Instructional Strategies
for Teaching Speaking
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Zolotonosha
February 24, 2012
Presented by Carol Haddaway, Sr. English Language
Fellow, Ukraine
U.S. Department of State
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“Speaking in a second or
foreign language has often
been viewed as the most
demanding of the four skills.”
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(Bailey and Savage in Celce-Murcia, p. 103)
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WHY?

 Because we must do it instantaneously and
interactively with another person or people.
 Fluent speech contains reduced forms (what do you
want?)
 slang (cool), idioms (hit the road running), phrasal
verbs (figure out)
 stress, rhythm, and intonation;
 During the interaction with another speaker one
must monitor and understand the other person,
think of one’s contribution, produce it, monitoring
its effect…
(Lazarton, p.103)
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Implications for
Teaching

 Create a relaxed atmosphere
 Use interesting topics and stimulating activities
 Expose Ls to naturally pronounced speech and
integrate pronunciation into your lesson
 Get Ls used to combining listening and speaking
in real time, in natural interaction.
 Establish English as the main classroom
language
(Davies , 2000, p. 82)
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“Talking classrooms”

Create a classroom culture of speaking
through the general use of English in the classroom.
(Scott Thornbury in Harmer, p. 123)
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Learners: motivate, involve, focus
create expectations, introduce topic
Information Gap
Oral Skills Class

Who are my learners?
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Low Level Learners

Build on their experience
Share their expertise
Use realia to keep learning as concrete as
possible
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S1: Have you ever been to Lviv?
S2: No I haven’t . Have you?
S1: Yes. It’s wonderful
S2: How long did you stayed?
S1: One week
S2: The buildings are beautiful, yes?
S1: Yes, and the streets….the chocolates..
S2: Ah, have you ever been to Kyiv?
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Non-academic learners

 BICS (Basic interpersonal Communication
Skills)
 Social language – interpersonal interactions
 Repetitive – functional language (greetings,
making requests, giving directions, sharing
information).
 Evidence of mastery: good TL pronunciation,
ease of TL social interactions, use of TL
expressions
 Used primarily, though not exclusively in oral
language – listening and speaking
 Takes 2-3 years to master
(Jim Cummings, 1970)
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Academic Learners

 CALP (Cognitive Academic Language Proficiency)
 Language encountered in academic situations
 Used primarily thought not exclusively in reading and
writing
 Not repetitive
 Takes on average 7-9 years to become truly fluent
 Participate in learning activities such as
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Class participation
Discussions & Presentations
Interacting with peers and professors
Asking and answering questions
Interpersonal communication
(Jim Cummings, 1970)
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Teacher, Learners, Atmosphere
Error Correction, Activities
Small Groups
Affective Filter

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Balance Accuracy and
Fluency

Is it more important to be able to speak a
language with accuracy (grammatically correct)
or with fluency (communicatively correct, but
not always grammatically correct)?
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Accuracy

Practice typically involves focusing only in
the new language structures (e.g.
comparisons)
Focus on pronunciation, vocabulary, word
formation, sentence formation
Errors are usually dealt with immediately
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Accuracy example

 L1: Is the Toyota bigger than the Chevy?
 L2: Yes, it is. Is the Lexus cheap than….
 Teacher: Cheap…?
 L2: Is the Lexus cheaper than the Chevy?
 L3: No, it isn’t. Is the Lexus faster than the Toyota?
 L4: Yes, it is. Is prettier the Toyota?
 Teacher: Is the……..
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Fluency

Likely to take place when
speaking activities focus on
meaning and its negotiation, when
speaking strategies are used, and
when overt correction is minimized.
)
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Information Gap
Think Pair Share
Telling Stories
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Information Gap
Characteristics

To exchange information
Main attention is sharing information
Need to communicate to reach objective
Learners must ‘fill the gap’ to complete the
activity/communication
Why information gap
activities?

Allow for comprehensible input (i+1)
Input should be at the right level of
difficulty to promote acquisition
 Learners produce language – this output
‘pushes’ learners to undertake complete
grammatical processing (M. Swain)
Help lower students’ affective filter
Sleep questionnaire
One thing in common
Cooperative Activity
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Think
Pair
Share
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Think-Pair-Share
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How:
 Teacher presents a question or problem
 Students are given “think/wait time” and write answers
(1)
 Students pair with a partner (2)
 Pair share with another pair (4)
 Group share their responses and ideas with another small
group or with the entire class.
Why:
 Have time to think, plan, and rehearse, with feedback
 Can practice before talking to whole group
Question/Problem 1

Interaction is the key to improving EFL
learners’ speaking ability. How do you
promote this interaction in your
classroom?
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Question/Problem 2

What types of speaking activities do
you normally use in your classroom?
Do they serve different purposes?
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Question/Problem 3

Your students are really shy and don’t
say anything. How do you arouse in
your learners a willingness and need or
reason to speak?
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Question/Problem 4
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Your students say they can’t talk
because they’ll make lots of mistakes.
What do/can you do to help them
overcome this fear?
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Question/Problem 5

What are effective ways to give
students feedback on their performance
during oral activities?
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Feedback and Error
Correction

Self – Correction
 Give learners the opportunity to correct
themselves, helping as necessary
Peer – Correction
 If learner cannot self-correct, invite other learners
to make the correction
Teacher Correction
 Recast, Error or Mistake, Accuracy or Fluency
focus
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Error Treatment

Should errors be treated?
What errors should be treated?
How should they be treated?
Who and When?
 “There is a French widow in every bedroom.”
 “The different city is another one in the
another two.”
Story telling
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Groups of 3
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A successful speaking activity
 Learners talk a lot

 Student (STT) vs teacher (TTT) – wait time
 Participation is even
 discussion not dominated by a minority of talkative
students
 Motivation is high
 learners are eager to speak; interested in topic
 Language is of an acceptable level
 utterances are easily comprehensible
 acceptable level of accuracy
UR, 1991, p. 120
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(Rivers, 1987 in Richards & Renandyn, p.208)
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References

 Brown, H.D. (2001). Teaching by Principles. Longman
 Davies, P. and Pearse, E. (2000). Success in English
Teaching. Oxford University Press.
 Farrell, T. (2006). Succeeding with English Language
Learners. Corwin Press.
 Harmer, J. (2007). How to teach English. Pearson
Longman.
 Lazaraton, A. (2001). Teaching Oral Skills. In
Teaching English as a Second or Foreign Language 3rd
Ed., edited by M. Celce-Mircia. Heinle & Heinle.
 Richards, J.C. & Renandya, W.A. (2002). Methodology
in Language Teaching. Cambridge.
 Ur, P. (1996).. A Course in Language Teaching.
Cambridge.
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Thank you!
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