Teaching Shakespeare in China with a Communicative Approach

Abstract

This article outlines the necessity and challenges of teaching Shakespeare to EFL students in China. It argues that teaching Shakespeare’s plays fulfills the multidimensional purposes of English learning including developing linguistic, literary and cultural competence, as well as facilitating critical capacity and personal enrichment, which are indispensable for advanced language learners. Through the introduction of the teaching procedures of Shakespeare’s Henry V and its two film versions, which are designed within a communicative orientation, it concludes that Content-Based Instruction (CBI) and Task-based instruction (TBI) are central to fulfilling the aforementioned goals in literature teaching, and can cope-well with the tough challenges in teaching a difficult author to EFL students.