Talk on the Port Royal Abbey Method of Teaching Languages and its direct influence in Our Time

The discussion continues from that of the last two Talks (9 10). Here we look in to certain facts on why language education made a drastic change from the classical and mediveal methods of teaching through the same language to the modern methods of teaching based on Teaching a language through the mother tongue of the learner introduced by the PortRoyal Abbey in the 17th century. The so called scientifically prudent method introduced by the Monks of Port Royal Abbey changed the language teaching completely from mentalese centric education to mother tongue centric education. We today use the archaic method of teaching languages introduced in the 17th century for teaching languages in the 21st century where demand of education of languages need a wholesome proficiency for the student not just a few skills like reading or writing. The talk try to focus why need a new perspective and a paradigm shift in the language pedagogy