Communicative language teaching and outcomes-based objectives setting: A questionnaire-based survey of a sample of tertiary teachers of English in Taiwan

Abstract

The aim of the research reported here was to determine, using a questionnaire-based survey, the extent to which a sample of teachers of English at tertiary level (college and university) in Taiwan appear to have been affected by two of what might be described as emerging ‘orthodoxies’ of English language teaching – the use of approaches associated with communicative language teaching and ‘can do’ outcomesbased objectives setting. The findings indicate that, so far at least as the survey respondents are concerned, these approaches are much less pervasive than is sometimes supposed. This suggests that teachers of English in Taiwan may be less likely to provide a receptive audience for dominant Western discourse on language teaching and learning than is sometimes supposed.