Bogged down ELT, bailed-out CLT?

Abstract With over 17 million children learning English, Bangladesh has one of the world’s largest English-learning populations. However, despite this, the country faces challenges in achieving the optimal level of English proficiency. English language teaching (ELT) initiatives in Bangladesh, which have evolved over time, can be broadly classified based on the Grammar-Translation Method, Communicative Language Teaching, and the English in Action project. These approaches predominantly reinforced traditional monolingual and bilingual frameworks while overlooking the rich metalinguistic, cultural, and intellectual resources that students bring to English classrooms. This article critically examines past ELT efforts, policies and their outcomes through a translanguaging lens, which challenges the rigid language separation ideology in traditional models and encourages the use of all linguistic repertoires in learning English as a target language. This article provides fresh perspectives on the strengths and weaknesses of past initiatives, as well as suggestions for developing linguistically and culturally sustainable ELT models based on translanguaging scholarship.