Direct Method

Direct Method of English Language Teaching

Direct Method

 Definition: The direct method in teaching a language is directly establishing an immediate and audiovisual association between experience and expression, words and phrases, idioms and meanings, rules and performances through the teachers' body and mental skills, without any help of the learners' mother tongue.
 Aims of this Method:
 Direct method aims to build a direct relation between experience and language, word and idea, thought and expression.
 This method intends for students to learn how to communicate in the target language.
 This method is based on the assumption that the learner should experience the new language in the same way as he/she experienced his/her mother tongue.
 The Direct Method, it’s sometimes called the Natural Method. The direct method focuses on full immersion in the classroom environment where not one word of the students’ native language is spoken. The focus is not on grammar but instead on learning through listening and speaking. When using the natural approach, we don’t focus on the rules, we allow for mistakes, and we aim for excellent oral communication. 
 It’s named “direct", because meaning should be connected directly with the target language without translation into the native language.
History
It was established in Germany and France around 1900, and it was an answer to the dissatisfaction with the older Grammar Translation Method, which teaches students grammar and vocabulary through direct translations and thus focuses on the written language.
One of its main proponents was the German Maximilian Berlitz, whose schools in the form of Berlitz International exist to this day.