Page 46 - Teaching English at Primary Level: From Theory into the Classroom
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Approaches to Language Teaching


                  tasks and negotiate meanings, but they also need considerable support from
                  the teacher in carrying out tasks and activities (Bland, 2019; Enever, 2015). We
                  may conclude that of all the possible roles played by a language teacher, that
                  of language model and classroom manager are especially significant in the
                  YL’s classroom.


                       Reflection Point
                       Several metaphors may be used to describe what teachers do, some teach-
                       ers feel they are like actors on a stage, some prefer the image of an orchestral
                       conductor or even a gardener who plants the seeds of knowledge in learners
                       (Harmer, 2007). How well do these metaphors capture the essence of being a
                       teacher? Which metaphor would you use?

                  Learner-Centred Teaching
                  The question of the teacher’s role is closely related to the constructivist idea
                  of ‘learner-centred’ teaching, that is teaching which puts into the centre of
                  theeducationalprocessthelearners’needsandexperiences.Onamoreprac-
                  tical level, Nunan (2013, p. 16) speaks of two opposing views to how a lan-
                  guage should be taught. On the one hand, subject-centred teaching sees
                  learning a language in terms of mastering a body of knowledge, while a
                  learner-centred view sees language learning as a process of acquiring skills.
                  In practice, both approaches are used, the difference is in the relative impor-
                  tance given to one or the other. In a learner-centred curriculum, the focus is
                  on teachers assisting learners in gaining communicative and linguistic skills
                  in order to carry out real-world tasks. In a learner-centred framework, ‘the
                  measure of a good lesson is the student activity taking place, not the per-
                  formance of the teacher’ (Harmer 2007, p. 56). However, learner-centredness
                  can also be viewed from a different perspective, taking into account the
                  type of activities and teaching objectives. Rather than speaking of two op-
                  posing options which exclude each other, Harmer (2007) suggests that the
                  choice of using a more teacher-fronted or a learner-centred approach may
                  depend on the type of activity the learners are involved in, the character-
                  istics of the learners and the educational tradition. As we have argued in
                  the discussion on teacher roles above, in the YLs’ classroom, the teacher is
                  an effective model of the target language and provider of additional sup-
                  port needed for carrying out tasks which may justify a more teacher-centred
                  approach.
                    However, while there are important benefits in designing and carrying out
                  single activities with YLs following a teacher-centred approach, it is also clear


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