(1) Over the last couple of decades there have been some important changes in the way people think about languages and how people learn them which have led to the development of an approach called communicative language teaching. Communicative language teaching is not a single, narrowly- defined methodology; rather, it is based on a set of related principles that are widely accepted among language teachers today. (2) Central to the communicative approach is the perception that language is not just a system of rules, but “a dynamic source for creation of meaning”. This emphasis tends to place more importance on the needs of learners as they actually use the language than on the abstracted study of the language itself. Grammar is not ignored in the communicative classroom, for students need to be able to use the grammar effectively for others to be able to understand them. However, CLT de-emphasizes language knowledge (being able to recite a rule) in favor of language use (being able to construct a correct sentence in a meaningful context).

(3) The shift in emphasis from the language itself to the language needs of the learner in a particular environment has led to greater flexibility in the syllabus and an increased focus on language tasks. Tasks are the activities that give rise to language. (4) Ideally, these resemble the same kinds of situations that learners would encounter in real life as they attempt to communicate in the second language. (5) Therefore, for a group of students whose goal is to work in hotels where there are many English-speaking guests, an appropriate task might be to role-play a situation between a hotel desk clerk and a visitor wishing to book a room.

While not all language tasks can be so directly related to student needs, at the least they should involve the natural use of language in realistic situations.