An evaluation of teachers' implementation of and reaction to the communicative approach

Abstract

Whatever the situation may be as regards actual teaching practices, communicative language teaching is well established as the dominant theoretical model in English language teaching. Despite recurrent attempts to identify the characteristics of the communicative approach many teachers remain somewhat confused about what exactly communicative language teaching is. The purpose of this study was to evaluate teachers' knowledge of the communicative approach, their attitude toward the use of the approach as well as their implementation of the communicative approach. The results of this study indicated the following: *teachers teaching in the schools of the Mmabatho education region in the North-West Province have a very "basic" knowledge of the communicative approach; *teachers' attitude toward the use of the communicative approach is mixed; and *the implementation of the communicative approach is not done effectively and efficiently. The results, therefore, highlight the need to raise suggestions on how to rectify and improve the prevailing situation. There is a great need to ensure that content and methods of language teaching are continuously and regularly reviewed for both preservice and in-service teacher training programmes.