APPROACHES & METHODS IN LANGUAGE TEACHING
Approaches and Methods in Language teaching was written by its authors because they felt there have been such a proliferation of methods and approaches to teaching second and foreign languages that clarification and understanding were necessary. The book gives a method by method account of the approaches and methods use in second and foreign language teaching. In the first chapter they give an introduction that covers a brief history of language teaching. In chapter two they unveil the single analytical model they will use for the entire book. This model “describes approaches and methods according to their underlying theories of language and language learning; the learning objectives; the syllabus model used; the roles of teachers, learners, and materials within the method or approach; and the classroom procedures and techniques that the method uses,” (Richards and Rodgers vii).
The authors then examine each approach or method by giving us the historical context within which it was framed. Further, they examine each of the discussed methods from three perspectives: approach; design; procedure. The eight methods and approaches covered include the following: Situational Language Teaching; Audiolingualism; Communicative Language Teaching; Total Physical Response; The Silent Way; Community Language Learning; The Natural Approach; Suggestopedia, (Richards, et.al.). This report will now analyze each of these approaches and methods which are given a chapter apiece. The conclusion will address the final section of the book, Comparing and evaluating methods.
The Situational Language or Oral Approach was developed in Britain between the 1930s and 1960s and its principles and concepts still are inherent in many EFL/ESL courses of today. British linguists originated an approach to methodology that used “systematic principles of selection (the procedures by which lexical and gra...