Communicative Focus

Teaching Foreign Language on the Basis of the Native Speaker's Communicative Focus

By: Boris Shekhtman, Dina Kupchanka

Narrated by: Virtual Voice

In the current volume, the author describes in detail the theory and nature of the principles and practices used in his approach to language teaching. He is not afraid to talk about some aspects of language learning and teaching, such as the development of lexical and grammatical accuracy, as well as the need for memorization and the development of memory, that have been increasingly omitted from the classroom as a result of the rise in popularity of theories that debase their significance but which are very important, especially if students are to reach the highest level of proficiency. He also discusses some ideas, such as the unique nature of the connection between language and meaning that native speakers experience that non-native speakers must learn to deal with-in differing ways at differing levels of proficiency. His focus throughout is on communication and the nature of communicative focus (and its development). Just as many students have tremendously benefited from Boris's unique approach to language teaching, many teachers can benefit from the information he has included in this book if they put aside their graduate-school-enforced understandings of how foreign-language development can occur if looked at from a point of view that we have not generally taken in the past. I recommend to all teachers who want to see leaps in their students' progress in developing language proficiency and who are willing to take upon themselves (as opposed to leaving to students) much of the responsibility for language acquisition to read this book carefully and to return to it frequently.