Which teaching technique is ideal in ELT?

One of the presentations in our Trends and Issues of TESOL class was on the Ideal Teaching Technique. We saw some factors that we need to consider when deciding which teaching technique is ideal in English Language Teaching, but we did not focus exactly on the ideal teaching technique itself. In my opinion, the ideal teaching technique is the one that aims to the Communicative Language Teaching Approach (CLT). According to Brown (2001), CLT techniques are designed to engage learners in the pragmatic, authentic, functional use of the language for meaningful purpose. I like the ‘authentic’ and ‘functional’ part of his definition. Generally, a student enrolls in an English class to be able to communicate outside the classroom, which means authentic learning. If we use real-life situations as part of the teaching techniques, the students will feel that they are learning to communicate, and not only learning rules and the forms of the language. Communication means more than only speaking or writing, therefore my ideal technique would involve integration of skills and grammar teaching (in a lesser extent) following the CLT.

Brown, D. H. (2001). Teaching by Principles: an Interactive Approach to Language Pedagogy. (2^nd ed.) New York: Pearson Longman.