Methods of teaching a foreign language: direct, communicative

Often desperate to learn a foreign language, remembering their school experience, are tempted by promises to quickly teach the language with the help of the latest method. In this case, often there is no difference between what methods of teaching a foreign language, and what - private methods. You can hear a lot about the game method, all sorts of authoring programs. We will consider the methods and methods of teaching foreign languages that exist today and emphasize their advantages for solving specific problems.

1. Traditional grammar and modern lexico-grammatical method

This traditional approach to teaching in pure form was used in schools and universities until the middle of the 20th century and longer. The training was based on a strong grammatical foundation and memorizing vocabulary (in our country - lexis ideologically correct and in real communication of little use). The main skill, mastered by those who managed to keep interest in the language and not give up at the beginning of a difficult and long way - is reading and translating texts, often - a narrowly specialized direction.

Despite the shortcomings of this method - the weak motivation of students, the formation of a language barrier, the inability to communicate in real situations - it has its advantages. First of all, this is a solid knowledge of grammar. This method is suitable for students with analytical thinking, for which the great advantage is the structured nature of the material and the existence of a logical explanation for the phenomenon, and not all clear schemes and tables in this case are a good auxiliary tool.

After decades, during which traditional methods of teaching a foreign language were subjected to all-round criticism, it was time to realize its advantages. And today, in its improved form, this method is called lexico-grammatical. Attention is paid to all four aspects of the language, that is, not only reading and writing, but also speaking and listening. It is successfully applied by the teachers of the "old school" and allows us to visually demonstrate the similarity and difference of the native and studied languages.

2. Communicative method

It is fundamentally the opposite of what was discussed above. As the name implies, it is designed to teach communication. This requires the most natural training conditions and a real need for interaction. Communicative method involves communication between the teacher and the student in the studied language, the explanation of the grammar is minimized. It is assumed that it must be learned intuitively. Errors in speech, if possible, are not corrected, if they do not interfere with understanding. The introduction of this method began in the 1970s with the filing of both foreign and domestic authors. He allowed many to get rid of the language barrier, learn to understand the language and speak it much faster. Of particular interest are the modern, colorful manuals with actual content. Particularly high results were achieved by students of primary school age, who, with sufficient motivation, learning the language really occurs in a "natural" way. Today, the communicative method is recognized as the most effective for group learning and is suitable for most language learners. However, it requires a high level of preparation from the teacher. It is with insufficient qualification and understanding of the fundamentals of this method that his criticism is connected, the essence of which is that the trainee does not learn to speak competently and does not know the grammar. This is not entirely true, since much depends on the length of the training, and on the efforts made by the trainee.

Techniques, forms and techniques

Often in the advertising of educational institutions you can hear that the classroom uses the latest methods of teaching a foreign language. Rather, we are talking about different forms of training (immersion, audio-lingual, etc.). And here the word "method" should be understood not as a fundamental approach, but as a way of presenting knowledge. In particular, many people say that they use interactive methods of teaching a foreign language. Here we are talking about absolutely useful online resources, which is rather an auxiliary tool, rather than methods. A form of learning is also popular, when communication with a teacher takes place, for example, via Skype.

Summarizing what has been said, one can say that today it became clear that the methods of teaching a foreign language are chosen based on the tasks assigned and the characteristics of a group or a particular trainee. You should distinguish them from the methods and forms of training and understand that none of the methods will allow you to learn the language in 2 months without making your own efforts.