Developing Communicative Competence in Learners of English

DEVELOPING COMMUNICATIVE COMPETENCE IN LEARNERS OF ENGLISH AS A SECOND LANGUAGE

Olubimpe O. M. Adekunle and Mary Oluyemisi Aina

ABSTRACT:

The issue of language acquisition and teaching has been a great concern of the

linguists from time immemorial. In addition to the functions of English in

Nigeria as a language of government, commerce, law and education, this can be

subsumed as transactional roles of maintaining social relationships among the

Nigerian citizens. For this reason, it is pertinent therefore for learners of English

as a second language to be well informed of its acquisition and usage, hence, the

need to discuss how the communicative competence in English can be

developed in the Nigeria context. This is mirrored through the basic language

skills: listening, speaking, reading and writing as well as the three genres of

Literature namely: drama, prose and poetry. This paper also examines some of

the issues militating against the acquisition of communicative competence by L2

users of English.

The importance of language in general has attracted the attention of scholars, and different

definitions have been given by them depending on their area of interest. Osisanwo (2003:1) saw language

as Human vocal noise or the arbitrary graphic presentation of this noise, used systematically and

conventionally by members of a speech community for purposes of communication. Fromkin and

Rodman (1974), described language as a system by which sounds and meanings are relatedThey added

that the knowledge of the language entails the knowledge of sounds, the words and the rules for their

combination. Closely related to this is the statement made by Halliday and Hudson quoted by Bamisaiye

(1997) that Knowing a language involves not only the ability to compose correct sentences but also the

ability to use the sentences appropriately in communication.

Here, the functional aspect of language is being emphasized. The ability of the language to

effectively and appropriately use linguistic forms in communication borders on competence. This paper

therefore concerns itself with how communication competence can be developed in learners of English as

a second language through the four basic language skills as well as literature in English. In the same vein,

some of the problems associated with English language learning in Nigeria are of paramount importance

in this paper.

The Concept of Competence As quoted by Tight (1996), competence is concerned with what people can do rather than what they

know. This to them, has several implications thus:

if competence is concerned with doing, then, it must have a context;

competence is an outcome. It describes what someone can do;

in order to measure reliability, that is someones ability to do something, there must be clearly defined and widely accessible standards through which performance is measured and accredited;

and

competence is a measure of what someone can do at a particular point in time:

The concept of competence was popularized by the American linguist, Chomsky (1995), who drew a

distinction between a persons knowledge of a language and the actual use of that language in real

situation. He referred to the former as competence, and the latter as performance. Another linguist,

Hymes (1972) described the notion of competence on the premise of the social context of

communication. To him, competence should describe the knowledge and ability of individuals for

appropriate language use in the communicative events in which they find themselves in any particular

Multidisciplinary Journal of Research Development Volume 18 No. 1, April, 2012


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speech community. Hymesnotion of competence highlights the socio-cultural dimensions of

competence which implies the knowledge of such things as how to start and end conversations; how and

when to be polite; and how to address people. Communicative competence is shaped by the social and

cultural life of a particular speech community, therefore, what is regarded as communicative competence

in one speech community may be regarded as something else in another. According to Hymes (1972),

appropriacy to context is employed to relate to a number of situational factors which he summed up in

the acronym SPEAKING

S= Setting

P= Participants

E= Ends (aims and results of the communication)

A= Acts sequence (the form and sequence of the message)

K= Key (the manner of delivery)

I= Instrumentalities

N=Norms (conduct of the participants)

G= Genre

The setting of the speech event is where, when and how the event takes place; the participants

are the people involved in this event. They are usually governed by rules of language usage, that their

choice of expressions are censored and verified before they are uttered; the ends are the goals of

interlocutors in a specific speech event, that is, what they actually seek to achieve; the acts sequence is the

actual form and content of what is said; the key refers to the tone and meaning of the interactants

expressions which could be serious, sarcastic, or light hearted; the instrument has to do with choice of

channel, which could be verbal, non verbal, paralinguistic, idioms, slang, figures of speech e.t.c.

The norms of interaction are the conventions to follow while interacting in order to avoid any

embarrassment as a result of violating the laid down rules; the genre means the type of linguistic event

involved in the interaction which obviously determines the kinds of expressions to be used and how. In

essence, Hymes is trying to say that there are elements of culture in language usage and that there are

rules and conventions guiding the use of language which then suggests that an adequate theory of

language should not be limited only to grammaticality and acceptability but should incorporate the theory

of communication and culture. Hallidays notion of competence is approached from the functional

perspective. Alo (2003:116) said Hallidays view of communicative competence in sociolinguistic and

functional terms has wide implications for the development of communicative competence in ESL.

The functional approach to describing language has its source in J.R. Firth, who viewed language

as interactive and interpersonal, that is, a way of behaving and making others behave. Building on Firths

traditions, Halliday (1973) came up with three functional components of language namely: ideational,

interpersonal and textual which he regards as meta functions. The ideational function of language serves

as an expression of the speakers experiences of the real world, including the inner world of his own

consciousness, the interpersonal function of language is used to establish and maintain social relations.

This is also referred to as interactional function of language by Brown and Yule (1983). The use of

language to maintain social roles between participants in any verbal interaction goes along with social

norms involved in conversations. The textual function is used to provide links with itself and with

features of the situation in which it is used. The language user is enabled to construct texts that are

situationally relevant. By the empowerment of this function, the speaker or writer is able to establish

cohesive relations from one sentence to the other in a discourse.

Canale and Swain (1980) proposed a modular framework of four components in describing

communicative competence. These are: grammatical, socio-linguistic, discourse and strategic

components. Grammatical competence includes knowledge of lexical items and rules of morphology,

syntax, sentence-grammar, semantics and phonology; socio-linguistic competence addresses the extent to

which utterances are produced and understood appropriately in different social linguistics contexts;

depending on contextual factors such as status of participants, purpose of the interlocutor and norms or

conventions of interactions. Discourse competence is concerned with intersentential relationships and

Developing Communicative Competence in Learners of English as a Second Language

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connection while strategic competence is the way to manipulate language in order to meet communicative

goals. Canale and Swains (1980) notion of communicative competence emerged to relate competence

with the socio-cultural contexts. They pointed out that some components such as discourse and socio

linguistic competences are culture-specific while grammatical and strategic competence are non culture-

specific. This notion of course, has illuminated the fact that communicative competence of a second

language user of English cannot be discussed in isolation, as the users native environment plays a key

function in his acquisition and mastery of the target language. In the light of this, it is pertinent to explain

what communicative competence really entails

What is Communicative Competence? Simply put, communicative competence is the ability to use language effectively to communicate

in whichever setting a person finds himself. It is not merely grammatical knowledge but knowledge of

appropriate use of language. It can also be said to be the ability to give appropriate answers in the right

language for ones interlocutor.

English in an ESL Setting

In tracing the diverse functions of English in a second language, it is necessary to have a clue of

what ESL setting actually looks like. Seweje, (2002:16) said ESL is a designation for programme and

classes to teach. Halliday and Hassan said English is regarded as the sole property of its native speakers

and the focus is on international communication between a native speaker and a non native speakers

work towards a native speakers communicative competence.In the light of the above statement, Nigeria

can be located or classified as an ESL setting, where English as a language plays major transactional and

interactive roles. Looking closely into Halliday and Hassans statement, it is quite evident that English is

regarded as the language for international communication.

This has an implication for the L2 learner as he is not only expected to learn English as second

language, but also attain a competence close to that of a native speaker for international communication.

Hence, the need to expose the learners of English in ESL situation to the ways and means of developing

communicative competence in the target language with a particular reference to Nigeria.

Problems Associated with the Development of Communicative Competence in Learners of

ESL Over the years, the diverse problems confronting the second language users of English have been

a hard nut to crack. Series of researches have revealed that numerous limitations to the L2 users

competence in the use of English are caused by teachers, because the responsibilities of teaching English

language as a second language in Nigeria rest largely on teachers. Since the attainment of independence

till date, the teaching of English language has been majorly done by non native speakers. This has a great

implication for the development of competence in the learners of EL2 in Nigeria. To achieve a native

speakers competence in English, the learner or pupil should be exposed to contacts with L1 speakers if

any progress is to be made. Besides, the questions of how competent a non native teacher is, is very

relevant here. It is popularly said that one cannot give out what one does not have. If this is true, then it

would be right to say that the in competency of the teacher will inevitably be transferred to the learners/

pupils.

Secondly, ineffective teaching methodology of ESL in Nigeria may pose a problem. Emphasis

has been on teaching structures that is, linguistic competence at the expense of communicative

competence. As noted by Ogunsiji (2003:132) for example, prose is badly taught in our secondary

schools. Teachers only do one or more of the following: story narration, teaching past questions or

engaging the students in vocal reading of the text. He said that this method of teaching is not productive

enough because it cannot develop students communicative abilities to the desired level. Teaching of

linguistic competence contradicts the goals of discourse analysis as presented by Brown and Yule

(1983:1), which stated that the analysis of discourse is necessarily the analysis of language in use.


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Thirdly, the second language classroom is limited in its ability to develop learners competence in

English. This is because learners are not exposed to the natural environment of English. There is a limit a

learner can attain in an attempt to acquire competence in a target language outside its natural

environment.

Finally, interference of culture is another problem that an L2 learner of English may face. There

are cultural norms, conventions and rules governing discourse as spelt out in Hymes acronym of

Speaking. Some of the rules of Mother tongue discourse patterns are overtly transferred into English

discourse patterns. This will cause a lot of problems for English L1 speakers in decoding English L2

speakers speech. Overt transfer of discourse patterns from Nigeria L1 for example to English language

will reduce the discourse competence of EL2 learner.

Nigeria as a multilingual nation having almost 500 indigenous languages is still seriously

confronted with the problems of choice of a national language. With the position of English in Nigeria

today (though to some, a foreign or an official language, to others, a second language), are we not in a

dilemma when we consider the percentage of Nigerians that cannot speak English fluently let alone

understand the same when it is spoken? It is then deemed expedient to trace the source of the

incompetence we suffer in the acquisition and effective usage of English.

Some of the problems are: Lack of motivation on the part of the society as a result of the attitude

towards English as a second language, the problem of mother- tongue or L1 interference which is

manifested in the pronunciation and accents, the grammatical system, the idioms, lexicon and vocabulary,

the status of English within the language policy, which ineffective teaching methodology and lack of

language learning facilities like the language laboratories, audio and visual equipment.

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Developing Communicating Competence in Learners of English as L2 Acquiring a second language entails discourse of the usage of the language. Discrepancies

between non- native and native discourse competence have both personal and economic consequences

when interlocutors misunderstand the contextual meanings of one anothers language behavior. Ogunsiji

(2004:7) opined that communicative competence can be consciously developed in the learners of English

as a second language through situational/functional language teaching. He stated that L2 learners of

English can develop competence through the development of the four basic language skills: that is,

listening, speaking, reading and writing and also through literature in English.

Developing Communicative Competence through the Basic Language Skills The development of the four basic language skills is very essential if communicative competence

is to be achieved in the second language learner of English. As explained by Ogunsiji (2004), the fact that

English is a second language in Nigeria has many pedagogical implications one of which is the thorough

teaching of all the four basic language skills so that the L2 learner may lay claim to the mastery of the

target language for local, national and international communicative purposes to a reasonable extent.

Listening

The ability to listen to the discourse patterns of English language is a starting point for any

learner of ESL. In listening, the individual hears familiar sound combination with which he must

associate meaning. He also acquires sources for reaction, interpretation and knowing. This is important so

that learners would be able to use them correctly without giving different meanings. Ogunsiji (2004)

suggested various ways in which this skill can be developed: through the teaching of minimal pairs, the

use of tape recorder, story telling and a host of others. The teaching of minimal pairs according to him

helps to bring out phonological contrasts. For example in the following words:

Cat /kt/, cart /ka:t/

Spot / sp t/, spot / sp :t/

Thin /in/, tin /tin/

Den /den/, then /en/


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Tree / tri: /, three /ri: /

The above are minimal pairs because two words are said to constitute a minimal pair if their

pronunciation differs only in terms of one sound segment. The teaching of minimal pairs can be done

either is isolation as in a-e above or in contexts as shown below:

A crafty cat is on the cart

There are many dangerous spots on the sports field

The three thin men hold ten tins of milk.

Three thin boys cut down the trees (Adapted from Ogunsiji, 2004)

He further commented quoting Oderinde (1979) that differentiation, identification and imitation are

exercises that the learner could be involved in while teaching minimal pair. In identification exercise, the

teacher pronounces a word in the pair and the pupils/ learners identify which one is pronounced. In

imitation exercise, the teacher pronounces a word and the pupil/ learner imitate him, repeating the

teachers model.

Speaking The teaching of speaking is a necessity in a second language situation. In teaching English as a

second language, speech work should be accorded its proper recognition. This is important so that

students would be made familiar with the sound patterns of the language in order to reduce the

occurrences of mother tongue interference. In teaching speech work, emphasis should be placed on proper

pronunciation of English words so that learners will be able to communicate intelligibly in the language.

Moreover, the supra segmental features of the language, that is pitch, stress, intonation should be

emphasized. Roach (1997) and Gimson (1980) asserted that English tones carry grammatical, discourse,

attitudinal and accentual meanings. For instance, the falling tune can be used to signal an attitude of

finality or an impression of definiteness; while the rising tune can be used to ask Tag questions etc.

This skill can be developed through oral work in form of conversation, dialogue or debates, as

well as listening to recorded works on tapes; while the students are doing this, the teacher would pay

attention to their pronunciation, taking note of the use of stress and intonation. He should make it a point

of duty to correct students errors after the lesson.

Reading Lado (1964) quoted by Ogusiji (2004:27) opined that to read is to grasp language patterns from

their written representation, reading is then seen as a process of extracting meanings from the written

language. The ability of an ESL learner to master these processes will enhance his competence as he will

be exposed to discourse patterns of English as he reads materials written by native speakers. Developing

this particular skill is advantageous to the L2 learner of English because he is accessible to the

information without the teachers assistance. Other methods of teaching reading skill in an ESL situation

are by adopting alphabet method, look and say method, phonic method, sentence method, reading

comprehension and many more. While using any of these methods, the teacher should bear in mind the

age, educational level and the social background of the learners.

In using the reading comprehension method in the upper primary school or at the Junior

Secondary School level, the teacher can adopt the vocal or silent reading method but should ensure that he

follows the three stages of teaching comprehension strictly which are: the introduction, presentation and

evaluation.

As part of the introduction, the teacher could start by narrating the story, after which he reads the

passage aloud to the students listening, and as a way of evaluating, asks the learners to read the passage

aloud again (choosing a good reader among them), while the teacher corrects pronunciation mistakes.

While acquiring communicative competence from reading texts written by native and non native speakers


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of English, it is important to put acquired knowledge into use either by speaking or writing to test ones

level of proficiency in the language patterns acquired.

Writing Controlled, guided and free compositions are some of the ways of teaching an L2 user or learner

of English the writing skills, as an avenue for developing communicative competence in the target

language. Where corrections are necessary, the teacher should not delay in doing so. This can build some

courage into the learner and as well, develop his creative ability.

Developing Communicative Competence through the Teaching of Literature in English Ogunsiji (2003) said that all the three basic genres of literature, that is, drama, prose and poetry

have potentialities of developing the imaginative capacities, originality of thought, fluency of thought as

well as the expression of the learners. Through the extensive and intensive reading opportunities offered

by these three genres of literature, the learner will be equipped with experiences which would motivate

them to express themselves in both oral and written forms. This way, the learners will become creative

and relatively proficient in the target language.

Drama Drama can be seen as representation through invention or creation of action on stage. Through

drama, communicative skills are exhibited. In order to use drama as an instrument for developing

communicative competence of L2 learners of English, dramatization method, discussion group methods

etc. should be adopted while teaching in and outside the classroom. In dramatization method, drama texts

can be acted, the teacher should give roles to the students according to their abilities having censored such

a text in terms of age, social and academic levels of the students.

Students should be divided into manageable groups and assigned specific responsibilities like stage

setting, acting, costume designing, directing, promoting etc. Role playing and modeling will aid the

students intelligence, sense of imagination, flexibility and fluency as they have to interact with one

another through dialogue as they take their turns in the acting, and the only instrument with which to do

this is the English Language. Teaching drama through classroom discussion will involve the learners,

thus encourage them to express their views and feelings.

During the discussions, there is bound to be grammatical or pronunciation errors, the teachers

should not distract the learners attention by correcting them immediately. All corrections should be

thoroughly done after the discussion. L2 learners can also do well in achieving communicative

competence in English by using some paralinguistic devices which are essential elements of spoken

communication. They are: intonation, facial expression, body movement, wink etc. These strategies are

used in reinforcing communication in creative language arts just as communication could either be verbal

or non verbal.

Prose Prose deals with invented stories relating to mans life and social experiences (Okonkwo 1990).

The ability to teach genre of literature very well can offer learners ample communicative experiences. To

achieve the result of good communicative skills, the methods recommended under drama can be utilized.

Adeyanju cited by Ogunsiji (2003:33) noted that the extensive reading which prose literature encourages

stimulates students reading efficiency which in turn enhances their writing skill. Scholars, especially

linguists observed that the ability to have intelligible discussion of the essential parts of a novel can aid

students mastery of some basic forms of writing such as argument, narration, description and exposition.

Poetry In using poetry to teach communicative competence in learners of English as a second language,

the teacher has a vital role to play. He must allow the students to learn from known to unknown, choosing

the poems that relate to the background and setting of the students to start with before gradually exposing


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them to alien ones. This is because, poetry confronts its readers with a riddling quality; the full

interpretation of poems therefore, is not dependent on an authority. To be able to comprehend a poem,

one must be ready to make meaning from sound, rhythm, and formal ordering of the language.

As a second language learner, one can derive communicative competence from poetry by

adhering to the four elements of poetry namely: words as sound, words as rhythm, words as pictures and

words as story.

The teacher can assist the learner this way by keeping to this method of teaching poetry so as to

enhance the language competence of L2 learner. In our poems, our pictorial sense may be exercised in

response to form and lay- out or in the picturing, that we find the words evoking as they are read. When

the themes and language together with the form of a poem are well understood, it could be recited, acted

or chanted as the case may be.

Conclusion Having realized that to achieve communicative competence in English in a second language

situation is not easy to come by as a result of several limiting factors enumerated in the body of the write

up, it is still necessary for us to brace up as teachers and learners of English in an ESL situation. It is

better to consider limitations as challenges rather than problems. The L2 teachers and learners should

make conscious efforts to start to have a right attitude to the teaching and learning of English. While

teachers should adopt more productive methods of teaching, learners also should try hard to improve their

own competence level through constant practices and judicious use of the available materials.

Recommendations

From the foregoing, it is obvious that it is necessary to train ESL learners the communicative acts

in English so as to create an environment that eases learning and usage of English, and to allow natural

language skills learning to take place. Nevertheless, the fact still remains that English is the property of

the native speakers, so as second language learners, our goals in communicative competence in English

should be Nigerian variety specific. This in essence, implies that mutual national intelligibility and

acceptability should have an edge over international acceptability and intelligibility. By implication, we

mean that our goals should be set within Nigerian socio-cultural contexts such that when Hausa elite

communicates with his Igbo, Yoruba, or Ibibio counterparts, mutual understanding would take place. This

is when communication can be said to be nationally intelligible. The international acceptability and

intelligibility though can be achieved in an ESL setting with time, is for sure a Herculean task for a multi-

cultural or multilingual nation like Nigeria.

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Developing Communicative Competence in Learners of English