Dogme ELT

Dogme ELT is a communicative approach to language teaching developed by Scott Thornbury and Luke Meddings, first articulated in Thornbury's 2000 article in IATEFL Issues and later codified in their book Teaching Unplugged (2009). The name references the Dogme 95 film movement's rejection of special effects in favour of raw, stripped-back storytelling.

The Three Pillars

1. Conversation-driven -- Conversation is the central medium and goal of language learning, treated as "language at work" rather than a means to practise discrete items.
2. Materials-light -- Published coursebooks and technology are de-emphasised. Lessons emerge from what learners bring to the classroom rather than from pre-packaged syllabi.
3. Emergent language -- The language that arises naturally during interaction becomes the syllabus. The teacher's role is to notice, harvest, and work with this language in real time.

Key Principles in Practice

Dogme classrooms rely heavily on teacher skill: the ability to listen for teachable moments, reformulate learner output, and scaffold emergent language on the board. This makes it demanding for novice teachers but liberating for experienced ones.

Thornbury himself later questioned whether insisting on "conversation-driven" was too narrow, acknowledging that other interactional modes (e.g., collaborative writing, project work) could equally generate emergent language.

Criticisms

Critics argue Dogme is impractical in contexts with low-proficiency learners, large classes, or institutional requirements for standardised curricula. It has also been described as more of a mindset than a replicable method -- a philosophy of teaching rather than a set of procedures.