EFL TEACHERS’ CONCEPTUALIZATIONS AND IMPLEMENTATION OF CLT

Abstract

This paper presents a case study that examined three EFL teachers’ implementation of Communicative Language Teaching (CLT) in a secondary school in Benin in the light of the characteristic features of CLT outlined by literature in the field. The study also explored the meaning that these teachers make of Communicative Language Teaching in EFL classrooms in order to gain insight into their pedagogical practices. Data collection operations consisted of classroom observations of the participant EFL teachers’ pedagogical practices and of follow-up semi-structured interviews in which they described their understanding of CLT and commented on aspects of their teaching. The findings reveal what follows: while the participant EFL teachers show awareness and understanding of the CLT principles through their descriptions, they exhibit classroom practices that are not congruent with the characteristic features of the approach.