The Impact of Implementing the Direct Approach in Teaching Conversational Strategies on the Development of EFL Learners’ Intercultural Communicative Competence

Abstract

Language hiccups and breakdowns are a salient part of communication in a TL. These problems may derive from one or a combination of the following: (a) resource deficits, (b) processing time pressure, (c) perceived deficiencies in one’s own language output, and (d) perceived deficiencies in the interlocutor’s performance. In any of these performance situations, the learner’s attempt to compensate for missing/ inaccessible knowledge results in communication strategy-implementation as their communicative success relies entirely on their ‘ability to communicate within restrictions’. Thus, conversational strategies (CSs) have been conceptualized as problem-shooting devices whose conscious implementation is directed towards counteracting the imbalance between learners’ linguistic means and communicative ends. To raise EFL learners’ awareness about the use and usefulness of CSs and to assess the impact of explicit CSs training on enhancing learners’ intercultural communicative competence were the main objectives of the current study. An interventionist strategy-based instruction was conducted at the Department of English Language and Literature, Sétif 2 University. Two intact groups of first year (N=30) and third year (N=30) were the participants of the main study. The 60 participants were randomly assigned to the experiment groups (N=30) and comparison ones (N=30) giving them equal chances of being selected to undergo the experiment. A self-report strategy questionnaire was developed to investigate CSs employed by learners and to explore their perceptions of the use and usefulness of each CS. Focused one-way and two-way tasks were used to depict learners’ actual performance. And to have in-depth information of their learning processes, Stimulated Recall was utilized. Further, an attitudinal questionnaire was used to gain information concerning students’ attitudes towards CSs instruction and its usefulness. Wilcoxon Matched-Pairs Signed-Ranks Test was used to analyze data gathered from the self-report strategy checklist. And ‘Typological Analysis’ was the procedure followed in analyzing students’ use of the seven taught achievement