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Grammar Translation Method GTM
Grammar Translation Method GTM
Grammar Translation Method GTM
Faisal Rahman
University of Ahmad Dahlan
ichal.yakusa@gmail.com
Abstract
In language teaching and learning, there are several methods those
are used for the effectiveness of the teaching learning activity, the methods
are conducted by researcher to help teacher in teaching the language, time
by time, the methods experienced many change and development based on
the situation and school of thought of teaching and learning a language,
every method has different character, technique and implementation.
This paper is going to elaborate about the grammar translation
method (GTM) that is used in nineteenth century to teach English as
foreign language, this method is based on the goal of grammatical
competence, to achieve the goal this method has several characteristic and
technique those will be used in its implementation.
Keyword: GTM, method, language teaching and learning.
A. introduction
Language is crucial in human life where without it people cannot communicate with
others, express their feeling and explore their mind, thus, learn language is very important for
human, especially a language that can connect many people in several countries that have
different mother tongue. The most powerful language is English because it can connect many
people to communicate each other even English is called as The World Language. So, the
most important language to be learned is English.
In conducting a language course, there are several things to be planned, such as the
decision of the course and the way to achieve the decision, like Richard (2006: 6) argued that:
GTM is a method that based on the target of grammatical competence that focuses on
the grammar as a basic of a language it is like Richard (2006: 3) mentioned that grammatical
competence refers to the knowledge grammar that account of ability in producing a sentence.
B. Historical Background
Grammar translation method was firstly used in the middle of nineteenth century in
Germany, it is like Tetzner (2004) stated that grammar -translation method (GTM) to teach
foreign language dominated from the mid-nineteenth century to the beginning of World War
Two and it is still used in some countries today. In the late eighteenth century, the first place
which began to establish GTM as the main method to teach a second language at national
high schools, known as Gymnasiums was Prussia in Germany. In this century GTM was the
only widely used teaching method in the schools, not only in Germany also in other European
countries. Originally it was used to teach Greek and Latin.
Due to this historical background GTM is also known as the traditional or classical
method, as the grammar school method or in America as the Prussian method. Along with
industrialisation more opportunities for communication had been arising especially in Europe
and consequently new methods for language teaching were developed in order to meet the
needs of the new class of language learners (Howatt, 1997 in Tetzner, 2004).
C. Characteristic of GTM
Every method has its own characters which should be known teacher to teach
language, GTM also has its own characteristic, like Prator and Celse-Murcia (1979: 3) in
Brown (2001: 19) mentioned that the major characteristics of GTM are:
1. Classes are taught in the mother tongue with little active use of the target language.
2. Much vocabulary is taught in the form of lists of isolated words.
3. Long, elaborate explanations of the intricacies of grammar are given.
4. Grammar provides the rules for putting words together, and instruction often focuses
on the form and inflection of words.
5. Reading of difficult classical text is begun early.
6. Little attention is paid to the content of texts, which are treated as exercises in
grammatical analysis.
7. Often the only drills are exercises in translating disconnected sentences from the
target language into the mother tongue.
8. Little or no attention of pronunciation.
The characteristic can be used by teacher as an outline of GTM usage in a class, while
for the way to use GTM is its technique.
D. Techniques of GTM
There are some techniques those are used in implementing GTM, every technique is
related with the others, according to Larsen Freeman (2006: 19-20), the techniques are:
Every method in teaching foreign language has advantages and disadvantages that
should be taken into account by teacher, GTM also has some advantages and disadvantages,
Gorzky (nd) mentioned that the advantages of GTM are (i) it reduces the teacher stress, the
students translate the text from target language into native language, so the teacher
involvement is rarely necessary, and teacher who is not fluent in target language, especially
English is able to teach by using this method, (ii) it focuses on grammar, sentence structure
and word meaning, in can help the students to learn how to read and write in the target
language. In the other site, Gorzky (nd) mentioned the disadvantages of this method are (i)
less learner or students motivation and participation, because GTM is not interactive method,
the students will not be motivated, and also there is less students participation and teacher-
learner relationship because they just learn from a textbook, (ii) unnatural and inaccurate
pronunciation, the students only learn about the grammar and word meaning from a textbook,
it makes them do not know how to pronounce the words naturally and accurately.
Those are some advantages and disadvantages of GTM, the teacher should give
attention to those when he/she want to use GTM in teaching language on the class.
F. Implementation of GTM
Based on the techniques above, implementation of GTM is divided into four phases:
first, the teacher gives the students a reading text, second, the students ordered to read the text
silently, third, the teacher help the students to identify a grammar rule in the text and translate
the text word by word directly and fourth, the students memorize the grammar rule and the
translation. See the process below:
At beginning of the class, the teacher gives the students a text entitled „Nyi Roro Kidul‟:
Silently, the students read the text, then identifying the grammar rule and translating word by
word by the teacher‟s help:
Generally, the text is structured as simple past tense, because there are some to be was and
were also the text generally use verb 2, such as: had, became, wandered, died , cried, thought,
got up, etc.
The first sentence: “Dewi Kandita was an unlucky woman”S+ to be+ complement
The sentence structure is simple past tense as a nominal sentence because there is no verb in
the sentence. The translation of the words in the sentence are:
“Dewi Kandita: name of a woman.
Was: a to be that shows the action is happened in the past, the meaning is adalah.
An: an article to shows that the woman is alone, the meaning is seorang
Unlucky: an adjective word to classify the noun „woman‟, the meaning is tidak beruntung.
Woman: a noun, the meaning is wanita”.
The activity is repeated till the end of the text, and then the students are ordered to memorize
the grammar rule of the text and the translation of the words in the text.
G. Conclusion
References:
Brown, H. Douglas. (2001). Teaching by Principles. 2th edn. White Plains, NY: Pearson
Education.
Larsen-Freeman, Diane. (2000). Technique and Principles in Language Teaching. 2nd edn.
Oxford University Press.
Richard, Jack. C. (2006). Communicative Language Teaching. New York: Cambridge
University Press.
Tetzner, Rene. (2004), Grammar Translation Method. Louton: University of Louton. [online]
available at http://www.grin.com/en/e-book/53246/the-grammar-translation-method.
Retrieved at march 16th 2014