Direct method
The direct method is a method of foreign language didactics . It focuses on the goal of mastering a language and demonstrating language skills. The use of the mother tongue in lessons is avoided and instead communicated exclusively in the language to be learned (“monolingualism”). Active speaking is the focus. The lessons consist mostly of conversation exercises based on simple question-and-answer patterns. The way of imparting grammar and language knowledge is thus inductive . That is, the rules of the language are actively derived from the examples by the students. It is in contrast to the deductive grammar translation method and other traditional approaches, in which sentences in the foreign language are constructed from learned rules and vocabulary.
The direct method goes back to Wilhelm Viëtor , who in his pamphlet “Language teaching must turn around!” At the end of the 19th century, turned against the then dominant grammar translation method and its “distantness”. The Callan Method for learning the English language as a form of application of the Direct Method became particularly well known .
Notes and sources
- ↑ Wilhelm Viëtor : Language teaching must turn around! A contribution to the question of overburdening. By Quousque Tandem , Heilbronn 1882. Reprinted in: Die neueren Sprachen , 81, 1982, pp. 120-148.