"In short, being able to communicate required more than linguistic competence; it required communicative competence" (Hymes, 1971). I agree with Hymes' viewpoint because I feel that sometimes communicative competence is overlooked in schooling. Teachers of foreign language will instruct students about a grammar topic, or a vocabulary list, and store all they can into the students. However, once the lesson or unit is over, the students forget all about what they had just been taught. I feel that students need to feel some sort of authenticity to what they are learning. In the article, the teacher used a real newspaper article, and for homework, he assigned the class to listen to a podcast. One philosophy of mine, even goal, is that my students will find ways to connect what is being taught to them, and branch it to the outside world. If students cannot transfer the knowledge obtained in the classroom, what is the point of retaining it?
After going over the teacher's lesson and reading it a few times, I found that he was very successful in finding ways of creating genuine communicative teachings (to the idea of predictions) for his students. He used authentic texts (newspaper), a card game (which allowed the students to make predictions about one another), a comic strip, and a role-play exercise. The teacher acted as the facilitator so that the students could be the ones communicating throughout the lesson. Through this, I believe that he achieved his goal of enabling students to communicate in the target language.
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Tom the TESOL Bro
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