The Nature of CLT

b. Theory of Learning

According to Johnson as cited in Richards and Rogers 2001: 161, there are some elements of underlying learning theory that can be discerned in some CLT practices: 1 Communicative principle This consists of activities that involve real communication to promote learning. 2 Task principle This principle includes the activities in which language is used for carrying out meaningful tasks that promote learning. 3 Meaningfulness principle This principle assumes language that is meaningful to the learners can support the learning process.

c. The Communicative Task

CLT contains a set of communicative task. Nunan defines the communicative task as classroom work which focuses on meaning rather than form 1998:18. Learners first need to understand the structural pattern of English as the target language, then to be able to perform English communicative way using appropriate structural pattern. The goal of the course is to make the learners to be able to use English communicatively, not to comprehend English structural pattern. A task consists of input, related activities, goals, roles of teachers, and learners, and a setting. They are set out in the figure 2. Figure 2. Frameworks for Analyzing Communicative Task The following is the explanation of the three component of analyzing the communicative task as stated by Nunan 1989. 1 Goals Goals are not always explicitly stated. Goals may relate to a range of general comes out communicative, affective, or cognitive or may directly describe teacher or learner behavior. An examination task may identify the goals. 2 Input A task consists of some inputs and one or more related activities. Input refers to the data that is from the point of departure for the task. 3 Activities Activities specify what learners will actually do with the input as the beginning of learning task. Nunan 1989 proposed three general ways of characterizing activities, namely: rehearsal for the real world, skills use, and fluencyaccuracy. Pattison as stated by Nunan 1989: 68 proposes seven activity types. Those types stated as follows: Goals Input Activities TASK Setting Learner role Teacher role