The Perception and Practice of EFL Teachers in Teaching Vocabulary Using Communicative Language Teaching (CLT)

Abstract

The purpose of this study was to investigate EFL teachers’ perception and practice of using CLT in teaching vocabulary in an Ethiopian secondary school. It focused on identifying the teachers’ perception to vocabulary teaching, to assess how often they teach it using CLT, and identify the challenges they face in teaching vocabulary using CLT. In order to achieve these objectives, descriptive survey design was employed. The participants of the study were 10 EFL teachers selected using comprehensive sampling. As data gathering instruments, questionnaire, observation, and interview were used. Descriptive statistics techniques - frequency, percentage and mean- were applied for data analysis. The interview data was also analyzed using themes. The results indicated that EFL teachers have positive perception to teach vocabulary using CLT although their actual classroom practice does not match with their perceptions. They did not use the techniques regularly to present the vocabulary lessons. Moreover, the major problems identified as obstacles in the teaching and learning process were large class size, lack of interest of students and poor quality of the textbook. The issue of teaching vocabulary using CLT remained impractical. Thus, stakeholders have to work hard to reverse the situation of language teaching in these schools.

Keywords—CLT, perception, practice, vocabulary, EFL teaching

DOI: 10.7176/JLLL/68-01

Publication date:May 31^st 2020