LANGUAGE

TEACHING
METHODOLOGY

Presented by: Cristine Joy R. Quizon

MATE 1
Language Teaching Methodology
Methodology in language teaching has been characterized in a
variety of ways. A more or less classical formulation suggests
that methodology is that which links theory and practice.
Theory statements would include theories of what language is
and how language is learned or, more specifically, theories of
second language features might include stated objectives,
syllabus specifications, types of activities, roles of teachers,
learners, materials, and so forth. Design features in turn are
linked to actual teaching and learning practices as observed in
the environments were language teaching and learning take
place. This whole complex of elements defines language
teaching methodology.
Within methodology, a distinction is often made
between methods and approaches, in which
methods are held to be fixed teaching systems
with prescribed techniques and practices.
 The Age of Methods
1950-1980
• During which a number of quite detailed prescriptions for language
teaching were proposed. Situational Language Teaching evolved in
the United Kingdom while a parallel method, Audio-Lingualism,
emerged in the United States. In the middle-methods period, a
variety of methods, a variety of methods were proclaimed as
successors to the then prevailing Situational Language Teaching and
Audio-Lingual methods. These alternatives were promoted under
such titles such as Silent Way, Suggestopedia, Community Language
Teaching, and Total Physical Responses.
THUS, in the 1980s, these methods in turn came to be known as
Communicative Language Teaching (CLT).
 Communicative Language Teaching advocates
subscribed to a broad set of principles such as these:

• Learners learn a language by using it to communicate.

• Authentic and meaningful communication should be the goal of
classroom activities
• Fluency is an important dimension of communication.
• Communication involves the integration of different language
skills.
• Learning is a process of creative construction and involves trial
and error.
 However, CLT advocates avoided prescribing the set of practices through which these principles could best be
realized, thus putting CLT clearly on the approach rather than the method end of the spectrum.
Communicative Language Teaching has spawned a number of off-shoots that share the same basic set of
principles, but which spell out philosophical details or envision instructional practices in somewhat diverse ways. These
CLT spin-off approaches include the Natural Approach, Cooperative Language Leaming, Content-Based Teaching, and
Task-Based Teaching.
It is difficult to describe these various methods briefly and yet fairly, and such a task is well beyond the scope of
this paper. However, several up-to-date texts are available that do detail differences and similarities among that many
different approaches and methods that have been proposed. (See,e.g. Larsen-Freeman, 2000, and Richard & Rogers,
2001). Perhaps it is possible to get a sense of the range of method proposals by looking at a synoptic view of the roles
defined for teachers and learners within various methods. Such a synoptic (perhaps scantly) view can be seen in the
following chart.
 What’s now? What’s next?
The future is always uncertain, and this is no less true in
anticipating methodological directions in second language
teaching than in any other field. Some current predictions
assume the carrying on and refinement of current trends;
others appear a bit more science-fiction like in their version.
Outlined below are 10 scenarios that are likely to shape the
teaching of second languages in the next decades of the new
millennium. These methodological candidates are given
identifying labels in somewhat tongue-in cheek style,
perhaps a bit reminiscent of yesteryear's method labels.
 1. Teacher/Learner
Collaborates
Match making techniques will be developed which will link
learners and teachers with similar styles and approaches to
language learning. Looking at the Teachers and Learners Roles
sketched in Fig.2,one can anticipate development of a system in
which the preferential ways in which teachers teach and learners
learn can be matched in instructional settings, perhaps via on-line
computer networks or other technological resources.
 2. Method Synergistic

Crossbreeding elements from various methods into a

common program of instruction seems an appropriate way to
find those practices which best support effective learning.
Methods and approaches have usually been proposed as
idiosyncratic and unique, yet it appears reasonable to combine
practices from d approaches where the philosophical
foundations are similar. One might call such an approach
"Disciplined Eclectism".
 Language teaching has not profited much
from more general views of educational design.
The curriculum perspective comes from general
education and views successful instruction as an
3. Curriculum interweaving of Knowledge, Instructional,
Learner, and Administrative considerations.
Developmentalism From this perspective, methodology is viewed
as only one of the several instructional
considerations that are necessarily thought out
and realized in conjunction with all other
curricular considerations.
 Content-based instruction assumes that language learning
is a by-product of focus on meaning on acquiring some
specific topical content--and that content topics to support
language learning should be chosen to best match learner
needs and interests and to promote optimal development
of second language competence. A critical question for
language educators is "what content' and "how much
4. Content-Based
content" best supports language learning.
The natural content for language educators is literature
Instructionand language itself, and we are beginning to see a
resurgence of interest in literature and in the topic of
"Language: The Basic Human Technology" as sources of
content in language teaching.
 The notion here is adapted from the Multiple Intelligences
view of human talents proposed by Howard
Garner (1983). This model is one of a variety of learning style
models that have been proposed in general education with follow-up
inquiry by language educators. The chart below shows Gardner's
5. Multintelligencia proposed eight native intelligences and indicates classroom language-
rich task types that play to each of these particular intelligences.
The challenge here is to identify these intelligences in individual
learners and then to determine appropriate and realistic instructional
task in response.
 6. Total Functional
Response
Communicative Language Teaching was founded (and
floundered) on earlier notional/functional proposals for the
description of languages. Now new leads in discourse and genre
analysis, schema theory, pragmatics, and systematic/functional
grammar are rekindling an interest in functionally based
approaches to language teaching.
One pedagogical proposal has led to a widespread
reconsideration of the first and second language program in
Australian schools where instruction turns on five basic text
genres identified as Report, Procedure, Explanation, Exposition,
and Recount. Refinement of functional models will lead to
increased attention to genre and text types in both first and
second language instruction.
 7. Strategopedia
"Learning to learn" is the key theme in an instructional focus on
language learning strategies. Such strategies include, at the most
basic level, memory tricks, and at higher levels, cognitive and
metacognitive strategies for learning, thinking, planning, and
self-monitoring. Research findings suggest that strategies can
indeed be taught to language learners, that learners will apply
these strategies in language learning tasks, and that such
application does produce significant gains in language learning.
Simple and yet highly effective strategies, such as those that
help learners remember and access new second language
vocabulary items, will attract considerable instructional interest
in Strategopedia.
 8. Lexical Phraseology
The lexical phraseology view holds that only "a minority of spoken clauses is entirely novel
creations" and that "memorized clauses and clause-sequences from a high proportion of the fluent
stretches of speech heard in every day conversation." One estimate is that “the number of
memorized complete clauses and sentences known to the mature English speaker probably
amounts, at least, to several hundreds of thousands" (Pawley & Syder, 1983). Understanding of
the use of lexical phrases has been immensely aided by large-scale computer studies of language
corpora, which have provided hard data to support the speculative inquiries into lexical
phraseology of second language acquisition researchers. For language teachers, the results of such
inquiries have led to conclusions that language teaching should center on these memorized lexical
patterns and the ways they can be pieced together, along with the ways that vary and the situations
in which they occur.
 9. O-Zone Whole Language
Renewed interest in some type of "Focus on Form" has
provided a major impetus for recent second language
acquisition (SLA) research. Focus on Form" proposals,
variously labeled as consciousness-raising, noticing, attending,
and enhancing input, are founded on the assumption that
students will learn only wat they are aware of. Whole Language
proponents have claimed that one way to increase learner's
awareness of how language works is through a course of study
that incorporates broader engagement with language, including
literary study, process writing, authentic content, and learner
collaboration.
 10. Full-Frontal Communicativity
We know that the linguistic part of human communication represents only a small
fraction of total meaning.
At least one applied linguist has gone so far as to claim that “we communicate so much
information non-verbally in conversations that often the verbal aspect of the conversation is
negligible." Despite these cautions, language teaching has chosen to restrict its attention to the
linguistic component of human communication, even when the approach is labeled
Communicative. The methodological proposal is to provide instructional focus on non-
linguistic aspects of communication, including rhythm, speed, speech, intonation, tone, and
hesitation phenomena in speech and gesture, facial expression, posture, and distance in non-
verbal messaging.