The International journal of analytical and experimental modal analysis ISSN NO: 0886-9367

Impact of a CALL Material to improve Communicative Competence in English

Prof. (Dr.) Chetan Trivedi#1, Mr. Viki M. Modi*2

Ph.D. Guide/Supervisor - KSV Gandhinagar & I/C Vice Chancellor Bhakt Kavi Narsinh Mehta University, Junagad#1
Ph.D. Scholar Kadi Sarva Vishwavidyalaya, Gandhinagar& Assistant Professor Smt. S. R. Patel Engineering College*2
1 & 2
cntrivedi@gmail.com vikimodi88@gmail.com
Abstract
This research paper unravels the impacts CALL material has on communicative competence in English.
Similarly, the study explores the various methodologies applicable in improving communicative competence
in English through CALL.

This research paper unravels the impacts CALL material has on communicative competence in English.
Similarly, the study explores the various methodologies applicable in improving communicative competence
in English through CALL. The present study focuses on; why effective Communicative Competence in
English should entail everywhere? The massive development in Indian education system, in addition to
explosion in Engineering and Technology based employments have offered an opportunity to a variety of
other basic developmental skills, where the employability is at the top most quality. For better employability
in the present days, two major areas of interest encompasses with industrial skills as well as Communicative
Competence in English. In this research, I expound how select materials in CALL contribute to the
advancement in selected engineering students’ communicative competence. The material of the course is
based on the requirements of outgoing engineers. The CALL based teaching material is used worldwide for
teaching many different subjects, but very few researches have particularly actualized this applied form of
teaching in the Engineering classroom with the goal of making students attain better communicative
competence in English.

Keywords

Communicative, Competence, CALL - Computer Assisted Language Learning, Employability, Engineering,

Impact

1.0 Introduction:
The good Communicative Competence in English is required everywhere. The extensive development in
Indian education system, in addition to explosion in Engineering and Technology based employments have
offered an opportunity of a variety of other basic skill developments, where the employability is at the top
most quality. For better employability in the present days, two major areas of interest include with industrial
skills as well as Communicative Competence in English.

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The Communicative Competence in English does not only create effective communication but also gives
direction to the stream of technical information and awareness for the direction of engineers, technocrats and
others in their professional enterprises. Unfortunately, many companies and organizations have been facing
excessive complications in appointing individuals who, despite their being technically competent, are not able
to communicate accurately in English - a prime requirement for employment particularly for international
services.

The researcher wants to find impacts of a CALL material to improve undergraduate engineering student’s
communicative competence. The material of the course will be based on the present requirement of
undergraduate students of engineering. For the purpose of creating positive impact as well as interests in
students, the researcher wants to use CALL as a supportive tool. The Communicative competence in English
is based and organized under the discussion of English Language syllabus design which emphasizes
communicative competence in English; this involves four areas of language skills: Listening, Reading,
Speaking & Writing.

3.0 Principles in designing CALL

Speaking Reading
Skill Skill

Listening Writing
Skill Communicative Skill
Competence

The instructional and tasks design based on the communicative competence paradigm has significantly
changed language teaching and learning practices in computer-assisted language learning or CALL structure
(Chapelle, 2001). The review of related literature suggests that the approval of any educational structure
should be depended on skill based educational philosophy and communications. Pennington (1996) notes that
an ideal teaching system:

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 Assist learners to extend and elaborate their individual cognitive development for the acquisition of a
second language.
 Permit learners to analyze the situation to take risks in a motivating and psychologically engineering
environment.
 Proposes input to both conscious and unconscious learning processes.
 Offers students conveniences to send and to obtain comment on the basis of performance.
 Places students in contact with other students.
 Encourages socio-cultural learning.
 Encourages communication activities in learning environment.
 Presents appropriate environment for learning.
 Expands the learner’s ‘zone of proximal development’.
 Creates the free learning environment for learners.
4.0 Syllabus Design
All classroom practices are controlled as well as determined by a specific methodological framework and are
realized finally by a set of techniques employed within that particular procedural framework. In that particular
procedural framework, the role of syllabus has always been central.

The process of communicative competence requires different kind of syllabus other than grammatical or
structural syllabus. Yalden (1983) was of the view that in a communicative syllabus, the whole thing becomes
a task-oriented teaching. The learner is provided simulated learning situations and certain language functions
to be performed on CALL. These functions are simulated on CALL through tasks and Functional Notional
Syllabus helps to perform various functions. The Functional Notional Syllabus helps learners to learn how to
use language for authentic communicative purposes.
5.0 A Communicative Lesson Plan
According to Mora (2000), the following are the objectives for lesson planning of Communicative
Competence in English as a Second Language Teaching.
1. To initiate the learning with the brainstorming and motivational involvement of the learners through
dialogue. The dialogues are mostly related to learners’ experiences and interests. They may learn about
different functions of language and situations through role playing, formality or informality.

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2. To accomplish the goal to develop communicative competence require framework or structure of

conversation through that the learners improve their vocabulary and language usage.
3. To ask the Questions based on the dialogue, topic or situation. The question should be Wh-, Yes/No type
and open ended questions.
4. To clarify the some of the unknown functions give basic study of communicative expressions or
structures which are contains images, real objects or dramatization etc.
5. To understand the rules of functional expressions or structures use model examples on the chalk & board,
underline the important features, using signs.
6. To give oral recognition and interpretative activities for freedom of language use.
7. To improve or practice the reading and writing skills use the dialogues with variations.
8. To evaluate the language and questions/answers of learning with oral presentations.
9. To give homework and extension activities to create new dialogues around the same situations.
10. To provide an opportunity to apply the use of language in new situations for the same or unknown idea to
complete the exercise series.
6.0 Instructional Material
The major objective of teaching Communicative Competence is to help the learners to make concrete use of
the language and to enable them to carry out a variety of communicative tasks. The instructional materials try
to fulfill the goal by up to date learning objective which collectively design the syllabus. According to
Littlewood (1981) the following are some of the role of instructional material:

1. Materials target the interactivity abilities of explanation, interpretation and discussion.

2. They should light on coherent, compatible, and attractive transformation of information, in lieu of the
demonstration of linguistic form.
3. They comprise peculiar varieties of media and different write up, through that the learners may use to
enhance their competence through various exercises.
4. They provide flexibility to learners to progress at their own rates of learning.
5. They are designed as per learners different styles of learning.
6. They provide flexibility for independent study and use.
7. They provide opportunities for self- evaluation and advancement in learning.

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7.0 What is Listening Competence?

Listening is an action developed before the birth of a child. When the child goes to school, the style of
learning oral messages has become automatic, as if the act of speaking is easier while listening is more
complex. Compared with other remaining skills, listening requires more efforts of both visual and aural
organs under the pressure of competing signals.

The research support of Listening behavior:

1. Listening skill improves day by day.
2. Listening skill can be learnt
3. Listening is the primary communication skill for everybody.
4. Listening skill requires thinking and language skill.
The listening competency is to examine the ability to:
1. Maintain concentration to spoken communication.
2. Understand the spoken language style instead of other language skills.
3. Understand a variety of spoken representation.
4. Use non-verbal clues to understand the messages.
5. Self-study the accuracy of comprehension.
7. 1 Factors that Influence Listening Competence
 Intelligence  Use of special method while listening
 Recognition of correct English usage  Genuine awareness in the passage discussed
 Listener's vocabulary  Emotional attachment with speaker
 Capability to make inferences  Try to listen critically
 Ability to structuralize a speech  Disinterest of the subject
 Reading comprehension  Physical weakness of the listener
7.2 Factors that do not Influence Listening Competence
 Listener’s optimism  Listener's health
 Social background of the listener  Space between the listener and the speaker
 Family background of the listener  Listener’s personal problems
 Self-satisfaction of the listener  Note-taking ability of the listener
 Profitable attitudes of the listener  Previous & Preparation training of the listener

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7.3 The Methodology of Developing Listening Competence

In order to develop Listening Competence students are supposed to go through definite stages. O. Vovk
provides a lucid division of exercises to be accomplished at different stages of work with an audio text.
Commonly, this procedure encompasses three coherent stages (1) Pre-listening: listening with an objective,
ice breaking, and preparing for further activities; (2) While listening: the real process of listening; (3) Post-
listening: checking the understanding of the received information and preparing for speaking. On balance, the
process of developing Listening Comprehension incorporates three main stages: instruction, audio material
presentation, and comprehension control.
8.0 What is Speaking Competence?
One of the most essential aims of English teachers is to make learners capable using English for
communication. According to many theorists speaking skill can be improved by various activities like games,
role play, etc. evidence shows that speaking should learn only through activities and in a group. Students have
a lot of problems at their primary level they want to speak but when they go to class. They do not feel like
they have learnt anything (Chastain, 1988). Students are able to convert their thought to their speech. For
students to improve second language skill, they need to practice more. First students need to improve their
general vocabulary and after that, they should listen to sentence from simple to complex. Students should also
read simple stories and sometimes try to memorize them.
8.1 Factors Influencing Speaking Competence
 Cognitive factors  Feedback during speaking tasks
 Linguistic factors  Semantics and psychological factors
 Sociolinguistic  Learners’ anxiety, self-confidence
 Performance conditions  Speaking performance
8.2 Factors not Influencing Speaking Competence
 Increased self-confidence  Risk Taking
 Increased cultural awareness  Psychologically aware
 Improved internal communication
8.3 The Methodology of Developing Speaking Competence
The methodology is aimed at the development of students’ speaking competence through the implementation
of the system of exercises of the stage-by-stage development speech production skills. Pyotr Y. Galperin
proved that mental activity reflects materialized one and that the former includes all the components of the
latter with the difference that external activity operates material objects whereas mental activity deals with

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ideal ones. The scientist distinguished five stages of the interiorization of an external action, which are
analyzed in relation to teaching argumentation (as one of the three main speech types) to students below.
 The informational and motivational stage  The training-creative stage
 The orienting stage  The creative stage
 The training stage
9.0 What is Reading Competence?
Reading is a cognitive process of decoding written symbols in order to build or deduce meaning. Reading
performs a key role in almost every course of study. To study and store the information in memory, primarily
the reader should understand the meaning of the information. Many studies have originated that the good
reader is competent of recognizing main ideas in the text and so they predict reading skills as a essential skill
for successful studying. Students who are sensitive to learn main ideas in reading are able to answer subjective
questions.
9.1 Factors that Influence Reading Competence
 Phonemic Awareness  Vocabulary
 Alphabetic Principle  Comprehension
 Fluency  Accuracy
9.2 Factors that do not affect Reading Competence
 Activating background knowledge  Summarizing
 Predicting and clarifying  Appropriate instruction
 Reading practices  Cognitive Ability
9.3 The Methodology of Developing Reading Competence
Many Researchers identified developing reading method such as; alphabetic method (bottom up), whole word
method (top-down) and interactive method (combination of both bottom up and top down) is of the view that
linguistic method is similar with interactive method. Mbunda (1974) mentions five methods of teaching
reading skills namely alphabetical method, sound method, whole word method, syllable method, and sentence
method. The teaching of reading using this method emphasizes the importance of reading each letter of a word
correctly.

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10.0 What is Writing Competence?

Ramelan (2003) stated that writing competence is a constant process of thinking and organizing, rethinking
and reorganizing. Through writing, we can inform others, carry out communication, convince, incense and
express feelings. According to O‟Malley (1996) writing is a personal work in which writers generate ideas
and transform them into self generated topics.
10.1 Factors that Influence Writing Competence
 Material  Classroom management
 Media  Teacher’s strategy
 Classroom activities  Teacher’s approach
10.2 Factors that do not affect Reading Competence
 Positive anxiety level  Motivation
 Self confidence  Library work
 Assessment work  Semantic and syntactic factors
10.3 The Methodology of Developing Reading Competence
According to Collins research identified five distinct methods for improving writing competence; each with
learning outcomes. The first type is one-draft writing to get ideas on paper as icebreaker introduction to a
class conversation and is assessed for implementing the assignment. The second type of writing is a one-draft
response to a teacher’s quickness that is assessed for correct content. The third type of writing adds the
component of correcting the errors, which directs student and teacher attention to accurate writing skills in
drafts. The forth type of writing, according to Collins, is the “most effective and effective of all the types at
improving writing skills”. In Type Four writing, a Type Three assignment is read out loud and analyzed by a
teacher, and then a second draft is written. The fifth type of writing assignments is intended for public
publication. Several drafts are required to achieve a text that is as accurate as possible.
11.0 Conclusion:
Thus, the article has attempted to review the rationale behind the impact of a CALL material use in improving
Communicative Competence. The paper has tried to classify CALL material and its use in improvement of
English language. The material is totally task-based so it is authentic and creative. It will also provide vast
opportunities for students to practice and promote competence on an international scale Language skills can
also be developed through CALL. In this entire process learners are a central part of the whole context and are
aware of the growing needs for proficiency in communicative competence in English.

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