of the group
discuss the information they have found with each other and put it
all together to complete the task .

Linguistic competence

All languages are similar in their organization and in their function and
every human being has a lexicon and a grammar to create sentences .
Therefore , the knowledge of the grammar and lexicon refers to person's
linguistic competence . Chomsky defined linguistic competence as a set
of rules that can be repeated to generate an infinite number of sentences
with a clear structural description to each sentence . Knowledge of
linguistic competence of a language allows the speaker to create well-
formed sentence structures . According to Chomsky , competence is the
ideal language system that makes it possible for speakers to produce and
understand an infinite number of sentences and to distinguish
grammatical sentences from ungrammatical ones . However , linguistic
competence cannot be seen as the only goal of language teaching since
the process of communication goes beyond the knowledge of generating
well-formed sentences .

Communicative competence

The notion of communicative competence is one of the theories that

underlies the communicative approach to foreign language teaching .
Communicative competence is a term in linguistics which refers to
language users' ability to communicate via language by using utterances
appropriately . In 1980 , the applied linguists Canal and Swain claimed
that it is useful for a person to understand what knowledge and skills a
person needs to acquire in order to communicate . They also claimed that
communicative competence requires four sub-competencies :

1- Grammatical . It refers to the ability to generate grammatically

well-formed sentences .
2- Sociolinguistic . It refers to the ability to produce appropriate
utterances in social contexts .
3- Discourse . It refers to the ability to produce utterances that make
sense .
4- Strategic . It refers to the ability to communicate via language and
compensate for any difficulty .

Fluency , accuracy and appropriacy

Fluency can be defined as the ability to communicate without too much

hesitation or too much pauses to cause barriers or breakdown in
communication .fluency refers to how well a learner communicates
meaning rather than how many mistakes he commits in grammar ,
pronunciation and vocabulary . Fluency occurs when a speaker engages
in a meaningful interaction and maintains comprehensible and ongoing
communication . In other words , fluency is the ability to produce
language in a coherent effortless way .Fluency is developed by creating
classroom activities in which students participate , negotiate , use
communication strategies correct misunderstanding and work to avoid
communication breakdowns . Moreover , fluency activities are designed
to make students' attention focuses on communicating information and
expressing ideas , their performance is assessed on how well ideas are
expressed and understood .
 Accuracy refers to the use of correct forms whre utterances do not
contain errors affecting the phonological , syntactic , semantic or
discourse features of a language . In other words , it refers to the
correctness and ability to produce grammatically lexically correct
sentences . Accuracy focuses on creating correct utterances of language
use . It helps students to achieve accurate perception and production of a
target language which can be a sound , a word or a sentence structure .
Accuracy activities are designed to make students' attention focuses on a
particular target item such as grammar exercises , students' performance
is assessed on how few language mistakes are made .

Appropriacy refers to whether an utterance is suitable for the

context it is used in . It is an important aspect of language , but it is
complex one as it requires understanding an utterance and producing
what is appropriate for the context . Teaching of a language involves
developing the ability to produce correct sentences . When learners
acquire a language , they do not only learn to produce sentences but they
learn how to use sentences appropriately to achieve communication . It
involves acquiring the ability to compose sentences and understand which
utterance to use . Activities that are used in order to achieve appropriacy
focus on inappropriate forms of the language and discuss what is
appropriate by using authentic materials that will help them to develop
their understanding of appropriacy .

In fact , a learner who is more fluent than accurate can be more successful
at communication even if the rate of accuracy is not very high . Moreover
, a learner may be fluent and accurate but inappropriate as he may
produce well-formed sentences fluently , but it is not suitable for the
context it is used in .
References

 Brown , D. teaching by principles (2nd Ed.). USA : pearson ESL ,

2001
 Larsen-freeman , D. and Anderson , M. Techniques and Principles
in Language Teaching (3rd Ed.). New York : Oxford University
Press , 2010.
 Widddoson , H. Teaching Language as Communication . New
York : Oxford University Press , 1978 .