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2. Communicative Language Teaching
This topic presents thematically some issues related to communicative
language teaching (CLT). Those are: the conceptual definition of CLT, evolution
of CLT, objective and syllabus of CLT, the communicative activities in CLT,
learners and teacher roles in CLT, and instructional materials in CLT.
a. The Conceptual Definition of CLT
CLT derives from Britain as a replacement to the earlier structural method
(Sreehari, 2012: 87). The theoretical interests underlie what the language educator
can best describe as CLT. It is difficult to offer a definition of CLT. It is a unified
broadly based, theoretically well informed set of tenets about the nature of
language and of the language learning and teaching. Brown (1994: 43) states that
―from the earlier seminal work in CLT up to more recent teacher education
textbooks, we have definition enough to send us reeling in which CLT can be seen
from its characteristic in language process or activities practically‖.
To take a simple definition is that we can see it from characteristics of
CLT such as students in a communicative class ultimately have to use the
language, productively and respectively, in unrehearsed contexts outside the
classroom, classroom tasks must therefore equip students with the skills necessary
for communication in those contexts. Students also in CLT are given opportunities
to focus on their own language process through an understanding of their own
styles of learning and through the development of appropriate strategies for
autonomous learning.
Savignon (2002: 1) states that ―communicative language teaching (CLT)
refers to both processes and goals in classroom learning and the central theoretical
concept in communicative language teaching is communicative competence‘‘. In
the classroom learning includes, the communicative activities and its goals are to
communicate with using language (Abe, 2013: 46-47). Its concept is namely
communicative competence. This term introduced into discussions of language
use and second or foreign language learning.
―Competence is defined in terms of the expression, interpretation, and
negotiation of meaning and looks to both psycholinguistic and
sociocultural perspectives in second language acquisition (SLA) research
to account for its development. Identification of learners‘ communicative
needs provides a basis for curriculum design.‖ (Savignon, 2002: 1)
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