Interaction and Communication in the ESOL Classroom

MARIANNE CELCE-MURCIA

University of California, Los Angeles

MARIANNE CELCE-MURCIA is professor of English at the University of California, Los Angeles, where she has taught English as a second language since 1972. She has worked abroad in Nigeria, Egypt, and Canada, and has also given lectures and workshops in Israel and Mexico. Her publications include articles in a number of professional journals. She is also coeditor with Lois McIntosh of Teaching English as a Second or Foreign Language (Newbury House, 1979) and coauthor with Diane LarsenFreeman of The Grammar Book: An ESL/EFL Teacher's Course (Newbury House, 1983). A member of LSA, AAAL, TESOL, and CATESOL, Professor Celce-Murcia was presented the UCLA Distinguished Teaching Award in 1976 and appointed a Danforth Associate (1977-83).

The purpose of this article is to explore the significance that the terms interaction and communication have in the context of teaching English to speakers of other languages. The first part of the article will define the terms, and the second part will explore their historical development with reference to language teaching. The third section will discuss four aspects of classroom interaction that affect communication in the language classroom, and the fourth section will demonstrate with examples how manipulative drills can be made more interactive and communicative. The fifth and final part of the article provides suggestions for teachers who must use a textbook containing predominantly manipulative drills but who would like to make their classroom activities more interactive and communicative.

Definitions and relationships

Human interaction is a process whereby two or more people engage in reciprocal action. This action may be verbal or nonverbal; in this article, I shall be emphasizing verbal interaction. Human communication, on the other hand, is a system of giving and receiving information. Information can be conveyed nonverbally via gestures, body language, or proxemics; however, verbal communication of information through speech, writing, or signs2 will be the main concern of this article.

What is the relationship between the terms interaction and communication? There can be no communication without interaction; however, it is possible for someone to initiate interaction without achieving communication. This happens, for example, when the person being addressed refuses to cooperate and won't interact with the initiating speaker. More typical, perhaps, are those cases where two or more people are trying to interact but communication fails because they have no common language, or because there is too much noise for the message to be understood, or because the message is incomplete, ambiguous, or contains errors; all of these can lead to miscommunication.

Communication entails four components: (a) a message, (b) a party to transmit the message, (c) a party to receive the message, and (d) a channel to use for transmission of the message (this channel may be the space between two speakers, a telephone, a radio, a walkietalkie, the postal service, etc.). The interactive aspects of communication are: (a) transmitting messages, (b) receiving messages, and (c) giving feedback-i.e., the receiving party lets the transmitting party know that the message is being (has been) received. Thus, communi

1. Proxemics is the study of what goes on in the physical space between two people who are communicating. Are they close or far apart? Do they touch each other (frequently, occasionally, never)? Such nonverbal aspects of communication can vary greatly from culture to culture.

2. I refer here to "signs" that communicate much the same thing that a written or spoken message could. For example, a red light at a street corner means "stop," a picture of a lighted cigarette with an "X" drawn through it means "no smoking," etc.