Communicative Language Teaching: Linguistic Theory and Classroom Practice (by Sandra J. Savignon)

a. What are the limitations of the terms “passive/active” or “receptive/productive” as Savignon sees it?

When dwelling upon 4 basic language skills (reading, writing, listening and speaking) Sandra Savignon mentions that L and R were considered to be passive skills, whereas S and W were considered to be active skills. She finds these terms not acceptable as far as listeners and readers play an active role in communication as in the process of meaning negotiation. Savignon also points out that current terms “receptive/productive” instead of “passive/active” do not reflect the “collaborative nature of making meaning”.  She pays our attention to the fact that using these terms limits the broad concept of communication to a simple message sending/receiving activity, thus dimming bright colours of communication strategies and meaning negotiation.

b. What role did the Threshold Level play in the development of communicative competence?

The Threshold Level identifies “what learners should be able to do with the language”, in other words it describes complete learning objectives and points out the final outcome of language learning. Actually it gave rise to levels of communicative competence.

c. What role did Savignon herself play in its development?

In her research project Savignon actually described the general principle of CLT as we know it today: learning to communicate through interaction (instead of pattern memorizing). Also she started using coping strategies in the language learning (instead of error avoidance).

d. At the end of page 16, Savignon states that as language teachers, we need to have an understanding of “… language learning as both an educational and political issue”. What does she mean?

I think Sandra Savignon considers language learning to be a political issue by number of reasons. First of all learning any foreign language (especially English as a lingua franca) broadens the horizons of information perception. And nowadays information is a key to most of social, political and cultural doors. Secondly, in some countries additional language learning may become a challenge for national languages' vitality. Besides, the political aspect of language learning becomes even more urgent due to globalization processes.

e. What makes cultural awareness so important in language learning?

Savignon points out the exceptional importance of cultural awareness that combines cultural knowledge and loyalty to cultural diversity. English is a lingua franca, so very often 2 people communicating in English may belong to different cultures. And it may happen so that they do not know anything about each other’s cultures. Cultural awareness serves to make such communications successful. So it is a language instructor’s concern to explain to his/her learners concepts of multiculturalism, cultural diversity and loyalty.

f. What does Savignon mean when she says “communicative competence is always relative”?

The key phrase that answers this question is “the ideal native speaker … exists in theory only”. Thus there is no absolute communicative competence, as well as we can’t say that someone has achieved the ultimate level of communicative competence. In other words someone may know English better than someone, but no one can know English best of all.

g. How can you explain the different reactions that teachers have, in Savignon’s opinion, to CLT? Which of the stated reactions most reflects your own?

Different reactions of teachers to CLT, Savignon touches upon, can be explained by the degree of readiness of a particular instructor to changes in the traditional language learning process. Some teachers were more open to innovations and took a risk to switch from calculability of traditional methods to ambiguity and uncertainty of the new approach. If I were a language instructor of that time I would definitely take a risk of accepting the ambiguity and trying a new method. And I would not regret that as the CLT would turn out to be quite a successful and productive method.

h. Summarize Savignon’s five components of language teaching by writing a sentence or two about each. Do you feel this is an accurate representation of teaching? Why or why not?

1.    Language Arts (language analysis): this component focuses mainly on the form of the language. It correlates with the grammar translation method in some way.

2.    Language for a Purpose (language experience): this component is characterized by meaningful use of the language for real communication situations. In contrast with the previous component it focuses on meaning.

3.    My Language Is Me: Personal Second Language Use: this component is all about the learner’s language identity and recognition of the learner’s individual personality in the process of second language acquisition and language usage.

4.    You Be, I’ll Be: Theater Arts: this component focuses on using language by a learner in a variety of sociocultural roles following different social rules.

5.    Beyond the Classroom: this component focuses on learning to communicate through interaction in real life situations.

I think the components of Savignon’s teaching model are quite competitive and to some degree they cover all basic principles of adults learning, like goal-orientation, autonomy, relevancy-orientation, practicability and respectful attitude towards learners.

i. Divide your paper into two columns, and re-read “What CLT is Not” on page 27. As you re-read, put words that explain what CLT is on one side, and what CLT is not on the other.

what CLT is	what CLT is not
CLT principles can be equally applied to all basic language skills activities	CLT is not focused on oral communication only
CLT can be productive both for individual language learners and language classrooms	CLT does not imply working in small groups or pairs
CLT’s main aim is to develop communicative competence in the full sense of this word	CLT does not ignore the form of the language

At the end I would like to point out that is a great idea to suggest us reading and reflecting on Sandra Savignon’s article “Communicative Language Teaching for the Twenty-First Century” in the refresher module to the course. It helped me to summarize the key principles of CLT and aroused new thoughts and ideas leading to better comprehension of the communicative approach phenomenon.