Asalanguage,Englishisessentiallyavehicleforcommunication.CommunicationasafunctionhasbecomesoimportantinEnglishteachingmethodologythatadistinctiveschoolofEnglishteachinghasbeencreated—theCommunicativeApproach.ThisfullytestifiestothegrowingimportanceofcommunicationinEnglishlearningandacquisition.
Unfortunately,inChineseuniversities,Englishclasses,likemanyotherclasses,areprimarilyteacher-dominated.Foralongtime,bothstudentsandinstructorshaveseemedcontentedwithdiscussinggrammarandunderstandingpassagesthroughreading,overlookingtheoralcommunicationwhichismuchmoreessential.However,communicationisabridgeleadingtocloserstudent-teacherinteraction.Studentsshouldovercometheirdiffidenceandnervousnessensuingfromtheirgrammaticaldeficiencies.Theyshouldsimplybecomemoreconcernedwithexpressingthemselvesthanseekinggrammaticalaccuracy.Astheybecomemoreoutspokenandexpressive,theywouldautomaticallybecomemoregrammaticallycompetent.
TheemphasisoncommunicationinEnglishclasseswillresultinmanyobviousadvantages.Englishwillbecomeaninstrumentofexpressingthoughtsforthepersonwhospeaksit,insteadofatooljustforreadingaboutthethoughtsofothers.Inaddition,teacherscanhavepositiveandtimelyfeedbackfromstudentsthroughcommunication.Finally,byhoningtheircommunicativeskills,Chinesestudentswillbecomemorecompetentininteractingwiththeirinternationalcounterpartsinthisageofglobalization.IbelievethosefactorsarewhatEnglishlearningisallaboutforChinesestudents.