Lecture 1: General problems of Foreign Language teaching

LECTURE 5. The oral approach and situational language teaching
Plan:
1. Vocabulary control
2. Grammar control
3. The Oral Approach and Situational Language Teaching

Few language teachers in the 1980s are familiar with the terms Oral Approach or Situational Language Teaching, which refer to an approach to language teaching developed by British applied linguists form the 1930s to the 1960s. even neither term is commonly used today, the impact of the Oral Approach has been long lasting, and it has shaped the design of many widely used EFL/ESL textbooks and courses, including many still being used today. One of the most successful ESL courses of recent times, Streamline English (Hartley and Viney 1979), reflects the classic principles of Situational Language Teaching, as do many other widely used series (e.g., Access to English, Coles and Lord 1975; Kernel Lessons Plus, O’Neill 1973; and many of L.G.Alexander’s widely used textbooks, e.g., Alexander 1967). As a recent British methodology text states. “This method is widely used at the time of writing and very large number of textbooks are based on it” (Hubbard et al. 1983: 36). It is important therefore to understand the principles and practices of the Oral Approach and Situational Language Teaching.

Background
The origins of this approach began with the work of British applied linguists in the 1920s and 1930s. Beginning at this time, a number of outstanding applied linguists developed the basis for a principled approach to methodology in language teaching. Two of the leaders in this movement were Harold Palmer and A.S.Hornby, two of the most prominent figures in British twentieth-century language teaching. Both were familiar with the work of such linguists as Otto Jespersen and Daniel Jones, as well as with the Direct Method. What they attempted was to develop a more scientific foundation for oral approach to teaching English than was evidenced in the Direct Method. The result was a systematic study of the principles and procedures that could be applied to the selection and organization of the content of a language course (Palmer 1917, 1921).