Framing communicative language teaching for better teacher understanding

Studies of the use of Communicative Language Teaching (CLT) approaches in foreign language classrooms have frequently raised doubts about the adequacy of elementary and secondary teachers' understanding of CLT and their use of this approach in classrooms at those levels. Reasons for this alleged state of affairs are reviewed, with one potential cause selected as the focus for further examination in this paper, namely the quality of written texts on the nature and use of CLT approaches as a learning resource for teachers. To assess the merits of this resource from the perspective of elementary and secondary teachers, a sample of written texts is analysed. This analysis reveals that the range of concepts used by individual authors to describe CLT and the use of CLT approaches in classrooms is somewhat limited and may not serve well the practical needs of teachers. To alleviate this alleged problem, a framework is proposed, within which, it is argued, the development of teacher understanding of communicative approaches can be achieved more effectively. Of course, this framework also has much wider applicability and could be used to facilitate teacher understanding of other approaches to teaching second languages