According to the principles of English language teaching, what should a…

Concept: Modern English language teaching treats a language as a skill acquired through meaningful use, not as a body of facts to be stored. The communicative, learner-centred principle therefore makes the learner the main user of language in the classroom, while the teacher designs and facilitates the opportunities for that use.

Application: Applied to what a teacher should prioritise, this principle gives classroom time to interactive and student-centred activities - pair and group tasks, role play, discussion, projects and language games - in which learners listen, speak, read and write for a real purpose. Because every learner produces language and negotiates meaning, the four skills develop together and errors surface where the teacher can work on them.

Cross-check - what each approach offers:

• Memorising vocabulary lists alone builds a store of isolated items but supplies no practice in using them in connected speech or writing.

• Teacher-centred lectures alone keep the learner receptive, so the teacher does most of the talking and learner production stays minimal.

• Exclusive translation work develops sentence-level equivalence between the two languages but leaves fluency and spontaneous use untrained.

• Interactive, student-centred activities place the learner in the role of language user, which is where listening, speaking, reading and writing actually develop.

Sustained, purposeful language use by every learner is what develops language ability, so creating interactive and student-centred activities is what a teacher should prioritise to promote effective learning.