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Methods and Approaches to English Language Teaching


Today, English is the worlds most widely studied foreign language. Five hundred years ago, Latin was the most dominant language to be studied because it was the language of business, commerce and education in the western world. In the sixteenth century, however, French, Italian and English gain in importance as a result of political change in Europe and Latin gradually became displaced as a language of spoken and written communication (Richards and Rodgers, 2001).

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Latin became a dead language. It was being started to read in the books as classic language. Children started to enter in the ‘grammar school’ in sixteenth and eighteenth centuries to learn grammar rules of Latin. To learn Latin language became a “mental gymnastic”. In the eighteenth century, when modern languages began to enter in the curriculum of the European countries, these languages were taught by the same methods as Latin language was taught. Grammatical rules were memorized. Written practices were done. The passages were translated from the second language to the first language and vice versa (ibid).
By the nineteenth century, this method was considered as a standard method of teaching language. The textbooks were divided into chapters. Each chapter contained a certain grammatical rule and rule was practices with a lot of written exercises (ibid).

Methods and Approaches of English Language Teaching

According to Asher and James (1982), Methods are the combination of techniques that are used and plasticized by the teachers in the classrooms in order to teach their students and approaches are the philosophies of teachers about language teaching that can be applied in the classrooms by using different techniques of language teaching. For example, if a teacher has an approach that language is the communication and learning a language is in fact learning the meanings, functions and uses of language. So the techniques will be based on the communicative language teaching and task based methods.

According to Freeman (2000), Methods which are taught to the teachers make a base and give them thinking about the applicable techniques and principles according to the situation where they stand. They are clear about their attraction towards certain methods and also think that why have they repelled certain method. The knowledge of method is very necessary because their knowledge is base of teaching.

Grammar Translation Method

Grammar translation method was the most popular and widely used method for language teaching between the ages of 1840 to 1940. But this method was first used for teaching and learning Latin language which was not the language of common use at that time. Latin was considered as a classic language. The learners were made able to study the literature of Latin language through learning the grammatical rules of language and learning the vocabulary so that learners may translate the language in their first language and in the second language. Grammar translation method was criticized intensively in the nineteenth century because it was considered that this method cannot fulfill the demands of language learning in nineteenth century.

Direct Method

The direct method was the outcome of the reaction against the grammar translation method. It was based on the assumption that the learners of foreign and second language should directly think in English. This method is against the translation of written and oral text and focuses on telling the meanings of the words through action, demonstration or real objects. This method focuses on directly thinking, doing discussion and conversation in second language (Richards and Rodgers, 2001).

Purwarno (2006) described the aims of the direct method. He described that direct method is an attempt and effort to form a link between thought and expression and between experience and language.

Direct method was criticized due to the following reasons:
1. Direct method is successful in private language schools because this method can be applied only in small classes where all the learners can get individual attention.

2. In Direct method, the teachers extravagantly excel in keeping the mother tongue of the learners away from them.

3. Direct method demands the learners to do oral communication in the second language and it also demands the pronunciation and accent to be just like the native speakers so there is need for the language school to hire the native speakers Structural Approach