There is such value in words. Interpersonal communication can change the lives of children, young students, and adults. In a classroom, regular communication and discussion between students can foster important improvement in the target language as well as relational and communication skills for students. I have always been a positive and extroverted social student. I aim to have my teaching style reflect this. Students deserve consistent and positive communication and motivation. I believe that languages are best learned through positive guided interaction and meaningful relationships between students and teachers as well as students and students. 

 For my future classrooms, I recognize the importance and value of Communicative Learning Teaching. Getting students to be comfortable communicating regularly and communicating with each other is a huge step in language acquisition. Isn’t the student’s ability to communicate effectively in real-life situations the goal? In comparison to other methods, such as Task-Based Learning, I find CLT to make the most sense. In a language learning environment, a teacher who facilitates and listens is doing the most for their students. While guidance and examples are necessary, it is extremely important for students to be experiencing communication on their own as well. This is how kids learn language on their own as well. When two four-year-olds are trying to communicate and one can’t get their point across, they’re gonna rework the language until it makes sense to both parties. This is the same for partner or group work. If someone doesn’t understand, the student, in real time, is able to rework their point and work through the language to come to a conclusion. The real-life application model is great for students. 

I envision a classroom where there is something different for students every day. It can be easy for students to lose attention in a foreign language classroom. When there are multiple, short activities for students to complete, there is less of a chance of them becoming bored or disinterested, and it will allow for the highest possible use of the target language. As students become disinterested and begin to veer off topic, they are less likely to be using the target language. Additionally, the activities I want my students to complete will reflect the applicability to the real world. I believe strongly in problem-solving activities, and I think that the restatement and recast activities are both effective methods of language learning. The restatement activities help build on sentence construction skills because it forces the student to describe something in their own words using the target language, instead of just rote memorization. Recast, when a teacher repeats the phrase without necessarily indicating the student was wrong, helps the student to hear where their error was without being called out. This goes against the behaviorism model, as there is no positive or negative reinforcement attached to it, yet there is still benefit from the act of a student listening to the indirect correction of the error. As I have been focusing on a classroom for younger students, the idea of a positive, nurturing environment with informal assessments is the most appropriate for that age group. However, I truly believe that there is a distinct benefit in these characteristics for any age group. In my classroom, students can expect a positive, open, and encouraging teacher who aims to facilitate their learning in the best way possible.