Communicative Language Teachingfor the Twenty-First Century

SANDRA J. SAVIGNON

In "Communicative Language Teaching (CLT) for the Twenty-First Century," Savignon identifies fivecomponents of a communicative curriculum. She sees the identification of learner communicativeneeds and goals as the first step in the development of a teaching program that involves learners asactive participants in the interpretation, expression, and negotiation of meaning.

You may not loiter downtoum in ice creamstores. You may not ride in a carriage orautomobile with any man unless he isyourfather or brother. You may not dress inbright colors. You must wear at least twopetticoats. You must start thefire at 7 A.M.

so the school room will be warm by 8A.M.

Rules for teachers,Goodland, Kansas (1915)1

What do you think of the above 1915 Rules forTeachers? Do they seem somewhat strange or out¬dated? Do they make you smile? If you had beena talented new teacher in Goodland, Kansas, in1915, you most likely would have found theserules to be the mark of a school system with highstandards. No doubt the standards set for stu¬dents were as high as those set for teachers.Teachers in Goodland could count on studentsto be respectful and diligent. In turn, teacherswere expected to set a good example.

Teachers have always been expected toset agood example for learners, to provide a model ofbehavior. But as the 1915 rules for teachers soclearly remind us, the model can and doeschange. What seems a good example in one timeor place, a given context of situation, may seemquite strange or inappropriate in another time orplace. And so it is with language teaching. As thisvolume’s introductory chapter by MarianneCelce-Murcia shows, teachers have found manyways or methods for teaching languages. All havebeen admired models in some time or place,often to be ridiculed, perhaps, or dismissed as

inappropriate in yet another.Times change, fash¬ions change. What may once appear new andpromising can subsequently seem strange andoutdated.

Within the last quarter century, commu¬nicative language teaching (CLT) has been putforth around the world as the “new,” or “innova¬tive,” way to teach English as a second or foreignlanguage. Teaching materials, course descrip¬tions, and curriculum guidelines proclaim a goalof communicative competence. For example, TheCourse of Study for Senior High School, guidelinespublished by the Japanese Ministry ofEducation, Science, and Culture (Mombusho)state the objectives of ELT: “To developstudents'ability to understand and to express themselvesin a foreign language; to foster students’ positiveattitude towards communicating in a foreignlanguage, and to heighten their interest in lan¬guage and culture, thus deepening internationalunderstanding” (Wada 1994, p. 1). Minoru Wada,

a university professor and a senior advisor toMombusho in promoting ELT reform in Japan,explains the significance of these guidelines:

The Mombusho Guidelines, or courseof study, is one of the most importantlegal precepts in the Japanese educa¬tional system. It establishes nationalstandards for elementary and second¬ary schools. It also regulates content,

the standard number of annual teach¬ing hours at lower level secondary[junior high] schools, subject areas,

13

subjects, and the standard number ofrequired credits at upper level second¬ary [senior high] schools. The courseof study for the teaching of English asa foreign language announced by theMinistry of Education, Science, andCulture in 1989 stands as a landmarkin the history of English education inJapan. For the first time it introducedinto English education at both sec¬ondary school levels the concept ofcommunicative competence. In 1989, theMinistry of Education, Science, andCulture revised the course of study forprimary as well as secondary schoolson the basis of proposals made in a1987 report by the Council on theSchool Curriculum, an advisory groupto the Minister of Education, Science,and Culture. The basic goal of therevision was to prepare students tocope with the rapidly occurringchanges toward a more global society.The report urgedJapanese teachers to

place much more emphasis on thedevelopment of communicative com¬petence in English.

Parallel efforts arc underway in nearby Taiwanfor similar reasons. Based on in-depth interviewsof expert teacher educators, Wang (in press)reports on the progress (see also Wang 2000):

Much has been done to meet thedemand for competent English usersand effective teaching in Taiwan.Current improvements, according tothe teacher experts, include thechange in entrance examinations, thenew curriculum with a goal of teachingfor communicative competence, andthe island-wide implementation in2001 of English education in the ele¬mentary schools. However, more has tobe done to ensure quality teaching andlearning in the classrooms. Based onthe teacher experts’ accounts, furtherimprovements can be stratified intothree interrelated levels related to

teachers, school authorities, and thegovernment Each is essential to thesuccess of the others’ efforts.

This chapter looks at the phenomenon ofcommunicative language teaching (CLT). Whatis CLT? How and why did it develop? What arethe theoretical underpinnings of this approachto language teaching? How has CLT been inter¬preted and implemented in various contexts?Keeping in mind the needs and goals ofleamersand the traditions of classroom teaching, whatare some ways for teachers to shape a more com¬municative approach to ELT in the context oftheir own situation?

WHAT IS CLT?

Not long ago, when American structural linguis¬tics and behaviorist psychology were the prevail¬ing influences in language teaching methodsand materials, second/forcign language teacherstalked about communication in terms of fourlanguage skills: listening, speaking, reading, andwriting. These skill categories were widelyaccepted and provided a ready-made frameworkfor methods manuals, learner course materials,and teacher education programs. Speaking andwriting were collectively described as activeskills,reading and listening as passive skills.

Today, listeners and readers no longer areregarded as passive. They are seen as activeparticipants in the negotiation of meaning.Schemata, expectancies, and top-down/bottom-upprocessingare among the terms now used to cap¬ture the necessarily complex, interactive natureof this negotiation. Yet full and widespreadunderstanding of communication as negotiationhas been hindered by the terms that came toreplace the earlier active/passivc dichotomy.The skills needed to engage in speaking andwriting activities were described subsequently asproductive, whereas listening and reading skillswere said to be receptive.

While certainly an improvement over theearlier active/passive representation, the terms

“productive” and “receptive" fall short of captur¬ing the interactive nature of communication. Lost

14 Unit I Teaching Methodology

in this productive/ receptive, message send¬ing/message receiving representadon is thecollaborative nature of making meaning. Meaningappears fixed, to be sent and received, notunlike a football in the hands of a team quarter¬back. The interest of a football game lies ofcourse not in the football, but in the moves andstrategics of the players as they punt, pass, andfake their way along the field. The interest ofcommunication lies similarly in the moves andstrategies of the participants. The terms that bestrepresent the collaborative nature of what goeson are interpretation, expression, and negotiationof meaning. The communicative competenceneeded for participation iucludcs not only gram¬matical competence, but pragmatic competence.

The inadequacy of a four-skills model oflanguage use is now recognized. And the short¬comings of audiolingual methodology arc widelyacknowledged. There is general acceptanceof the complexity and interrelatedness of skillsin both written and oral communication andor the need for learners to have the experienceof communication, to participate in the negotia¬tion of meaning. Newer, more comprehensivetheories of language and language behaviorhave replaced those that looked to Americanstructuralism and behaviorist psychology forsupport. The expanded, interactive view of lan¬guage behavior they offer presents a number ofchallenges for teachers. Among them, howshould form and function be integrated in aninstructional sequence? What is an appropriatenorm for learners? How is it determined? Whatis an error? And what, if anything, should bedone when one occurs? How is language learn¬ing success to be measured? Acceptance of com¬municative criteria entails a commitment toaddress these admittedly complex issues.

tradition including social as well as linguisticcontext in description of language behavior ledthe Council of Europe to develop a syllabus forlearners based on notional-functional conceptsof language use. Derived from nco-Firthian sys¬temicor functional linguistics that views languageas meaning potential and maintains the centralityof context of situation in understanding lan¬guage systems and how they work, a ThresholdLevel of language ability was described for eachof the major languages of Europe in terms ofwhat learners should be able to do with the lan¬guage (van Ek 1975). Functions were based onassessment of learner needs and specified theend result, the goal of an instructional program.The term communicative attached itself to pro¬grams that used a functional-notional syllabusbased on needs assessment, and the languagefor specific purposes (LSP) movement waslaunched.

Other European developments focused onthe processof communicative classroom languagelearning. In Germany, for example, against abackdrop of social democratic concerns for indi¬vidual empowerment, articulated in the writingsof the contemporary philosopher JurgenHabermas (1970), language teaching methodol¬ogists took the lead in the development of class¬room materials that encouraged learner choice(Candlin 1978). Their systematic collection ofexercise types for communicatively orientedEnglish language teaching were used in teacherin-service courses and workshops to guide cur¬riculum change. Exercises were designed to

exploit the variety of social meanings containedwithin particular grammatical structures. A sys¬tem of “chains” encouraged teachers and learn¬ers to define their own learning path throughprincipled selection of relevant exercises(Piepho 1974; Piepho and Bredella 1976).Similar exploratory projects were also initiated byCandlin at his then academic home, theUniversity of Iancastcr in England, and by Holcc(1979) and his colleagues at the Universityof Nancy in France. Supplementary teacherresource materials promoting classroom CLTbecame increasingly popular during the 1970s(e.g., Malcy and Duff 1978).

HOW AND WHY DID CLTDEVELOP?

The origins of contemporary CLT can be tracedto concurrent developments in both Europe andNorth America. In Europe, the language needsof a rapidly increasing group of immigrants andguest workers, as well as a rich British linguistic

15Communicative Language Teaching for the Twenty-First Century

Meanwhile, in the United States, Hymes(1971) had reacted to Chomsky’s (1965) char¬acterization of the linguistic competence of the“ideal native speaker" and proposed the termcommunicative competence to represent the use oflanguage in social context, or the observance ofsodolinguisdc normsof appropriacy. His concernwith speech communities and the integration oflanguage, communication, and culture was notunlike that of Halliday in the British linguistic tra¬dition (see Halliday 1978). Hymes's communica¬tive competence may be seen as the equivalent ofHalliday’s meaning potential. Similarly, his focuswas not language learning, but language as socialbehavior. In subsequent interpretations of the sig¬nificance of Hymes’s views for learners, method¬ologists working in the United States tended to

focus on native speaker cultural norms and thedifficulty, if not impossibility, of authenticallyrepresenting them in a classroom of normativespeakers. In light of this difficulty, the appropri¬ateness of communicative competence as aninstructional goal was questioned (e.g., Paulston1974).

three component framework for communicativecompetence. (The original Canale and Swainframework with subsequent modifications isdiscussed below.) Test results at the end of theinstructional period showed conclusively thatlearners who had practiced communication inlieu of laboratory pattern drills performedwith no less accuracy on discrete-point tests ofgrammatical structure. On the other hand, theircommunicative competence as measured in terms offluency, comprehensibility, effort, and amount ofcommunication in unrehearsed oral commu¬nicative tasks significandy surpassed that oflearners who had had no such practice. Learnerreactions to the test formats lent further supportto the view that even beginners respond well toactivities that let them focus on meaning asopposed to formal features.

A collection of role plays, games, and othercommunicative classroom activities were subse¬quently developed for inclusion in adaptatingthe French CREDIF4 materials, Voix et Visages dela France. The accompanying guide (Savignon1974) described their purpose as that of involvinglearners in the experience of communication.Teachers were encouraged to provide learnerswith the French equivalent of expressions thatwould help them to participate in the negotiationof meaning such as “What’s the word for . . . ?*“Please repeat," “I don't understand." Not unlikethe efforts of Candlin and his colleagues workingin a European EFL context, the focus here wason classroom process and learner autonomy.The use of games, role play, pair work, and othersmall-group activities has gained acceptance andis now widely recommended for inclusion inlanguage teaching programs.

CLT thus can be seen to derive from a mul¬tidisciplinary perspective that includes, at a min¬imum, linguistics, psychology, philosophy,sociology, and educational research. Its focushas been the elaboration and implementationof programs and methodologies that promotethe development of functional language abilitythrough learner participation in communicativeevents. Central to CLT is the understanding oflanguage learning as both an educational and apolitical issue. Language teaching is inextricably

At the same time, in a research project at theUniversity of Illinois, Savignon (1972) used theterm “communicative competence" to charac¬terize the ability of classroom language learnersto interactwith other speakers, to make meaning,as distinct from their ability to recite dialogs orperform on discrete-point tests of grammaticalknowledge. At a time when pattern practice anderror avoidance were the rule in language teach¬ing, this study of adult classroom acquisition ofFrench looked at the effect of practice on the useof coping strategies as part of an instructional pro¬gram. By encouraging learners to ask for informa¬tion, to seek clarification, to use circumlocutionand whatever other linguistic and nonlinguisticresources they could muster to negotiate meaningand stick to the communicative task at hand,teachers were invariably leading learners to takerisks and speak in other than memorized patterns.The coping strategies identified in this studybecame the basis for subsequent identification byCanale and Swain (1980) of strategic competencewhich—along with grammatical competence and

sodolinguisdc competence—appeared in their

16 Unit I Teaching Methodology

tied to language policy. Viewed from a multicul¬tural mtranational as well as international per¬spective, diverse sociopolitical contexts mandatenot only a diverse set of language learning goals,but a diverse set of teaching strategies. Programdesign and implementation depend on negoti¬ation between policy makers, linguists, re¬searchers, and teachers. And evaluation ofprogram success requires a similar collaborativeeffort. The selection of methods and materialsappropriate to both Lhe goals and context ofteaching begins with an analysis of sociallydefined learner needs and styles of learning.

not include the ability tostate rules of usage. Onedemonstrates grammatical competence not bystatinga rule but by using a rule in the interpre¬tation, expression, or negotiation of meaning.

CONTEXTS

\ i\ :

i\ :o\c /f i \ i i .It

% \ I 8 /1\\\|!5//yHOW HAS CLT BEENINTERPRETED? IuThe classroom model shows the hypotheticalintegration of four components that have beenadvanced as comprising communicative compe¬tence <Savignon 1972, 1983,1987, in press;Canale and Swain 1980; Canale 1983a; Byram1997). Adapted from the familiar “inverted pyra¬mid'’ classroom model proposed by Savignon(1983), it shows how, through practice and expe¬rience in an increasingly wide range of commu¬nicative contexts and events, learners graduallyexpand their communicative competence, con¬sisting of grammatical competence, discourse compe¬tence, sociocultural competence, and strategiccompetence. Although the relative importance ofthe various components depends on the overalllevel of communicative competence, each one is

essential. Moreover, all components arc interre¬lated. They cannot be developed or measured inisolation and one cannot go from one compo¬nent to the other as one strings beads to make anecklace. Rather, an increase in one componentinteractswith other components to produce a cor¬responding increase in overall communicativecompetence.

Grammatical competence refers to sentence-level grammatical forms, the ability to recognizethe lexica], morphological, syntactic, and phono¬logical feature of a language and to make use ofthese features to interpret and form words andsentences. Grammatical competence is notlinked to any single theory of grammar and does

/*1/\E

E

iFigure I. Components of Communicative Competence

Discourse competence is concerned not withisolated words or phrases but with the intercon¬nectedness of a series of utterances, writtenwords, and/or phrases to form a texe, a meaning¬ful whole. The text might be a poem, an e-mailmessage, a sporcscast, a telephone conversation,

or a novel. Identification of isolated sounds orwords contribute to interpretation of the overall

meaning of the text. This is known as bottom-upprocessing. On the other hand, understanding ofthe theme or purpose of the text helps in theinterpretation of isolated sounds or words. This isknown as top-down processing. Both are importantin communicative competence.

TWo other familiar concepts in talkingabout discourse competence are text coherenceand cohesion. Text coherence is the relation ofall sentences or utterances in a text to a singleglobal proposition. The establishment of a globalmeaning, or topic, for a text is an integral part of

17Communicative Language Teaching for theTwenty-First Century

both expression and interpretation and makespossible the interpretation of the individual sen¬tences that make up the text. Local connectionsor structural links between individual sentences

provide cohesion. Halliday and Hasan (1976)are well-known for their identification of variouscohesive devices used in English, and their workhas influenced teacher education materials for

ESL/EFL (for illustration, see Cclce-Murcia andLarsen-Freeman 1999).

Sociocultural competence extends well beyondlinguistic forms and is an interdisciplinary fieldof inquiry having to do with the social rulesof language use. Sociocultural competencerequires an understanding of the social contextin which language is used: the roles of the partic¬ipants, the information they share, and the func¬tion of the interaction. Although we have yet toprovide a satisfactory description of grammar, weare even further from an adequate description ofsociocultural rules of appropriateness.Andyetweuse them to communicate successfully in manydifferent contexts of situation.

It is of course not feasible for learners toanticipate the sociocultural aspects for everycontext. Moreover, English often serves as a lan¬

guage of communication between speakers ofdifferent primary languages. Participants in mul¬ticultural communication are sensitive not onlyto the cultural meanings attached to the lan¬guage itself, but also to social conventions con¬cerning language use, such as turn-taking,appropriacy of content, nonverbal language, andtone of voice. These conventions influence howmessages are interpreted. Cultural awarenessrather than cultural knowledge thus becomesincreasingly important. Just knowing somethingabout the culture of an English-speaking countrywill not suffice. What must be learned is a generalempathy and openness towards other cultures.Sociocultural competence therefore includes awillingness to engage in the active negotiation ofmeaning along with a willingness to suspendjudgement and take into consideration the pos¬sibility of cultural differences in conventions oruse. Together these Features might be subsumedunder the term cultural flexibility or culturalawareness.

The “ideal native speaker,” someone whoknows a language perfectly and uses it appropri¬ately in all social interactions, exists in theoryonly. None of us knows all there is to knowof English in its many manifestations, botharound the world and in our own backyards.Communicative competence is always relative.The coping strategies that we use in unfamiliarcontexts, with constraints due to imperfectknowledge of roles or limiting factors in theirapplication such as fatigue or distraction, arerepresented as strategic competence. With practiceand experience, wc gain in grammatical, dis¬course, and sociocultural competence. The rela¬tive importance of strategic competence thusdecreases. However, the effective use of copingstrategies is important for communicative com¬petence in all contexts and distinguishes highlycompetent communicators from those who areless so.

By definition, CLT puts the focus on thelearner. Learner communicative needs, providea framework for elaborating program goals interms of functional competence. This impliesglobal, qualitative evaluation of learner achieve¬ment as opposed to quantitative assessment ofdiscrete linguistic features. Controversy overappropriate language testing measures persists,and many a curricular innovation has beenundone by failure to make correspondingchanges in evaluation. Current efforts at educa¬tional reform favor essay writing, in-class presen¬tations, and other more holistic assessmentsof learner competence. Some programs haveinitiated portfolio assessment, the collection andevaluation of learner poems, reports, stories,videotapes, and similar projects in an effortto better represent and encourage learnerachievement

Although it now hasenjoying widespread recognition and researchattention, CLT is nota new idea. Throughout thelong history of language teaching, there alwayshave been advocates of a focus on meaning, asopposed to form, and of developing learner abil¬

ity to actually use the language for communica¬tion. The more immediate the communicativeneeds, the more readily communicative methods

a new name and is

18 Unit I Teaching Methodology

seem to be adopted. In her book BreakingTradition, Musumed (1997) provides a fascinat¬ing account of language teaching reform effortsdating back to the Middle Ages when Latin, notEnglish, was the lingua franca. Breaking Traditionis a favorite reading of my students. They find ita refreshing and reassuring reminder that dis¬cussions of methods and goals for languageteaching predate the twentieth century by far.

Depending upon their own preparationand experience, teachers themselves differ intheir reactions to GLT. Some feel understand¬able frustration at the seeming ambiguity in dis¬cussions of communicative ability. Negotiationof meaning may be a lofty goal, but this view oflanguage behavior lacks precision and does notprovide a universal scale for assessment of indi¬vidual learners. Ability is viewed as variable andhighly dependent upon context and purpose aswell as on the roles and attitudes of all involved.Other teachers who welcome the opportunity toselect and/or develop their own materials, pro¬viding learners with a range of communicativetasks, are comfortable relying on more global,integrative judgments of learner progress.

An additional source of frustration for someteachers are second language acquisitionresearch findings that show the route, if not therate, of language acquisition to be largely unaf¬fected by classroom instruction. First languagecross-linguistic studies of developmental univer¬sal initiated in the 1970s were soon followed bysimilar second language studies. Acquisition,assessed on the basis of expression in unre¬hearsed, oral communicative contexts, appearedto followadescribable morphosyntactic sequenceregardless of learner age or context of learning.Although they served to bear out teachers’ infor¬mal observations, namely that textbook presenta¬tion and drill do not ensure learner use of taughtstructures in learners’ spontaneous expression,the findings were nonetheless disconcerting.They contradicted both grammar-translation andaudiolingual precepts that placed the burden oflearner acquisition on teacher explanation ofgrammar and controlled practice with insistenceon learner accuracy. They were further at oddswith textbooks that promise “mastery” of “basic”

English,Spanish, French, etc. Teacher rejection ofresearch findings, renewed insistence on tests ofdiscrete grammatical structures, and even exclu¬sive reliance in the classroom on the learners’native or first language, where possible, to be surethey “get the grammar,” have been in some casesreactions to the frustration of teaching forcommunication.

SHAPING A COMMUNICATIVECURRICULUM

In recent years, many innovations in curriculumplanning have been proposed that offer bothnovice and veteran teachers a dizzying arrayof alternatives. Games, yoga, juggling, andjazz have been proposed as aids to languagelearning. Rapidly increasing opportunities forcomputer-mediated communication, bothsynchronous—online chat rooms—and asyn¬chronous— the full spectrum of informationand interactions available on the Internet as wellas specialized bulletin boards and e-mail—holdpromise for further integration of communica¬tive opportunities for learners worldwide.

In attempting to convey the meaning ofCLT to both pre-service and in-service teachersof English as a second or foreign language in awide range of contexts, I have found it helpful tothink of a communicative curriculum as poten¬tially made up of five components. These com¬ponents may be regarded as thematic clusters ofactivities or experiences related to language useand usage, providing a useful way of categoriz¬ing teaching strategies that promote commu¬nicative language use. Use of the term componentto categorize these activities seems particularlyappropriate in that it avoids any suggestion ofsequence or level. Experimentation with com¬municative teaching methods has shown that allfive components can be profitably blended at all

stages of instruction. Organization of learningactivities into the following components servenot to sequence an ELT program, but rather tohighlight the range of optionsavailable in curricu¬lum planning and to suggest ways in which theirvery interrelatedness benefit the learner.

19Communicative Language Teaching for theTwenty-First Century

Language ArtsLanguage for a PurposeMyLanguageIsMe: PersonalEnglish Language

In an ESL classroom where English is thelanguage of instruction, there is an immediateand natural need for learners to use English.Where this happens, Language for a Purpose isa built-in feature of the learning environment.In an EFL setting where the teacher may have alanguage other than English in common withlearners, special attention needs to be given toproviding opportunities for English languageexperience. Exclusive use of English in the class¬room is an option. In so-called content-basedinstruction, the focus is other than the Englishlanguage. The content, for example history,music, or literature, is taught through the use ofEnglish. Immersion programs at the elementary,secondary, or even university level where theentire curriculum is taught in English offer amaximum amount of Language for a Purpose(see Snow’s chapter in this volume). In addition,task-based curricula are designed to providelearners with maximum opportunity to useLanguage for a Purpose (see chapters by Nunan;

Johns and Price-Machado; and Chaudron andCrookes in this volume).

Learners who are accustomed to beingtaught exclusively in their mother tongue may atfirst be uncomfortable if the teacher speaks tothem in English, expecting them not only tounderstand but, perhaps, to respond. When thishappens, teachers need to take special care tohelp learners realize that they are not expectedto understand every word, any more than theyare expected to express themselves in nativelikeEnglish. Making an effort to get the gist andusing strategies to interpret, express, and nego¬tiate meaning are important to the developmentof communicative competence. For learnerswho are accustomed to grammar translationcourses taught in their mother tongue with anemphasis on grammar and accuracy, the tran¬sition will not be easy. Kiyoko Kusano Hubbell (inpress), a Japanese teacher of English in Tokyo,recounts some struggles in her determined effortto teach communicatively:

Many Japanese students have beentaught that they have to really knowevery word in a sentence or a phrase

UseYou Be, I’ll Be; Theater ArtsBeyond the Classroom

Language Arts, or language analysis, is thefirst component on the list. Language Artsincludes those things that language teachersoften do best. In fact, it may be a#they have beentaught to do. This component includes manyof the exercises used in mother tongue programsto focus attention on formal accuracy. In ELT,Language Arts focuses on forms of English,including syntax, morphology, and phonology.Spelling tests, for example, are important ifwriting is a goal. Familiar activities such as trans¬lation, dictation, and rote memorization can behelpful in bringing attention toform. Vocabularyexpansion can be enhanced through definition,synonyms, and antonyms as well as attention tocognates and false cognates when applicable.Pronunciation exercises and patterned repeti¬tion of verb paradigms and other structural fea¬tures can be useful in focusing on form, alongwith the explanation of regular syntactic features,rules of grammar. There are also many LanguageArts games that learners of all ages enjoy for thevariety and group interaction they provide. Solong as they are not overused and are not pro¬moted as the solution to all manner of languagelearning problems, these games can be a wel¬come addition to a teacher’s repertoire.

Languagefor a Purpose, or language experi¬ence, is the second component. In contrast withlanguage analysis, language experience is the useof English for real and immediate communica¬tive goals. Not all learners are learning EnglishFor the same reasons. Attention to the specificcommunicative needs of the learners is impor¬tant in the selection and sequencing of materials.Regardless of how distant or unspecific the com¬municative needs of the learners may be, everyprogram with a goal of communicative compe¬tence should give attention to opportunities formeaningful English use, opportunities to focuson meaning rather than on form.

20 Unit I Teaching Methodology

in order to understand a foreign lan¬guage. They are not taught to use thestrategies that they already use in theirnative Japanese, that is, to guess themeaning from the context When theblackboard is full of writing and I ambusy in class, I ask a student “Pleaseerase the blackboard!”, handing himan eraser and pointing to the dirtyblackboard. If he does not move, it isnot because he is offended. Hejust didnot recognize the word “erase,"and tohim that means he did not understandme. If he is willing to accept the ambi¬guity, he gets up and cleans the board.

With encouragement and help from theirteacher in developing the strategic competencethey need to interpret, express, and negotiatemeaning, learners express satisfaction and evensurprise. Kusano Hubbell goes on to report thepositive reactions she receives at the end of theterm. (All comments have been translated fromJapanese by the author.)

“Completely different from any classI’ve ever had!”“I have never expressed my own ideasin English before. Work was always totranslate this section, to ED in theblanks or read. It was all passive.”

“In my career of English educationfrom Jr. High to Cram School therewas no teacher who spoke Englishother than to read the textbooks.”

My LanguageIsMe: PersonalEnglish LanguageUse, the third component in a communicativecurriculum, relates to the learner’s emergingidentity in English. Learner attitude is without adoubt the single most important factor in learnersuccess. Whether a learner’s motivations are inte¬grative or instrumental, the development of com¬municative competence involves the wholelearner The most successful teaching programsare those that take into account the affectiveas well as the cognitive aspects of languagelearning. They seek to involve learners psycho¬logically as well as intellectually.

In planning for CUT, teachers shouldremember that not everyone is comfortable inthe same role. Within classroom communities, aswithin society at large, there are leaders andthere are those who prefer to be followers. Bothare essential to the success of group activities. Ingroup discussions, there are always some whoseem to do the most talking. Those who oftenremain silent in larger groups typically partici¬pate more easily in pair work. Or they may preferto work on an individual project The wider thevariety of communicative, or meaning-based,activities, the greater the chance for involvingall learners.

My Language Is Me implies, above all,

respect for learners as they use English for self-expression. Although Language Arts activitiesprovide an appropriate context for attention toformal accuracy, Personal English Language Usedoes not Most teachers know this and intuitivelyfocus on meaning rather than on form aslearnersexpress their personal feelings or experiences.However, repeated emphasis on structural accu¬racy in textbooks or on tests may cause teachersto feel uncomfortable about their inattentionto non-nativelike features that do not impedemeaning. An understanding of the importance ofopportunities for the interpretation, expression,and negotiation of meaning in CLT and of thedistinction between Language Arts and MyLanguage IsMe can help to reassure teachers thatthe communicative practice they are providing isimportant for their learners.

Respect for learners as they use English forself-expression requires more than simplyrestraint in attention to formal “errors” thatdo not interfere with meaning. It includes recog¬nition that so-called “nativelike” performancemay not, in feet, even be a goal for learners.Language teaching has come a long way fromaudiolingual days when “native" pronunciationand use was held upterms “native" or “nativelike” in the evaluationof communicative competence is inappropriatein today’s postcolonial, multicultural world. Asobserved earlier, we now recognize that nativespeakers are never “ideal” and, in fact, vary widelyin range and style of communicative abilities.

as an ideal. Reference to the

Communicative Language Teaching for theTwenty-First Century 21

Moreover, as the English language is increasinglyused as a language of global communication, socalled “non-native" users of its many varietiesoverwhelmingly outnumber so-called "nativespeakers.” The decision of what is or is not one’s“native” language is arbitrary and irrelevant forELT and is perhaps best left to the individualconcerned. Chenny Lai, a graduate MATESLcandidate studying in the United States, expresseshis views:

I just don’t know what to do rightnow. I might have been wrong since Ibegan to learn English; I always triedto be better and wanted to be a goodspeaker. It was wrong, absolutely wron$When I got to California, I started imi¬tating Americans and picked up thewords that I heard. So my Englishbecame just like Americans. I couldn’thelp it I must have been funny tothem, because I am a Japanese andhave my own culture and background.I think I almost lost the most importantthing I should nothave. I got CaliforniaEnglish, including intonation, pronun¬ciation, the way they act, which are notmine. I have to have my own English, bemyself when I speak English (Preston1981, p.113).

As to the definition of “native” or “first”language wc discussed in today’s class, Icame up with the idea that we have nosay about whether a person’s native lan¬guage is this one or that one. It is thespeaker who has the right to FEELwhich language is his native one. Thenative language should be the one inwhich the speaker feels most comfort¬able or natural when making dailycommunication, or more abstractly,the one in which the speaker does allhis thinking. There are two major lan¬guages spoken in Taiwan: Mandarinand Taiwanese. I don’t have any slight¬est problem using either of them sinceI use both every day in equal propor¬tion. But when I do my thinking, con¬sidering things, or even kind of talkingto myself, my “mental” language isMandarin. Because of this, I wouldsay that my native language isMandarin----we probably can say thata person’s native language can actually“switch” from one to another duringstages of his life.

Since a personality inevitably takes on anew dimension through expression in anotherlanguage, that dimension needs to be discoveredon its own terms. Learners should not only begiven the opportunity to say what they want tosay in English, they also should be encouragedto develop an English language personality withwhich they are comfortable. They may feel morecomfortable maintaining a degree of formalitynot found in the interpersonal transactions ofnative speakers. The diary entry of a Japaneselearner of English offers important insight onthe matter of identity:

On the other hand, learners may discover anew freedom of self-expression in their new lan¬guage. When asked what it is like to write inEnglish, a language that is not her nativetongue, the Korean writer Mia Yun, author ofHouse of the Winds (1998), repUed that itwas “likeputting on a new dress.” Writing in Englishmade her feel fresh, see herself in a new way,offered her freedom to experiment. Whenexpressing themselves in a new language, writersare not the only ones to experience the feelingof “putting on a new dress.” My Language IsMe calls for recognition and respect for the indi¬vidual personality of the learner. (We will return

to the matter of the “native/non-native" dis¬tinction with respect to users of English laterwhen discussing sociolinguistic issues.)

You Be, I’ll Be: Theater Arts is the fourth com¬ponent of a communicative curriculum. “All theworld’s a stage," in the familiar words ofShakespeare (Ay You Like It, II, viii; 189). And onthis stage we play many roles, roles for which weimprovise scripts from the models we observearound us. Child, parent, sister, brother, em¬ployer, employee, doctor, or teacheroles that include certain expected ways of behav¬ing and using language. Sociocultural rules ofappropriateness have to do with these expectedways. Familiar roles may be played with little

all are

22 Unh I Teaching Methodology

conscious attention to style. On the other hand,new and unfamiliar roles require practice, withan awareness of how the meanings wc intend arebeing interpreted by others. Sometimes therearc no models. In the last half of the twentiethcentury, women who suddenly found themselvesin what had been a “man’s world,” whether asfirefighters, professors, or CEOs, had to adaptexisting models to ones with which they couldbe comfortable. And the transition is far fromcomplete. With the exception of Great Britain,no major world power to date has had a womanhead of state. By the end of the twenty-first cen¬tury there no doubt will be numerous modelsfrom which to choose.

If the world can be thought of as a stage,with actors and actresses who play their parts asbest they can, theater may beseen as an opportu¬nity to experiment with roles, to try things out

Fantasy and playacting are a natural and impor¬tant part of childhood. Make-believe and the “yoube, I’ll be” improvisations familiar to children theworld over are important to self-discovery andgrowth. They allow young learners to experimentand to try things out, such as hats and wigs,moods and postures, gestures and words. As occa¬sionsfor language use, role-playing and the manyrelated activities that constitute Theater Arts arelikewise a natural component of language learn¬ing. They allow learners to experiment with theroles they play or may be called upon to play inreal life. Theater Arts can provide learners withthe tools they need to act, that is, to interpret,express, and negotiate meaning in a new lan¬guage. Activities can include both scripted andunscripted role play, simulations, and even pan¬tomime. Ensemble-building activities familiar intheater training have been used very successfullyin ELT to create a climate of trust so necessaryfor the incorporation of Theater Arts activities(see Savignon 1997). The role of the teacher inTheater Arts is that of a coach, providing sup¬port, strategies, and encouragement for learnersas they explore new ways of being.

Beyond the Classroom is the fifth and finalcomponent of a communicative curriculum.Regardless of the variety of communicative activ¬ities in the ESL/EFL classroom, their purposeremains to prepare learners to use English in the

world beyond. This is the world upon whichlearners will depend for the maintenance anddevelopment of their communicative compe¬tence once classes are over. The classroom is buta rehearsal. Development of the Beyond theClassroom, component in a communicative cur¬riculum begins with discovery of learner interestsand needs and of opportunities to not onlyrespond to but, more importantly, to develop thoseinterests and needs through English language usebeyond the classroom itself.

In an ESL setting, opportunities to useEnglish outside the classroom abound. Systematic“field experiences” may successfully become thecore of the course, which then could become a

workshop in which learners can compare notes,seek clarification, and expand the range ofdomains in which they learn to function inEnglish. Classroom visits to a courtroom trial,a public auction, or a church bazaar provideintroductions to aspects of the local culture thatlearners might not experience on their own.Conversation partners, apprenticeships, andactivities with host families can be arranged.Residents of nearby retirement communities canbe recruited as valuable resources for a range ofresearch projects. Senior citizens often welcomethe opportunity to interact with international vis¬itors or new arrivals and offer a wealth of knowl¬edge and experience. They could be interviewedabout noteworthy historical events, child rearingin earlier decades, or their views on politics,health care, or grandparenting,

In an FJFL setting, on the other hand, thechallenge for incorporating a Beyond theClassroom component may be greater, but cer¬tainly not insurmountable, and is essential forboth teacher and learners. As a child, I lookedforward to receiving letters from my pen pals.They would arrive bearing colorful stamps fromFrance, Wales, Japan, Taiwan, and Australia. Ihad yet to learn a second language, so our corre¬spondence was all in English. However, this reg¬ular exchange of letters put a small townmidwestem American girl in touch with otherplaces around the globe and with other users ofEnglish. Technology has since brought the wholeworld much closer. English language radio andtelevision programs, videos, and feature length

23Communicative Language Teaching for the Twenty-First Century

films are readily available in many EFL settings,along with newspapers and magazines. Englishspeaking residents or visitors may be available tovisit the classroom. The Internet now providesopportunities to interact with English speakingpeers on a variety of topics, to develop gram¬matical, discourse, sociocultural, and strategiccompetence. These opportunities for computer-mediated communication (CMC) will increasedramatically in the years ahead. The followingexcept from an e-mail exchange between classesof secondaryschool students in Germany and theUnited States on the topic of the death penaltyreveals the potential for developing socio¬cultural and strategic skills in addition to gram¬matical and discourse competence (Roithmeierand Savignon in press):

GER1: Death Penalty—an inhuman punishmentGER3: . . . Finally, I think nobody has the

right to kill other people but to kill aperson because of mercy is inhumanand should never be a law in certaindemocratic states or countries. . . .

USA 2: ... I can see both sides of the deathpenalty. I believe when discussing thisinhuman treatment you must thinkabout the victims of these people.

USA 4: ... Basically, I think the death penaltyis wrong and inhumane.

USA 6: The death penalty is inhumane . . .Examples such as the above provide strong

support for the claim that members of a discus¬sion group are strongly influenced by prior post¬ings and that the language they use is influencedby what they read from participants. In additionto prearranged exchanges, learners can checkWorid Wide Web sites for a range of information,schedules, rates, locations, descriptions, andthe like.

Arts, and Beyond the Classroom? These questionsmust be answered by individual language teach¬ers in the context in which they teach. Culturalexpectations, goals, and styles of Learning are butsome of the ways in which learners may differfrom each other. To the complexity of the learnermust be added the complexities of teachers andof the settings in which they teach. Establishedroutines, or institutional belief about what isimportant, weigh heavily in a teacher’s decisionsas to what and how to teach and often makesinnovation difficult (see Sato in press; Wang inpress). Finally, the need for variety must be takeninto account Learners who are bored with rulerecitation or sentence translation may just aseasily lose interest in games or role play, if theseare allowed to become routine. Difficult as itis, the teacher’s task is to understand the manyfactors involved and respond to them creatively.

Teachers cannot do this alone, of course.They need the support of administrators,

the community, and the learners themselves.Methodologists and teacher education programshave a responsibility as well. They should provideclassroom teachers with the perspective and expe¬riences they need to respond to the realitiesof their world, a changing world in which theold ways of ELT may not be the best ways. Theoptimum combination of the analytical and theexperiential in ESL/EFL for a given context is afocus of ongoing research. However, a now well-established research tradition in sccond/fordgnlanguage learning/teaching has clearlyshown theimportance of attention to language use, or expe¬rience, in addition to language usage, or analysis.But the overwhelming emphasis in most schoolprograms is on the latter, often to the completeexclusion of the former.

WHAT ABOUT GRAMMAR?Discussions of CLT not infrequently lead toquestions of grammatical or formal accuracy.The perceived displacement of attention to mor-phosyntactic features in learner expression infavor of afocus on meaninghas led in some casesto the impression that grammar is not important,

PUTTING IT ALL TOGETHER

How do we put it all together? Is there an opti¬mum combination of Language Arts, PersonalLanguage Use, Language for a Purpose, Theater

24 Unit I Teaching Methodology

or that proponents of CLT favor learner self-expression without regard to form. Whileinvolvement in communicative events is seen ascentral to language development, this involve¬ment necessarily requires attention to form. Thenature of the contribution to language develop¬ment of both form-focused and meaning-focusedclassroom activity remains a question in ongoingresearch. The optimum combination of theseactivities in any given instructional settingdepends no doubt on learner age, nature andlength of instructional sequence, opportunitiesfor language contact outside the classroom,

teacher preparation, and other factors. However,for the development of communicative ability,research findings overwhelmingly support theintegration of form-focused exercises withmeaning-focused experience. Grammar is im¬portant, and learners seem to focus best on gram¬mar when it relates to their communicative needsand experiences.

Communicative competence obviously doesnot mean the wholesale rejection of familiarmaterials. There is nothing to prevent commu¬nicatively-based materials from being subjectedto grammar-translation treatment, just as theremay be nothing to prevent a teacher with only anold grammar-translation book at his or her dis¬posal from teaching communicatively. What mat¬ters is the teacher’s conception of what learninga language is and howit happens. The basic prin¬ciple involved is an orientation towards collectiveparticipation in a process of use and discoveryachieved by cooperation between individuallearners as well as between learners and teachers.

even greater instability and variability in terms ofboth the amount and rate of change. Moreover,

sodolinguistic concerns with identity and accom¬modation help to explain the construction bybilinguals of a “variation space” that is differentfrom that of a native speaker. This may includeretention of any number of features of a previ¬ously acquired code or system of phonology andsyntax as well as features of discourse and prag¬matics, including communication strategies.The phenomenon may be individual or, in thosesettings where there is a community of learners,general. Differences not only in the code itselfbut in the semantic meanings attributed to thesedifferent encodings contribute to identificationwith a speech community or culture, the way aspeech community views itself and the world.This often includes code mixing and codeswitching, the use by bilinguals of resources frommore than one speech community.

Sodolinguistic perspectives have beenimportant in understanding the implications ofnorm, appropriacy, and variability for CLT andcontinue to suggest avenues of inquiry for furtherresearch and materials development. Use ofauthentic language data has underscored theimportance of context, such as setting, roles, andgenre, in interpreting the meaning of a text Arangeprovides learners with a variety of language expe¬riences, which they need to construct their own“variation space” and to make determinations ofappropriacy in their own expression of meaning.“Competent" in this instance is not necessarilysynonymous with “nativelike.” Negotiation inCLT highlights the need for inteiiinguistic, thatis, intercnltural, awareness on the part of allinvolved (Byram 1997). Better understanding ofthe strategies used in the negotiation of meaningoffers a potential for improving classroom prac¬tice of the needed skills.

of both oral and written texts in context

SOCIOLINGUISTIC ISSUES

Numerous sodolinguistic issues await attention.Variation in the speech community and itsrelationship to language change are central tosodolinguistic inquiry. As we have seen above,sodolinguistic perspectives on variability andchange highlight the folly of describing nativespeaker competence, let alone non-native speakercompetence, in terms of “mastery” or “command"of a system. All language systems show instabilityand variation. Learner language systems show

Natives and ForeignersWe might begin by asking ourselves whose lan¬guage we teach and for what purpose. What isour own relationship with English? Do we con¬sider it to be a foreign, second, or native language?

25Communicative LanguageTeaching for theTwenty-First Century

English in Pattaya is no excuse for ignoring oravoidingopportunitiesfor communication, bothwritten and oral. The potential of computer-mediated negotiation of meaning for languagelearning and language change in the decadesahead will be increasingly recognized, both

inside and outside language classrooms.What may be a problem is the teacher’s

communicative competence. Is he or she anative speaker? If not, does he or she considerhim- or herself bilingual? If not, why not? Is it alack of communicative competence? Or, rather,a lack of communicative confidence? Is he orshe intimidated by “native" speakers? NativeSpeaker is the ride of a moving first novel byChang-rae Iÿee, an American raised in a Koreanimmigrant family in New Jersey. It documentsthe struggle and frustration of knowing two cul¬tures and at the same time not completelybelonging to either one. As such, it serves as apoignant reminder of the challenges of bilin¬gualism and biculturalism. How does one“belong”? What docs it mean to be bilingual? Tobe bicultural? To be a native speaker?

Again, the example of English is importantSuch widespread adoption of one language isunprecedented. English users today includethose who live in countries where English is a pri¬mary language—the United States, the UnitedKingdom, Canada, Australia, and New Zealand;

those who live in countries where English is anadditional, iwiranational language of communi¬

cation —for example, Bangladesh, India,

Nigeria, Philippines, and Tanzania; those whouse English primarily in international contexts—countries such as China, Indonesia,Japan, SaudiArabia, and Russia. By conservative estimates thenumber of non-native speakers of English in theworld today outnumbers native speakers bymore than 2 to 1, and the ratio is increasing.Models of appropriacy vary from context to con¬text. So much, in fact, that some scholars speaknot only of varieties of English but of WorldEnglishes, the title of a new journal devoted to

discussion of descriptive, pedagogical, and otherissues in the global spread of the English

Webster’s New International Dictionary, 2ndedition, published in 1950, a time when languageteaching in the United States was on thethreshold of a period of unprecedented scrutiny,experimentation, and growth, provides the fol¬

lowing definitions of these terms we use so often

with respect to language. Foreign derives fromMiddle English forein, forme, Old French forainand I-atin faros, meaning outside. Related words

are foreclose, forest, forfeit. Modem definitionsinclude “situated outside one’s own country; bomin, belonging to, derived from, or characteristicof some place other than the one under consid¬eration; alien in character, not connected orpertinent," etc.

Those identified as teaching a foreign lan¬guage, perhaps even in a Department of ForeignLanguages, should ask, “Why?" What does thelabel “foreign” signal to colleagues, learners,and the community at large? Today we are con¬cerned with global ecology and global economy.And English has been describe as a “global lan¬guage" (Crystal 1997). Nonetheless, one mightobject, “foreign” is still a useful term to use indistinguishing between teaching English in, say,Pattaya, Thailand, and teaching English inYoungstown, Ohio. In Youngstown, English istaught as a second language whereas in Pattayait is a foreign language. The contexts of learningare not the same, to be sure. Neither are the1carnets. Nor the teachers. But do these factschange the nature of the language? And whatabout the teaching of Spanish in Chicago, inBarcelona, in Buenos Aires, in Guatemala City,in Miami, or in Madrid? In what sense canSpanish in each of these contexts be describedas “foreign” or “second”? And what are the impli¬cations of the label selected for the learners? Forthe teachers?

Having taught French in Urbana, Illinois,

for many years, I can easily identify with the

problems of teachers of English in Pattaya. Moreso, perhaps, than those who teach ESL inUrbana with easy access to English speakingcommunities outside the classroom. On theother hand, teaching French in Urbana or

26 Unit I Teaching Methodology

language. As we have seen above, depending onthe context as well as learner needs, “native"speakers may or may not be appropriate models(see also Kachru 1992).

theory of intercultural communicative compe¬tence to be used in developing materialsand methods appropriate to a given context oflearning. Contexts change. A world of carriagesand petticoats evolves into one of genomes andcyberspace. No less than the means and normsof communication they are designed to reflect,communicative teaching methods designed toenhance the interpretation, expression, andnegotiation of meaning will continue to beexplored and adapted.

WHAT CLT IS NOT

Disappointment with both grammar-translationand audiolingual methods for their inabilityto prepare learners for the interpretation, ex¬pression, and negotiation of meaning, along withenthusiasm for an array of alternative methodsincreasingly labeled communicative, has resulted inno small amount of uncertainty as to what areand are not essential features of CLT. Thus,this summary description would be incompletewithout brief mention of what CLT is not.

CLT is not exclusively concerned with face-to-face oral communication. The principlesof CLT apply equally to reading and writingactivities that involve readers and writersengaged in the interpretation, expression, andnegotiation of meaning; the goals of CLTdepend on learner needs in a given context.CLT does not require small-group or pair work;group tasks have been found helpful in manycontexts as a way of providing increased oppor¬tunity and motivation for communication.However, classroom group or pair work shouldnot be considered an essential feature and maywell be inappropriate in some contexts. Finally,CLT does not exclude a focus on metalinguisticawareness or knowledge of rules of syntax,discourse, and social appropriateness.

The essence of CLT is the engagement oflearners in communication in order to allowthem to develop their communicative compe¬tence. Terms sometimes used to refer to featuresof CLT include process oriented, task-based, andinductive, or discovery oriented Inasmuch as strictadherence to a given text is not likely to be trueto its processes and goals, CLT cannot be foundin any one textbook or set of curricular materi¬als. In keeping with the notion of context of sit¬uation, CLT is properly seen as an approach or

DISCUSSION QUESTIONS

1. If you had to choose three adjectives todescribe CLT, what would they be?What might be some obstacles encounteredby teachers who wish to implement a com¬municative approach to language teaching?How might these obstacles be overcome?Do you feel English to be a foreign, second, ornative language? How might your feelingsinfluence your classroom teaching?Of the five described components of a com¬municative curriculum, which are the mostfamiliar to you as a language learner? As alanguage teacher?Who sets the norm for English language mein your particular context of situation? How?Why?

2.

3.

4.

5.

SUGGESTED ACTIVITIES

1. Request permission to observe two or threedifferent introductory level ESL or EFLclasses. Note the interaction between theteacher and the learners. Who docs most ofthe talking? How much of the talking thatyou hear is in English? Why?

2. Interview some language learners for theirviews on why they arc learning a foreign orsecond language.

27Communicative Language Teaching for the Twenty-First Century

3. Look at the inverted pyramid diagram ofcommunicative competence on page 17. Doyou agree with the proportions drawn? Drawyour own diagram to show the relationshipbetween the four components of commu¬nicative competence.

4. Select one of the five components of a com¬municative curriculum described in thischapter. Make a list of corresponding learn¬er activities or experiences that you wouldlike to use in your teaching.

Holliday, A. 1994. Appropriate Methodology and SocialContext Cambridge:Cambridge UniversityPress.

Nunan. D. 1989a. Designing Tasks for the Commu¬nicative Classroom. Cambridge: CambridgeUniversity Press.

Savignon, S.J. 1997. Communicative Competence: Theoryand Classroom Practice. New York: McGraw Hill.

ENDNOTESI The author copied this passage many yearsagowhile

visiting the Union School, a countryschool buildingthat was moved to the city of Goodland, Kansas, bythe Sherman County Historical Society. It is ownedand operated asa school museum by the Society.CREDIF is the acronym for Centre de Rechercheet d’Etude pour la Diffusion du Franÿais. It wasan institution specializing in French as a foreignlanguage and functioned in association with theEcole Normale Superieur de Saint-Cloud from1959 to 1996.

FURTHER READING2Breen, M., and C. Candlin. 1980. The essentials of a

communicative curriculum in language teaching.Applied Linguistics1{1):S9—112.

Byram, M. 1997. Teaching and Assessing Inter-cultural Communicative Competence. Qevedon, UK:Multilingual Matters.

28 Unit I Teaching Methodology