SPEAKING ACTIVITIES. CHAPTER 1 AND 2

 

An Introduction to Speaking Activities

Personal experience
Several years ago, I was having lunch with my administrator and several other instructors. My administrator asked me how I liked the book I was using in class. I told her my feelings about it, describing the things I liked and disliked. Another instructor chimed in and expressed her concern about the book. She went on to say that she really didn't like it because on the opening page of each lesson, students talked so much, that she couldn't get them to stop!

It is easy to lose sight of our objectives if we don't remind ourselves regularly what we are doing and why we are doing it. Nevertheless, one thing is certain: we want students to produce. In order to be able to communicate competently in English, learners need multiple opportunities to practice and use the language.

Speaking
Brown (1994) states that listening and speaking are the most common skills used in the classroom. However, all speaking in the classroom does not involve meaningful communication. Some is simply practice, especially at the lower levels, or in cases where focus is on suprasegmental elements or linguistic structures (grammar).

All opportunities to speak are important. And practice, even when it doesn't involve a free exchange of ideas, can still allow students to produce language in a way that is new for them.

Lesson planning
In this lesson, we will look at some interactive speaking techniques and discuss how they can be incorporated into a classroom lesson plan. First, though, let's identify elements that all speaking activities should include.

All speaking activities within a lesson plan should:

1. establish a context (introduction).
2. provide building blocks and skills (presentation).
3. provide meaningful tasks and make sure students have been successful (practice and evaluation).
4. allow students to be creative with the language (application). 

1. Establishing a context (introduction)
To establish a context, an instructor might tell a story, present some meaningful realia, or ask a question. At this stage, the activity is often instructor-centered, but it should allow for as much student input as possible. At the lowest levels, an instructor can elicit one-word answers from learners.

At the lower levels, for example, an instructor might ask all of the students to stand up. Then he or she might ask for all students with T-shirts to sit down. The instructor then writes T-shirt on the board and asks the students to repeat it. The instructor continues with other items of clothing until all are sitting. In doing this, the teacher has successfully established the context for the lesson.

At higher levels, the instructor can tell a story, ask questions, take a class poll, introduce a reading, or offer a current event. In each of these activities, the instructor is taking the lead to introduce the activity, but the students are providing input.

2. Providing building blocks and skills (presentation)
In the presentation stage of a lesson, the instructor should make sure all key language and information about the topic is introduced.

At the lowest levels, using drills and dialogues can be a good a way of providing students with this information so that they will be able to practice on their own in the next stage.

Students with a higher level of English may be given important information about speaking strategies (for example, clarification skills, rephrasing, turn-taking etc.). They will then practice using this language during the practice phase of the activity.

3. Providing meaningful tasks (practice and evaluation)
Practice is less directed and more guided and communicative in this phase of the activity. Here the tasks are meaningful but are still provided by the instructor.

They might include using simple dialogues at the lower levels. At the higher levels, learners might engage in information gathering or open-ended projects and simulations.

4. Allowing students to be creative (application)
In the application stage, the instructor no longer guides students to the extent done in the prior stage. Now students personalize and apply what they've learned to a new situation. Tasks are typically more open-ended and range from group interaction, student-created role-plays and skits, to discussions or special presentations or class projects.



Chapter 2

Drills and Dialogues

Why use drills and dialogues?
The Audio-Lingual Method stressed mimicry and included in its methodology drills and dialogues. For a number of years, both were commonly used in many language learning classrooms. More recently, though, many instructors have come to think of drills and dialogues less favorably, claiming that both are rather mechanical and uncommunicative. Nevertheless, drills and dialogues do have a place in language learning in that they can be used to prepare students for more communicative practice.

Every instructor has had the experience of giving students a communicative task only to find that they couldn't adequately do it. Often this happens because we don't give our learners the tools and skills they need to achieve the task. Drills and dialogues can help us do this (though over drilling or repeated dialogue practice is not encouraged).

Drills and dialogues are especially useful at the lower levels where students are attempting to form sounds and produce utterances for the first time. Drills shouldn't dominate a lesson. Instead, they should be used in the presentation stage where guided practice is applied.

Drills and dialogues may be used for the purpose of developing vocabulary, skills, grammar, or pronunciation skills. In this chapter we will only address vocabulary and skill development.

Drills
Drills are typically used with single words, phrases, and sentences. They give students the first experience producing and manipulating language. They are most effective when the instructor is conducting the activity.

The following tables list different drill types:

Drills for Vocabulary Development
Choral repetition	The teacher models certain language and the students repeat in unison.
Substitution	Students are given a sentence and a cue word. They are asked to substitute these cue words in the appropriate place in the sentence. Teacher: I buy apples at the store. ... Pear Student: I buy pears at the store.
Completion	Students are given a sentence and respond by repeating the sentence and adding more information (for example, a tag word(s)). Teacher: He loves baseball. Student: He loves baseball or is it soccer?

Although drills are mechanical, they do not need to be dry and lifeless. They can be fun if the instructor orchestrates them creatively. The following table illustrates some variations.

Drill Variations
Backward buildup	Sentences that are too long are easier to manipulate if broken up into smaller units. With backward buildup drills, the instructor has the students repeat the last word and then adds more starting from the word before the last word until the entire sentence is repeated. For example: things; some things; need some things; We need some things.
Split-word technique	Sections of the class are given different parts of a word or a sentence to produce. The instructor conducts the production by pointing to the different sections of the class.
Competition	The class is split up to see which group(s) can produce the word, phrase or statement clearer or louder.
Volume	The teacher says "louder" or "softer." Students must be able to repeat a given word, phrase, or sentence properly.
Buildup technique	First, an individual repeats a given word, phrase, or sentence followed one small group, then another, and another until the entire class has repeated the item together.

Dialogues
Dialogues are extended drills with added context. They are exchanges between two individuals and consist of at least two lines. Since they are typically used for initial practice and not intended to be communicative, they should not be overly long. At the lowest level, 2-8 lines are sufficient. If these dialogues are to be used for practice, the instructor should provide students with all key language in the presentation stage of the lesson.

The following table describes different types of dialogues.

Dialogue Types for Practice
Repetition	Students read the dialogue to one another. This kind of dialogue is usually used for intonation and pronunciation practice.
Substitution	Within the dialogue are places where other information is substituted for the current information. See the example below.
Completion or Information Gap	This type of dialogue/speaking exercise includes blanks that can only be completed by working with a partner to ask questions. See the example below.
Completion/Personal Information	This type of dialogue/speaking exercise includes questions that can only be answered with personal information from someone else.

Substitution dialogues
The following example shows how a substitution dialogue works.

toothache          fever                  runny nose headache          sore throat         cold earache            rash                   cough

Student A: What's the matter?
Student B: I have a stomachache.

1. Students are asked to act out the ailments when doing the dialogue above with a partner.
2. Students perform the dialogue with five different students and substitute a different ailment for the underlined word each time.

Information (Info) Gap
Information gap activities are very common in ESL/EFL. They usually contain two pages. Student A looks at one page while Student B looks at the other. Each has different information. Through dialogue, they get information from the other student, as in the simple example below.

Student A Soccer superstar David Beckham was born on          in the city of Leytonstone, England. At age         , he won his first soccer award...

Student B Soccer superstar David Beckham was born on May 2, 1975 in the city of         , England. At age 11, he won his first soccer award...