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Date Posted: 17:22:33 08/01/03 Fri
Author: Renata Rodrigues
Subject: Task 13

According to Littlewood (1981:39), functional communication activities place learners in a situation where they need to use language for a well defined communicative purpose.

Create a good communication activity and describe it to your classmates. Say which type it is, according to Littlewood. It MUST be original. Do not copy any activity from textbooks.

My suggestion of a communicative activity which I created is based on the functional communication activities. According to Littlewood (1981), the range of functional communication involves mainly the sharing and the processing of information. The activity which I invented would present, for instance, eight students who would work in pairs. The level would be upper intermediate. The teacher would provide each pair a small sheet of paper with a situation which the students were supposed to perform. One situation described for the students would be: 'you arrived late at work and your boss was angry. What should you have done?' One student would pretend that he is the boss and the another one would be the employee. Another situation would be: 'you forgot your best friend's birthday and she was very disappointed. What should you have done?' Another one, for example, would be: 'you left your homework to be done for the last moment and your teacher didn't like that. What should you have done?' Finally there would be another situation: 'you stood your cousin up and he was very angry. What should you have done?'

One can see that there is a problem which learners must solve and through the attempt to sort it out. Littlewood (1981:20) suggests that they should use the language they know in order to get meanings as effectively as possible in those specific situations. Thus each pair would have five minutes to discuss and get prepared without taking notes, only practising orally and using the language for communication. Then the students would perform each situation in front of the class and the teacher would monitor and be available to guide and help them.

To conclude, I think that the activity which I created entails the functional aspect of communication, that is, "learners must not only share information, they must also discuss or evaluate this information in order to solve a problem" (Littlewood, 1981:33). Then, the potential students will be able to produce pieces of communication by thinking over the situations which encourage them to reach a goal - the final role-playing.


Reference:

Littlewood, W. Communicative language teaching. Cambridge: Cambridge Univeristy Press, 1981. p.16-42

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