Contextual Teaching and Learning

A.    Contextual Teaching and Learning

The CTL system is an educational process that aims to help the students see meaning in the academic material they are studying by connecting academic subjects with the context of their daily lives, that is, with the context of their personal, social, and cultural circumstances. To achieve this aim, the system encompasses the following eight components: making meaningful connections, doing significant work, self-regulated learning, collaborating, critical and creative thinking, nurturing the individual, reaching high standards, and using authentic assessment.

CTL begins with a simulated or real problem. Students use critical thinking skills and a systemic approach to inquiry to address the problem or issue. Students may also draw upon multiple content areas to solve these problems. Worthwhile problems that are relevant to students’ families, school experiences, workplaces, and communities hold greater personal meaning for students.

B.     The characteristics of Contextual Teaching and Learning (CTL)?

There are 8 characteristics of Contextual Teaching and Learning consist of:

a.       Making meaningful connections

Students can organize themselves as learners, who learn actively in improving their interest individually, person who can work individually or collectively in a group and a person who can do learning by doing.

b.      Doing significant work

Student can make relationship among schools and the various existing contexts in the real world as business maker and as a citizen.

c.       Self-regulated learning

Students do the significant work; it has purpose, it has connection with others, it has connection with decision making and it has the concrete results or products.

d.      Collaborating

Students are able to work together. The teacher helps students in order to work effectively in a group and teacher helps them to understand the way how to persuade and communicate each others.

e.       Critical and creative thinking

Students are able to apply higher level thinking critically and effectively. They are able to analyze, to synthesize, to tackle the problem, to make a decision and to think logically.

f.       Nurturing the individual

Students carry on their selves, understand, give attention, possess high wishes, motivate and empower themselves. Students can’t get the success without the support from adult people. Students should respect their companion and adult person

g.      Reaching high standard

Students know and reach the high standard. It identifies their purposes and motivates them to reach it. Teacher shows to students how to reach what called ‘excellent’.

h.      Using authentic assessment

Students use academic knowledge in the real world context to the meaningful purposes. For example, students may describe the academic information that have learnt in subject of science, health, education, math, and English subject by designing a car, planning the school menu, or making the serving of human emotion or telling their experience.

C.     The Procedures of Contextual Teaching and Learning

There are seven main components of the contextual teaching and learning that become the foundation of the contextual learning in the classroom. They are constructivism, questioning, inquiry, learning community, modelling, reflection, and authentic assessment. A teacher uses the contextual approach in the classroom if he/she applies the seven main components in the learning process. The contextual learning can be applied in what curriculum is being done, what subject is being used and what situation the class is.

1.      Constructivism

Constructivism is a basic philosophy of contextual learning. It means that knowledge is built by the human beings less more less, and the result is enlarged through the limited context. Knowledge is not a set of facts, concept, or the pattern which is not ready to be taken or reminded. The human must construct the knowledge and give the meaning by his new experiences. The students must understand and apply their knowledge. They have to work to solve the problem, find something by themselves, and develop the ideas. The teacher does not only give the information to the students’ mind but also can transfer the important and useful concepts to them.

2.      Inquiry

Inquiry is a complex idea that means many things to many people in many contexts. Inquiry is an asking. Inquiry can be applied in all subjects. The key word of the inquiry strategy is the student can find himself. An inquiry activity is a cycle. The cycle consists of some steps. They are formulating the problem, collecting the data, analyzing and providing the result, communicating and presenting the result to the reader, classmates, or other audiences. The inquiry cycle consists of observation, questioning, hypothesis, data gathering, and conclusion.

3.      Questioning

Questioning is the main strategy of the contextual learning. It is the beginning of the knowledge, the heart of the knowledge, and the important aspect of learning. Questioning is a strategy which used by the students to analyze and explore the ideas actively. Questioning can be used for some purposes, some forms, and some answers. Sadker and Sadker (Cooper, 1990:113) explains that to question well is to teach well. In the skillful use of the question more than anything else lays the fine art of teaching; for in it we have the guide to clear and vivid ideas, and the quick spur to imagination, the stimulus to thought, the incentive to action. What’s in a question, you ask? Everything. It is the way of evoking stimulating response or stultifying inquiry. It is, in essence, the very core of teaching. The art of questioning is the art of guiding learning.

4.      Learning Community

In the learning community, the result of learning can be taken from cooperate with another people. The result of learning can be accepted by the sharing from friends, groups, and among those who know to those who don’t know. Learning community has a multi dimension meaning. There are learning community, sharing ideas, discussion, service learning, group learning, contextual learning, learning resources, problem-based learning, learning to be, learning to know, learning to do, learning how to live together, task-based learning, school-based management, and collaborative learning in cooperative learning.

5.      Modelling

Modelling is to translate the ideas that thought, to demonstrate how the teacher asks the students to study, asks them to do what he asks. Modelling is also the way how to operate something. The teacher as modelling gives the model or the way how to study effectively.

6.      Reflection

Reflection is a description of the activity or knowledge that just accepted. Reflection is the way of thinking about something that we have learned or thinking the past about what thing that we have done. The teacher should do reflection at the end of the learning process.

7.      Authentic assessment

Assessment is the process of gathering data which can give description of the students’ learning development. Authentic assessment is the assessment procedure on the contextual learning. The characteristics of the authentic assessment are:

a)      It must measure all learning aspects: process, activity, and product.

b)      It’s done after teaching learning process or the activity is going.

c)      It uses some ways and some resources.

d)     Test is only one of the data collectors for assessment.

e)      The teacher gives the tasks to the students which reflect the real living of the students on every day.

f)       Assessment must focus on the students’ knowledge and skills not quantity.

D.    The strength of Contextual Teaching and Learning.

-    Both direct instruction and constructivist activities can be compatible and effective in the achievement of learning goals.

-        Increasing one’s efforts results in more ability. This theory opposes the notion that one’s aptitude is unchangeable. Striving for learning goals motivates an individual to be engaged in activities with a commitment to learning.

-       Children learn the standards values and knowledge of society by raising questions and accepting challenges to find solutions that are not immediately apparent. Other learning processes are explaining concepts, justifying their reasoning and seeking information. Therefore, learning is a social process which requires social and cultural factors to be considered during instructional planning. This social nature of learning also drives the determination of the learning goals.

-        Knowledge and learning are situated in particular physical and social context. A range of settings may be used such as the home, the community, and the workplace, depending on the purpose of instruction and the intended learning goals.

-       Knowledge may be viewed as distributed or stretched over the individual, other persons, and various artefacts such as physical and symbolic tools and not solely as a property of individuals. Thus, people, as an integral part of the learning process, must share knowledge and tasks.

E.     The weaknesses of Contextual Teaching and Learning.

The weaknesses of Contextual Teaching and Learning is  in applying this strategy in class, because it needs the resource, facilities , labs and others that some school have not it.

F.      The strategy to be a great Project Based Learning Teachers

Involves real world experience:

Centre of Occupational Research and Development (CORD) describes the strategies of the contextual teaching and learning. There are five strategies of the contextual teaching and learning that called a REACT.

-          Relating

Learning is related to the real living experiential context.

-          Experiencing

Learning is focused on the exploration, discovery, and invention

-          Applying

Learning is about the knowledge which presented in the utilization of the context.

-          Cooperating

Learning is through interpersonal communicative context, and the collective using.

-          Transferring

Learning is through the utilization of the knowledge in the new situation or context.

Communicative Language Teaching

1.      General Overview

The goal of language teaching is to develop communicative competence. In Hymes’ theory, communicative competence refers to what a speaker needs to know in order to be communicative in a speech community. According to Richards and Rodgers (2003: 159), the main goal of CLT is to enable students to communicate in the target language. The emphasis is on the communication, rather than the language forms. In Hymes’ view, a person who acquires communicative competence acquires both knowledge and ability for language use with respect to:

2.      Approach

The communicative approach in language teaching starts from a theory of language as communication. The goal of language teaching is to develop what Hymes (1972) referred to as "communicative competence." Hymes coined this term in order to contrast a communica­tive view of language and Chomsky's theory of competence. Chomsky held that linguistic theory is concerned primarily with an ideal speaker-listener in a completely homogeneous speech community, who knows its language perfectly and is unaffected by such grammatically irrelevant conditions as mem­ory limitation, distractions, shifts of attention and interest, and errors (random or characteristic) in applying his knowledge of the language in actual performance (Chomsky, 1965: 3).

For Chomsky, the focus of linguistic theory was to characterize the abstract abilities speakers possess that enable them to produce gram­matically correct sentences in a language. Hymes held that such a view of linguistic theory was sterile, that linguistic theory needed to be seen as part of a more general theory incorporating communication and culture. Hymes's theory of communicative competence was a definition of what a speaker needs to know in order to be communicative com­petent in a speech community. In Hymes's view, a person who acquires communicative competence acquires both knowledge and ability for language use with respect to:

a)      whether (and to what degree) something is formally possible;

b)      whether (and to what degree) something is feasible in virtue of the means of implementation available;

c)      whether (and to what degree) something is appropriate (adequate, happy, successful) in relation to a context in which it is used and evaluated;

d)     whether (and to what degree) something is in fact done, actually per­formed, and what its doing entails.

This theory of what knowing a language entails offers a much more comprehensive view than Chomsky's view of competence, which deals primarily with abstract grammatical knowledge.

Another linguistic theory of communication favored in CLT is Halliday's functional account of language use. "Linguistics ... is concerned... with the description of speech acts or texts, since only through the study of language in use are all the functions of language, and therefore all components of meaning, brought into focus" (Halliday, 1970: 145). In a number of influential books and papers, Halliday has elaborated a powerful theory of the functions of language, which complements Hymes's view of commu­nicative competence for many writers on CLT (e.g., Brumfit and Johnson 1979; Savignon 1983). He describes (1975: 11-17) seven basic functions that language performs for children learning their first language:

a)      the instrumental function: using language to get things;

b)      the regulatory function: using language to control the behavior of others;

c)      the interactional function: using language to create interaction with others;

d)     the personal function: using language to express personal feelings and meanings;

e)      the heuristic function: using language to learn and to discover;

f)       the imaginative function: using language to create a world of the imagination;

g)      The representational function: using language to communicate information.

Proponents of Communicative Language Teaching as acquiring the linguistic means to perform different kinds of functions similarly viewed learning a second language.

At the level of language theory, Communicative Language Teaching has a rich, if somewhat eclectic, theoretical base. Some of the characteristics of this communicative view of language follow.

a)      Language is a system for the expression of meaning.

b)      The primary function of language is for interaction and communication.

c)      The structure of language reflects its functional and communicative uses.

d)     The primary units of language are not merely its grammatical and struc­tural features, but categories of functional and communicative meaning as exemplified in discourse.

3.      Design

A.    Objectives

Piepho (1981) discusses the following levels of objectives in a communicative approach:

                                                      i.            An integrative and content level (language as a means of expression)

                                        ii.            A linguistic and instrumental level (language as a semiotic system and an object of learning)

                                           iii.            An effective level of interpersonal relationships and conflict (language as a means of expressing values and judgments about oneself and others.

                                                    iv.            A level of individual learning needs (remedial learning based on error analysis)

                                                   v.            A general educational level of extra-linguistic goals (language learning within the school curriculum)

These are proposed as general objectives, applicable to any teaching situation. Particular objectives for CLT cannot be defined beyond this level of specification, since such an approach assumes that language teaching will reflect the particular needs of the target learners. These needs may be in the domains of reading, writing, listening, or speaking, each of which can be approached from a communicative perspective. Curriculum or instructional objectives for a particular course would reflect specific aspects of communicative competence according to the learner's proficiency level and communicative needs.

B.     The Syllabus

Discussions of the nature of the syllabus have been central in Communicative Language Teaching. We have seen that one of the first syllabus models to be proposed was described as a notional syllabus (Wilkins, 1976), which specified the semantic-grammatical categories (e.g., frequency, motion, location) and the categories of communicative function that learners need to express. The Council of Europe expanded and developed this into a syllabus that included descriptions of the objectives of foreign language courses for European adults, the situations in which they might typically need to use a foreign language (e.g., travel, business), the topics they might need to talk about (e.g., personal identification, education, shopping), the functions they needed language for (e.g., describing something, requesting information, expressing agreement and disagreement), the notions made use of in communication (e.g., time, frequency, duration), as well as the vocabulary and grammar needed. The result was published as Threshold Level English (Van Ek and Alex­ander, 1980) and was an attempt to specify what was needed in order to be able to achieve a reasonable degree of communicative proficiency in a foreign language, including the language items needed to realize this "threshold level."

C.    Types of learning and teaching activities

The range of exercise types and activities compatible with a commu­nicative approach is unlimited, provided that such exercises enable learn­ers to attain the communicative objectives of the curriculum, engage learners in communication, and require the use of such communicative processes as information sharing, negotiation of meaning, and interaction. Classroom activities are often designed to focus on completing tasks that are mediated through language or involve negotiation of in­formation and information sharing.

D.    Learner roles

The role of learner is as a negotiator-between themselves, the learning process, and the object of learning. The students’ role is also as communicator in dealing with the material that is given by the teacher.

E.     Teacher Roles

Several roles are assumed for teachers in Communicative Language Teaching, the importance of particular roles being determined by the view of CLT adopted. Breen and Candlin describe teacher roles in the following terms:

The teacher has two main roles: the first role is to facilitate the communica­tion process between all participants in the classroom, and between these participants and the various activities and texts. The second role is to act as an independent participant within the learning-teaching group. The latter role is closely related to the objectives of the first role and arises from it. These roles imply a set of secondary roles for the teacher; first, as an organizer of resources and as a resource himself, second as a guide within the classroom procedures and activities. A third role for the teacher is that of researcher and learner, with much to contribute in terms of appropriate knowledge and abilities, actual and observed experience of the nature of learning and organi­zational capacities (1980: 99).

F.     The Role of Instructional Materials

A wide variety of materials have been used to support communicative approaches to language teaching. Unlike some contemporary methodologies, such as Community Language Learning, practitioners of Com­municative Language Teaching view materials as a way of influencing the quality of classroom interaction and language use. Materials thus have the primary role of promoting communicative language use. We will consider three kinds of materials currently used in CLT and label these text-based, task-based, and realia.

                                                       I.            TEXT-BASED MATERIALS

There are numerous textbooks designed to direct and support Communicative Language Teaching. Their tables of contents sometimes sug­gest a kind of grading and sequencing of language practice not unlike those found in structurally organized texts. Some of these are in fact written around a largely structural syllabus, with slight reformatting to justify their claims to be based on a communicative approach. Others, however, look very different from previous language teaching texts. Morrow and Johnson's Communicate (1979), for example, has none of the usual dialogues, drills, or sentence patterns and uses visual cues, taped cues, pictures, and sentence fragments to initiate conversation. Watcyn-Jones's Pair Work (1981) consists of two different texts for pair work, each contains different information needed to enact role plays and carry out other pair activities. Texts written to support the Malaysian English Language Syllabus (1975) likewise represent a departure from traditional textbook modes. A typical lesson consists of a theme (e.g., relaying information), a task analysis for thematic development (e.g., understanding the message, asking questions to obtain clarification, asking for more information, taking notes, ordering and presenting in­formation), a practice situation description (e.g., "A caller asks to see your manager. He does not have an appointment. Gather the necessary information from him and relay the message to your manager."), a stimulus presentation (in the preceding case, the beginning of an office conversation scripted and on tape), comprehension questions (e.g., "Why is the caller in the office?"), and paraphrase exercises.

                                                    II.            TASK-BASED MATERIALS

A variety of games, role plays, simulations, and task-based communication activities have been prepared to support Communicative Lan­guage Teaching classes. These typically are in the form of one-of-a-kind items: exercise handbooks, cue cards, activity cards, pair-communication practice materials, and student-interaction practice booklets. In pair-communication materials, there are typically two sets of material for a pair of students, each set containing different kinds of information. Sometimes the information is complementary, and partners must fit their respective parts of the "jigsaw" into a composite whole. Others assume different role relationships for the partners (e.g., an interviewer and an interviewee). Still others provide drills and practice material in inter­actional formats.

                                                 III.            REALIA

Many proponents of Communicative Language Teaching have advo­cated the use of "authentic," "from-life" materials in the classroom. These might include language-based realia, such as signs, magazines, advertisements, and newspapers, or graphic and visual sources around which communicative activities can he built, such as maps, pictures, symbols, graphs, and charts. Different kinds of objects can be used to support communicative exercises, such as a plastic model to assemble from directions.

4.      Procedure

1)      Presentation of a brief dialog or several mini-dialogs

2)      Oral practice of each utterance of the dialog segment to be presented that day

3)      Question and answer based on the dialog topic.

4)      Question and answer related to the student’s personal experience

5)      Study one of the basic communicative expressions in dialog.

6)      Learner discovery of generalizations or rules underlying the functional expression

7)      Oral recognition, interpretative activities

8)      Oral production activities proceeding from guided to freer communication activities

9)      Copying of the dialog or modules if they are not in the class text

10)  Sampling of the written homework assignment

11)  Evaluation of learning.

5.      The Pitfall

a.       In Communicative Language Teaching, the teachers should be able to mastering communication skill in order to deliver the materials for the target language.

b.      Reading skill will decrease among the students because they will usually using speaking skill and the portion of reading decrease.

c.       The beginner’s students will find difficulties because they must jump to communicative activity directly.

6.      Conclusion

Communicative Language Teaching is best considered an approach rather than a method. The goal of language teaching is to develop communicative competence. The communicative approach in language teaching starts from a theory of language as communication.

Piepho (1981) discusses the following levels of objectives in a communicative approach:

i.          An integrative and content level (language as a means of expression)

ii.         A linguistic and instrumental level (language as a semiotic system and an object of learning)

iii.        An effective level of interpersonal relationships and conflict (language as a means of expressing values and judgments about oneself and others.

iv.        A level of individual learning needs (remedial learning based on error analysis)

v.         A general educational level of extra-linguistic goals (language learning within the school curriculum)

Discussions of the nature of the syllabus have been central in Communicative Language Teaching. We have seen that one of the first syllabus models to be proposed was described as a notional syllabus (Wilkins, 1976), which specified the semantic-grammatical categories (e.g., frequency, motion, location) and the categories of communicative function that learners need to express.

The range of exercise types and activities compatible with a commu­nicative approach is unlimited, provided that such exercises enable learn­ers to attain the communicative objectives of the curriculum, engage learners in communication, and require the use of such communicative processes as information sharing, negotiation of meaning, and interaction. Classroom activities are often designed to focus on completing tasks that are mediated through language or involve negotiation of in­formation and information sharing.

The role of learner is as a negotiator-between themselves, the learning process, and the object of learning. The students’ role is as communicator in dealing with the material that is given by the teacher.

The teacher has two main roles: the first role is to facilitate the communica­tion process between all participants in the classroom, and between these participants and the various activities and texts. The second role is to act as an independent participant within the learning-teaching group.

A wide variety of materials have been used to support communicative approaches to language teaching. Unlike some contemporary methodologies, such as Community Language Learning, practitioners of Communicative Language Teaching view materials as a way of influencing the quality of classroom interaction and language use. Materials thus have the primary role of promoting communicative language use. We will consider three kinds of materials currently used in CLT and label these text-based, task-based, and realia.

The procedures of Communicative Language Teaching are:

1)      Presentation of a brief dialog or several mini-dialogs

2)      Oral practice of each utterance of the dialog segment to be presented that day

3)      Question and answer based on the dialog topic.

4)      Question and answer related to the student’s personal experience

5)      Study one of the basic communicative expressions in dialog.

6)      Learner discovery of generalizations or rules underlying the functional expression

7)      Oral recognition, interpretative activities

8)      Oral production activities proceeding from guided to freer communication activities

9)      Copying of the dialog or modules if they are not in the class text

10)  Sampling of the written homework assignment

11)  Evaluation of learning.

This method also has some weaknesses, those are:

a.       In Communicative Language Teaching, the teachers should be able to mastering communication skill in order to deliver the materials for the target language.

b.      Reading skill will decrease among the students because they will usually using speaking skill and the portion of reading decrease.

c.       The beginner’s students will find difficulties because they must jump to communicative activity directly.