After thinking about my experience as an English student, I came to the conclusion that the school where I studied based its teaching method in the Communicative approach. Many friends of mine say they learned English with the Audio-Lingual Method, though.
Last week I had the opportunity to talk about this method – which I studied and researched about. The Audio-Lingual method is an oral-based approach that incorporated principles from behavioral psychology. It was believed that the best way to learn a second language was through conditioning – “helping learners to respond correctly to stimuli through shaping and reinforcement”. The teacher is allowed to use only the target language in the classroom (actions and pictures are also used to show meaning). He/she uses drills to help the students learn the language patterns. Students are expected to repeat sentences over and over – when they mispronounce something, the teacher is supposed to correct right away. If they pronounce the sentence correctly, the teacher says “very good” or “great” – by doing so correct habits can be developed. The sentences are not the same – difficulty increases during the class, since the teacher conducts transformation and question-and-answer drills. Vocabulary is limited – the most important function of this method is to provide the students with new linguistic patterns. It is believed that vocabulary can be learned afterwards. There are no grammar rules; “grammatical points are taught through examples and drills”. Written work is limited – speech is believed to be the most important skill in a language. Other skills are also taught, in an order that is like the one we usually learn a first language: listening, speaking, reading and writing. Culture is also taught through dialogs which describe daily activities, everyday behavior, etc.
It’s important to mention that there is no “best method or approach” for learning a second language. After all, we must take into consideration that individuals are very different and, as a consequence, methods will work differently with each person. Besides, most schools are usually a mix of different approaches: every method has interesting and useful ideas that can be used effectively.