The Audio-lingual Method

According to Brown (1994:57) explains that the Audio-lingual Method
was widely used in the United States and other countries in the 1950’s and 1960’s.
It is still used in some programs today. This method is based on the principles of
behaviour psychology. It adapted many of the principles and procedures of the
Direct Method, in part as a reaction to the lack of speaking skills of the reading
approach. This new method incorporated many of the features of the earlier Direct
Method, but the disciplines added the concepts of teaching “linguistics patterns”
in combination with “habit forming”.
He also explains that this method was one of the first to have its roots
”firmly grounded in linguistics and psychological theory” (Brown,1994:57),
which apparently added to its credibility and probably had some influence in the
popularity it enjoyed over a ling period of time. It also had a major influence on
the language teaching methods that were to follow and can still be seen in major
or minor manifestations of language teaching methodology even to this day.
The Principles of Audio-lingual Method
The Audio-lingual method, like the direct method, is also an oral approach.
However, it is very different in that rather than emphasizing vocabulary
acquisition through exposure to its use in situations, the Audio-lingual method
drills students in the use of grammatical sentence patterns. In its development,
principles from behavioral psychology were incorporated. It was thought that the
way to acquire the sentence patterns of the target language was through
conditioning helping learners to respond correctly to stimuli through shaping and
reinforcement.
Bushra Noori (2001) describes the principles of the Audio-lingual
method as follows: (1) instructions are given in the target language (2) language
forms occur within a context (3) students’ native language interferes as little as
possible with the students’ attempts to acquire the target language (4) teaching is
directed to provide students with a native –speaker like model (5) analogy
provides a better foundation for language learning than analysis (6) errors are
carefully avoided because they lead to the formation of bad habits (7) positive
reinforcement helps the student to develop correct habits (8) students are
encouraged to learn to respond to verbal and non-verbal stimuli (9) the teacher is
regarded as an orchestra leader conducting , guiding and controlling the
students’ behaviour in the target language (10) learning foreign language is
treated on par with the native language.
Meanwhile, Brown (1994:57) also enumerates the principles of the Audiolingual
method are as follows: (1) New material is presented in dialog form (2)
There is dependence on mimicry, memorization of set phrases, and over learning
(3) Structures are sequenced by means of contrastive analysis and taught one at
time (4) Structural patterns are taught using repetitive drills (5) There is little or
no grammatical explanation. Grammar is taught by inductive analogy rather than
deductive explanation (6) Vocabulary is strictly limited and learned in context (7)
There is much use of tapes, language labs, and visual aids (8) Great importance is
attached to pronunciation (9) Very little use of the mother tongue by teachers is
permitted (10) Successful responses are immediately reinforced (11) There is great effort to get students to produce error-free utterances (12) There is tendency
to manipulate language and disregard content.