Practical Knowledge Growth in Communicative Language Teaching

Communicative language teaching (CLT) is promoted in teacher education programmes around the world, although the appropriateness of this methodology in contexts outside the English-speaking West has been questioned, often from a theoretical perspective. In fact, very little empirical research has been conducted into the practical knowledge of CLT of non-native speaker teachers of English, and there is a lack of such research investigating growth longitudinally in this area. Using observations, interviews, and reflective writing, this study charts the practical knowledge growth in CLT of a lower secondary teacher in the Middle East while she was studying part-time on an in-service BA (TESOL) programme run by the University of Leeds in conjunction with the Ministry of Education in the Sultanate of Oman. Qualitative data suggests that the teacher’s practical knowledge of CLT developed considerably during the course. Further research into the influence of teacher education programmes in TESOL on practical knowledge is called for. Introduction – Practical Knowledge Growth in Communicative Language Teaching As Nunan (1987) writes: “While a great deal has been written on the theory and practice of communicative language teaching (CLT), there have been comparatively few studies of actual communicative language practices” (p. 136). This is still true, particularly in contexts outside English-speaking Western ELT where the voices of non-native speaker teachers are too often unheard. This is unfortunate as, in the absence of research evidence as to the cognitions and behaviour of such practitioners, the designers of teacher education programmes are left with assumptions that may be erroneous. In this paper, I report on the developing “practical knowledge” (Elbaz, 1981) of a non-native speaker teacher of English over a three-year period in a hitherto little-researched context. During this time, she was studying for an in-service university degree in TESOL. My focus is on her design and use of communicative tasks (Cameron, 2001) to develop speaking skills.