THE ROLE OF THE COMMUNICATIVE LANGUAGE TEACHING (CLT) METHOD IN DEVELOPING STUDENTS’ COMMUNICATIVE COMPETENCE
Keywords:
Communicative competence, Communicative Language Teaching, task-based learningAbstract
Communicative Language Teaching (CLT) has become the dominant paradigm in foreign‐language pedagogy, yet empirical evidence concerning its concrete effect on learners’ communicative competence in non-English-speaking environments remains fragmented. This paper reports an intervention study carried out in two Uzbek higher-education institutions where English is taught as a compulsory subject. The research compares outcomes in classes using a traditional structural–situational syllabus with those adopting a task-based CLT syllabus aligned with national curriculum goals. A mixed-methods design, combining spoken-interaction tests, discourse-completion tasks, classroom observations, and semi-structured interviews, enabled a nuanced measurement of gains in grammatical, sociolinguistic, discourse, and strategic sub-competences. Findings reveal statistically significant improvements in fluency, cohesion, and pragmatic appropriacy among students exposed to CLT, without a commensurate decline in formal accuracy. Qualitative data suggest that learner confidence and willingness to communicate also rose markedly, mediated by increased opportunities for authentic negotiation of meaning. The study concludes that sustained, context-sensitive CLT integration meaningfully strengthens communicative competence and recommends curricular adjustments that balance interactional practice with explicit form-focused feedback.
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