The communication argument

There is more to knowing a language than knowing its grammar. It is one thing to know that Do you drink? is a present simple question. It is another thing to know that it can function as an offer. This simple observation is at the heart of what is now called the Communicative Approach, or Communicative Language Teaching (CLT). From the 1970s on, theorists have been arguing that grammatical knowledge (linguistic competence) is merely one component of what they call communicative competence. Communicative competence involves knowing how to use the grammar and vocabulary of the language to achieve communicative goals, and knowing how to do this in a socially appropriate way.

Two schools of thought emerged as to the best means of achieving the objectives of this communicative approach. Both schools placed a high premium on putting the language to communicative use. But they differed as to when you should do this. The first – or shallow–end approach – might be summed up as the view that you learn a language in order to use it. That is: learn the rules and then apply them in life-like communication. The more radical line, however, is that you use a language in order to learn it. Proponents of this deep-end approach take an experiential view of learning: you learn to communicate by communicating. They argue that, by means of activities that engage the learner in life-like communication, the grammar will be acquired virtually unconsciously. Studying the rules of grammar is simply a waste of valuable time.