Communicative Language Teaching

The 1970s saw the emergence of Communicative Language Teaching which was widely considered to be a reaction to the more mechanical pedagogies of Audiolingualism and structural syllabi. Initially, two versions arose, a strong version in which advocates considered all language learning to take place during interaction, and a hybrid version, which used structural and functional syllabi for inputs and communicative activities for outputs. Communicative Language Teaching is an umbrella term for a variety of communicative approaches with common principles, such as authentic materials, active learning and interaction, and activities, such as information gap, information transfer, and information gathering. Despite its hegemony, CLT has been subject to a number of criticisms, the most serious being that it lacks a theory of language learning. Some have suggested that its theory of learning can be derived from its principles, but these do no more than specify the conditions for language learning. Others have suggested Michael Long’s Interaction Hypothesis but this is not adequate to explain anything other than a small amount of learning. As a consequence of its lack of a learning theory, CLT overemphasizes productive activities and underspecifies language inputs to learners.