The Implementation Of Communicative Approach To Teaching English As A Foreign Language: Bishoftu Preparatory School Grade Eleven In Focus.

Abstract

This study was designed to investigate the implementation of communicative approach in teaching English as a foreign language in grade eleven at Bishoftu Preparatory School. The research questions asked were to assess the teaching and learning approach used for the English lesson, to review the classroom activities carried out and possible problems that affected the implementation of CLT during the EFL lessons. Accordingly, participants of the study were 90 grade 11 students (54 males and 36 females) and five grade 11English teachers who were randomly selected. To achieve the purpose of this study a descriptive survey research design was employed. In order to gather data from the subjects of the study, questionnaire, semi-structured face-to-face interview and classroom observation with the help of checklist were used. EFL lessons were observed using observation checklist while selected teachers were conducting their classes. The interview questions were used to get detailed information from the teachers and to cross-check the data gathered using other tools. The data collected was analyzed using descriptive statistics. The finding of the study revealed that teachers rarely implemented the principles of communicative language teaching during the lessons although they had knowledge about the principles of CLT. The results also revealed that teachers were taking much time and the students often expected their teachers to explain to them everything rather than being active participants. Moreover, the finding showed that communicative activities were not happing much. The finding also indicated that constraints that hindered the implementation of communicative language teaching approach included the students‟ poor background and lack of interest to work in group and shortage of time to do various communicative activities in the students‟ text book.