Communicative Approach (grew out of the work of anthropological linguists (e.g., Hymes, 1972) and Firthian linguists (e.g., Halliday, 1973), who view language first and foremost as a system for communication).
a. It is assumed that the goal of language teaching is learner ability to communicate in the target language.
b. It is assumed that the content of a language course will include semantic notions and social functions, not just linguistic structures.
c. Students regularly work in groups or pairs to transfer (and, if necessary, negotiate) meaning in situations where one person has information that the other(s) lack.
d. Students often engage in role-play or dramatization to adjust their use of the target
language to different social contexts.
e. Classroom materials and activities are often authentic to reflect real-life situations and
demands.
f. Skills are integrated from the beginning; a given activity might involve reading,
speaking, listening, and perhaps also writing (this assumes the learners are educated
and literate).
g. The teacher's role is primarily to facilitate communication and only secondarily to
correct errors.
h. The teacher should be able to use the target language fluently and appropriately.
To sum up, we can see that certain features of several of the first five approaches outlined above arose in reaction to perceived inadequacies or impracticalities in an earlier approach or approaches. The four more recently developed approaches also do this to some extent; however, each one is grounded on a slightly different theory or view of how people learn second or foreign languages, or how people use languages, and each has a central point around which everything else revolves:
Cognitive Approach: Language is rule-governed cognitive behavior (not habit formation). Affective-Humanistic Approach: Learning a foreign language is a process of self-realization
and of relating to other people.
Comprehension Approach: Language acquisition occurs if and only if the learner
comprehends meaningful input.
Communicative Approach: The purpose of language (and thus the goal of language teaching)
is communication.
These four more recent approaches are not necessarily in conflict or totally incompatible since it is not impossible to conceive of an integrated approach which would include attention to rule formation, affect, comprehension, and communication and which would view the learner as someone who thinks, feels, understands, and has something to say, In fact, many teachers would find such an approach, if well conceived and well integrated, to be very attractive.
A NOTE ON APPROACH, METHOD, AND SYLLABUS TYPE
We now understand that an approach is general (e.g., Cognitive), that a method is a specific set of procedures more or less compatible with an approach (e.g., Silent Way), and that a technique is a very specific type of learning activity used in one or more methods (e.g., using rods to cue and facilitate language practice). Historically, an approach or method also tends to be used in conjunction with a syllabus, which is an inventory of things the learner should master; this inventory is sometimes presented in a recommended sequence and is used to design courses and teaching materials.