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English is important in the Sultanate of Oman for acquiring science and technology, conducting business, traveling to English-speaking and nonArabic speaking countries, analyzing and understanding culture (reading, watching films and other programs, listening to pop music, and surfing the Internet), and finding white-collar jobs. Over 250 Omani students are yearly awarded fully- or partiallysponsored scholarships by the Omani government to study for their undergraduate and postgraduate degrees in English-speaking countries (Al-Issa, 2006). These students will subsequently contribute to the nation-building of Oman.
Prior to embarking on their program of specialization, many of these students enroll in an intensive English as Second Language (ESL) improvement course in an English speaking country for six to twelve months, which may cost between $10,000 and $15,000. These courses are taught by native Englishspeaking teachers (NESTs), who often have little or no knowledge about the cultural, academic, and linguistic backgrounds of the Omani students.
This paper discusses the problem of Omani students ' lack of communicative competence after nine years of EFL school-based learning. It investigates the causes leading to this problem and suggests ways that ESL instructors in English-speaking countries can cope. The aim is to enlighten NESTs about the cultural background and educational needs of these students, which in turn should have a positive effect on both the teachers' performance and the students' achievement.
The Problems
When students in Oman exit high school, they generally encounter problems with using English communicatively (Al-Issa, 2005a). They lack grammatical competence (how to use the structure and form of the language), discourse competence (how to provide cohesion and coherence across sentences and utterances), sociolinguistic competence (how to interact), and strategic competence (how to make the most of the language you have, especially when it is deficient) (Hymes, 1972). Omani students are exposed to substantial teaching of grammar rules, so grammatical competence is their least problematic area.
The four primary causes of students' lack of communicative ability are the national textbook; the transmission-based education system; the lack of educational aids, especially technology, in the EFL classrooms; and the paucity of time given to English in the national curriculum.
It is worth mentioning that these problems are not exclusive to Omani learners. Other Arab learners in contexts where English is another school subject, a...