Communicative Language Teaching
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Communicative Language Teaching
Materia: Ingles y su Enseñanza III Mark: 9 (nine)
Very good!!
Profesora: Ma. Cecilia Romero
Alumna: Garcia Diaz Lis Leila
Año:
Contents
3- References
4-What is Communicative Language Teaching?
-Academic influences.
7- Differences between Audiolingual Method and Communicative Approach.
9- Approach.
11-Theory of learning.
12-Design.
13-Syllabus.
15-Types of learning and teaching activities.
-Learners’role.
16-Teachers’ role.
17-Ten Core Assumptions in CLT.
- Principles of CLT
18-Grammatical Competence Vs. Communicative Competence.
-Fluency Vs Accuracy.
19-Advantages and disadvantages of CLT.
20-Mainstream Language Teaching.
23-Conclusion.
References -Approaches and methods in Language Teaching- Jack C. Richards- 2001
- Is Communicative Language Teaching a thing of the past?-Jason Beale-
- Communicative Language Teaching today.- Jack C. Richards - www.wikipedia.org
Learners converse about personal experiences with partners, and instructors teach topics outside of the realm of traditional grammar, in order to promote language skills in all types of situations. This method also claims to encourage learners to incorporate their personal experiences into their language learning environment, and to focus on the learning experience in addition to the learning of the target language. According to CLT, the goal of language education is the ability to communicate in the target language.This is in contrast to previous views in which grammatical competence was commonly given top priority. CLT also focuses on the teacher being a facilitator, rather than an instructor.
Academic influences
The origins of Communicative Language Teaching (CLT) are to be found in the changes in the British language teaching tradition dating from the late 1960s. Until then, Situational Language Teaching represented the major British approach to teaching English as a foreign language. In Situational Language Teaching, language was taught by practicing basic structures in meaningful situation-based activities. But just as the linguistic theory underlying Audiolingualism was rejected in the United States in the mid-1960s, British applied linguists began to call into question the theoretical assumptions underlying Situational Language Teaching: By the end of the sixties it was clear that the situational approach had run its course. What was required was a closer study of the language itself and a return to the traditional concept that utterances carried meaning in themselves and expressed the meanings and intentions of the speakers and writers who created them. This was partly a response to the sorts of criticisms the prominent American linguist Noam Chomsky had leveled at structural linguistic theory in his now-classic book Syntactic Structures (1957). Chomsky had demonstrated that the current standard structural theories of language were incapable of accounting for the fundamental characteristic of language – the creativity and uniqueness of individual sentences. British applied linguists emphasized another fundamental dimension of language that was inadequately addressed in approaches to language teaching at that time – the functional and communicative potential of language. They saw the need to focus in language teaching on communicative proficiency rather than on mere mastery of structures. Scholars who advocated this view of language, such as Christopher Candlin and Henry Widdowson, drew on the work of British functional linguists (e.g., John Firth, M. A. K. Halliday), American work in sociolinguistics (e.g., Dell Hymes, John Gumperz, and William Labov), as well as work in philosophy (e.g., John Austin and John Searle). Another impetus for different approaches to foreign language teaching came from changing educational realities in Europe. With the increasing interdependence of European countries came the need for greater efforts to teach adults the major languages of the European Common Market. The Council of Europe, a regional organization for cultural and educational cooperation, examined the problem. Education was one of the Council of Europe’s major areas of activity. It sponsored international conferences on language teaching, published books about language teaching, and was active in promoting the formation of the International
Association of Applied Linguistics. The need to develop alternative methods of language teaching was considered a high priority. In 1971, a group of experts began to investigate the possibility of developing language courses on a unit-credit system, a system in which learning tasks are broken down into “portions or units, each of which corresponds to a component of a learner’s needs and is systematically related to all the other portions” (van Ek and Alexander 1980: 6). The group used studies of the needs of European language learners, and in particular a preliminary document prepared by a British linguist, D. A. Wilkins (1972), which proposed a functional or communicative definition of language that could serve as a basis for developing communicative syllabuses for language teaching. Wilkins’s contribution was an analysis of the communicative meanings that a language learner needs to understand and express. Rather than describe the core of language through traditional concepts of grammar and vocabulary, Wilkins attempted to demonstrate the systems of meanings that lay behind the communicative uses of language. He described two types of meanings: notional categories (concepts such as time, sequence, quantity, location, frequency) and categories of communicative function (requests, denials, offers, complaints). Wilkins later revised and expanded his 1972 document into a book titled Notional Syllabuses (Wilkins 1976), which had a significant impact on the development of Communicative Language Teaching. The Council of Europe incorporated his semantic/communicative analysis into a set of specifications for a first-level communicative language syllabus. These threshold level specifications (van Ek and Alexander 1980) have had a strong influence on the design of communicative language programs and textbooks in Europe. The work of the Council of Europe; the writings of Wilkins, Widdowson, Candlin, Christopher Brumfit, Keith Johnson, and other British applied linguists on the theoretical basis for a communicative or functional approach to language teaching; the rapid application of these ideas by textbook writers; and the equally rapid acceptance of these new principles by British language teaching specialists, curriculum development centers, and even governments gave prominence nationally and internationally to what came to be referred to as the Communicative Approach, or simply Communicative Language Teaching. (The terms notional functional approach and functional approach are also sometimes used.) Although the movement began as a largely British innovation, focusing on alternative conceptions of a syllabus, since the mid- 1970s the scope of Communicative Language Teaching has expanded. Both American and British proponents now see it as an approach (and not a method) that aims to (a) make communicative competence the goal of language teaching and (b) develop procedures for the teaching of the four language skills that acknowledge the interdependence of language and communication. Its comprehensiveness thus makes it different in scope and status from any of the other approaches or methods discussed in this book. There is no single text or authority on it, nor any single model that is universally accepted as authoritative. For some, Communicative Language Teaching means little more than an integration of grammatical and functional teaching. Littlewood (1981: 1) states, “One of the most characteristic features of communicative language teaching is that it pays systematic attention to functional as
- Native-speaker-like pronunciation is sought.
- Grammatical explanation is avoided.
- Communicative activities only come after a long process of rigid drills and exercises.
- The use of the student’s native language is forbidden.
- Translation is forbidden at early levels.
- Reading and writing are deferred till speech is mastered.
- The target linguistic system will be learned through the overt teaching of the patterns of the system.
- Linguistic competence is the desired goal.
- Varieties of language are recognized but not emphasized.
- The sequence of units is determined solely by principles of linguistic complexity.
- The teacher controls the learners and prevents them from doing anything that conflicts with the theory.
- “Language is habit” so errors must be prevented at all costs.
- Accuracy, in terms of formal correctness, is a primary goal.
- Students are expected to interact with the language system, embodied in machines or controlled materials.
- The teacher is expected to specify the language that students are to use.
- Intrinsic motivation will spring from an interest in the structure of the language. Communicative Approach
- Meaning is supreme.
- Dialogues, if used, center around communicative functions and are not normally memorized.
- Contextualization is a basic premise.
- Language learning is learning to communicate.
- Effective communication is sought.
- Drilling may occur, but peripherally.
- Comprehensible pronunciation is sought.
- Any device that helps the learners is accepted – varying according to their age, interest, etc.
- Attempts to communicate may be encouraged from the very beginning.
- Judicious use of native language is accepted where feasible.
- Translation may be used where students need or benefit from it. 12.Reading and writing can start from the first day, if desired. 13.The target linguistic system will be learned best through the process of struggling to communicate.
- Communicative competence is the desired goal (i.e., the ability to use the linguistic system effectively and appropriately).
- Linguistic variation is a central concept in materials and methodology.
- Sequencing is determined by any consideration of content, function, or meaning that maintains interest.
- Teachers help learners in any way that motivates them to work with the language.
- Language is created by the individual, often through trial and error.
- Fluency and acceptable language is the primary goal: Accuracy is judged not in the abstract but in context.
- Students are expected to interact with other people, either in the flesh, through pair and group work, or in their writings.
- The teacher cannot know exactly what language the students will use.
- Intrinsic motivation will spring from an interest in what is being communicated by the language. Apart from being an interesting example of how proponents of Communicative Language Teaching stack the cards in their favor, such a set of contrasts illustrates some of the major differences between communicative approaches and earlier traditions in language teaching. The wide acceptance of the Communicative Approach and the relatively varied way in which it is interpreted and applied can be attributed to the fact that practitioners from different educational traditions can identify with it, and consequently interpret it in different ways. One of its North American proponents, Savignon (1983), for example, offers as a precedent to CLT a commentary by Montaigne on his learning of Latin through conversation rather than through the customary method of formal analysis and translation. Writes Montaigne, “Without methods, without a book, without grammar or rules, without a whip and without tears, I had learned a Latin as proper as that of my schoolmaster” (Savignon 1983: 47). This anti structural view can be held to represent the language learning version of a more general learning perspective usually referred to as “learning by doing” or “the experience approach” (Hilgard and Bower 1966). This notion of direct rather than delayed practice of communicative acts is central to most CLT interpretations. The focus on communicative and contextual factors in language use also has an antecedent in the work of the anthropologist Bronislaw Malinowski and his colleague, the linguist John Firth. British applied linguists usually credit Firth with focusing attention on discourse as subject and context for language analysis. Firth also stressed that language needed to be studied in the broader sociocultural context of its use, which included participants, their behavior and beliefs, the objects of linguistic discussion, and word choice. Both Michael Halliday and Dell Hymes, linguists frequently cited by advocates of Communicative Language Teaching, acknowledge primary debts to Malinowski and Firth. Another frequently cited dimension of CLT, its learner-centered and experience-based view of second language teaching, also has antecedents outside the language teaching tradition per se. An important American national curriculum commission in the 1930s, for example, proposed the adoption of an Experience Curriculum in English. The report of the commission began with the premise that “experience is the best of all schools. The ideal curriculum consists of well-selected experiences” (cited in Applebee 1974:
functions of language, and therefore all components of meaning, brought into focus” (Halliday 1970: 145). In a number of influential books and papers, Halliday has elaborated a powerful theory of the functions of language, which complements Hymes’s view of communicative competence for many writers on CLT (e.g., Brumfit and Johnson 1979; Savignon 1983). He described (1975: 11–17) seven basic functions that language performs for children learning their first language: 1. the instrumental function: using language to get things 2. the regulatory function: using language to control the behavior of others 3. the interactional function: using language to create interaction with others 4. the personal function: using language to express personal feelings and meanings 5. the heuristic function: using language to learn and to discover 6. the imaginative function: using language to create a world of the imagination 7. the representational function: using language to communicate information Learning a second language was similarly viewed by proponents of Communicative Language Teaching as acquiring the linguistic means to perform different kinds of functions. Another theorist frequently cited for his views on the communicative nature of language is Henry Widdowson. In his book Teaching Language as Communication (1978), Widdowson presented a view of the relationship between linguistic systems and their communicative values in text and discourse. He focused on the communicative acts underlying the ability to use language for different purposes. A more pedagogically influential analysis of communicative competence is found in Canale and Swain (1980), in which four dimensions of communicative competence are identified: grammatical competence, sociolinguistic competence, discourse competence, and strategic competence. Grammatical competence refers to what Chomsky calls linguistic competence and what Hymes intends by what is “formally possible.” It is the domain of grammatical and lexical capacity. Sociolinguistic competence refers to an understanding of the social context in which communication takes place, including role relationships, the shared information of the participants, and the communicative purpose for their interaction. Discourse competence refers to the interpretation of individual message elements in terms of their interconnectedness and of how meaning is represented in relationship to the entire discourse or text. Strategic competence refers to the coping strategies that communicators employ to initiate, terminate, maintain, repair, and redirect communication. The usefulness of the notion of communicative competence is seen in the many attempts that have been made to refine the original notion of communicative competence. Canale and Swain’s extension of the Hymesian model of communicative competence discussed earlier was in turn elaborated in some complexity by Bachman (1991). The Bachman model has been, in turn, extended by Celce-Murcia, D¨ornyei, and Thurrell (1997). At the level of language theory, Communicative Language Teaching has a rich, if somewhat eclectic, theoretical base. Some of the characteristics of this communicative view of language follow:
- Language is a system for the expression of meaning.
- The primary function of language is to allow interaction and communication.
- The structure of language reflects its functional and communicative uses.
- The primary units of language are not merely its grammatical and structural features, but categories of functional and communicative meaning as exemplified in discourse.
Theory of learning
In contrast to the amount that has been written in Communicative Language Teaching literature about communicative dimensions of language, little has been written about learning theory. Neither Brumfit and Johnson (1979) nor Littlewood (1981), for example, offers any discussion of learning theory. Elements of an underlying learning theory can be discerned in some CLT practices, however. One such element might be described as the communication principle: Activities that involve real communication promote learning. A second element is the task principle: Activities in which language is used for carrying out meaningful tasks promote learning (Johnson 1982). A third element is the meaningfulness principle: Language that is meaningful to the learner supports the learning process. Learning activities are consequently selected according to how well they engage the learner in meaningful and authentic language use (rather than merely mechanical practice of language patterns). These principles, we suggest, can be inferred from CLT practices (e.g., Littlewood 1981; Johnson 1982). They address the conditions needed to promote second language learning, rather than the processes of language acquisition. Other accounts of Communicative Language Teaching, however, have attempted to describe theories of language learning processes that are compatible with the Communicative Approach. Savignon (1983) surveys second language acquisition research as a source for learning theories and considers the role of linguistic, social, cognitive, and individual variables in language acquisition. Other theorists (e.g., Stephen Krashen, who is not directly associated with Communicative Language Teaching) have developed theories cited as compatible with the principles of CLT. Krashen sees acquisition as the basic process involved in developing language proficiency and distinguishes this process from learning. Acquisition refers to the unconscious development of the target language system as a result of using the language for real communication. Learning is the conscious representation of grammatical knowledge that has resulted from instruction, and it cannot lead to acquisition. It is the acquired system that we call upon to create utterances during spontaneous language use. The learned system can serve only as a monitor of the output of the acquired system. Krashen and other second language acquisition theorists typically stress that language learning comes about through using language communicatively, rather than through practicing language skills. Johnson (1984) and Littlewood (1984) consider an alternative learning theory that they also see as compatible with CLT – a skill-learning model of learning. According to this theory, the acquisition of communicative competence in a language is an example of skill
they might typically need to use a foreign language (e.g., travel, business), the topics they might need to talk about (e.g., personal identification, education, shopping), the functions they needed language for (e.g., describing something, requesting information, expressing agreement and disagreement), the notions made use of in communication (e.g., time, frequency, duration), as well as the vocabulary and grammar needed. The result was published as Threshold Level English (van Ek and Alexander 1980) and was an attempt to specify what was needed in order to be able to achieve a reasonable degree of communicative proficiency in a foreign language, including the language items needed to realize this “threshold level.” Discussion of syllabus theory and syllabus models in Communicative Language Teaching has been extensive. Wilkins’s original notional syllabus model was soon criticized by British applied linguists as merely replacing one kind of list (e.g., a list of grammar items) with another (a list of notions and functions). It specified products, rather than communicative processes. Widdowson (1979) argued that notional functional categories provide only a very partial and imprecise description of certain semantic and pragmatic rules which are used for reference when people interact. They tell us nothing about the procedures people employ in the application of these rules when they are actually engaged in communicative activity. If we are to adopt a communicative approach to teaching which takes as its primary purpose the development of the ability to do things with language, then it is discourse which must be at the center of our attention. (Widdowson 1979: 254) There are several proposals and models for what a syllabus might look like in Communicative Language Teaching. Yalden (1983) describes the major current communicative syllabus types. Modified version of Yalden’s classification of communicative syllabus types, with reference sources to each model:
- structures plus functions Wilkins (1976) 2. functional spiral around a structural core Brumfit (1980) 3. structural, functional, instrumental Allen (1980) 4. functional Jupp and Hodlin (1975) 5. notional Wilkins (1976) 6. interactional Widdowson (1979)
- task-based Prabhu (1983) 8. learner-generated Candlin (1976), HennerStanchina and Riley (1978). There is extensive documentation of attempts to create syllabus and proto-syllabus designs of Types 1–5. Descriptions of interactional strategies have been given, for example, for interactions of teacher and student (Sinclair and Coulthard 1975) and doctor and patient (Candlin, Bruton, and Leather 1974). Although interesting, these descriptions have restricted the field of inquiry to two-person interactions in which there exist reasonably rigid and acknowledged superordinate-to-subordinate role relationships. Some designers of communicative syllabuses have also lookedat task specification and task organization as the appropriate criteria for syllabus design. The only form of syllabus which is compatible with and can support communicational teaching seems to be a purely procedural one – which lists, in more or less detail, the types of tasks to be attempted in the classroom and suggests an order of complexity for tasks of the same kind. (Prabhu 1983: 4) An example of such a model that has been implemented nationally is the Malaysian communicational syllabus
(English Language Syllabus in Malaysian Schools 1975) – a syllabus for the teaching of English at the upper secondary level in Malaysia. This was one of the first attempts to organize Communicative Language Teaching around a specification of communication tasks. In the organizational schema three broad communicative objectives are broken down into twenty-four more specific objectives determined on the basis of needs analysis. These objectives are organized into learning areas, for each of which are specified a number of outcome goals or products. A product is defined as a piece of comprehensible information, written, spoken, or presented in a nonlinguistic form. “A letter is a product, and so is an instruction, a message, a report or a map or graph produced through information gleaned through language” (English Language Syllabus 1975: 5). The products, then, result from successful completion of tasks. For example, the product called “relaying a message to others” can be broken into a number of tasks, such as (a) understanding the message, (b) asking questions to clear any doubts (c) asking questions to gather more information, (d) taking notes, (e) arranging the notes in a logical manner for presentation, and (f) orally presenting the message. For each product, a number of proposed situations are suggested. These situations consist of a set of specifications for learner interactions, the stimuli, communicative context, participants, desired outcomes, and constraints. These situations (and others constructed by individual teachers) constitute the means by which learner interaction and communicative skills are realized. As discussion of syllabus models continues in the CLT literature, some have argued that the syllabus concept be abolished altogether in its accepted forms, arguing that only learners can be fully aware of their own needs, communicational resources, and desired learning pace and path, and that each learner must create a personal, albeit implicit, syllabus as part of learning. Others lean more toward the model proposed by Brumfit (1980), which favors a grammatically based syllabus around which notions, functions, and communicational activities are grouped.
Types of learning and teaching activities
The range of exercise types and activities compatible with a communica- tive approach is unlimited, provided that such exercises enable learners to attain the communicative objectives of the curriculum, engage learners in communication, and require the use of such communicative processes as information sharing, negotiation of meaning, and interaction. Classroom activities are often designed to focus on completing tasks that are medi- ated through language or involve negotiation of information and infor- mation sharing. These attempts take many forms. Wright (1976) achieves it by showing out-of-focus slides which the students attempt to identify. Byrne (1978) provides incomplete plans and diagrams which students have to complete by asking for information. Allwright (1977) places a screen between students and gets one to place objects in a certain
Several roles are assumed for teachers in Communicative Language Teaching, the importance of particular roles being determined by the view of CLT adopted. Breen and Candlin describe teacher roles in the following terms: The teacher has two main roles: the first role is to facilitate the communication process between all participants in the classroom, and between these participants and the various activities and texts. The second role is to act as an independent participant within the learning-teaching group. The latter role is closely related to the objectives of the first role and arises from it. These roles imply a set of secondary roles for the teacher; first, as an organizer of resources and as a resource himself, second as a guide within the classroom procedures and activities. A third role for the teacher is that of researcher and learner, with much to contribute in terms of appropriate knowledge and abilities, actual and observed experience of the nature of learning and organizational capacities. (1980: 99)Other roles assumed for teachers are needs analyst, counselor, and group.process manager. Ten Core Assumptions in CLT:
- Engaging in interaction and meaningful communication facilitates language learning.
- Effective classroom learning tasks provide students the opportunities to extract meaning, expand language, notice how language is used, and take part in a meaningful interpersonal exchange.
- Meaningful communication occurs when students process content that is relevant, purposeful, interesting, and engaging.
- Communication is a comprehensive process that often calls upon the use of several language skills.
- Language learning is facilitated both by activities that: ○ involve inductive or discovery learning of language rules, and ○ involve the analysis of language rules.
- Language learning is a gradual process that involves creative use of language, and trial and error.
- The ultimate goal of language learning is to be able to use the new language
both accurately and fluently.
- Learners develop their own routes to language learning, progress at different rates, and have different needs and motivations for language learning.
- The role of the teacher in the language classroom is that of a facilitator, who creates a classroom climate conducive to language learning and provides opportunities for students to use and practice the language and to reflect on language use and language learning.
- The classroom is a community where learners learn through collaboration and sharing. Principles of Communicative Language Teaching: ● Make real communication the focus of language learning. ● Provide opportunities for learners to experiment and try out what they know. ● Provide opportunities for learners to develop both accuracy and fluency. ● Link the different skills such as speaking, reading, and listening together, since they usually occur so in the real world ● Let students induce or discover grammar rules. ● Be tolerant of learners’ errors as they indicate that the learner is building up his or her communicative competence. ● Focus more on achieving communicative competence with students without neglecting grammatical competence and on fluency without neglecting accuracy. Grammatical Competence VS. Communicative Competence. To achieve grammatical competence, students learn the rules of sentence formation in a language. But to achieve communicative competence students learn language through activities and they learn sentence formation and its use at the same time. About Grammatical Competence: ● The ability to produce sentences in a language. ● The knowledge of the building blocks of sentences (e.g. parts of speech, tenses, phrases, clauses, sentence patterns) and how they are formed. ● The unit of analysis and practice is typically the sentence. ● Accuracy is the main goal to achieve when learning a language. About Communicative Competence: Communicative competence includes knowing how to: ● Use language for a range of different purposes and functions. ● vary our use of language according to the setting and the participants.
situation where learners are left using their own devices to solve their communication problems. Thus they may produce incoherent, grammatically incorrect sentences. These advantages and disadvantages have been discussed for several years by teachers and linguists who want CLT to start disappearing from its inside and that is why most of them have started to study the weaknesses of this approach. Nevertheless, its influenceon other methods is still too strong to make it vanish.
Mainstream Language Teaching
Mainstream language teaching today is still largely based on Communicative Language Teaching in most parts of the world in the so-called Post-Methods Era. In the 1970s the idea of communicative competence was brought out by Hymes and the importance of it in second language learning was emphasized instead of linguistic competence, which deals with grammatical knowledge. Teaching should be based on ways of how people learn. Valuing the view of language being fundamentally social that a second language should be learnt through communication thus knowing what to say and how to say it appropriately in various social contexts in the target language is the goal of teaching and learning. The Post- Methods Era has a flexible and selective use of approaches and methods but mostly with a focus on communicative competence, which means not to totally abandon the old brand-name methods such as the grammar translation method and audio lingual method but to know how to adapt the advantages of each methods into the teaching and focus on all the four skills: listening, speaking, reading and writing. In Communicative Language Teaching Today Richard says: ‘Since its inception in the 1970s, CLT has served as a major source of influence on language teaching practice around the world. Many of the issues raised by a communicative teaching methodology are still relevant today…’.How the Communicative Language Teaching is adapted in the modern day teaching and issues involving the use of L1 and explicit
grammar teaching will be discussed in the following paragraphs. Communicative Language Teaching is considered as an approach but not a method because it does not provide teachers with any specific techniques. 'It is a unified but broadly based theoretical position about the nature of language and of language learning and teaching', says H. Douglas Brown in his Principles of Language Learning and Teaching. Methods such as Content-Based Instruction and Task- Based Language Teaching are different versions of the communicative approach realized in practical and specific techniques sharing the same theoretical foreground. The Communicative Language Teaching provides a guideline and a principle. Thus it is very flexible and can be broadly adopted in various types of classrooms; it has had a longer shelf life than other approaches and continues being the main approach being used. However it has its own strengths and weaknesses in modern day teaching, teaching different languages and teaching different aspects of languages. Therefore it is critical for teachers to know well about the methods and to know which ones to use in what type of classroom. Learning a second language is no longer viewed as a habit formation through drilling and making grammatically correct sentences under teacher-centred classrooms where error correction happens immediately after an error is made. Richards wrote in 2006 that 'in recent years, language learning has been viewed from a very different perspective. It is seen as resulting from processes such as: - Interaction between the learner and users of the language - Collaborative creation of meaning - Creating meaningful and purposeful interaction through language - Negotiation of meaning as the learner and his or her interlocutor arrive at understanding - Learning through attending to the feedback learners get when they use the language - Paying attention to the language one hears (the input) and trying to incorporate new forms into one's developing communicative competence - Trying out and experimenting with different ways of say things.' Learners now participate actively in a communicative classroom involving different activity types such as peer discussion, games, role-plays and group work, etc. They are encouraged to learn independently and to learn from each other with emphasis placed on the process of learning. Meaningful tasks and conversations are considered to be promoting and motivating learning with the content relevant to the current society and the students' personal lives. After the communicative language teaching started to be the mainstream approach, there has been a shift in the thinking about teachers, learning and teaching, according to Richards, in the same book mentioned in the previous page, he pointed out that individual differences of students were taken more into consideration in education, the schools were much more connected to the world than before, teaching should help students to understand the purpose of learning and develop their own purpose and the promoting of lifelong learning rather than learning in order to take exams, etc. The techniques and the shifts in thinking reflect each other and help to improve with teaching. The use of L1 is forbidden in traditional communicative language teaching