Audio-lingualism Methods of Teaching

THE USE... R. Arief Nugroho Mater’s Program in Linguistics, Diponegoro University ©2009, UNDIP Institutional Repository

C. Methods of Teaching

Comprehensive Teaching Technique uses some methods which accommodate children learners’ needs because we know that one of the characteristics which children have is they have a limited attention span, and they will easily get bored if teachers use the same technique over and over again. The researcher set the implementation of various methods in joint construction level. There are some methods which become the underlying methods of Comprehensive Teaching Technique CTT. Those methods are:

1. Audio-lingualism

According to Richards, J, J. Platt, H. Webber 1985: 21 the definition of Audio-lingualism is as follows: A method of foreign or second language teaching which a emphasizes the teaching of speaking and listening before reading and writing b uses dialogues and drills c discourages use the mother tongue in the classroom d often makes use of the contrastive analysis…The theory behind the audiolingual method is the aural-oral approach to language teaching, which contains the following beliefs about language and language learning: a speaking and listening are the most basic language skill b each language has its own unique structure and rule system c a language is learned through forming habit. Children as an early learner must be introduced with the correct forms of English. In line with the philosophy of behaviorism, while using this method children are being taught with the repetition of verbal language in the Joint Construction level. When teachers deal with a specific target language, they have to mention the form repeatedly. This activity will give THE USE... R. Arief Nugroho Mater’s Program in Linguistics, Diponegoro University ©2009, UNDIP Institutional Repository students a chance to imitate and restore the correct form of language. In addition, Richards and Rodgers 2001:52 state that “the structure of the language was identified with its basic sentence patterns and grammatical structures. The language was taught by systemic attention to pronunciation and by intensive oral drilling of its basic sentence patterns”. Moreover, according to Rivers 1964:5 “language is speech, not writing…a language is a set of habit”. That is why when teachers use this method in Joint Construction level, the repeated language focus will be the main activity in order to make students familiarize with the target language. According to Larsen –Freeman 2000:42-43, there are some principles that become the philosophy of Audiolingual method; those principles are: a. The native language and the target language have separate linguistic systems. They should be kept apart so that the students’ native language interferes as little as possible with the students’ attempts to acquire the target language. b. One of the language teacher’s major roles is that of a model of the target language. Teachers should provide students with a good model. By listening to how it is supposed to sound, students should be able to mimic the model. c. Language learning is a process of habit formation. The more often something is repeated, the stronger the habit and the greater the learning THE USE... R. Arief Nugroho Mater’s Program in Linguistics, Diponegoro University ©2009, UNDIP Institutional Repository In addition, Larsen –Freeman 2000:45 states that “teachers want their students to be able to use the targe t language…their students achieve this by forming new habits in the target language and overcoming the old habits of their native language”. That is why by using this method, students will experience a natural language used which occurs on the teaching and learning process and it will help them to digest English easier. Furthermore, according to Larsen- Freeman 2000:46 “…audio- lingual has been influenced by descriptive linguists. Every language is seen as having its own unique system. The system comprised of several different levels: phonological, morphological, and syntactic…everyday speech is emphasized in the audio- lingual method”. When using this method in Joint Construction level, teachers will play an important role. According to Richards and Rodgers 2001:62 “the teacher’s role is central and active…the teacher models the target language, controls the direction and pace the learning, and monitors and corrects the learners’ performance”. That is why teachers should supervise students’ actions in order to make students pacing the right streak to study English. Although the researcher used audio-lingualism method in this level joint construction, during the implementation the researcher was able to find some weaknesses. One of the weaknesses was that the implementation of this method was quite boring. This is in line with Richards and Rodgers’ 2001:65 statement “students were often found to THE USE... R. Arief Nugroho Mater’s Program in Linguistics, Diponegoro University ©2009, UNDIP Institutional Repository be unable to transfer skills acquired through Audiolingualism to real communication outside the classroom, and many found the experience of studying through audiolingual procedures to be boring and satisfying”. Even though the researcher found this weakness, the researcher tried to cover this weakness by using other methods Task Based Learning, CLL, Suggestopedia, and TPR that were suitable for students.