IMPACT OF COMMUNICATIVE LANGUAGE TEACHING (CLT) ON LARGE ESL CLASSROOMS:A TEACHER'S PERSPECTIVE

Abstract

 This qualitative study explores the impact of Communicative Language Teaching (CLT) in large English as a Second Language (ESL) classrooms at the tertiary level from a teacher’s perspective. The study was conducted in a Pakistani university context, where large, exam-oriented classes are common. Data were collected through semi-structured interviews with six university English teachers and were analysed thematically. The findings show that teachers generally view CLT as a useful, learner-centred approach that enhances students’ speaking skills, fluency, and confidence by engaging them in real-life communicative tasks. However, they also reported significant practical challenges when using CLT in large classes, including difficulty in monitoring all students, limited individual feedback, noise and discipline issues, time constraints, and unequal participation between strong and weak learners. In response, teachers adapt CLT by using group and pair work, fixed roles, shorter structured tasks, and local topics, while combining CLT with other methods such as Grammar‑Translation, direct method, task-based learning, and audio‑lingual drills. The study highlights the need for teacher training, institutional support, smaller or better-managed class sizes, and assessment systems that value communicative competence. It concludes that CLT can have a positive impact in large ESL classrooms, but it is most effective when used in flexible, hybrid forms that are sensitive to local constraints.