linguistic competence.
b. Knowing whether something is understandable to human beings; c. Knowing whether something is in line with social norms;
d. Knowing whether or not something is in fact done: Do people actually use language this way?
In other words, communicative competence entails knowing not only the language code or the form of language, but also what to say to whom and how to say it appropriately in any given situation. Communicative competence includes knowledge of what to say, when, how, where and to whom.
3.2 Three principles should be obeyed in communicative approach teaching
Although people’s understanding of communicative language teaching varies, the following three principles, which have been suggested by Richards and Rodgers (1986:72), have been generally agreed upon:[2]
a. Communicative principle: Activities that involve real communicative promote learning.
b. Task principle: Activities in which language is used for carrying out meaningful tasks promotelearning.
c. Meaningfulness principle: Language that is meaningful to the learner supports the learning process.
3.3 How to develop students’ communicative competence
As we know, the goal of CLT is to develop students’ communicative
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competence, which includes both the knowledge about the language and the knowledge about how to use the language appropriately in communicative situations. In language teaching practice, the communicative competence is to develop learners’ language skills, namely, listening, speaking, reading and writing. However, as teachers of English, they must train and exert students’ initiative, activity and independence, exerting all their strength to act as organizers, helpers and judgers. Since forty-five minutes is the key to success, a teacher should make good use of the precious time and create a good language environment for the students, providing them a chance to listen. Students’English studying begins with listening; teachers should give them more opportunities to listen to the language spoken. When it comes to listening, teachers should speak English slowly and correctly because only when students listen clearly and accurately, can they speak well. When they speak correctly and their teacher praises them, they will be encouraged greatly. In Middle School classroom, in order to improve students’ ability of listening, teachers can choose differentconversations in all kinds of situations, which are good for listening. Such as telephone conversations about business, conversations with foreigners, watching TV in English shop assistants who sell goods to foreigners, hotel and restaurant services, listen to English songs and so on. In the four skills, I think the most important skill is speaking. In order to practiceEnglish speaking effectively, the first step that the teacher should do is to design tasks, in which the language proficiency level of the
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students must take into consideration. If the teachers ask them questions above their level, they will simply become frustrated and demotivated. On the other hand, it is good to give students tasks that challenge them, because if speaking tasks are too easy, they can also become demotivated. Using group work in the speaking tasks is a good way because it is the strongest argument for using small group work which increases the time for each student to practise speaking in one lesson. The only way to become good at a skill is to practise it. There are several kinds of activities that teachers can apply them to the communicative language teaching. [2]
a. One excellent way to make speaking tasks communicative is to use Information-gap activities, in which the students have different information and need to obtain information from each other to finish a task.
b. Dialogues and Role-plays are also effective ways to learn to speak. But what should teachers do to make dialogues communicative? First, turn the dialogues into role-plays. So the students can pretend to act as someone else.
a. Using cue cards makes dialogues more similar to real life. This way an information gap is formed because each student sees only a cue card and therefore doesn’t know what the other person is going to say.
b. Activities using pictures are invaluable in speaking activities. Appropriate pictures provide cues, prompts, situations and non-verbal aid for communication. Students from elementary level to advanced level can all benefit from using pictures in speaking activities.
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c. A problem-solving activity tends to be productive because there is a clear objective to be reached. There are many topics that would be interesting and relevant to the students’ life.
Through theexperience of my learning and teaching, there are some very useful ways to traincommunicative competence of students. Breaking psychological barrier is important for developing students’ communicative competence. In fact everyone hopes that he himself can speak English fluently, but most students are timid psychologically and they are afraid of making mistakes and losing faces. So at first the teacher should draw students’ attention by all kinds of ways, he may use “body language” to clear up students’ intension and fear. In order to draw students’ attention, the teacher should try to act with expression; emotional tone to make the atmosphere of classroom active and make a lasting impression on students, for some time students can learn to use English naturally. Moreover the teacher should encourage students to answer questions in English. Shy and timid students are unwilling to open their mouths，we may let them read the text, let one of them read a small paragraph, or a few words. Through taking these exercises for some time, students must have removed the barrier of psychology slowly. Before class is over, we may let students discuss some questions for a few minutes. This will not only strengthen the knowledge students have learned, but also can raise their oral ability.
In order to improve students’ communicative competence, we may ask
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students on duty to make a speech for five minutes. The topics of the speech are various, fables, humorous stories and news. They may use vivid language and action while making the speech. The contents are from simple to complicated. For example, after learning “The Family Tree” students will bring their family photos and make dialogues in class, after learning “A Telephone Call”, students can make dialogues and perform them in class. Making a speech by the students on duty will develop students’ intelligential factor and non-intelligential factor. Students must use their head to compile the materials before they make a speech. They not only consider how to use new knowledge but also consider how to compile it well. Students creatively use and exert the language they have learned in the whole course. On the other hand, students experience themselves the successes and pleasure of communication in English, this intimulates students’ interest of studying. In some way, making a speech improves the comprehensive ability of hearing, speaking, reading and writing, which proves very useful for training students’ communicative competence.
Besides giving chance for students to carry on language practice in class, we may encourage students to take part in English corner, We may also have a Christmas Party every year, teach students some English songs, let them understand the custom and culture of other countries, in the party we may decorate a beautiful Christmas tree, let students play English games, that will greatly raise students’interest in English, make them feel that it’s very happy
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交际法在中学英语课堂教学中的应用
