An Investigation Of The Attitudes Of Teachers And Students Towards Communicative Language Teaching In A Senior Middle School In Nanchang

Since the late1980s there has been a movement to reform English languageteaching in China. An important component of this reform has been an effort toimport Communicative Language Teaching (CLT) in the Chinese context. Researchershave advocated CLT as an effective teaching method in middle schools. One of themain goals in using this method is to improve communicative competence in Englishthrough meaningful communicative activities and task-oriented teaching model of thelearners. Despite the widespread adoption of CLT in EFL countries, research suggeststhat there might be some problems in using CLT. Therefore, this study sets out toinvestigate application of communicative language teaching in a senior middleschool.This study intends to find out the application of CLT in Nanchang senior middleschools. For this purpose, a descriptive research method was used to describe aphenomenon.11English teachers and150students of6classes in NO.7MiddleSchool took part in the study. They were asked to respond to a questionnaire andparticipate in an interview. After the data were collected and analyzed, this surveydemonstrated the difficulties that teachers and students suffered in the application ofCLT in Chinese English classroom. Meanwhile, this survey is designed to explore thepossible solutions as well. It is hoped that the implications of the findings of the studywill benefit EFL educators in terms of developing students’ communicativecompetence.The findings of the study reveal that:(1) the students prefer to be open to varioustechniques and practices rather than mono-approach. They favor the idea of adoptinga meaning-based approach, with grammar taught in class as needed. Their perceptionsand attitudes reported in this study represent that to reconcile communicativeactivities and non-communicative activities in English learning is the best way.(2)This study generally indicates that the majority of teachers have favorable attitudetowards communicative language teaching. They deeply believe that CLT is anefficient way to facilitate English learning of most students.(3) In spite of favorable responses of the students and teachers to CLT, Chinese teachers and students have anumber of difficulties in use of the CLT in classroom, such as limitations andconstraints of the Chinese teachers; their lack of materials; the pressure placed uponthem by their educational officials, peers, and students; the emphasis on thepreparation of students for national examinations, and their own cultural differences.On the basis of the above findings, some implications for the use of CLT in seniormiddle school can be offered as follows:(1) teacher’s overall ability should beimproved;(2) students’ misconceptions of CLT should be avoided;(3) realcommunicative atmosphere should be created;(4) class size should be reduced; and (5)motivation for communicative competence should be strengthened. We must be verysensitive to the traditional Chinese methods and the needs of the teachers and theirstudents.