Theme: Methods of Foreign Language Teaching

Problems:

General Remarks.

The Grammar-Translation Method.

The Direct Method.

Henry Palmer's Method.

M. West's Method.

Summary.

Literature

Methods of Foreign Language Teaching

A person who starts studying Methods will be puzzled by the variety of "methods" he may come across in books and journals and, of course, there are good grounds for this.

At different periods, depending on the aims of teaching and learning a foreign language, new methods sprang up. Moreover, the methods themselves have been modified by teachers and textbook writers, while still remaining recognizably the same basic method by another so that same amalgamated versions have resulted. In each case the method received a certain name denoted logical categories, for example: the synthetic method (synthesis), the analytic method (analysis), the deductive method (deduction), the inductive method (induction) sometime the method was names after the aspect of the language upon which attention was focused as in the cases of the grammar method, the lexical method, the phonetic method. A third set of methods received their names from the skill which was the main object of teaching. Among these is the translation method, the oral method. Sometimes the method got its name from the psychology of language learning: in this category, the following names occur; the intuitive method, the conscious method, the direct method.

Finally, the method was sometimes named after its inventor. Thus we find: the Amos Comenius method, the Jacotot method, the Berlitz method, the Palmer (West, Fries) method.

In some cases the methods bear coupled names: they represent two sides of teaching , for example, the leading aspect of the language and the skill the pupils acquire (the grammar-translation method), or the name of the author and the language activity which is the main aim in teaching-"Fries oral method", "the method of teaching reading by West".We may find even such names as "hear-say-see-say-read-write method" and other.

All the methods existed in the history of teaching languages are grouped into four classes. It is certainly true that all four methods have survived intact and are still being used by some teachers somewhere in the world. The four following methods are archetypes-classic examples – and offer a clear picture of the way language teaching has developed in the present century. Teachers of English have concluded that no single method or approach is appropriate for all learning styles. A good lesson will therefore be one in which you use a smorgasbord of activities taken from a variety of sources. By varying your technique, you will give students of all styles the chance to shine some of the time. With this thought in mind, you can begin to appraise the language learning approaches used in the country in which you serve. Each method (approach) has something to offer. Our task is to identify AND exploit those elements.

Below, we have selected for comment those methods which have had a long history and have influenced the contemporary methods of foreign language teaching, and live on in them.