Teaching Listening Comprehension: Listening
Comprehension in Pedagogical Research
The importance of listening in language learning can hardly be overestimated.
Through reception, we internalize linguistic information without which we could not
produce language 1. In classrooms, students always do more listening than speaking.
Listening competence is universally "larger" than speaking competence. Is it any
wonder, then, that in recent years the language teaching profession has placed a
concerted emphasis on listening comprehension?
Listening comprehension has not always drawn the attention of educators that it
now has. Perhaps human beings have a natural tendency to look at speaking as the
major index of language proficiency.
Listening as a major component in language learning and teaching first hit the
spotlight in the late 1970s with James Asher's (1977) work on Total Physical Response, in
which the role of comprehension was given prominence as learners were given great
quantities of language to listen to before they were encouraged to respond orally.
So, the teachers consider some specific questions about listening comprehension:

What are listeners "doing" when they listen?

What factors affect good listening?

What are the characteristics of "real-life" listening?

What are the many things listeners listen for?

What are some principles of designing listening techniques?

How can listening techniques be interactive?
How Do We Listen?2
Types of Listening
When we listen, we use a variety of strategies to pick up the message. Some of
these are connected with understanding the ‘big’ picture, e.g. gaining an overview of the
structure of the whole text, getting the gist Listening in this way is sometimes termed

gist listening or - listening for gist

extensive listening.
Other strategies are connected with the small pieces of the text, e.g.

correctly hearing precise sounds,
1
H. Douglas Brown, Teaching by Principles: An Interactive Approach to Language Pedagogy, San
Francisco State University, 1994, p. 233-234
2
Jim Scrivener, Learning Teaching, Macmillan Books for Teachers, 2007, p. 178-181
1

working out exactly what some individual words are,

catching precise details of information, etc.
This is often called ‘listening for detail’.
When working on listening in the classroom, it makes more sense to start with work
on the 'small pieces' (e.g. sounds and words and details) or on ‘big pieces’ (e.g. background
topics, the overall structure and organization of a text, the general meaning, etc.)?
The two views described here are known as top-down and bottom-up.
Top-down and bottom-up
It used to be believed that listeners built up their understanding of a text by working
out what each individual sound was, then adding these up into a word, understanding the
word, checking the meaning of that word with the words around them, etc. (a bit like
building up a wall from the individual bricks). Although this theory, known as ‘bottom-up’
(i.e. building up the messages from the individual small pieces), may initially sound
appealing, it is virtually impossible to do.
Spoken English probably comes at you too fast to be able to adopt such an item byitem approach on its own. It seems likely that we make use of ‘bottom-up’ skills more to fill
in missing gaps rather than as a general approach to comprehension word by word.
The alternative theory is that when we listen to a new dialogue, we start
processing the text using skills associated with a second theory (‘top-down’), i.e. making
use of what we already know to help us predict the structure and content of the text, and
getting a general overall impression of the message.
Task: Factors that help you listen
Imagine that you are going to listen to (and take part in) an important conversation
in a foreign language you half-know. You are, naturally, a little nervous. Will it be easier for
you to follow the dialogue if you:

have some idea what the topic being discussed will be?

know something about that topic?

know the typical sequence of exchanges that is used in a dialogue like this?

can predict issues likely to be raised?

are quickly able to get an overview of the general direction of the conversation?

know any general rules or guidelines for what can/can't be said in
conversations of this type?

understand the attitudes of the participants?

know some words/phrases that are commonly used in conversations of this type?
We think the answer to each of these is probably ‘yes’. We don't come to a new
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piece of listening completely from a 'zero' starting point. We bring our previous knowledge
to it, even before it's started. Making a good prediction of the content or the shape of a
listening text will definitely help us to make better sense of it when it happens. Rather than
having to start from scratch, the listening may fall neatly into an imagined framework we
have already set out for it. Of course, we can't be ready for everything, but anything that
we have correctly expected frees up our energy to pay attention to things that require
more intensive listening. This is summed up in Figure.
Task: Top-down and bottom-up
Do the following represent use of top-down or bottom-up strategies?
1. Before we start listening, we can already predict some possible words and
phrases that might be used because of our knowledge of lexical sets
associated with the topic.
2. We listen carefully to a recording a number of times so that we can find a word
we can't catch clearly.
3. When we don't clearly catch some of what people say, we hypothesize what we
have missed and reinstate what we think was there, based on our knowledge of
similar conversations.
4. We know the typical pattern some interactions follow (e.g. the typical sequence
of exchanges when ordering a taxi on the phone), and this helps us to
understand these when they are spoken.
Commentary
Strategy 2 is bottom-up. Strategies 1,3 and 4 are examples of top-down strategies, and
we do a lot more of this kind of processing that you might expect Using background
knowledge, prediction and 'filling-in' gaps are all important i listening skills.
Principles for Designing Listening Techniques3
3
H. Douglas Brown, Teaching by Principles: An Interactive Approach to Language Pedagogy, San
Francisco State University, 1994, p. 244-246
3
Several decades of research and practice in teaching listening comprehension
have yielded some practical principles for designing techniques that include aural
comprehension. These principles are summarized below. Some of them, especially the
first two, actually apply to any technique; the others are more germane to listening.
1. In an interactive, four-skills curriculum, make sure that you don't
overlook the importance of techniques that specifically develop listening
comprehension competence.
If your curriculum is strongly content-based, or otherwise dedicated to the
integration of skills, remember that each of the separate skills deserves special focus
in appropriate doses. It is easy to adopt a philosophy of just letting students
"experience" language without careful attention to component skills. Because aural
comprehension itself cannot be overtly "observed", teachers sometimes incorrectly
assume that the input provided in the classroom will always be converted into intake.
The creation of effective listening techniques requires studied attention to all the
principles of listening already summarized in this chapter.
2. Techniques should be intrinsically motivating.
Appeal to listener's personal interests and goals. Since background information
(schemata) is an important factor in listening, take into full account the experiences
and goals and abilities of your students as you design lessons. Also, remember
that the cultural background(s) of your students can be both facilitating and interfering
in the process of listening. Then, once a technique is launched, try to construct it in
such a way that students get caught up in the activity and feel self-propelled toward its
final objective.
3. Carefully consider the form of listeners' responses.
Comprehension itself is not externally observable. We cannot peer into a learner's
brain through a little window of some kind and empirically observe exactly what is
stored there after someone else has said something. We can only infer that certain
things have been comprehended through students' overt responses (verbal or
nonverbal) to speech. It is therefore important for teachers to design techniques in
such a way that students' responses indicate whether or not their comprehension has
been correct. Lund (1990) offers nine different ways that we can check listeners'
comprehension:

Doing-the listener responds physically to a command

Choosing-the listener selects from alternatives as pictures, objects, texts
4

Transferring-the listener draws a picture of what is heard

Answering-the listener answers questions about the message

Condensing-the listener outlines or takes notes on a lecture

Extending-the listener provides an ending to a story heard

Modeling-the listener orders a meal, for example, after listening to a model
order

Conversing-the listener engages in a conversation that indicates
appropriate processing of information.
4. Encourage the development of listening strategies.
Most foreign language students are simply not aware of how to listen. One of
your jobs is to equip them with listening strategies that extend well beyond the
classroom. Draw their attention to the value of such strategies as:

looking for keywords

looking for nonverbal cues to meaning

predicting a speaker's purpose by the context of the spoken
discourse

associating
information
with
one's
existing
cognitive
struc
ture (activating schemata)

guessing at meanings

seeking clarification
As you "teach learners how to learn" by helping them to develop their overall
strategic competence, strategies for effective listening can become a highly significant
part of their chances for successful learning.
5. Include both bottom-up and top-down listening techniques.
Speech processing theory distinguishes between two types of processing in both
listening and reading comprehension. Bottom-up processing proceeds from sounds to
words to grammatical relationships to lexical meanings, etc., to a final "message." Topdown processing is evoked from "a bank of prior knowledge and global expectations"
(Morley, 1991:87) and other background information that the listener brings to the text.
Bottom-up techniques typically focus on sounds, words, intonation, grammatical
structures, and other components of spoken language. Top-down techniques are more
concerned with the activation of schemata, with deriving meaning, with global
understanding, and with the interpretation of a text. It is important for learners to operate
from both directions since both can offer keys to determining the meaning of spoken
discourse. However, in a communicative, interactive context, you don't want to dwell too
5
heavily on the bottom-up, for to do so may hamper the development of a learner's allimportant automaticity in processing speech.
Developing Listening Skills
The aim of listening comprehension activities is to enable learners to understand
natural speech, according to their reasons for listening, whether in a face to face
situation or as listeners in a non-reciprocal situation, i.e. where they have no control
over the stream of speech.
Features of natural speech:
Spoken language differs in a number of respects from written language: there is
greater redundancy; it is more repetitious (a feature of interactional type speech in
particular); it contains more fillers; there is usually less cognitive content than in a
similar passage of written discourse (although there may be considerable interactive
and attitudinal content); the discourse is less structured, (e.g. discontinuous and
fragmented structures, changes of direction); cohesive devices are more difficult to
identify, there may be ungrammatical forms and unimportant words may be slurred or
dropped.
Difficulties may also be caused by such features as the rate of delivery,
unfamiliar rhythm and stress patterns, the number of speakers, different registers,
strong regional accents, poor articulation, overlapping speech, emotional speech and
background noise.
In order to develop the skills and strategies necessary to cope with natural
speech, learners need to be introduced to authentic or authentic-sounding texts on a
planned basis. Their confidence can be built up by a judicious choice of texts and
preparatory activities.
It is important that only short passages are played in the early stages and that
both the linguistic and cognitive content are appropriate to the learners' level. It is
helpful in these stages if speech is clear and not too fast, if the number of speakers is
limited, and if learners do not have to cope with too many new words and structures or
with a variety of accents.
These conditions can be met by the use of carefully prepared authentic-sounding
or 'semi-authentic' recordings made under controlled conditions which are an
increasingly popular feature of many recent elementary and intermediate level courses.
Where the focus in on teaching rather than on testing listening skills learners
should be allowed to hear the recording a number of times
Listening can be made
6
purposeful and may be guided by the provision of a variety of suitable activities (and not
simply multiple-choice, true/false and wh- questions). If skills are to be developed,
rather than simply tested, it is important that learners have regular opportunities to
evaluate both the text and the activities so that they learn to work out for themselves
where their listening problems occur and what might be done to help solve them.
Some Listening Activities4
A number of well-known activities arc illustrated as follows:
 Pre listening activities
 While-listening activities
 Post-listening activities
Pre-listening activities
Learners can be prepared for or oriented towards the text in various ways
Where appropriate they:

are told what type of text they are going to listen to so that their
knowledge of that particular type of discourse is activated, e.g. news
bulletin, interview with a famous person, buying something, etc.

are provided with any necessary background information about the text, e.g.
"This is in interview between .... They are talking about.... The speaker
presumes that listeners are aware of... Do you remember the incident in the
news last week ....?", etc.

may be advised that: the speech is fast, they won't understand everything at
the first listening, gist comprehension is adequate initially, they will
understand a little more each time they hear the text

hear a shortened, simplified or slower version before the text is played

study photographs or drawings which create certain expectations about the
speakers and events in the text

are given key vocabulary and expressions which occur in the text. They could
use these to imagine what the text is about or to create their own versions
which can then be compared with the recorded text.

discuss the theme of the text. This gives learners an opportunity to express
their own views, feelings and experiences both before and after listening to
the recording.

4
read a summary, (e.g. a series of jumbled sentences which they put in
Council of Europe, Communication in the modern language classroom, by Joe Sheils, 1993
7
what they in to be the correct order. They check this when listening to the
text)

read a short parallel text, (e.g. a newspaper article which corresponds to a
radio/T. V. news item)

complete a gapped transcript of the recorded text:
Example 1:
Learners are informed that they are going to listen to Bill and Susan making a
date on the phone. Their knowledge of such situations, i.e. their 'dating script' (from
their own experience or mediated through cinema, television, reading) leads them to
expect lo hear the voices of a man and a woman, one voice 'present' and the other
slightly distorted at heard through the earpiece of a telephone. They could try to
anticipate the discourse, v p. inviting, accepting an invitation, making a suggestion,
accepting or rejecting the suggestion and making an alternative proposal, arranging
time and place to meet, vocabulary relating to entertainment. Visuals would be
particularly helpful, creating expectations about sex, age, number of speakers, mood of
speakers, social background, location.
Learners are told that they w i l l listen to a text requiring understanding of
numbers where they are to write down the populations of the world's ten largest cities.
First, they write down their own predictions of what they imagine the population of each
of the ten cities to be Then, in groups of three or four, they share their predictions and
narrow them down to a single agreed set of numbers. Each group writes its predictions
on the board. Where the text is played or read out learners note the populations. These
figures are read back and compared with the predictions. The group with the greatest
number of correct predictions (or whose guesses are closest) is the winner.5
Example 2:
In the following example learners will listen to a news item dealing with the
enormous traffic jams which occur at the beginning and end of the summer holidays in
France. With the aid of a dictionary, they first classify the vocabulary as they wish | A].
They then try to find nouns in the word list which correspond to the adjectives listed in
IB). Finally, they add appropriate verbs to make sentences |C|. The same procedure
could be used as a post-listening activity instead.
The transcript of the news item is too lengthy to reproduce here, but essentially it
5
(Source. Kehe, 1) and P., 'Entering a Lesson through Predictions', Modern English
Teacher, Vol. 13, No. 3, Spring, 1986, Modern English Publications Ltd, pp.3-5.)
8
describes a number of huge traffic jams and offers advice to motorists.
Example 3:
Learners create a text from key words which they later compare with the recorded
text
-
learners are told they will hear a radio news bulletin report on a hold-up in a post
office in Campoleone and that they can later read a newspaper account of the same
incident
-
before listening or reading they make up their own account of what might
have happened from a list of words supplied
-
they then listen to the tape and compare their versions with that on tape
-
in a follow up phase they read the transcript of the radio account, correcting their
own story
-
finally, learners read the newspaper account for the fine detail.
While-listening activities
Some possible activities are summarised and illustrated below.
Summary:

questioning

recognising

matching

following instructions

note-taking

using a transcript

interpreting

completing
Questioning
o multiple choice
o true/false/don't know
o open-ended
Recognising
o recognise the type of text, e.g. interview, advertisement, sports commentary,
story ...
o recognise the context - who is speaking to whom, about what, where, when, i.e.
name and approximate age of speakers, how well they know one another
9
(formal,
neutral
or
casual
register),
their
attitude
(polite/impolite,
friendly/unfriendly), the topic, where they are (clues from background noises,
loudness of voices)
o recognise the general purpose of the interaction, e.g. seeking information, social
'chatting' (little or no information content)
o recognise specific speech intentions
o recognise selected items, e.g. key words, the number of times a particular
expression is used, all the proper names which occur
o recognise and appreciate the value of rhetorical features, e.g. ways of
encouraging someone to say more, repetition, fillers, formulae for introducing an
opinion, an explanation, emphasising.
A transcript of the text is helpful in a follow-up discussion on the role of these features.
Matching
o match dialogues, short narratives, descriptions with the correct pictures or
symbols; the focus may be on the literal content e.g. description of a picture, or
on interpretation, e.g. matching the expression of attitudes and feelings with
facial expressions and gestures
o rearrange a set of jumbled pictures, e.g. to match the sequence of events in a
story variation: a number of pictures which are not so obviously related to the
story are included. Learners choose the pictures that they associate with the
story and explain their choice to their partners. The extra pictures allow learners
to see different things in the story.
o match a spoken and written text, e.g. a news item in a radio/TV. broadcast with a
newspaper headline; statements with the names of speakers (who said what)
Following instructions
o mark directions on a map
o fill in details on an outline map (e.g. rivers, roads, buildings) or picture (e.g. draw
furniture in a room)
o modify a picture according to instructions, e.g. draw a moustache on
someone, colour in objects
variation: note any differences between a spoken description and a picture
of a person, place or object. The differences may simply be marked on the
picture or the picture may be modified to correspond to the spoken text.
o label objects or people in a picture
10
o
draw a picture or diagram (abstract pictures are obviously the most
difficult)
o
perform actions (miming a story; assembling: e.g. shapes or blocks,
arranging a set of pictures, etc.).
Note-taking
o
transfer information to a grid
o complete a form
o complete a flow chart (e.g. boxes with headings) so that the key points in a
sequence are noted in order (a story, recipe, assembling something,
following a procedure)
o write down a telephone message for someone who is absent
o take notes around key words or themes supplied in advance e.g. list words
referring to "sport", "violence", etc.; take notes on what the speaker says
about something or someone
o note the main points in a discussion,
o note how the speaker expresses opinions, attitudes, feelings
o study a paraphrase of what someone says, then listen carefully and note
what the person actually said variation: study the text of what a person is
thinking/preparing to say (e.g. illustrated in a thought bubble) and then
compare this with what he/she actually says)
Using a transcript
o mark pauses in an unpunctuated transcript of a spoken text (followed by
discussion of the role of pauses)
o listen to a text and underline slight differences which occur in the transcript of the
text
Interpreting
o a short uncontextualised and deliberately vague extract is played (e.g. part of a
dialogue or discussion) and learners infer who the speakers are, their
relationship, what they might be talking about, where they are (clues from
content, register, tone of voice, intonation, background noises). Extracts where
the literal meaning is different from the implied meaning lead to a greater variety
of interpretations and consequently to more discussion.
o listen to comments in a dialogue or interview and evaluate the speaker's attitude,
e.g. approving, disapproving. The text should not be too explicit and attention
can be directed to features such as tone of voice and intonation.
11
Completing
o aural cloze: insert missing words (gaps should not occur too frequently) and
nonsense words could be substituted to retain the natural rhythm of the speech;
as a help to learners the missing words could be supplied in a jumbled format
o complete unfinished utterances: the tape is stopped and learners predict the rest
of the utterance (several options could be supplied)
o "role-listening": learners listen to a dialogue in pairs, each listening in the role of
one of the speakers. The tape is stopped without warning and the learner
listening in the role of the next speaker continues the dialogue, predicting the
next utterance and addressing his/her partner. The tape is then played, the two
versions are compared and a discussion may follow on the appropriateness of
the learner's utterance to the context. The most effective dialogues are those
where the speakers have adopted standpoints and where the discourse has a
reasonably predictable pattern e.g. expression of an opinion followed by partial
or total disagreement and expression of an alternative opinion. The actual words
used are less important than predicting the type of speech intention. With video it
would be possible to use conversations with more than two people and the tape
could be stopped at any point as it would be clear who is speaking to whom.
o dialogue completion: learners hear only one of the speakers in a telephone
conversation and imagine what the other speaker might be saying
o complete an unfinished story, joke ...
o 'patchwork listening': the volume is turned down at various points and
learners try to guess the missing elements. On the first listening they note
whatever they can. On the next playing the volume is lowered at different
points so that learners can verify their guesses or revise them. The process
continues until learners have the gist of the complete text.
Post-listening Activities
Involve learners in a creative response to listening texts. Learners could:

propose a title for a text

create new texts

prepare questions and answers based on their interpretation of what
was said

describe their relations

discuss the attitude of the speakers using clues from what they said,
mood, attitude, voice, gestures, appearance.
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Listening Ideas
We suggest some ideas for more effective listening activities:
Jigsaw listening
No wonder this technique is a teachers' favourite. 6 You can run listening activity that
allow learners to work at their own speed, controlling the CD player or tape recorder
themselves and repeatedly playing parts of a text until they are really happy with their
understanding of it. It also involves a lot of message-oriented communication and
useful group co-operation.
Here's the basic idea:

Working in small groups, learners listen to separate small parts of a longer
recording, i.e. each group hears different things.

They then meet up, perhaps in pairs, threes or fours, with people from groups
that listened to other parts of the recording.

They report to each other on what they have heard and compare ideas and
reach a conclusion or consensus or complete some specific task. The task
might be simply to construct a full picture of the recording's contents.

To run a jigsaw task, a little technical preparation is required:

You'll usually need a separate CD player or tape recorder for each group to
listen on and the same number of separate recordings.

To make sure that students cannot accidentally hear parts of the recording
from other groups' sections, you might need to rerecord and edit some
recordings (if your course book doesn't offer ready-made materials).
Jigsaw task ideas
Three (or more) slightly different viewpoints of a single event, each on a separate
recording. The task is to work out what actually happened. Useful additional materials
might be a location map or diagram of a room. Example events:
6

witnesses of a crime

accident reports

finding where someone might have lost their purse

working out exactly who was at a meeting (‘I met Jay and Frieda ...’, etc.)

working out the sequence of events (what happened first, second, etc.)

a news story with additional (or varying) details in each separate section
Jim Scrivener, Learning Teaching, Macmillan Books for Teachers, 2007, p. 1181-184
13

a description of a place or people (to get the complete picture, students will
need to put together information from all sections), a party, an office, a factory
process

'diary' information from three people (e.g. when/where they are doing things);
the listening task could be to choose a time and place for a meeting.
The Tape Gallery
A variation on jigsaw listening. Find about ten interesting short jokes, stories,
advertisements or poems (not more than a minute long) and record yourself reading
them, each onto a different cassette or CD. Borrow two or three extra tape recorders/CD
players and place them at different locations around the room. Put two or three of your
cassettes/CDs next to each machine. Make sure learners know how to operate the
machines. Then invite learners to wander freely around the different places, changing
tape/CD or location at will, with the aim of choosing their favourite recording.
Make sure they play recordings softly and that they don't all gather round one
machine, but otherwise leave the control of the activity to them. Afterwards, get feedback
on what they enjoyed or learned.
Home recording
Many teachers have found that it's interesting and useful to make their own short
recordings for classroom use. This gives you the chance to offer listening topics directly
relevant to your course or of interest to your learners. A popular tactic is to 'interview' one
or two other teachers in the staff room.
When you ask colleagues if they can help, warn them how much time it might
require. It's often possible to do the whole process of briefing, rehearsal and recording in
about ten minutes.
You can have completely unscripted, improvised, ‘natural’ conversations, but it
often works better if you give your speaker (s) a briefing on:

what you want them to talk about;

any particular points that should be mentioned;

language items you would really like included (e.g. 'Please use lots of present
perfect!') or avoided (e.g. ‘Don't use the past progressive if you can help it’);

how fast and clearly you want them to speak (e.g. normal speed or slower?).
One useful strategy is to offer speakers a set of brief written notes - just the key
words - to help them remember the structure of the conversation.
Alternatively, you could fully script the text of recordings, so that the speakers just
read this aloud. It's usually worth doing one quick rehearsal or ‘read-through’ before
14
recording.
Making a home recording will take some of your time and it can be quite hard to
make a voice recording of good enough audio quality to stand up to playing in some
classrooms.
Live listening
One activity that has grown in popularity in recent years is ‘live listening’. The
basic idea is straightforward: students get to listen to real people speaking in class, rather
than to recordings. Here's a way of trying this:

When you find that your course book has a fairly dull listening text coming up,
instead of using the recording, invite a colleague with a spare five minutes to
come into your class.

Make sure the class has a clear task while listening, e.g. to note down the main
points that each speaker makes.

Sit in front of the learners and have a live ‘ordinary’ conversation on the same
topic as the book.
Though there is certainly a lot of value in getting a variety of visitors with different
vocal styles into your class, you can do live listenings on your own, too: reading or
improvising conversations in your own voice, or 'acting' a range of characters yourself.
The following activity could be done using a visitor or by yourself.
Guest stars
Prepare notes for a short monologue in character (e.g. as the Queen or Britney
Spears). In class, announce that a guest star is coming today, but don't say who is. Go out
of the room and return 'in character' (or invite another colleague in). The 'guest' then chats
naturally for a minute or two in character, about her life, a typical day, how she feels, etc.
The learners should listen and not shout out who they think it is, but instead write
down their guess. At the end of the monologue let them compare their guesses in small
groups (giving reasons) and then check with you. When they know who the guest is, they
could briefly ask a few more interview questions to the character. Repeat the activity with
different ‘guests’ as a regular slot in your lessons. (Maybe students could play the ‘guest’,
too.)
15
Developing Speaking Skills
Communication involves the use of 4 language skills:

listening and speaking in oral communication,

reading and writing in written communication.
The sender of the message uses speaking or writing skills to communicate ideas, the receiver uses
listening or reading skills to interpret the massage. The skills used by the sender are productive and
those used by the receiver are receptive (or interpretive).
The use of each skills demand various components of language substance. Each skill involves the
use of specific vehicles.
The goal in language teaching is an approximation of the native speaker’s knowledge of both
language substance and language skills. The highest level of proficiency within the speaking skills is an
approximation of the native speaker’s ability to produce meaningful utterance, within the listening skills to understand the text listened, within writing skills - to communicate through writing.
Learners usually attain a much higher level of proficiency in the receptive skills than in the
productive skills. Mastering the language skills, like mastering any kind of skill, requires a considerable
amount of practice. Step by step in the teaching-learning development process the learner should
become more proficient.
When we say a person knows the language, we first of all mean he understands the language
spoken and can speak himself. Language came into life as a means of communication. It exists and is
alive only through speech. When we speak about teaching a foreign language, we first of all have in mind
teaching it as a means of communication. Speech is a bilateral process. It includes hearing and speaking.
Speaking exists in two forms: dialogue and monologue.
Developing Oral Communication Skills
Developing oral communication skills attention should be concentrated on the following main
problems:

syllabus requirements

language and speech

physiological and linguistic characteristics of speech

ways of creating situations

prepared, unprepared and inner speech

types of exercises.
Oral communication has 2 types: productive-speaking and receptive-listening.
The syllabus requirements for developing oral communication are as follows:

to listen and understand the language spoken

to carry on a conversation and to speak a foreign language within the topics and linguistic
material the syllabus sets.
Oral language is a means of testing pupils’ comprehension when they read or hear a text.
Properly used oral language ensures pupils’ progress in language learning and, consequently,
arouses their interest in the subject.
16
Language and Speech.
Language refers to the linguistic system. It is a system of forms, which any speaker possesses. It
enables him to produce meaningful sentences.
Speech is the activity of using a language system for communicative purposes in real situation. We
should seek methods of teaching not language so much, as communication through the language.
Mastery of language depends not only on what the language is, but also on what the language is
for. That is for communication language system of forms is taught to help the learners to develop their
philological and logical thinking on the one hand and as a means of developing communication skills, on
the other. Both of them are equally important.
To get a better understanding of what speech is, the teachers should know psychological and
linguistic characteristics of speech.
Psychological Characteristics of Speech (oral lang.)

Speech must be motivated.
The speaker should have inner motivation, a desire, a necessity to say sth. to someone. Motive is
the factor, which incites a person’s will to do or say sth. When we speak we want either to say sth to
someone or get information from someone about sth. important. Pupils should have a necessity, desire to
express their thoughts and feelings, to inform the hearer of sth. Interesting, important or to get
information. from him. Their speech should be stimulated (by the teacher).

Speech is always addressed to an interlocutor.
We don’t speak when there is no one to address the speech. Teaching oral language pupils
should address, speak to someone, to their classmates, to the class, to the teacher. They should interact.
During English lesson the pupils very often don’t know where to look while they speak, they look
either at the ceiling or out of the window, because they don’t know whom their speech is addressed to.
This point is closely connected with motivation. When we have an inner necessity to say sth, we should
say it to someone. So the teacher should suggest: “Tell the class… Ask your friend… Tell me…”

Speech is always emotionally coloured for a speaker expresses his thoughts, his
feelings, his attitude what he says.
That’s why the pupils should be taught to use emotional means to express their feelings about what they
say.

Speech is always situational.
It takes place in a certain situation. There can be no speech out of situation. There can be no
speech out of situation. Situation is the integrity of circumstances in which the human beings are
motivated to develop speech activity. The main components of situations are: the speaker, the stimulus to
speech and the person to whom the speech is addressed.
Linguistic Characteristics of Speech.
Oral language. as compared to written language is more flexible. It is relatively free and is
characterized by some peculiarities in vocabulary and grammar. We don’t teach pupils colloquial English.
That’s why oral language taught in schools is close to written language standards and especially its
monologic forms.
17
Linguistic peculiarities of dialogue are as follows:
1. The use of incomplete sentences (ellipses) in response:
e.g. Where do you live? - In Yerevan. How many books do you have? – One.
2. The use of contracted forms: doesn’t. won’t, haven’t, can’t
3. The use of some abbreviations: lab, bike, math’s, fridge, comp, p.c. etc.
4. The use of conversational tags. These are the words the speaker uses when he wishes to
speak without saying anything:
e.g of course, perhaps, surely, etc.
Prepared and Unprepared speech
Pupils’ speech whether it is a monologue or dialogue may be of 2 kinds: prepared and unprepared.
When the pupils are given enough time to think over the content and form of his speech. it is
prepared speech. He can speak on the subject following the plan made either independently at home or
in class under the teacher’s supervision. His speech will be more or less correct and sufficiently fluent
since plenty of preliminary exercises had been done before.
When the pupil speaks without any previous preparation, his speech is unprepared and he can:

speak on a subject suggested by the teacher

speak on the text read (summarize or give content)

discuss problems touched upon in the text read or heard

help a “foreigner”, e.g. to find the way to some place.
Prepared and unprepared speech must be developed simultaneously from the very beginning. In
junior stage prepared speech takes the lead, while in senior stage unprepared speech should prevail. The
aim is teaching unprepared speech.
Principles for Designing Speaking Techniques
1.Techniques
language-based
should
focus
cover
on
the
spectrum
accuracy
to
of
learner
message-based
needs,
focus
from
on
interaction, meaning, and fluency 7.
When you do a jigsaw group technique, play a game, or discuss solutions to the environmental
crisis, make sure that your tasks include techniques designed to help students to perceive and use the
building blocks of language. At the same time, don't bore your students to death with lifeless,
repetitious drills. As already noted above, make any drilling you do as meaningful as possible.
2. Techniques should be intrinsically motivating.
Try at all times to appeal to students' ultimate goals and interests, to their need for knowledge,
for status, for achieving competence, autonomy, and for "being all that they can be." Even in those
techniques that don't send students into ecstasy, help them to see how the activity will benefit them.
Many times students don't know why we ask them to do certain activities.
Techniques should encourage the use of authentic language in meaningful contexts.
This theme has been played time and again in this book, but one more reminder shouldn't hurt! It is
7
H. Douglas Brown, Teaching by Principles: An Interactive Approach to Language Pedagogy, San
Francisco State University, 1994, p. 268.
18
not easy to keep coming up with meaningful interaction. We all succumb to the temptation to do, say,
disconnected little grammar exercises where we go around the room calling on students one by one to
pick the right answer. It takes energy and creativity to devise authentic contexts and meaningful
interaction, but with the help of quite a storehouse of teacher resource material now it can be done.
Even drills can be structured to provide a sense of authenticity.
4. Provide appropriate feedback and correction.
In most EFL situations, students are totally dependent on the teacher for useful linguistic feedback.
It is important that you take advantage of your knowledge of English to inject the kinds of corrective
feedback that are appropriate for the moment.
5. Capitalize on the natural link between speaking and listening.
Many interactive techniques that involve speaking will also of course include listening. Don't lose
out on opportunities to integrate these two skills. As you are perhaps focusing on speaking goals, listening
goals may naturally coincide, and the two skills can reinforce each other. Skills in producing language are
often initiated through comprehension.
6. Give students opportunities to initiate oral communication.
A good deal of typical classroom interaction is characterized by teacher initiation of language. We ask
questions, give directions, provide information, and students have been conditioned only to "speak when
spoken to." Part of oral communication competence is the ability to initiate conversations, to nominate
topics, to ask questions, to control conversations, and to change the subject. As you design and use
speaking techniques, ask yourself if you have allowed students to initiate language.
7. Encourage the development of speaking strategies.
The concept of strategic competence is one that few beginning language students are aware of.
They simply have not thought about developing their own personal strategies for accomplishing oral
communicative purposes. Your classroom can be one in which students become aware of, and
have a chance to practice such strategies as:

asking for clarification (What?)

asking someone to repeat something (Huh? Excuse me?)

using fillers (Uh, I mean, Well) in order to gain time to process

using conversation maintenance cues (Uh huh, Right, Yeah, Okay, Hm)

getting someone's attention (Hey, Say, So)

using paraphrases for structures one can't produc e

appealing for assistance from the interlocutor (to get a word or phrase, for
example)

using mime and nonverbal expressions to convey meaning.
Types of Classroom Speaking Performance 8
With the obvious connection between listening and speaking, six categories of oral performance
are expected to carry out in the classroom.
8
H. Douglas Brown, Teaching by Principles: An Interactive Approach to Language Pedagogy, San Francisco
State University, 1994, p. 266-268
19
1. Imitative
Imitation of this kind is carried out not for the purpose of meaningful interaction, but for focusing on
some particular element of language form.
A question that new teachers in the field always want to have answered is: Is drilling a legitimate
part of the communicative language classroom? The answer is a qualified yes. Drills offer students an
opportunity to listen and to orally repeat certain strings of language that may pose some linguistic difficultyeither phonological or grammatical.
Drills are to language teaching what the pitching machine is to baseball. They offer limited practice
through repetition. They allow one to focus on one element of language in a con trolled activity.
Here are some useful guidelines for successful drills:
 Keep them short (a few minutes of a class hour only).
 Keep them simple (preferably just one point at a time).
 Keep them "snappy".
 Make sure students know why they are doing the drill.
 Limit them to phonology or grammar points.
 Make sure they ultimately lead to communicative goals.
 Don't overuse them.
2. Intensive
Intensive speaking is designed to practice some phonological or grammatical aspect of language.
Intensive speaking can be self-initiated or it can even form part of some pair work activity, where learners
are "going over" certain forms of language.
3. Responsive
A good deal of student speech in the classroom is responsive: short replies to teacher or
student initiated questions or comments. These replies are usually sufficient and do not extend into
dialogues. Such speech can be meaningful and authentic:
T: How are you today?
S: Pretty good, thanks, and you?
T: What is the main idea in this essay?
S: The United Nations should have more authority.
S1 So, what did you write for question number one?
S2: Well, I wasn't sure, so I left it blank.
4. Transactional (dialogue)
Transactional language, carried out for the purpose of conveying or exchanging specific
information, is an extended form of responsive language. Conversations, for example, may have more of a
negotiate nature to them than merely responsive speech:
T: What is the main idea in this essay?
S: The United Nations should have more authority.
T: More authority than what?
S: Than it does right now.
T: What do you mean?
S: Well, for example, the UN should have the power to force a country like Iraq to
destroy its nuclear weapons.
20
T: You don't think the UN has that power now?
S: Obviously not. Iraq is still manufacturing nuclear bombs.
Such conversations could readily be part of group work activity as well.
5. Interpersonal (dialogue)
The other form of conversation is the interpersonal dialogue, carried out more for the purpose of
maintaining social relationships than for the transmission of facts and information. These conversations
are a little trickier for learners because they can involve some or all of the following factors:

a casual register

colloquial language

emotionally charged language

slang

ellipsis

sarcasm

a covert "agenda".
Teaching Speaking
There exist 2 forms of speaking: monologue and dialogue: Each form has its peculiarities, which
should be taken into consideration.
Monologue
Monologue is the speech of one person who expresses his thoughts and feelings in a particular
situation and shows his definite conclusion. Monologue is prepared speech. The speaker even may have
the plan of his speech. Of great importance are the speaker’s

logical pauses,

the speed of speech,

the gestures.
Pupils should be able to express their thoughts and feelings and attitude towards the fact in a
definite situation within topics and language substance the syllabus requires. The pupils’ speech should
be motivated, situational and addressed to someone.
In teaching monologue 3 stages are distinguished:
1.
The statement level.
The smallest speech unit is sentence. No speech is possible until pupils learn how to make up
sentences in the foreign language and how to make statements on the topic or situation suggested.
Pupils are given sentence patterns to assimilate. The sentence pattern is filled with different words,
so that pupil assimilates it,
e.g. I can see a … (blackboard picture)
I am fond of… (the pupils repeat + music)
A pattern must be repeated many times with a great variety of changes in its contents until the
pattern becomes a habit.
Eg. a) give it a name
e.g. We write with… - It is a pen.
b) say the opposite
e.g. I live in… - I don’t live in … .
21
2.
Having assimilated different sentence patterns the pupils should learn to combine
statements of various sentence patterns in a logical sequence – in an utterance. In the utterance
level the pupils are to say a few words about an object, a subject offered.
e.g. This is a pencil. The pencil is green. It is on the table. I like the pencil.
At this stage pupils learn to express their thoughts, attitude to what they say.
3.
The discourse level.
When pupils have acquired habits and skills in making statements and combining in a logical
sequence, free speech is possible. At this level pupils are asked to speak on a picture, film or comment
on a text they have read or heard, make up a story of their own. The teacher should supply the pupils
with “what to speak about.”
e.g. “The farmer’s treasure” … the teacher asks questions about the text and the pupils reproduce
the facts by means of agreeing with the suggested idea (thought or rejecting it (…fill the class what
happened with the sons of the farmer; your opinion about the treasure…) retell the text from diff.
characters’ point).
Dialogue
Dialogue is a conversation between 2 interlocutors. A dialogue can’t be prepared and planned. It is
always situational and emotionally coloured.
To carry on a dialogue pupils need words and phrases to start a conversation, to join it, to confirm,
to argue, to reject, to invite, to comment and so on:
I’d like to tell you; and what about; I hope; I mean to say; thank you; I’m sorry; don’t mention it;
good luck etc.- These phrases make dialogues more lively and emotional.
In teaching dialogue we should use pattern dialogues in 3 stages:
1.
receptive: pupils listen to the dialogue once or twice recorded or reproduced by the teacher,
then they read it silently for better understanding. The teacher helps them in comprehension of
the dialogue using pictures.
2.
reproduction: 3 kinds of reproduction must be underlined:

immediate – pupils listen to the dialogue imitating the speaker: attention should be
paid to pronunciation and intonation.

delayed – pupils enact the pattern dialogue in person. (listen the 2nd time before it)

modified – pupils enact the dialogue changing some element in it. The more
elements they change in the pattern the better they assimilate the structure of the
dialogue.
These first 2 patterns aim to store up the patterns in pupils’ memory for expressing themselves in
different situations.
3.
Constructive or creative: pupils are given a picture of situation and they make up their own
dialogues.
There is a great variety of dialogue structures. Here are main 4 lead-response units, which should
be taught in schools within the topic and linguistic material the syllabus requires:
1.
question-response
e.g. - What’s your name?
- Ann…
2.
statement- question
22
e.g. – I’m going to the theatre tonight.
- Where did you get the tickets?
3.
statement-statement
e.g. – I’d like to know when his going to come and see you.
- That’s difficult to say. He is promising but…
4.
question-question
e.g. – Will you help me?
- What shall I do?
Question-response dialogue is usually taught in schools. Above mentioned 4 lead-response units
should be taught and their peculiarities should be taken into account.
The use of dialogues in language teaching has a long tradition. 9 Stereotyped dialogues and
dialogues in unnatural language have been recently replaced by more natural dialogues, which illustrate
how sentences are combined for the purpose of communication in clearly defined (specific) social
context.
In dialogue activities not only accurate expression is important but also the appropriate use of
language forms in a specific social context. Therefore the interlocutors (learners) should take into
consideration:
o
who is speaking to whom,
o
about what,
o
for what purpose,
o
where and when.
It is also important to heighten learners’ awareness of how dialogue is structured, of ways of
opening, maintaining and classing a conversation, and of the strategies used by the speakers to negative
meaning so that their efforts at communication achieve the desired result.
The following examples illustrate some possible uses of dialogues:

Contextualized dialogues: these are useful for presenting the relationship between notions
and forms.
Learners listen to and study 2 short model dialogues. Their attention is drawn to the ways of
expressing the functions or notions. These are represented in new contexts and learners then make their
own dialogues guided by cues. (e.g. … talking about new things)
 Re-ordering carefully selected jumbled dialogues help to sensitise learners to the structure of
particular “scripts”. It also heightens their awareness of differences in (formal/informal) register where a
formal and an informal dialogue are.
Promoting Speaking Skills
Communicative language teaching concern with all the skills and their integrated usage. In
promoting speaking skills particular attention is paid on ways of developing speaking skills.
Teaching speaking not only linguistic competence, but also sociolinguistic, discourse, strategic,
socio-cultural and social competence should be developed as the components of communicative ability.
Speaking activities aim to develop the confidence, desire and ability to use the target language not only
9
Council of Europe, Communication in the modern language classroom, by Joe Sheils, 1993
23
accurately but also appropriately and effectively for the purpose of communication.
Errors and Corrections
It is important to set attainable objectives to have good results in learners’ achievements. This
requires a certain attitude particularly to errors and communication strategies for gaps in the learner’s
linguistic resources.
There are different viewpoints on error tolerance or correction. Some methodologists insist on
correctness to avoid the risk of fossilization of errors. Most insist on tolerance not to inhibit the learners to
attempt to communicate. it is important to know which kinds of errors to tolerant and when to do it. The
approach will depend on the type of error.
If errors interface with comprehension and lead to a breakdown in communication or to
misunderstanding, they will be corrected immediately, whereas less serious errors can be corrected at a
later stage. It is perfectly natural for learners to make mistake; a mistake in a language class can have a
positive influence on progress, the learners can learn from it. They should remember that there is no
stigma attached to making mistakes.
The teacher may not correct all the mistakes immediately or may correct you when you don’t
expect it, and correction will not only come from your teacher, sometimes you will be helped to spot and
correct your own mistakes; sometimes you will have opportunities to correct each other.
The use of communication strategies (Strategic Competence)is effective ways to compensate
for gaps in communicative ability.
Language is a tool of communication, yet none of us has such a perfect command of it, not even in
our native language, that we do not encounter communication problems. Communicating through a
language we may get stuck in a sentence constitution, use words that mean sth. else to our partner or we
may simply not know what to call sth. or formulate sth. We often say “I don’t know how to put it into
words” and not only in a foreign language, but also in our native tongue.
To overcome these difficulties there are a number of communication strategies:

Retracing (when getting stuck in a sentence structure: “Sorry, I’ll start again”)

Rephrasing (“Let me put it in a different way”)

Substitution:

o
by a general word (thing, person)
o
by a pronoun (this it, they, sth)
o
by a subordinate (“free” for an “oak-tree”, “meat” for “mutton”)
o
by a synonym (“discuss” for “debate”)
description by means of:
o
general physical properties (colour, size)
o
specific features (it has 4 legs)
o
interaction (functional characteristics)

demonstration (here, look at this…)

gesture, mime, sounds

appeal for assistance (Pardon? Will you say that again? What do you mean by
that? etc)
24
As a foreign language user, the communicator may have recourse to even more strategies:

transliteration

word creation (compounding and deviation)

mutilation (omitting inflectional suffixes, neglecting gender distinguish)

language swish (using native language elements - it sometimes works)
These strategies may lead to some errors. The learners should be made aware of the strategies
used in their native language, and how they might employ them in the target language. Activities
designed to practice strategies, in particular, paraphrasing, describing, rephrasing and substitution, help
to foster confidence in learners ability to communicate even with limited resources.
Organizing Communicative Activities
One virtual component of communicative ability is strategic competence, which requires suitable
classroom activities. The activities should be developed in situation where the learner must whish and be
able to engage in communication.
Real satisfaction and confidence are achieved through successful communication. So the learners
must be involved in tasks suited to their interest and linguistic development. and facilitated by the proper
game activities.
A variety of activities to promote the development of speaking skills: dialogues, role play,
simulation, the learner can speak personally in the classroom situation, to know each other better. They
exchange information, express feelings and values through interviews, surveys, games etc and this way
they become involved in discussions, story telling and different projects.
Here are examples of some popular general types of communicative activities. In every case, we
are primarily concerned with enabling and encouraging communication.

Picture difference tasks
In pairs, one student is given picture A, one picture B. Without looking at the other picture, they have to find
the differences (i.e. by describing the pictures to each other).

Group planning tasks
The first example is 'planning a holiday'. Collect together a number of advertisements or
brochures advertising a holiday. Explain to the students that they can all go on holiday together, but they
must all agree on where they want to go.
Divide the students into groups of three and give each group a selection of this material. Their task
is to plan a holiday for the whole group (within a fixed budget per person).
Allow them a good amount of time to read and select a holiday and then to prepare a presentation
in which they attempt to persuade the rest of the class that they should choose this holiday. When they are
ready, each group makes their presentation and the class discusses and chooses a holiday.
The second example is 'Survival'. Tell a 'lost in the forest' story. Make it dramatic (invent the
details). Include a disaster of some kind, e.g. minibus crashes miles from anywhere, injuries, etc. Give them
the map and the notes. Students must plan what they should do to have the best chance of survival.

List sequencing tasks (also known as 'Ranking tasks’)
Prepare a list of items that learners can discuss and place in a particular order according to
their opinions, e.g.
25

o
What's the most useful invention?
o
What's the best improvement that could be made to our town?
o
What are the worst programmes on TV?
o
Who's the most important person of the last 100 years?
o
What are the qualities of a good language course?
Pyramid discussion
A 'pyramid discussion' is an organizational technique that works particularly well with simple problem-
based discussions and especially with item-selection tasks, e.g. 'What are the four most useful things to have
with you if you are shipwrecked on a desert island?', or list sequencing tasks, e.g. 'Put these items in order of
importance'. Here's how to do it:
1. Introduce the problem, probably using a list on the board or on handouts.
2. Start
with
individual
reflection
-
learners
each
decide
what
they
think
now
discuss
and
that
there
might
be
a solution.
3. Combine
individuals
agreement
or
compromise
solution
to
make
compromise.
before
If
you
pairs,
you
move
who
demand
on
to
the
next
must
stage,
come
be
it
will
to
an
an
agreed
significantly
help to focus the task.
4. Combine the pairs to make fours; again, they need to reach an agreement.
5. Join each four with another four or - in a smaller class - with all the others.
6. When the whole class comes together, see if you can to reach one class solution.
What's the point of doing a discussion in this way? Well, most importantly, the technique gives
students time to practize speaking in smaller groups before facing the whole class. Even the weaker speakers
tend to find their confidence grows as the activity proceeds and they are able to rehearse and repeat
arguments that they have already tested on others. It also tends to lead to a much more exciting and well
argued whole-class discussion. The smaller groups are seedbeds for a variety of ideas and opinions; if we
jumped in the deep end with the whole-class stage, we would probably get silence or possibly just one or two
students dominating.

Puzzles and problems
There are many published books nowadays filled with logic puzzles and problems. Many of
these make interesting discussion tasks, maybe following a structure of
A. letting learners spend a little time individually considering the problem, then
26
B. bringing students together in a group to try and solve the puzzle together. Alternatively,
some puzzles work well with the same stage a), but then for stage b) having a full class
'mingle' (all learners walking around, meeting and talking), during which learners can
compare their solutions with others.
Role Play, Real Play and Simulation
The term role play is generally used to refer to a wide range of practice and communicative
activities. Some of the controlled or guided dialogues, especially cued dialogues, might be considered as
an introduction to role play These prepare learners to take part in role play activities which require
greater spontaneity and fluency.
Role play activities vary in the degree of control over how learners act and speak. The interaction
may be controlled by cues or guided by a description of a situation and a task to be accomplished. The
result may be very predictable or an open-ended scenario may allow learners to negotiate the outcome
in the course of the activity. Even fairly routine and seemingly predictable transactional types of role play
can be transformed by the introduction of an element of surprise which obliges learners to use various
strategies to cope with the unexpected development.
Role play requires learners to project themselves into an imaginary situation where they may play
themselves or where they may be required to play a character role. In some instances this is prescribed
in detail and at other times learners are free to create the role, which inevitably leads to greater
involvement in the activity. A situation or scenario may be realistic (e.g. coping with a problem in a
campsite, etc.). It may also be unrealistic for learners (You are a detective, explorer, etc.) or appeal to
their sense of fantasy (You are a caterpillar about to become a butterfly ....). All kinds of role play are
useful and it is essentially a question of maintaining a balance between realistic activities and other
imaginative and interesting situations which provide motivation, enjoyment and satisfaction in the hereand-now of the classroom.
Role play, then, is not simply a rehearsal for future real-life transactions. It is a means of going
beyond the valuable but necessarily limited discourse of classroom socialising and activities such as
surveys, games and discussions. It provides learners with opportunities to practise correct and
appropriate use of a wide range of functions, notions and structures in a variety of contexts
The ultimate aim of role play, as of all speaking activities, is to involve learners in fluent and
creative expression in a way which can and should be enjoyable. This, as always, requires a supportive
classroom atmosphere where learners are not afraid to 'have a go' and where the role play mask may
provide some relief, particularly for shyer learners, from the intensity of T'-centred activities.
Learners who are unfamiliar with pair or group work will need time to get used to these activities.
It is best to start with short, controlled or guided role plays and to supply detailed guidelines on how to
proceed. Where a role seems demanding it may be helpful if those with the same roles prepare together
beforehand, perhaps filling in a "character" card based on pictures of people cut from magazines. This
could contain details about the kind of role they are playing, taking into account some of the following
aspects: name, age, sex, occupation, physical appearance, personality, mood and attitude in the present
situation. Learners could also discuss what their character might say in the particular situation.
Pre-role play discussion is a valuable activity at all levels as learners are communicating about
real and immediate needs. They must, of course, gradually be given the means to conduct this
discussion in the target language and encouraged to do so as much as possible in both the pre-play and
27
post-play stages.
Learners who are familiar with role play may be introduced to simulation which is a more complex
activity, usually requiring greater preparation and organisation and more time to carry out. Simulations
may involve learners in imaginative activities, for example how to survive on a desert island in the face of
various dangers and difficulties, or, more realistically, in accomplishing a task such as preparing the front
page of a newspaper, a publicity campaign, or a radio/TV programme. Participants may also be placed in
a situation of conflict where teams take on roles to defend or oppose a proposal before a decision is
taken, e.g. whether or not to build a nuclear power plant, to abolish beauty contests, and so on.
Simulations - these have rules which constrain participants, requiring them to act in a realistic
manner in keeping with their roles.10
While they are often less flexible than role play activities and less convenient because they usually
require a lot of time.
Simulations usually involve a more complex structure and often larger groups (of 6 to 20) where the entire
group is working through an imaginary situation as a social unit, the object of which is to solve some specific
problem. A common genre of simulation game specifies that all members of the group are shipwrecked on
a "desert island." Each person has been assigned an occupation (doctor, carpenter, garbage collector,
etc.) and perhaps some other mitigating characteristics (a physical disability, an ex-convict, a prostitute,
etc.) Only a specified subset of the group can survive on the remaining food supply so the group must
decide who will live and who will die.
Both role play and simulation require careful planning-to ensure that they run smoothly, but the
greater proportion of time would be spent on the actual performance and post-play analysis, based on
recordings or observers' comments where possible.
Real play-A powerful variation on role-play is real-play. In this case, situations and one or more of the
characters are drawn not from cards, but from a participant's own life and world11. Typically, one of the learners
plays him/herself. This person explains a context (e.g. from his/her work life) to other learners, and then together
they recreate the situation in class. The real-play technique allows learners to practise language they need in
their own life. It is particularly useful for business and professional people.
Here is a brief description of a sample real-play activity:
In a Business English class, a receptionist at a company said that she found it difficult to deal with foreign
visitors who wanted to ask a question rather than just be directed to a person's office. She described a
recent time when this had happened and then real-played this with another student (who played her, while
she played the part of the visitor). She found it helpful to watch her colleague playing her own role, as he did
some things quite differently from her and used some interesting expressions. The teacher was also able to
suggest some ideas and language. Then they repeated the real-play (with her playing herself). She said
afterwards that she felt a little more confident about such situations.
Fluency, Accuracy and Communication
In spoken language the question we face as teachers is: How shall we prioritize the two clearly
important speaker goals of
10
Council of Europe, Communication in the modern language classroom, by Joe Sheils, 1993
11
Jim Scrivener, Learning Teaching, Macmillan Books for Teachers, 2007, p. 155-163
28

accurate (clear, articulate, grammatically and phonologically correct) language,

fluent (flowing, natural) language?
In the mid to late 70s, egged on by a somewhat short-lived anti-grammar approach, some teachers
turned away from accuracy issues in favour of providing a plethora of "natural" language activity in their
classrooms. The argument was, of course, that adult second language acquisition should simulate the
child's first language learning processes. Our classrooms must not become linguistics courses but rather
the locus of meaningful language involvement, or so the argument went.
Unfortunately, such classrooms so strongly emphasized the importance of fluency-with a concomitant
playing down of the bits and pieces of grammar and phonology-that many students managed to produce
fairly fluent but barely comprehensible language. Something was lacking.
It is now very clear that both fluency and accuracy are important goals to pursue in CLT. While
fluency may in many communicative language courses be an initial goal in language teaching, accuracy
is achieved to some extent by allowing students to focus on the elements of phonology, grammar, and
discourse in their spoken output.
If you were learning to play tennis instead of a second language, this same philosophy would
initially get you out on the tennis court to feel what it's like to hold a racquet, to hit the ball, to serve,
etc., and then have you focus more cognitively on certain fundamentals.
Fluency is probably best achieved by allowing the "stream" of speech to "flow."
Affective factors
One of the major obstacles learners have to overcome in learning to speak is the anxiety
generated over the risks of blurting things out that are wrong, stupid, or incomprehensible. Because of the
language ego that informs people that "you are what you speak," learners are reluctant to be judged by
hearers. Language learners can put a new twist on Mark Twain's quip that "it's better to keep your
mouth closed and have others think you are ignorant than to open it and remove all doubt." Our job as
teachers is to provide the kind of warm, embracing climate that encourages students to speak however
halting or broken those attempts may be.
The interaction effect
The greatest difficulty that learners have in learning to speak is not in the multiplicity of sounds,
words, phrases, and discourse forms that characterize any language, but rather in the interactive nature
of most communication. Conversations are collaborative as participants are engaged in a process of
negotiation of meaning. So, for the learner, the matter of what to say-a tremendous task, to be sure-is often
eclipsed by conventions of how to say things, when to speak, and other discourse constraints.
Imagine a switch inside your head - it swings between two settings: 'working mainly on accuracy' and
'working mainly on fluency'.
12
12
Jim Scrivener, Learning Teaching, Macmillan Books for Teachers, 2007, p. 160-163
29
Working mainly on
Figure : Accuracy/fluency switch
Certainly there are activities in which you are arguably working on both accuracy and fluency in
relatively equal measure, but many everyday language-teaching lesson stages are focused on one more than
the other, and at any one moment, in any one activity, it is likely that you will be aiming to focus on accuracy
rather than fluency, or fluency rather than accuracy.
There are times in class when a focus on accuracy - and therefore a greater use of instant correction
- may be appropriate.
There are other times when the focus is on fluency. At these times, instant correction may be less appropriate
and could interfere with the aims of the activity.
30
Running a fluency activity
If the main aim is to get the students to speak, then one way to achieve that would be for you to
reduce your own contributions. Probably the less you speak, the more space it will allow the students. It
could be useful to aim to say nothing while the activity is underway, and save any contributions for before
and after.
Scaffolding
‘Scaffolding’ refers to the way a competent language speaker helps a less competent one to
communicate by both encouraging and providing possible elements of the conversation. It is the way a
primary-school teacher might help a young child to communicate, or the way a chat-show host might draw out a
guest.
The listener offers support - like scaffolding round a building - to help the speaker create his own
spoken structure.
Scaffolding in class isn't a normal conversation in the sense that the teacher/listener is not aiming to
contribute any personal stories or opinions of her own; the aim of her own speaking is solely to help the speaker
tell his story.
Here are some notes on techniques that might be appropriate:
Scaffolding techniques

Showing interest and agreeing: nodding, ‘uh-huh’, eye contact, ‘yes’, etc.;

Concisely
asking
for
clarification
of
unclear
information,
e.g.
repeating
an
unclear word;

Encouragement
echo:
repeating
the
last
word
(perhaps
with
questioning
intonation) in order to encourage the speaker to continue;

Echoing
meaning:
picking
on
a
key
element
of
meaning
that
mainly
and
saying
it
back
to
the speaker;

Asking
conversation-oiling
questions
(ones
recap
already
stated
information), e.g. ‘Is it?’ ‘Do you?' 'Where was it?’ etc.;

Asking
brief
questions
(or
using
sentence
heads)
that
encourage
the
speaker
to
extend the story, e.g. ‘And then ...’ ‘He went...’ ‘She wanted ...’ etc.;

Unobtrusively
the
saying
correct
word
the
correct
makes
form
a
of
an
significant
incorrect
word
positive
(but
only
contribution
if
to
having
the
communication).
31

What Makes Speaking Difficult?
There ex some characteristics of spoken language that can make oral performance easy as well as,
in some cases, difficult.

Clustering
Fluent speech is phrasal, not word by word. Learners can organize their output both cognitively and
physically (in breath groups) through such clustering.

Redundancy

The speaker has an opportunity to make meaning clearer through the redundancy of
language. Learners can capitalize on this feature of spoken language.

Reduced forms

Contractions, elisions, reduced vowels, etc. all form special problems in teaching spoken
English. Students who don't learn colloquial contractions can sometimes' develop a stilted,
bookish quality of speaking that in turn stigmatizes them.

Performance variables
One of the advantages of spoken language is that the process of thinking as you speak allows you to
manifest a certain number of performance hesitations, pauses, backtracking, and corrections. You can
actually teach learners how to pause and hesitate. For example, in English our "thinking time" is not
silent, but rather we insert certain "fillers": uh, um, well, you know, I mean, like, etc. One of the most
salient differences between native and nonnative speakers of a language is in their hesitation
phenomena.

Colloquial language
Make sure your students are reasonably well acquainted with the words idioms and phrases of
colloquial language and that they get practice in producing these forms.

Rate of delivery
Another salient characteristic of fluency is rate of delivery. One of your 5 in teaching spoken English is
to help learners to achieve an acceptable speed along with other attributes of fluency.

Stress, rhythm, and intonation
This is the most important characteristic of English pronunciation. The stress-timed rhythm of
spoken English and its notion patterns convey important messages.
32
Teaching Reading
The written word surrounds us daily. It confuses us and enlightens us, it
depresses us and amuses us, it sickens us and heals us. At every turn, we who are
members of a literate society are dependent on twenty-some-odd letters and a handful
of other written symbols for significant, even life-and-death, matters in our lives. 13

How do we teach second language learners to master this written code?

What do we teach them?

What are the issues?
Reading is a receptive speech activity and one of communicative aims in
teaching-learning foreign languages. Reading ability will best be developed in
association with writing, listening, and speaking activity.
Pupils must be able to read and understand texts containing 4-6% unfamiliar
words without dictionary. They should be able to understand unfamiliar words guessing
form the context analyzing word-building elements and from the similarity with the
words in the Armenia, Russian or any other language they know. They should read and
understand texts containing 6-8% unfamiliar words with the help of a dictionary. The
learners should be trained if they ignore some unfamiliar words if they don’t prevent
them from understanding the gist of the text.
The aim of reading instruction is ultimately, as Kohonen states: "to enable
learners to read unfamiliar, authentic texts, without help, at appropriate speed, with
adequate understanding, for a variety of purposes".14
The autonomous reader is a flexible reader who applies a variety of reading
strategies depending on the reading purpose and who knows when his/her
comprehension is adequate for that purpose, whether skimming to get a general idea of
the text, scanning for specific points or reading for detailed comprehension.
The promotion of efficient reading can be assisted by suitable tasks which reflect
the interactive nature of reading and help learners to develop good reading strategies.
They should be made aware of those strategies which will help them to read efficiently
and to gain confidence in their ability to handle written texts on their own. This means
that readers must be willing to form hypotheses, make predictions, guess and keep on
reading when faced with uncertainty.
Learners should be made to be aware of how discourse is organised, and
13
H. Douglas Brown, Teaching by Principles: An Interactive Approach to Language Pedagogy, San
Francisco State University, 1994, p. 283
14
Council of Europe, Communication in the modern language classroom, by Joe Sheils, 1993, p. 81-130
33
encouraged to process the text in meaningful 'chunks' rather than word by word.
It is important to provide learners with opportunities to read complete texts rather
than only short extracts so that they can develop enough context to facilitate
comprehension and to become familiar with a writer's style. Graded readers can be
particularly helpful at the elementary/intermediate stages and guidelines for building up
a scheme of such readers are to be found in publications by Nutall and Hedge.
In order to become efficient readers, learners need to read extensively and to
enjoy their reading. Material should obviously be of interest to them and they should
have a say in choosing the texts.
As well as being a source of pleasure and information, written texts are also an
important means of presenting new vocabulary in context. It is not simply a question of
testing learners' receptive knowledge but, as Gairns and Redman stress, of devising
activities to activate and reinforce useful lexis from a text.
Strategies for Reading Comprehension
For most second language learners who are already literate in a previous language,
reading comprehension is primarily a matter of developing appropriate, efficient
comprehension strategies. Some strategies are related to bottom-up procedures and
others enhance the top-down processes. Following are ten such strategies, each of
which can be practically applied to our classroom techniques.
1. Identify the purpose in reading.
Efficient reading consists of clearly identifying the purpose in reading something.
By doing so, you know what you're looking for and can weed out potential distracting
information. Whenever you are teaching a reading technique, make sure students know
their purpose in reading something.
2. Use grapheme rules and patterns to aid in bottom-up decoding
(for beginning level learners).
At the beginning levels of learning English, one of the difficulties students
encounter in learning to read is making the correspondences between spoken and
written English. In many cases, learners have become acquainted with oral language
and have some difficulty learning English spelling conventions. They may need to be
given hints and explanations about certain English orthographic rules and peculiarities.
3. Use efficient silent reading techniques for relatively rapid com
prehension (for intermediate to advanced levels).
If you are teaching beginning level students, this particular strategy will not apply
34
because they are still struggling with the control of a limited vocabulary and grammatical
patterns. Your intermediate to advanced level students need not be speed readers, but
you can help them to increase efficiency by teaching a few silent reading rules:
 You don't need to "pronounce" each word to yourself.
 Try to visually perceive more than one word at a time,
preferably phrases.
 Unless a
word
is absolutely crucial to
global understanding,
skip over it and try to infer its meaning through its context.
4. Skimming
Perhaps the two most valuable reading strategies for learners as well as native
speakers are skimming and scanning. Skimming consists of quickly running one's eyes
across a whole text (an essay, article, or chapter, for example) to get the gist. Skimming
gives readers the advantage of being able to predict the purpose of the passage, the main
topic or message, and possibly some of the developing or supporting ideas. This gives
them a "head start" as they embark on more focused reading. You can train students to
skim passages by giving them, say, 30 seconds to look through a few pages of
material, have them close their books, and tell you what they learned.
5. Scanning
The second in the "most valuable" category is scanning, or quickly searching
for some particular piece or pieces of information in a text. Scanning exercises may
ask students to look for names or dates, to find a definition of a key concept, or to list a
certain number of supporting details. The purpose of scanning is to extract certain
specific information without reading through the whole text. For academic English,
scanning is absolutely essential. In vocational or general English, scanning is important
in dealing with genres like schedules, manuals, forms, etc.
6. Semantic mapping or clustering
The strategy of semantic mapping, or grouping ideas into meaningful clusters, helps
the reader to provide some order to the chaos. Making such semantic maps can be
done individually, but they make for a productive group work technique as students
collectively induce order and hierarchy to a passage. Early drafts of these maps can be
quite messy-which is perfectly acceptable.
7. Guessing
This is an extremely broad category. Learners can use guessing to their
advantage to:
35

guess the meaning of a word,

guess a grammatical relationship (e.g., a pronoun reference),

guess a discourse relationship,

infer implied meaning ("between the lines"),

guess about a cultural reference,

guess content messages.
8. Vocabulary analysis
One way for learners to make guessing pay off when they don't immediately
recognize a word is to analyze it in terms of what they know about it. Several
techniques are useful here:

look for prefixes (co-, inter-, un-, etc.) that may give clues

look for suffixes (-tion, -tive, -ally, etc.) that may indicate what part of
speech it is

look for roots that are familiar (e.g., intervening may be a word a stu
dent doesn't know, but recognizing that the root, ven comes from Latin "to
come" would yield the meaning "to come in between")

look for grammatical contexts that may signal information

look at the semantic context (topic) for clues.
9. Distinguish between literal and implied meanings.
Types of Classroom Reading Performance
Intensive and Extensive Reading 15
Reading is a complicated intellectual activity. It requires a number of mental
operations: analysis, synthesis, induction, deduction, comparison and conclusion.
Reading and writing are often called literacy skills. The teaching and learning of these
skills are closely connected with each other: one enforces the other.
There are 2 ways of reading
1. aloud or orally
2. silently
Variety of reading performance in the language classroom is derived more from
the variety of texts.
15
H. Douglas Brown, Teaching by Principles: An Interactive Approach to Language Pedagogy,
San Francisco State University, 1994, p. 297-298
36
Chart: Classroom Reading Performance
Intensive Reading
Silent reading may be subcategorized into intensive and extensive reading.
Intensive reading, analogous to intensive listening is usually a classroom-oriented
activity in which students focus on the linguistic or semantic details of a passage.
Intensive reading calls students' attention to grammatical forms, discourse markers,
and other surface structure details for the purpose of understanding literal meaning,
implications, rhetorical relationships, and the like.
Intensive reading also may be a totally content-related reading initiated because
of subject-matter difficulty. A complex cognitive concept may be "trapped" inside the
words of a sentence or paragraph, and a good reader will then very slowly and
methodically extract meaning therefrom.
A lot of classroom work (with coursebooks, exercises, texts) involves intensive reading, i.e.
reading texts closely and carefully with the intention of gaining an understanding of as much
detail as possible. This is often a stop/start kind of reading, involving going back over the
same (usually short) text a number of times to find more and more in it, making sure that the
words have been correctly interpreted.
Extensive Reading
Extensive reading is carried out to achieve a general understanding of a text. All
pleasure reading is extensive. Technical, scientific, and professional reading can (and
should) also be extensive. The latter, especially, sometimes involves skimming and
scanning as strategies for gaining the general sense of a text. At other times, perhaps
after students have done some pre-reading activity, skimmed for the gist, and scanned
for some key details, extensive reading is quite simply a relatively rapid and
efficient process of reading a text for global or general meaning.
In teaching a foreign language both ways should be developed, anyhow people
usually start learning to read orally.
Extensive reading activities
The following ideas are some slightly more unusual activities based around
37
interpreting and enjoying readers in class:

Don't always start at the beginning! Try jumping in at the middle and reading
one page. Predict what happened before, who the people are, where they are,
etc. Or use a contents page similarly.

Use a key section of the story as a dictation.

Create a situation quite separate from the story of the book and allow students
to improvise to see how the characters would behave in a totally different
environment or time.

Students draw the picture of the scene. When finished, they compare and
discuss their different interpretations.

Interviews: one student is a chat-show host or a newspaper reporter and
interviews another student in the role of a character. 'So why did you do that?'
’What do you really think about Joseph?’ etc. Or get all the characters together
and interview them. Similarly, put the characters 'on trial' in a courtroom: ‘Whose
fault was it?’

Map
the
story.
Draw
lines
on
it
to
show
different
characters'
movements. Or map out the relationships between characters. A good
classroom poster?

Keep a character's diary.

Review the book for a TV programme. Meet the author. Discuss, argue,

Would it make a good film? The students are the board of directors for a film
company. They need to decide whether the book is film material or not. How does
the story need to be changed? How can they make it more exciting? Who should
direct it? Who should play the parts? Make an advertisement poster for the film.

What did the front page of the local newspaper look like on the day when ...?

Choose a page or paragraph from the next chapter in the book and blank out
some words. Students need to guess what is going to happen by trying to find the
missing words.

Redesign the cover of the book. Write the .’blurb’ on the back cover.
Readers
‘Readers’ are books of stories (or other content) published specifically for
learners to get extended exposure to English. They often have their grammar and
vocabulary 'graded' to named levels (e.g. Elementary) so that learners at that level
38
should stand a reasonable chance of successfully reading them. Many state the size of
vocabulary used and have footnotes or glossaries of words outside their stated word
limit.
The main aim of readers is to provide opportunities for extensive reading for
pleasure.
As far as possible, let students read, enjoy and move on, rather than read and
then have to do lots of exercises afterwards. There are ideas for some creative extensive
reading activities at the end of this section.
Some Reading Activities
A number of popular activities are illustrated below:

Pre-reading activities

While-reading activities

Post-reading activities

Combining Activities
Pre-Reading Activities
Learners may be prepared for the text in various ways depending on the type of
text and the level of the learners.
Some possibilities:

Learners are encouraged to form certain expectations about the text based on
clues from accompanying pictures or photographs, the text type, layout,
headings and sub-headings.

Necessary or helpful background information is provided or recalled, e.g. What
do you know about...? Do you remember ...?

A shortened and/or simplified version of the text is provided.

Learners reorder a list of jumbled sentences or join up split sentences which
contain the main points from the text.

A broadly-similar type of text which introduces key vocabulary and expressions is
studied beforehand.

A listening text on the same topic is presented, e.g. a news item from the
radio or television is played before reading about the same event in a
newspaper article.

Learners first read a similar text in their mother tongue, e.g. a newspaper story
about a recent event and then read about the same event in an article from a
39
newspaper in the target language. The two versions are compared: attitude of
the journalist, facts, opinions.

A diagrammatic representation which summarises the text is studied and
discussed.

Learners study a few general questions on the text which activate what they
already know about the subject and suggest the kind of new information which
might be presented in the text.

Learners are given the theme of the text. In a brainstorming activity, they try
to anticipate some of the main points and offer their own ideas in a prereading
discussion. A few general questions may be supplied to guide the discussion

A number of statements are made about the theme. Learners are asked to say
whether they agree or disagree with them and to give their reasons. When
reading the text, they check to see whether or not the writer shares their views.

Key words are supplied and learners try to guess what the text might be about.
Several themes could be offered in a multiple-choice question. Activities may be
introduced which help them remember the words, for example classifying them
and justifying their choice of categories. They could use the words to create their
own versions of the text or simply try to put them in the order in which they will
appear in the text.

Learners write a story inspired by a photograph or headline in a newspaper or
magazine. They compare their stories with the one in the newspaper or
magazine.
While-Reading Activities
Summary:

deducing meaning

questioning

recognising

matching

ordering

following instructions

comparing

note-taking

completing

decision-making/problem-solving.
Deducing Meaning
40
It covers analogy, context, word formation, previous knowledge, etc. Learners
should be encouraged to draw on a range of strategies which enable them to
understand the gist of a text and to keep on reading even where there are words or
phrases which they do not understand at first.
It may be helpful if learners occasionally note the strategies they use, so that
they can later examine and evaluate them.
Questioning
The most popular question types found in course books are multiple choice,
true/false and "wh-" questions (e.g. who, what, when, where, why). Finally some
specific questions are listed which guide learners and encourage them to reflect when
reading different types of texts.
Multiple-choice questions
Multiple-choice questions may be used both to guide learners in understanding a
text and to test comprehension. They may provide a clue which helps learners to
understand (e.g. to infer the meaning of a word) where two out of three options are
easily discounted or they may focus their attention on an idea in the text which they
might not have noticed otherwise. In the case of questions where two or more answers
are possible, learners are obliged to think about the possibilities and could be asked to
discuss and justify their choice.
Multiple-choice questions may focus on what was actually said in a text or
require learners to think about the text. They may be concerned with a single word, an
expression, a sentence, a paragraph or the whole text.
True/false questions
As well as providing a useful quick check on comprehension, true/false questions
can also help learners to reflect on the text in the same way as multiple choice
questions except that the choice is more restricted. They take the form of statements
which learners identify as either right or wrong. Learners can be asked to correct a false
statement or to quote from the text to substantiate correct statements. It is also possible
to include some statements which cannot be confirmed from the text. This technique is
more suited to fairly general questions rather than to questions which focus on points of
detail.
Wh-questions
These may simply deal with facts in the text (e.g. Who said ...? What was the
girl's name?) or may be open-ended and allow learners to offer their own
interpretations of the text (e.g. Why do you think that N. ...? What do you think might
41
have happened that caused …? What would you have done if you had been N ? )
Open-ended questions of this kind can be particularly useful in a brainstorming session
where all learners' views are accepted and noted without comment. This type of
questioning facilitates not only individual interpretation of the text but also encourages
learner - learner interaction as they explain and justify their interpretations to one
another.
Encouraging learners to devise questions for one another
Although reading is an individual activity, it can readily be adapted to the
interactive nature of the communicative classroom. As well as pre-reading discussion
and follow-up activities such as role play, writing assignments, etc., learners can be
encouraged to ask one another questions on the text rather than simply responding to
questions asked by the teacher or set by the course book writer
As they cannot be expected to ask meaningful questions without some training,
the following procedure may be helpful at upper intermediate/advanced levels.
The "reciprocal questioning" technique aims to train learners to be independent
comprehenders by eliciting predicting and questioning skills. The procedure is
suitable for narrative material, especially where the story has a surprise ending.
Procedure:
o ask learners to make predictions from the title of the story
o write all the predictions on the board. For example, in a story called "Flowers"
possible responses might be: taking flowers to a sick friend, picking flowers, a family
named Flowers, having a garden.
o explain to learners that they are going to read only one sentence or paragraph at
a
time, that they can ask any questions they wish about that or preceding parts of the
text, and that they will then be asked questions
o a sentence or paragraph (in the case of a longer text) is revealed and time is
allowed for silent independent reading
o learners ask the teacher questions, then the teacher asks the learners. The
teacher
models good questioning techniques and may ask any of five types of questions,
using
the acronym FIVE.
F - factual questions i.e. those that are directly answered in the story, e.g.
"What was the girl's name?"
42
o I - inference questions, i.e. those where the learners have to think about the
story or make a guess if they are making predictions about a section not yet
read, e.g. "Why do you think the boys were afraid to go to the
cemetery?"
o V - vocabulary questions, i.e. those which reveal knowledge or lack of it about
the words in the story, e.g. "What does the word 'cemetery' mean?"
o E - experience questions, i.e. those that help learners draw on their own
background with the subject, e.g. "Have you ever had a sick friend?"16
Questions to guide learners
These questions can provide guidance to learners when reading various types of texts.
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charity, join an organisation or vote for a political candidate.
Newspaper Article
A newspaper article is a special kind of article, which usually reports on a recent
event in detail.
o What newspaper was the source of this article?
o What is the main topic of the article?
o Do you know anything about this topic?
o What is the topic of each paragraph? That is: into what subtopics is the main topic
divided?
o What are the details relevant to each subtopic?
o Could the details have been put in a different order?
Short Story / Novel
A short story is a type of fictional writing, which deals with one or two main
characters in a single situation and always includes some kind of conflict.
o What is the story about?
Does the title tell you what the story is about?
o Who are the main characters? Who is the main character?
What can you find out about them/him/her from the story?
Do the characters seem real to you?
16
Cooper, A, "Reciprocal Questioning: Teaching Students to Predict and Ask High Level
Questions", TESOL Newsletter, Vol.XX, No. 5, October, 1986, p. 9-10.
43
Who tells the story: a main character, a minor character or someone
outside the story?
o How many scenes does the story have?
Where do the scenes start and end?
Do the main characters appear in every scene?
Where does each scene take place?
o What is the conflict in the story?
o Do the main characters change because of the conflict?
o What does the dialogue tell you about the characters?
o How did you like the story?
Did it frighten you, make you laugh, bore you, surprise you?
Did it make you look at something about yourself or the world around you
in a different way?
Poem
A poem expresses the poet's feelings about an experience or idea, using
special forms and special language.
o What is the topic of the poem?
Is the topic expressed in the title?
What words and phrases in the poem express the title?
Does the poem tell a story? If so, what is the story?
o What experience is conveyed in the poem?
What words and phrases tell you something about the experience?
Have you ever had a similar experience?
o What feelings does the poem express?
What words and phrases in the poem express feelings?
Does the poem use concrete images to express feelings?
Have you ever had similar feelings?
o Can you find out anything from the poem about the person who had the experience?
When you read the poem aloud, do you notice anything special about the
language?
o What is the main idea of the poem?
Did you enjoy reading the poem?
Recognising
Recognizing:
 the purpose of a text, e.g. to greet, apologise, remind:
44

the type of text, (e.g. literary, journalistic, public notice)

the genre, (e.g. extract from a novel, short story, fairy tale)

the topic, (e.g. infer from title, headline or sub-titles)

the intended readers, (i.e. general public, specialists)

the purpose of the text, (e.g. to inform, amuse, persuade)

the paragraph which summarises the main information in the text

the main idea in each paragraph and distinguish this from supporting detail, (e.g.

key sentences are often the first and last sentences in a paragraph)

the tone of the text, (e.g. descriptive, satirical, ironical)

the relationship between the writer and addressee, (e.g. formal/informal letters)

specific functions within the text, (e.g. ways of expressing obligation, gratitude,
etc.)

quotes from the text, (e.g. Who said: " .........................................."? Where in the
text does it say: " ............................."?)

all the words relating to a particular theme in the text

cohesive devices: underlining connectives, (e.g. and, but, although, however);

relating reference words, (e.g. pronouns) to the words they refer to;

noting the different ways of referring to the same person, (e.g. man, robber,
criminal);

coherence in a passage, (e.g. removing sentences which do not relate to the
topic, (i.e. additional sentences inserted by the teacher), reordering a jumbled
text, transferring information to a chart)

grammatical features, e.g. underlining different tenses, adverbs, etc.
Matching
 matching statements of the main actions with the corresponding paragraphs:
o helps learners to see the structure of the text
 matching statements of the main ideas with the corresponding paragraphs:
o focuses attention on the main points in each paragraph (theories about
violence and aggressiveness)
o learners are required to study each theory in detail as the statements
are paraphrases and several statements may be associated with more
than one theory
Ordering
 jumbled paragraphs or sentences (some extra sentences which don't fit may be
 included)
45
 a jumbled sequence of pictures associated with the text, (e.g. story, recipe)
 a jumbled sequence of texts, (e.g. two writers in ongoing correspondence with
one
 another)
 two distinct texts which are jumbled and presented together, (e.g. two letters,
each
 written in a different register)
Ordering a jumbled text:
o they first reorder a jumbled summary of a story
This prepares them
for the next task of reordering the paragraphs which give a fuller
account of the events. They then suggest a title for the story variations.
o the story is supplied in the correct order, l-earners first read the story
and then reorder the jumbled summary.
or
o each sentence in the summary is put on a separate card.
The cards
are distribute at random, one per learner. They memorise their lines,
call them out and reconstruct the story in the correct order.
Separating and reordering two stories jumbled together
o Requires learners to pay attention to reference words
Reordering with the aid of questions.
Following Instructions

tracing a route or marking places on a map:

requires learners to show that they understand the key information

they study the page from the tourist guide and mark the direction of the
suggested sight-seeing route with arrows

responding with actions, (e.g. following written directions and tracing
these on a map; assembling something from instructions) following a
description of a complex process, (e.g. how something is constructed).
Comparing
Two texts where one text contains new or contradictory information, (e.g. articles
from two different newspapers on the same subject expressing different points of view
or providing conflicting or extra information)

comparing two s i m i l a r texts
o requires learners to analyse the purpose of each text and the attitude
of the writer
46
o focuses attention on the main information and encourages note taking
or highlighting so that ideas or information in each text can be
compared
o learners may be guided by a chart to be completed or by specific
questions which highlight similarities and differences in the two texts
Note-taking

noting information under specified headings in a chart or diagram

noting the main ideas, arguments for and against...

noting specific points

noting the way a particular idea or point is expressed
o focusing learners' attention on the way the text
is organised
o directing them to the main information
Completing
 expanding a short newspaper headline into a complete sentence

finishing an incomplete sentence or paragraph

putting the missing words or sentences in a gapped text

completing a map or diagram using information in the text

correcting mistakes or contradictions in a text

doing a crossword

completing a gapped text

correcting contradictions in a text

inserting punctuation in a text

filling in a questionnaire
Decision -Making/Problem- Solving
Learners study a text in order to make a decision or solve a problem. The
reading text serves as a stimulus for discussion:
e.g.
reading a travel brochure and choosing the most suitable holiday for
someone with particular interests solving a mystery or crime.
Post-Reading Activities
Learners react in a personal way to the text, relating it to their own opinions,
feelings and experience in activities which may involve discussion and the creation
of new texts. Reading texts also lend themselves to further exploitation for grammar
47
and vocabulary practice.
A few possibilities are summarised below and some of these are illustrated in the
examples which follow.
Some possibilities:
Learners could

express their views on the subject of the text and relate it to their own
experience and that of their classmates

discuss and justify their different interpretations of a text

create new texts, e.g. change a narrative into a drama, role play an interview
with a character in the text or with the writer, create a similar text modelled on
the one just read, undertake a project on the theme of the text, illustrate a
story or their feelings about a text (drawings or a collage of magazine
pictures), etc.

recreate the text, e.g. reconstruct it from key words, write a summary exploit
the text for grammar and vocabulary learning, e.g. rewrite in a different tense,
find verbs to correspond to selected adjectives or nouns, find synonyms and
antonyms for words, etc.
Example 1:
After reading the letter, learners discuss the problem and write a letter
offering their solution to it. This is followed by a discussion on the theme
(friendship).
Example 2:
Learners devise a role-play related to the theme of the text (peace) and
undertake project-work, e,g. make a collage, paint pictures, design a poster.
Example 3: Jigsaw reading
Learners are divided into groups (e.g. three or six groups depending
on class size). Each group reads a different text containing complementary and
perhaps contradictory information on the same subject. The groups read and
discuss their information, agreeing on the main points and taking notes.
New groups are then formed containing at least one learner from each of the
previous groups so that those who have studied different texts can now work
together, sharing and comparing their information. The pieces of the jigsaw are
fitted together, for example, by assembling all the information in a chart, so that
a conclusion can be reached or a decision made.
Cooperative attitudes are encouraged and motivation is increased as learners
48
must share information to complete the task. In this case reading, writing (notetaking) and speaking are integrated.
In the post-reading phase learners try to write their own story choosing
words (e.g. 3 nouns and 2 verbs) from the list.
Combining Activities
The following examples show how some of the different activities illustrated
above can be used with particular texts.
Example: a simple story
In the following example learners read a text from "The Rainbow
Reader".17 The text describes how little Peter fell seriously ill on a ship crossing
the Atlantic during a storm. His only hope was a breathing apparatus but there was
none on board. An emergency radio message resulted in a helicopter flying from
Britain with the life-saving apparatus but the storm made it impossible for the
helicopter to land on the ship. As the pilot was about to give up and return to base,
his radio-operator volunteered to go down the rope ladder with the apparatus in
spite of the enormous risk. After a hazardous descent, he jumped safely into the
arms of some crewmen and some minutes later little Peter was breathing oxygen
from the apparatus.
Exercises:
1)
recognising genre
2)
ordering the main ideas (using sub-titles)
3)
true/false and correction of false statements
4)
ordering a summary of the story (guidelines provided in LI)
5)
focus on language (underlining verbs in the past tense)
Exercises 1 and 2 focus on understanding the gist of the story, exercise 3 requires
learners to look more closely at the story and provides a comprehension check,
exercise 4 requires them to pay attention to discourse markers and exercise 5 could be
followed by an analysis of language forms.
Example: a newspaper article
The article deals with the Hungerford massacre where a gunman went on the
rampage indiscriminately shooting and killin g a number of people in a town in
England
17
Klett Verlag, Kasy Stories, series, Stuttgart, 1979.
49
Pre-reading phase:
A.
Learners recall their knowledge of the event which was widely reported at the
time, i.e. his name, what he did and the consequences
B
They create short sentences using the words supplied These refer to some of the
types of people and places involved.
C.
They suggest what happened, to whom, where, how, e.g. a young woman was
killed in her garden by a rifle shot.
While-reading phase:
D.
Learners repeat exercise C. but this time using the information in the article.
E.
They refer to the text to complete the grid which summarises the information on
the gunman: name, age, single/married, dress, home, weapons, gun licence,
trapped, before dying, the end of the episode. They then complete a grid on the
victims, giving their ages and what they were doing before they were shot.
F.
Learners draw up a list of all the words in the article which relate to fire arms.
Post-reading phase:
G.
Without the aid of the text, learners complete the gaps and reorder the jumbled
sentences.
H.
I.
They use the new vocabulary to describe other similar events.
They complete a gapped text on the event (this is not illustrated below).
Note:
It is not suggested that learners complete all of these activities. They are offered as
some options from which learners and teachers can choose.
Principles for Designing Interactive Reading Techniques 18
1. In an interactive curriculum, make sure that you don't over look the
importance of specific instruction in reading skills.
ESL students who are literate in their own language sometimes are "left to their
own devices" when it comes to teaching them reading skills. We like to assume that they
will simply learn good reading by absorption.
It is important to make sure that students have ample time for extensive reading.
18
H. Douglas Brown, Teaching by Principles: An Interactive Approach to Language Pedagogy,
San Francisco State University, 1994, p. 299-300
50
Sustained silent reading allows students to develop a sense of fluency. Also, silent
reading then becomes an excellent method for self-instruction on the part of the learner.
2. Techniques should be intrinsically motivating.
One very popular and intrinsically motivating approach to reading instruction
is called the Language Experience Approach (LEA). Developed initially for use in native
language instruction of children, the LEA has now found its way into numerous ESL
classes for both children and adults.
The essence of this approach lies in students' self-generation of reading material.
Instead of being handed some standard textbook, they create their own.
3. Techniques should utilize authentic language and contexts.
By now, the importance of authentic language should be more than clear to you!
But in teaching reading, one issue that has invited a bit of controversy is the advisability
of what are called "simplified texts," in which an otherwise authentic text is edited to
keep language within the proficiency level of a set of students. In order for you to make
a decision on this issue, it is important
o to distinguish between simple texts and simplified texts,
o to understand sources of complexity in reading material.
4. Encourage the development of reading strategies.
5. Include both bottom-up and top-down techniques.
In our craze for communicative, authentic language activity in the classroom,
sometimes we forget that learners can indeed benefit from studying the fundamentals.
Make sure that you give enough classroom time to focusing on the building blocks of
written language- geared appropriately for each level.
6. Consider subdividing your techniques into pre-reading, duringreading, and after-reading phases.
7. Build in some evaluative aspect to your techniques.
It is as important in reading as it is in listening to be able to accurat ely assess
students' comprehension and development of skills.
51
Teaching Writing
The aim of this lecture

To think about writing as a skill

To reflect upon types and mechanisms of writing

To draw on activities for teaching to write
Statements that can be marked as “true”, “false” or “debatable” (TFD) 19
Statements
TFD
1. Writing is a process of ENCODING ideas on paper.
2. Writing CLARIFIES ideas born in mind
3. The PURPOSE of writing is to store information.
4. Writing can ADEQUATELY convey the message.
5. Writing is the same as speaking but IN LETTERS
6. Writing requires the knowledge of a written text FORMAT
7. Writing is done with the READER in mind
Writing as a communicative skill
Writing is a communicative skill to send, store and retrieve messages with the
help of written symbols. History of writing is very long. Writing originated in
Mesopotamia and Egypt, pre-Columbian America, possibly in India. The earliest
evidence of writing is cuneiform script from Mesopotamia at 3500 BC. Recent findings
prove that "trident-shaped" markings on pottery existed in Pakistan in 5500 BC. There
were six early systems of visual graphic language representations that contributed to
the development of writing systems: ritualistic markings found in caves, tallying devices
to keep count, property markings indicating owners, tokens and totems as symbols of
clans, mnemonic devices to keep memory of things, pictographic/ideograph narratives.
Modern writing systems are different and they include graphic
representations of
morphemes and words (Chinese), graphic representations of syllables (Hebrew),
alphabetic representations of phonemes (English, Russian etc)
Approach
Writing in the foreign language classroom can be an especially enjoyable and
meaningful activity for learners than some more artificial speaking activities. Good
writing tasks not only provide useful language practice but also stimulate learners to
express themselves in a creative and personal manner as they communicate their own
ideas, experience and feelings.
19
Millrood R. 2001, Teaching to Write, Modular Course in ELT Methodology
52
Learners do not simply write texts so that the teacher can correct their mistakes.
Writing is a purposeful and meaningful activity where they write in order to communicate
with a particular reader, readers, each other as well as with the teacher and, of course,
members of the target language community (pen pals, youth hostel manager, etc.).
Writing is not simply a transcription of the spoken word and, unlike oral
communication, writers have no way of checking how well they are being understood.
There are no paralinguistic elements to help as in face-to-face communication and the
kinds of digression, rephrasing, repetition, pronunciation or grammar 'mistakes', etc.
which are typical of speech are not acceptable in writing. Spelling and grammar
mistakes are more obvious and lack of coherence and cohesion can lead to a failure to
communicate or make intolerable demands on the reader.
Writing has to be better organised and more precise than speech and this is
expected of the writer who has time to reflect, restructure and reformulate, unlike the
speaker who communicates under the pressure of instant communication in real time.
Good writing is a skill which needs to be developed and supported. Extensive
reading (and listening) are an important source of input. It is only through writing,
however, that writing skills are developed and regular opportunities for practice and free
expression are essential.
Practice writing may be controlled or guided, for example by a model text to
imitate, a matrix to follow, key points to expand, etc. and useful language material may
be supplied. In freer activities, learners have greater responsibility for content and
organisation and little or no language assistance is provided.
It is also possible to begin with the free writing stage where learners use
whatever resources they have (their linguistic and strategic competence in particular) to
produce text. This exploratory text is then compared wi t h a model text or other suitable
text. Evaluation and feedback are not concerned exclusively with form but also with
content and organisation.
Writing is thus viewed as a process where learners experiment as they reflect,
plan, discuss, draft, write and edit their own text. Mistakes are an inevitable part of the
first stage of this process and an indication that learning is taking place as learners
exploit and extend their developing competence.
Whatever approach is preferred at any particular stage, writing can retain an
interactive dimension if learners are encouraged to work in small groups where they can
first discuss the task, share ideas, formulate sentences and then draft their texts
individually or collectively (e.g. before replying to a letter they discuss possible content,
53
organisation and expressions).
Trends in the teaching of writing in ESL and other foreign languages
have, not surprisingly, coincided with those of teaching of other skills, espe
cially listening and speaking20.
Characteristics of Written Language
1. Permanence
Once something is written down and delivered in its final form to its intended
audience, the writer abdicates a certain power: power to emend, to clarify, to
withdraw. Student writers often feel that the act of releasing a written work to an
instructor is not unlike putting yourself in front of a firing, squad. Therefore, whatever
you can do as a teacher and guide and facilitator to help your students to revise and
refine their work before final submission will help to give them confidence in their work.
2. Production time
The good news is that, given appropriate stretches of time, a writer can indeed
become a "good" writer by developing efficient processes for achieving the final
product. The bad news is that many educational contexts demand student writing
within time limits, or "writing for display".
So, one of your goals, especially if you are teaching in an EAP context, would be to
train your students to make the best possible use of such time limitations. This may
mean sacrificing some process time, but with sufficient training in process writing,
combined with practice in display writing, you can help your students to deal with time
limitations.
3. Distance
One of the thorniest problems writers face is anticipating their audience. That
anticipation ranges from general audience characteristics to how specific words and
phrases and sentences and paragraphs are going to be interpreted. The distance factor
requires what I have called cognitive empathy, in that good writers can "read" their own
writing from the perspective of the mind of the targeted audience. Writers need to be able
to predict the audience's general knowledge, cultural and literary schemata, specific
subject-matter knowledge, and very importantly, how their choice of language will be
interpreted.
4. Orthography
Everything from simple greetings to extremely complex ideas are captured through
20
H. Douglas Brown, Teaching by Principles: An Interactive Approach to Language Pedagogy, San
Francisco State University, 1994, p.319, 325-327
54
the manipulation of a few dozen letters and; other written symbols. Sometimes we take
for granted the mastering of the mechanics of English writing by our students. If
students are non-literate in the native language, you must begin at the very beginning
with fundamentals of reading and writing. For literate students, if their native language
system is not alphabetic, new symbols have to be produced by hands that may have
gotten too accustomed to another system. If the native language has a different
phoneme-grapheme system, then some attention is due here.
5. Complexity
Writers must learn how to remove redundancy, how to combine sentences, how to
make references to other elements in a text, how to create syntactic and lexical variety,
and much more.
6. Vocabulary
Writing places a heavier demand on vocabulary use than does speaking. Good
writers will learn to take advantage of the richness of English vocabulary.
7. Formality
Whether a student is filling out a questionnaire or writing a full-blown essay, the
conventions of each form must be followed. For ESL students, the most difficult and
complex conventions occur in academic writing where students have to learn how to
describe, explain, compare, contrast, illustrate, defend, criticize, and argue.
Microskills for Writing
Microskills for writing production can be enumerated as follows:
 Produce graphemes and orthographic patterns of English.
 Produce writing at an efficient rate of speed to suit the purpose.
 Produce an acceptable core of words and use appropriate word order
patterns.
 Use acceptable grammatical systems (e.g., tense, agreement, pluraliza tion), patterns, and rules.
 Express a particular meaning in different grammatical forms.
 Use cohesive devices in written discourse.
 Use the rhetorical forms and conventions of written discourse.
 Appropriately accomplish the communicative functions of written texts
according to form and purpose.
 Convey links and connections between events and communicate such
relations as main idea, supporting idea, new information, given informa
tion, generalization, and exemplification.
55
 Distinguish between literal and implied meanings when writing.
 Correctly convey culturally specific references in the context of the
written text.
 Develop and use a battery of writing strategies, such as accurately assess
ing the audience's interpretation, using pre-writing devices, writing with
fluency in the first drafts, using paraphrases and synonyms, soliciting
peer and instructor feedback, and using feedback for revising and
editing.
Principles for Designing Writing Techniques
Out of all characteristics of the written word, along with microskills and
research issues, a number of specific principles for designing writing techniques
emerge.
1. Incorporate practices of "good" writers
This first guideline is sweeping. But as you contemplate devising a technique that
has a writing goal in it, consider the various things that efficient writers do, and see if
your technique includes some of these practices. For example, good writers:

focus on a goal or main idea in writing

perceptively gauge their audience

spend some time (but not too much) planning to write

easily let their first ideas flow onto the paper

follow a general organizational plan as they write

solicit and utilize feedback on their writing

are not wedded to certain surface structures

revise their work willingly and efficiently

patiently make as many revisions as needed.
2. Balance process and product
In the first section of this chapter, a good deal was said about the process
approach. Make sure that the application of the process principle does not detract
from a careful focus on the product as well.
3. Account for cultural/literary backgrounds
Make sure that your techniques do not assume that your students know English
rhetorical conventions. If there are some apparent contrasts between students' native
traditions and those that you are trying to teach, try to help students to understand
what it is, exactly, that they are accustomed to and then by degrees perhaps, bring
them to the use of acceptable English rhetoric.
56
4. Connect reading and writing
Clearly, students learn to write in part by carefully observing what is already
written. That is, they learn by observing, or reading, the written word. By reading and
studying a variety of relevant types of text, students can gain important insights both
about how they should write and about subject matter that may become the topic of
their writing.
5. Provide as much authentic writing as possible
Whether writing is real writing or for display, it can still be authentic in that the
purposes for writing are clear to the students, the audience is specified overtly, and
that there is at least some intent to convey meaning. Writing that is shared with other
students in the class is one way to add authenticity. Publishing a class newsletter,
writing letters to people outside of class, writing a script for a skit or dramatic
presentation, writing a resume, writing advertisements-all these can be seen as
authentic writing.
6. Frame your techniques in terms of prewriting, drafting, and revising
stages.
Process writing approaches tend to be framed in three stages of writing. The
prewriting stage encourages the generation of ideas, which can h appen in
numerous ways:
1. reading (extensively) a passage
2. skimming and/or scanning a passage
3. conducting some outside research
4. brainstorming (see below)
5. listing (in writing-individually)
6. clustering (begin with a keyword, then add other words,
using free association)
7. discussing a topic or question
8. instructor-initiated questions and probes
9.
freewriting.
Types of Classroom Writing Performance
While various genres of written texts abound, classroom writing performance is, by
comparison, limited.
Let’s consider the following five major categories of classroom writing
performance:
57
1. Imitative, or, writing down
At the beginning level of learning to write, students will simply "write down"
English letters, words, and possibly sentences in order to learn the conventions of the
orthographic code. Some forms of dictation fall into this category although dictations
can serve to teach and test higher order processing as well. Dictations typically involve
the following steps:

Teacher reads a short paragraph once or twice at normal speed.

Teacher reads the paragraph in short phrase units of three or four
words each, and each unit is followed by a pause.

During the pause, students write exactly what they hear.

Teacher then reads the whole paragraph once more at normal speed
so students can check their writing.

Scoring of students' written work can utilize a number of rubrics for
assigning points. Usually spelling and punctuation errors are not considered
as severe as grammatical errors.
2. Intensive or controlled
Writing is sometimes used as a production mode for learning, reinforcing, or
testing grammatical concepts. This intensive writing typically appears in controlled,
written grammar exercises. This type of writing would not allow much, if any, creativity
on the part of the writer.
A common form of controlled writing is to present a paragraph to students in which
they have to alter a given structure throughout. So, for example, they may be asked to
change all present tense verbs to past; in such a case, students may need to alter
other time references in the paragraph.
Guided writing loosens the teacher's control but still offers a series of stimulators.
For example, the teacher might get students to tell a story just viewed on a video tape
by asking them a series of questions: Where does the story take place? Describe the
principal character. What does he say to the woman in the car?...
Yet another form of controlled writing is a dicto-comp. Here, a paragraph is read at
normal speed; then the teacher puts key words from the paragraph, in sequence, on the
blackboard and asks students to rewrite the paragraph from the best of their
recollection of the reading, using the words on the board.
3. Self-writing
A significant proportion of classroom writing may be devoted to self-writing, or
writing with only the self in mind as an audience. The most salient instance of this
58
category in classrooms is notetaking, where students take notes during a lecture for
the purpose of later recall. Other notetaking may be done in the margins of books and
on odd scraps of paper.
Diary or journal writing also falls into this category. However, in recent years more
and more dialogue journal writing takes place, where students write thoughts, feelings,
and reactions in a journal and an instructor reads and responds, in which case the
journal, while ostensibly written for oneself, has two audiences.
4. Display writing
It was already noted earlier that writing within the school curricular con text is
a way of life. For all language students, short answer exercises, essay
examinations, and even research reports will involve an element of display. For
academically bound ESL students, one of the academic skills that they need to
master is a whole array of display writing techniques.
5. Real writing
While virtually every classroom writing task will have an element of display
writing in it, nevertheless some classroom writing aims at the genuine
communication of messages to an audience in need of those messages. The two
categories of real and display writing are actually two ends of a continuum, and in
between the two extremes lie some practical instances of a combination of display
writing and real. Three subcategories illustrate how reality can be injected:
 Academic. The Language Experience Approach gives groups of stu
dents opportunities to convey genuine information to each other.
Content-based
instruction
encourages
the
exchange
of
useful
information, and some of this learning uses the written word. Group
problem-solving tasks, especially those that relate to current issues and
other personally relevant topics, may have a writing component in which
information is genuinely sought and conveyed. Peer-editing work adds
to what would otherwise be an audience of one (the instructor) and
provides real writing opportunity. In certain ESP and EAP courses,
students may exchange new information with each other and with the
instructor.
 Vocational/technical. Quite a variety of real writing can take place in
classes of students studying English for advancement in t heir
occupation. Real letters can be written; genuine directions for some
operation or assembly might be given; and actual forms can be filled
59
out. These possibilities are even greater in what has come to be called
"English in the Workplace" where ESL is offered within companies and
corporations.
 Personal. In virtually any ESL class, diaries, letters, post cards, notes,
personal messages, and other informal writing can take place,
especially within the context of an interactive classroom. While certain
tasks may be somewhat contrived, nevertheless the genuine exchange
of information can happen.
Some Practice Activities21
Summary

Sentences

Short reports and descriptions

Linking words

Text completion

Flowcharts

Pictures
Sentences
o
The words could be cut out and rearranged physically before being written as
sentences.
o
Jumbled sentences
o
The sentences form a cohesive text
o
Jumbling the sentences and asking learners to reorder them draws their attention
to reference words
o Expanding a sentence draws attention to word order in a challenging and
creative way.
Short reports and descriptions
These usually follow on from a speaking, listening or reading activity and so lead
to an integration of skills, e g speak/listen, take notes and use your notes to write a
report It is helpful to provide a model of the writing task
Learner:
(a)
read the report and transfer the information to the grid
(b)
then carry out their own group interviews and complete a sim ila r grid
finally write a report using the model report in (a).
21
Council of Europe, Communication in the modern language classroom, by Joe Sheils, 1993, p. 220-258
60
Before the report is written, a grammar phase could focus on the forms necessary
for the report, e.g. singular and plural forms, pronouns, possession.
Learners:
o Interview one another in groups using the discourse chain as a guide
o Take notes in a grid
o Each group reports its information to the class and learners then write a class
report with the aid of some key phrases
Linking words
Learners need specific practice in using linking words to ensure that their texts
are not a disjointed series of short sentences
o sequencers
o joining short sentences to form longer and more complex sentences
o drawing learners' attention to sequencers
o after studying the model text, they write a similar text about their
own day. Learners then complete a gapped text and put in the
sequencers.
Text Completion
The content may be tightly controlled or simply guided by key words
Learners first expand notes into sentences.
o In a chain game learners are free to complete the text as they wish within
the constraints imposed by the framework. Each learner completes a
sentence, folds the sheet and passes it on to his or her neighbour.
o Learners complete a series of sentences about themselves. They are free to
choose the content within certain limits imposed by the structure of the text.
A series of ’’Wh’’ question words guided learners (Who? Where?, What?,
o
When?, Why?) they freely complete the blanks to create a meaningful text.
Flow charts
A flow chart provides language material as well as guidance on content and organization.
Writing may be completely controlled or guided.
o The language is provided. Learners simply transform present to past tense and choose
different options at various points,
o Learners first read several newspaper reports and compare the reports
61
o They then sum up what happened using the chart given, which shows the order of events.
Link words are provided
o In a freer writing activity, learners write a group report on an incident of their choice,
having first made notes in a flow chart to show the sequence of events
Pictures
Pictures can be exploited to develop discussion and information-sharing activities leading to
collective writing
o in small groups learners re-order a series of jumbled pictures and write a story which
they first prepare orally. One or two pictures may be missing and they imagine what
happened.
o learner A writes a description of a picture or diagram. Learner B then reproduces this
with the aid of the written description.
o learners work in groups (e.g. six if there are six pictures)
o each learner in the group receives one of the pictures and writes one or two sentences
about it in the past tense
o without looking at one another's pictures, learners pass around their 'paragraphs' They
write down what each one has written, making any corrections they think arc
necessary.
o they then discuss and order the story correctly, making any necessary changes, e.g.
o adding cohesive devices, correcting mistakes (tense, grammar, spelling) Each group
member writes out the story in full
o all the pictures are studied and the story is checked with these. Any important facts
which were omitted are written in
o learners then form new groups which contain at least one member from each of
the previous groups
The six versions of the story are passed around and
compared
o in a whole class activity, the stories can be used to construct a matrix which can serve
as a model for a freer writing activity where the content is not dictated by pictures but
left to learners' imagination variation: each group receives only one picture and
collectively prepares a few sentences on it. Learners then form new groups as
described above so that each member of the second group has a written description
of a different picture. They share their account and the full story is then written, using
linking devices, changing tenses, etc. Each group reads out its story and the class
discusses them.
62
Some Writing Games
Word games

Snow-ball technique:
A story is built up beginning with one word, then two words in the second sentence,
three in the third and so on until the class runs out of ideas. Everyone writes down the
agreed sentences and, ideally, the teacher writes a copy on an overhead transparency
to help learners correct their text when the story has been completed.
 A word game to get an idea for a story:
Nine lists each containing eleven words (nouns, adjectives, verbs) and two dice are
required
Working in pairs or small groups, learners take turns to throw the dice, each
time taking a word from one of the lists which corresponds to the number on the dice.
A possible result: 10.4.2-8.10.5-4.11.12.
By adding articles and prepositions, a story plot may be obtained. The different story
lines could then be collected and the most original one retained as the basis for a story
to be developed in groups.

Each learner suggests a word at random.
The words are written on the board or taken down by everyone if working in
groups. The class, or each group, creates a story incorporating all the words. This is
first, done orally and then in writing. Where necessary prompting could be provided by
questions from the teacher.
variation: The technique could be exploited to encourage fluency in writing. Learners
are given a set time (e.g. 15-20 minutes) to write a story incorporating as many of the
words as possible. The focus is on content rather than complete accuracy of
expression. The stories are not shown to the teacher but are passed to other learners
who may write comments on them.
63
An inductive approach to writing short texts

Writing a postcard
The following series of activities illustrate a structured three-phase approach
to writing postcards which could also be adapted to writing other types of text
(e.g. messages, letters, diaries).
Familiarisation
o when do you write postcards?
o sensitising learners to the appropriate choice of language
forms
o inducing the 'rules' for writing postcards
o focus on useful structures
Transfer and Practice
o thinking about the use of tenses to express present, past
and future reference
o controlled/closely-guided writing (content to be extracted
from a travel brochure)
Consolidation

guided writing assisted by
o photographs, key language exponents
o changing a letter to a postcard

free writing
o a postcard about a holiday/week-end/excursion (unguided)
Familiarization
Postcards are usually associated with holidays, when people do not feel like
writing long letters, and prefer to send a few informal lines to their friends and
family. Even though they are informal, postcards are usually written according to a
number of unwritten 'rules'.
Consolidation
Task
Learners choose one (or more) from a number of holiday photographs. They decide
whom they are going to write to and compose an appropriate postcard.
-
a girl/boyfriend
-
your uncle
-
one of your parent's friends (whom you don't know very well
-
a classmate
64
Some useful vocabulary is supplied, e..g.
The weather
cold, freezing,
What you see. Where you stay.
superb, breathtaking, spectacular,
Feelings
tired,
rainy, windy,
magnificent, marvelous, beautiful,
bored,
foggy, misty,
lovely, attractive, charming,
disappointed,
gorgeous,
picturesque, friendly, hospitable,
fed up,
sunny, hot,
comfortable, cosy, famous,
interested,
warm, mild,
dull, boring, uninteresting.
excited,
unattractive, disappointing, ugly,
enthusiastic.
expensive, noisy, crowded, dirty, smelly.
exhausted
Responses to writing
In real life, we can judge if our writing was successful by whether it did what we
wanted it to do. For example:
o if we wrote a complaint e-mail to an Internet bookshop, we would feel
successful
if they replied, seemed to understand our problem and took steps to deal
with it;
o if we wrote a story about a happy incident in our childhood, we might feel
we
had succeeded if other people read it and enjoyed it, and perhaps wanted
to
talk to us about it and ask questions or respond with their own stories;
o if we wrote a report about sales prospects in Slovakia for a board meeting,
we
might feel that we had achieved our goal if other people at the meeting
found
the information clear, succinct and complete and were able to make use of
it
in
the discussion.
The fact that writing can achieve such things is part of what motivates us to put
care into our writing. And in cases where we are not able to get such immediate, direct,
tangible feedback, we may need to be particularly careful in rereading and editing a text
before we send it away to a reader. This 'delayed response' nature of much writing can
be part of what makes it hard to do. Good writers need to become careful readers and
reflectors of their own work. The existence of audience and purpose are worth bearing
65
in mind in class.
Setting relevant writing tasks
Rather too many classroom writing tasks are directionless and audienceless. If
students are only writing ‘to please the teacher’, there is probably relatively low
motivation, and the quality of writing may be compromised, as students will have no clear
perception as to why the work is being done. So how can we provide audience and
purpose? Here are some key strategies:
o If you have done a Needs analysis with your students, base writing work on
stated
needs, i.e. using task types, contexts and situations directly relevant to
students.
o Even before students start writing, think carefully about what will happen
with
the finished piece of text. If students know who will read their text and
what
that reader may need or expect from it, then they have a clear idea of the
purpose of the writing, which will strongly affect many other decisions they
take in the writing.
o Make sure you do not mark and give feedback only on accuracy of
language.
Include attention to the question of whether the writing is appropriate for
the
task type and is well targeted at the probable reader.
o Even if you feel that you have relatively little idea of your class's needs (for
example, if your class is studying on a short general English course), you
can
still select writing tasks that are likely to reflect things that many students
may
need to write in real life.
Marking
If you are required (or wish) to provide some more traditional marking/feedback on
written work, what are the options?
Task: Alternatives to traditional 'marking'
Your students have done some written work. You now collect in the papers,
underline every mistake in red pen and write a mark or grade at the end. That's one option,
66
but why may it not always be a good idea? What alternative options can you think of?
Commentary
Getting back a piece of work with a teacher's comments and corrections on it can be
helpful. It can also be discouraging, especially if there is too much information, if the
information is inappropriate or hard to interpret, or if the general tone is negative rather
than positive. The red pen particularly has associations for many people with insensitive
and discouraging correction and judgement. Some alternatives are listed below.
Variations On Traditional Teacher Marking
Here are some other options available to you:

Use a green or a blue pen.

Discuss the marking criteria with students. Agree a mark or grade.

Write the correct answers in the margin.

Use correction codes in the margin .

Underline all errors of one type (e.g. all verb-tense mistakes, all spelling
mistakes, etc.).

Write a letter in reply.

Write nothing. Discuss the work with the individual students.

Only write a comment about the meaning and message of the piece.

Use errors from a number of different students' writing to devise an
exercise,
quiz, game, etc. Or get students to create the exercise themselves based
on their own mistakes (more challenging than simply copying out correct
answers).

Give a dictation based on sentences from their work.

In all of these options, there is one important guideline to bear in mind: tell
students (or agree) before the writing what will happen afterwards (e.g. ‘I'll
be marking tense mistakes only’).
Correction codes
Some teachers like to use ‘correction codes’ for marking students’ work.
Codes can indicate where an error is and what type of error it is. However, they leave the
learners to do some work in order to find the corrections for themselves. This may seem
preferable to handing them the correction 'ready made'. It is, of course, essential that the
students understand your own set of codes, e.g.

V = verb problem (possibly incorrect tense);

WO = word order;
67

WW = wrong word;

X = missing word;

SP = spelling.
It often seems inappropriate to point out every error; it can be dispiriting to get
back work with a large quantity of marks on it. You probably need to decide which errors
you think are most important or useful for the student to work on at the moment and then
to draw attention to these.
68
MULTIMEDIA
The Use of High Technologies in Teaching/Learning
Computer, Internet, DVD, Video, TV
Today's classroom teachers must be prepared to provide technology -supported
learning opportunities for their students. Being prepared to use technology and knowing
how that technology can support student learning must become integral skills in every
teacher's professional repertoire22.
Teachers must be prepared to empower student's with the advantages
technology can bring. Schools and classrooms, both real and virtual, must have
teachers who are equipped with technology resources and skills and who can
effectively teach the necessary subject matter content while incorporating technology
concepts and skills. Real-world connections, primary source material, and sophisticated
data-gathering and analysis tools are only a few of the resources that enable teachers
to provide heretofore unimaginable opportunities for conceptual understanding.
Traditional educational practices no longer provide prospective teachers with all
the necessary skills for teaching students who must be able to survive economically in
today's workplace. Teachers must teach students to apply strategies for solving
problems and to use appropriate tools for learning, collaborating, and communicating.
The following chart lists characteristics representing traditional approaches to
learning and corresponding strategies often associated with new learning environments
for students. These new learning environments should also be established in teacher
preparation programs.
Establishing New Learning Environment
Incorporating New Strategies
Traditional Learning Environments...............New Learning Environments
Teacher -centered instruction.......................Student - centered instruction
Single-sense stimulation...............................Multisensory stimulation
Single-path progression................................Multipath progression
Single media.................................................Multimedia
Isolated work................................................Collaborative work
Information delivery......................................Information exchange
Passive
learning...........................................Active/exploratory/inquiry-based
learning
22
National Educational Technology, Standards for Teachers, International Society for Technology in Education,
USA, 2003-2004
69
Factual,
knowledge-based
learning.............Critical
thinking
and
informed
decisionmaking
Reactive response........................................Proactive/planned action
Isolated, artificial context..............................Authentic, real-world context
The new learning environments should prepare students to:

Communicate using variety of media and formats

Access and exchange

Compile, organize, analyze, and synthesize information

Draw conclusions and make generalizations based on information gathered

Use information and select impropriate tools to solve problems

Know the content and be able to locate additional information as
information in a variety of ways
needed

Become self-directed learners

Collaborate ad cooperate in team efforts

Interact with others in ethical and appropriate ways.
Teachers know that the wise use of technology can enrich learning environments
and enable students to achieve marketable skills. It is still critical that educators analyse
the potential benefits of technology for learning and employ it appropriately.
The primary goal of the ISTE National Educational Technology Standards (NETS) project
is to enable learners for effective use of technology to support and develop education.
NETS Documents
Integrating Technology into T/L Process

Technology Foundation Standards for Students
describes what students should know about technology and be able to do with
technology.23

Standards for Using Technology in Learning and Teaching
describes how technology should be used throughout the curriculum for teaching,
learning, and instructional management

Educational Technology Support Standards
describes systems, access, staff development, and support services essential to
support effective use of technology

23
Standards for Student Assessment and Evaluation of Technology Use
M. D. Roblyer, Integrating Educational Technology into Teaching, Third Edition, University of Maryland, 2003
70
describes various means of assessing student progress and evaluating the use of
technology in learning and teaching
The Technology Foundation Standards for Students contained in this document
are the first step in the NETS Project. This document represents the responses to
proposed educational technology standards from many groups and individuals across
the nation who have participated in conference sessions, technology forum meetings,
Internet dialogue, and individually submitted surveys.
The technology foundation standards for students are divided into six broad
categories. Standards within each category are to be introduced, reinforced, and
mastered by students. These categories provide a framework for linking performance
indicators found within the Profiles for Technology Literate Students to the standards.
Teachers can use these standards and profiles as guidelines for planning technologybased activities in which students achieve success in learning, communication, and life
skills.
Technology Foundation Standards for Students
1.Basic operations and concepts

Students demonstrate a sound understanding of the nature and operation of
technology systems.

Students are proficient in the use of technology.
2.Social, ethical, and human issues

Students understand the ethical, cultural, and social issues related to
technology.

Students practice responsible use of technology systems, information, and
software.

Students develop positive attitudes toward technology uses that support lifelong
learning, collaboration, personal pu rsu it and productivity.
3.Technology productivity tools

Students use technology tools to enhance learning, increase productivity and
promote creativity.

Students use productivity tools to collaborate in constructing technologyenhanced models, preparing publications, and producing other creative works.
4. Technology communications tools

Students use telecommunications to collaborate, publish, and interact with peers,
experts, and other audiences.
71

Students use a variety of media and formats to communicate information and
ideas effectively to multiple audiences.
5. Technology research tools

Students use technology to locate, evaluate, and collect information from a
variety of sources.

Students use technology tools to process data and report results.

Students evaluate and select new information resources and technological
innovations based on the appropriateness to specific tasks.
6. Technology problem-solving and decision-making tools

Students use technology resources for solving problems and making
informed decisions.

Students employ technology in the development of strategies for so
problems in the real world.
Issues and Problems Related to Technology
in Language Arts Instruction
Educators interested in adopting computers and other forms of advanced
technology as tools for language arts teaching and learning have had to face a number
and overcome a variety of problems, only some of which are specific to the focus of their
instruction. Like teachers in all subject areas, they face difficulties in acquiring access to
sufficient hardware and software, and struggle with uncertainties over how best to use
the technological access they do have. In addition, they have had to deal with issues
related specifically to their chosen areas of instruction. The three examples below give
the reader a flavour for the type of concerns that language arts educators are currently
facing.
Keyboarding instruction.
Without question, the most common application of technology in the language
arts is writing. To date, the most common way to write using computer has required
input through a keyboard. This has the issue of whether keyboarding instruction should
prerequisite to the use of computers for writing. Those in favour argue that students will
learn bad habits if they use keyboard without proper training.
Those against requiring keyboarding instruction as a prerequisite argue that too
much student time and computer resources are spent on getting kids trained to type
quickly, that students need only basic keyboard familiarization, and that keyboarding
72
instruction will likely be a waste of time unless students have real-world applications in
which to use computer.
All too often, teachers complain that the computer labs in their schools are
booked entirely for com-literacy and keyboarding instruction. Such scheduling
precludes their use by teachers interested in integrating technology into their curricula.
Both arguments are legitimate and most teachers have resolved the issue, at
least temporarily, by favoring keying instruction if it is available and needed, but not
preventing students from using the computer if they do not have good keyboarding
skills. Many students arrive in schools with years of computer experience. Teachers
have rightly seen that it makes little sense to prevent continued access to this powerful
tool simply because a student can not type 30 words a minute using the "correct"
fingering. On the other hand, teachers have also rightly seen that students with more
refined keyboarding skills are often able to integrate the technology into their academic
lives more completely and effectively.
Reading on the computer versus reading from print.
Computers are not originally designed for reading, and it has taken technology a
long time to produce text on the screen that is easily readable. Even today with highresolution text and graphics, reading from a computer monitor is still more
awkward
ness
than
as
fringing
well
on
reading
from
as
concerns
copyright,
and
print
on
paper.
about
endangering
acquiring
access
This
awkward-
eyesight,
to
in
resources,
has prevented many language arts teachers from embracing electronic texts as tools for
teaching reading or reading to learn. Technology advocates have long predicted the demise of the traditional book, but language arts teachers have generally not agreed with
that prediction nor worked to make it come true.
Nonetheless, hundreds of thousands of electronic texts are available to teachers
and students, many of them freely accessible to anyone with an Internet connection. At
issue is why would anyone want to read documents in electronic form (as opposed to
printing them out or just buying the book)?

What are the advantages of reading electronic text as opposed to traditional
print?

And if we move to reading electronic text, does that mean death to our traditional
reading materials and textbooks?
Anderson-Inman and Horney (1998) have proposed seven features of electronic text
that distinguish it from traditional print and make it useful to teachers engaged in literacy
73
instruction. They argue that because electronic text is malleable, it can be modified,
enhanced, programmed, and linked in ways that support instruction in reading and promote improved comprehension by students reading independently. Furthermore,
because electronic text can be more quickly searched than paper-based text, it can be
a tool for studying language patterns or observing change in character and theme over
time.
Finally,
because
instantaneously,
it
electronic
lends
itself
text
to
can
be
collaborative
shared
over
endeavors
long
and
distances
cross-culture
communication. Features such as these make electronic books and documents
extremely useful for studying, as opposed to simply reading. And it is this distinction
that is increasingly capturing the attention of language arts teachers.
The questions are no longer "Should I use electronic text for reading instruction?"
and "What will happen to students" abilities to read print-based text if I do?" Instead,
teachers are asking questions such as "How can I find the electronic texts I need?" and
"How can I best integrate them into the curriculum?"
The debate over electronic versus paper-based text is being resolved as
teachers see advantages to both formats and seek to capitalize on the strengths
of each when teaching students to read effectively and meaningfully.
Media literacy as opposed to print literacy
To be able to live and work in a world that increasingly operates in a variety of
media formats, students need to be media literate, not just print literate. This often
places language arts teachers in a difficult position, in part because their training as
professionals gives supremacy to the medium of print, and in part because the need for
teaching media literacy places additional pressure on an already full curriculum, in
terms of both time and material resources.
To be media literate, students need to be able to locate, access, analyze,
evaluate, manipulate, and communicate information effectively in a variety of formats.
This includes knowing how to find appropriate electronic information sources to be
incorporated into their research products and presentations, as well as the ability to
access and use information stored in a variety of formats including CD-ROM, still and
moving images, text, sound, and print.
Understandably, this selection requires critical thinking and informed decisionmaking skills. By extension, being media literate also requires knowledge of the
hardware (e.g., computers, televisions, VCR, scanners, camcorders, digital cameras,
etc.) that these materials might be stored on and how to use these devices to create
74
and present multimedia products reflecting success on curriculum objectives. Skill in the
use of various media can support the integration of information technology across
curricular areas and can give students opportunities to integrate information into
meaningful learning experiences, projects and presentations.
75
Subject Matter Applications of Technology in Special Education
Whereas the historical application of technology in special education has focused
on assistive technology, renewed attention is being given to instructional technology in
order for students with disabilities to gain access to the general education curriculum.
Integrating technology into reading.
A characteristic associated with many disabilities is difficulty in learning how to
read and developing grade-level reading skills. As a result, special education teachers
tend to devote a great deal of time and energy to the teaching of reading and are like to
use a variety of software products to remediate students' reading abilities.
Increasingly, CD ROM-based multimedia books are available to engage students
in reading on the computer and to provide reading support (e.g.. text-to-speech to read
individual words or a whole page, comprehension checks, pre-reading activities).
Examples of products that have been demonstrated as effective for students struggling
in reading include Arthur's Teacher Trouble, part of the Living Books series (Learning
Company), Reading Realities (Teacher Support Software), and Start-to-Finish Books
(Don Johnston).
In addition to direct instruction on reading, special education teachers must often
make decisions about compensatory reading interventions. These types of tools are
provided to students in recognition that they may not have the decoding abilities to read
grade-level text materials but they can comprehend the material.
Integrating technology into writing.
Many tools have been developed to support students who struggle in various
phases of the writing process. For students who are unable to write by hand, who have
illegible handwriting, or find handwriting extremely tedious, voice recognition software
(examples) may be an option. While the potential of voice recognition software is that
users can dictate their written work to the computer rather than having to compose using
the keyboard, in practice, many systems are challenging to use. Some students who
are slow typists or have difficulty spelling can benefit from word prediction software that
attempts to complete a word as letters are entered.
Talking word processors feature speech synthesis to allow students to hear what they
have written. WYNN (Freedom Scientific) is a specialized word processor that provides
an array of support tools 10 students with learning disabilities.
Other products have been developed that alter the instructional
context
for writing,
Language Experience Recorder (Teacher Support .Software) is used by teachers to
capture the oral language students use in describing events and stories and then save the
76
information so it can be used as part of reading instruction. The process of writing and
illustrating stories effectively engage dents in the publishing aspect of writing and often to
enhance written expression by allowing the students to engage in an extended prewriting
activity as the) their picture and then write about it. Easy Book I (Sunburst
Communications) and Storybook Weaver and My Own Stories (Learning Company) are
examples of such writing software.
Computer-Based Cooperative Learning
Computer assistance can alleviate some of the logistical obstacles to using
cooperative learning methods, particularly the tasks of managing information, allocating
different individual responsibilities, presenting and monitoring instructional material,
analyzing learner responses, administering tests, and scoring and providing
remediation for those tests.
Mentioned earlier was the critical problem of ensuring that learners recognize
their interdependence. Some software programs parcel out different information to
different individuals so that they have to constantly check with each other and pool their
information to make good decisions. Other programs provide information or give
feedback only in displays that are flashed for a limited period of time. Group members
are forced to delegate responsibility for watching for certain kinds of messages if they
are to succeed. Each member has something different and essential to contribute to
the group deliberations.
Group-oriented programs of this sort can also deal with the logistical problems of
assisting a number of groups simultaneously, as is necessary in the single-computer
classroom. The software manages a rotation of the teams so that there is little time lost
waiting in line.
Distance Education
Distance education is a rapidly developing approach to instruction worldwide. The
approach has been widely used by business, industrial, and medical organizations. For
many years doctors, veterinarians, pharmacists, engineers, and lawyers have used it to
continue their professional education. These individuals are often too busy to participate in
classroom-based education. Recently, academic institutions have been using distance
education to reach a more diverse and geographically dispersed audience who do not
have access to traditional classroom instruction.
The distinguishing characteristic of distance education is the separation of the
instructional team and student(s) during the learning process. As a consequence, the
course content must be delivered by instructional media. The media may be primarily
77
print (books and paper-and pencil tests), as in traditional correspondence courses.
Or, it might involve a variety of media, including audio-cassettes, videotapes,
videodiscs, and computer courseware sent to individual students. In addition, radio,
broadcast television, and teleconferences are utilized for "live" distance education. The
latter allows for real-time interactive instruction between instructor and students.
Computer conferencing enables "conversations" among students who log on at
different times and different locations to exchange messages. In addition there are chat
rooms, bulletin boards, and listservs to support distance learning. Computer networks
and online , courses can be used for distance education.
Profiles for Technology Literate Students
A major component of the NETS Project is the development of a general set of
profiles describing technology literate students at key developmental points in their
education. These profiles reflect the underlying assumption that all students should have
the opportunity to develop technology skills that support learning, personal productivity,
decision making, and daily life. These profiles and associated standards provide a
framework for preparing students to be lifelong learners who make informed decisions
about the role of technology in their lives.
Advantages
 Self-pacing.
Programmed
tutoring
shares
with
programmed
instruction
the
characteristic of individualized pacing24.
 Practice and feedback. Like programmed instruction, programmed tutoring requires
constant learner participation. The use of a live tutor as a mediator adds immensely to
the flexibility of the feedback system, and it adds another major advantage over printed
self-instructional material by employing social reinforcers in the form of praise ("That's
great"; "Oh, what a good answer"; "You're really on the ball today") rather than just
simple knowledge of results.

Reliable. Like programmed instruction, programmed tutoring provides reliable
instruction in that the teaching-learning pattern is embodied in a set of written
instructions for the tutor. Compared with unstructured tutoring, programmed
tutoring has higher reliability because there is a predetermined pattern to the
tutor's action. With trained and motivated tutors, this has proven to be one of
the most powerful technologies for learning. Administered flexibly and
creatively by a live guide, this technology can overcome the monotonous
24
National Education Technology, Standards for Students, USA, 1997
78
pattern that sometimes results with other programmed formats.

Effective. The effectiveness of programmed tutoring has been well
established through the evaluation studies carried out by its originator,
Douglas Ellson.

The evidence from these was persuasive enough that in the early 1980s the
U.S. Department of Education recognized programmed tutoring as one of the
half-dozen most effective compensatory education programs. Summaries of
research have also found structured tutoring, variously defined, to be among
the most effective and cost-effective innovations, with tutees scoring from the
70th to the 79th percentile compared to the 50th percentile for conventional
instruction.
Limitations

Labor intensive.
Programmed tutoring depends on the availability of
volunteer tutors. In schools, tutoring is usually done by peers, older students,
or parents.

Development cost. The success of programmed tutoring depends on the
design of the tutoring guides; their development requires an investment of
time and expertise.
79
Didactic Functions of Computer Technology
This is refered to be the possible manifestation of the application of different
instructional means in language teaching/learning process, for specific purposes. It
covers:

Multimedia-requires the equipment of the teaching/learning process with
different means and effects (motion, pictures, colours, sound, etc.).

Coordination and systematization of the activities of the learners, teachers,
educators, teacher-trainers of schools and other educational institutions within
the same area and even without. Cooperative learning increases the learners'
motivation, independence, autonomy, self-confidence, and responsibility.

Organization of the available network of distance education.

Use of digital technologies for teacher-training courses.

Formation and development of the learners habits and skills for communication
on th one hand, and skills for expressing their thoughts and ideas more logically
and concisely, on the other.

Organization of real scientific activities.

Formation and development of the learners skills-to get, to compile, to organize,
to class ify, to store, to share and exchange information through the technology.

Creation
of
natural
language
communication
environment
through
broadcasting international conferences, joint projects. These stimulate the
development of communicative-language competence of the learners.

Formation and development of international and intercultural relations, which
spur the humanistic education of th learners and their intercultural competence
as well.

Integration of verbal and visual ways of thinking.

Realization of different variations of feedback.
80
The Use of Internet in Language Teaching/Learning Process
Internet is the virtual reflection of the real world. It implements several definite
pedagogical and educational functions in the process of t/l languages.
Pedagogical functions of the Internet
Internet serves as a means of

communication with the whole world,

receiving information,

using data-bases of different web-pages of
variety organizations and
personalities,

designing projects with different students of schools and other educational
institutions within the same area and even without.

It provides an opportunity of distance education, that is to become a student of
this or that higher school, reagardless the geographical areas of the learners.
Educational functions of the Internet
Internet provides:
1. Broadcasting services - these include advertisments, electronic newspapers,
journals, electronic libraries. These serve as classified data bases of knowledge
and are in touch with the reader.
The teacher can book through the internet:

electronic books,
course-books,
newspapers, journals,
methodological material, dictionaries

instructional material and other digital programmes

electronic libraries, data-bases, information systems.
2. Interactive services - these include dialogues, contacts, communication which
increase the effectiveness of language teaching/learning process.
Among electronic services the electronic post is of utmost significance, it enables to:

receive and send electronic letters and massages within a few
minutes,

receive and send material of broadcasting meetings and
conferences,

receive information service which can be either charge-free or
one of requiring payment,
81

receive advertisment service from different organizations and
individuals.
Electronic conferences - These can be both simultaneous and none-simultaneous.
Simultaneous (ѳٳųٳݳÏÛ³) conferances serve as one of the most important
didactic functions of the internet (free dialogues, dicussions-Talk City, Web-chat
systems).
None - simultaneous (áã ѳٳųٳݳÏÛ³) broadcasting conferances provide
opportunities to exchange information in written form.
Unlike ordinary conferences, none -simultaneous broadcasting conferances keep and
store the whole material, which allows to touch upon previous thoughts and ideas from
time to time, if needed.
3. Quest
services
(áñáÝáÕ³Ï³Ý Í³é³ÛáõÃÛáõÝÝ»ñ) - Internet is the ocean of
information.There exist several quest systems which allow students to search for any
kind of information, document, web-pages, people and so on.
How can teachers enjoy the advantages of the Internet?
Based on the collosal volume of the information provided by the internet, teachers can

progress their professionalism,

continue their education through the distance learning,

receive all normative documents regarded to the educational system,

receive information about new pedagogical technologies,

receive information concerning the congresses, workshops, conferences,
contests, grants (¹ñ³Ù³ßÝáñÑ) and send their claims (ѳÛï), reports, articles,

publish articles or reports,

keep contacts with colleagues and co-thinkers who live in different parts of the
world

search for, find out, book or buy the appropriate literature, if needed,

search for information of any kind and subject.
Internet is a unique world of endless information, possibilities and entertainments.
82
TV, DVD and Video
This is the obvious way of using visual equipment: Sit students in front of the TV25.
Switch it on. Let them watch the programme through. This is the classic 'lazy' teacher's
lesson. It works fine, and most teachers who have access to the equipment will have done
this at some time. But there must be more to video than this! By simply playing around with
this basic scenario a little, we can create some excellent lessons.
There are a lot of good video courses published, with accompanying materials. An
increasing number of recordings are integrated with coursebooks and have a wide range of
aims and activities. However, you can do a great deal with things you record yourself - TV
news, advertisements, pop songs, etc. - even if the language used is not English
When we use video in class, we try to keep hold of a few basic guidelines. These may
sound simple, but they often make the difference between a slick video lesson and
technomuddle;

Keep it short.

Exploit the material.

Switch the TV off when the students don't need to look at it.

If possible, find your place before the lesson.

Don't only use video to extract language for study.
Video can be a great starting point for communicative activities, too, for writing or for
introducing discussion topic areas.
Video is simply another classroom tool; it doesn't do the teaching for you. It's not
too hard to extract 30 to 60 minutes' work out of a three-minute recording, and that may
be a lot more use than putting a one-hour recording on and just letting it run all the way
through while the students quietly nod off.
Video in class
In order to exploit video recordings, we need to consider what there is to exploit.
Commentary:
A video has:

sound;

moving pictures (The pictures give context to the sounds we hear. We can see
facial expressions, eye contact, physical relationships, background, etc.);
25

a 'rewind' button: we can replay these images again and again;

a 'pause' button: we can freeze-frame images, stopping the action at any point;
Jim Scrivener, Learning Teaching, Macmillan Books for Teachers, 2007, p. 350-360
83

a volume control; we can turn the sound off, or make it quiet or very loud;

If we also have a video camera, there are even more possibilities (for
making programmes, recording students speaking in activities, etc.).

You can accurately jump to a specific moment.

You can replay small sections with precision.

You can have subtitles in English - or any included language - on screen.

There is a much clearer fast-play or fast-rewind facility, allowing you to watch
the images while you wind.

You can also pause a single image more clearly.

Many discs have isolated sound cues and music available (i.e. for use without
watching the film).

DVD discs (e.g. of feature films) often have bonus supplementary materials
which are an excellent source for student research, 'jigsaw viewing' (see
below), short complete programmes, etc. 'Deleted scenes' and 'out-takes' can
provide interesting discussion matter.
Using Video and DVD in Class
We can divide video playback activities into three general categories:
1. Preview: what you do before you watch a section of recording;
2. Viewing: what you do while you watch;
3. Follow-up: what you do after watching.
1. Preview activities
Here are four typical preview activities:

A language focus on lexis, function or grammar that will come up on the
recording;

Students predict what will happen from some given information or pictures;

Students discuss a topic that leads into or is connected with the subject on the
recording;

Students study a worksheet that they will use when watching the recording.
The whole of the previous lesson (or week) could itself be a sort of preview task leading up
to the recording. For example, if a particular function is being studied, the students might
already have spent a lesson or two working with it and now view the recording to expand
their knowledge of it.
2. Viewing Activities
As with audio recordings, it usually helps to set clear viewing tasks and to follow similar
84
procedures. The task-audio-feedback circle still works well as a basic procedure for video.
Tasks might be in the form of oral instructions or in the form of a worksheet, or they might
be a natural follow-on from the preview activities. You may want to play the recording
through many times with harder tasks. Tasks can be listening, looking or interpreting; for
example,

Why are they so keen to get into the museum after it's closed? or

What seven things does the man do after leaving the gondola? or

How does the shop assistant feel? or

What will they do next?
The tasks can focus specifically on function, grammar, lexis or pronunciation;
e.g.,

How many ways do the couple ask for help?

Which of the following verbs does he use?

What is on the shelf?' 'Is she being polite or rude?
The answers to many of these questions will involve active interpretation of the visual as
well as the audio messages. Focusing on gestures, facial expressions, body language, etc.
is especially useful when studying functional language.
3. Follow-up Activities
There are many activities that you can do after viewing; here are just a few ideas.

Discussion, interpretation, personalisation, e.g.
o What would you have done? or
o Has this ever happened to you?;

Study of new language;

Role-play the scene (or its continuation);

Inspiration for other work:

What did the newspaper/Hello magazine say the next day?

Design the front page;

Write a letter from one character to another;
 Plan what they should do next.
The DVD Advantage
Most of the ideas above apply equally to DVD and video. Here are a few DVDspecific suggestions.

Play through a section of an unknown film at 8x or 16x speed. Ask students to watch
and try to work out what is happening. When finished, groups can compare and
85
argue. Maybe the class as a whole could then try to reach a consensus, after which
everyone can watch the film at normal speed and check.

Watch an one- or two-minute clip a number of times with the sound down and
English subtitles. Ask students to first copy these subtitles. Replay it often enough for
them to do this. When all have the text (and have checked it), ask them to work in
pairs to decide what the subtitles would be in their own language. When they have
finished writing and have compared (and acted out their versions?), they can, of
course, watch the DVD with subtitles in their language and see how close they got.

Choose an one- or two-minute clip no one is familiar with, perhaps of a very visually
dramatic or humorous moment. Cover up the top three-quarters of the screen. Switch
on English subtitles. Play the clip. Ask learners to sketch what they think is
happening on screen. When finished, they compare, and at the end get to see what
is really on screen.
GAMES
The
terms
game,
simulation,
and
simulation
game
are
often
used
interchangeably. But because these terms have different meanings, we will discuss
them separately here. A game is an activity in which participants follow prescribed rules
that differ from those of real life as they strive to attain a challenging goal.
The distinction between play and reality is what makes games entertaining. Most
people seem to enjoy setting aside the logical rules of everyday life occasionally and entering an artificial environment with different dynamics. For example, in chess the
markers each have arbitrarily different movement patterns based roughly on the military
potentials of certain societal roles in some ancient time. Players capture each other's
markers by observing elaborate rules of play rather than simply reaching across the
board to grab the marker.
Some instructional games are designed to encourage players to decide among
themselves what criteria to apply in determining success.
Games can incorporate the common features of behaviorism, cognitivism,
constructivism, and social psychology. Students enjoy actively participating in games. Games
provide the opportunity to practice content, e.g., math facts, vocabulary, and problemsolving skills.
Individual differences arc accommodated, particularly in team games. Students
receive feedback based on the consequences of their actions, answers, and decisions.
Games do not necessarily take place in realistic contexts. There is no real-world counterpart
to tic tac-toe or bingo. Games based on realistic contexts are called simulation games. Most
86
games provide social interactivity. The exception is solitare-type games in which players
compete against themselves or prescribed standards and do not interact with other players
or team members. Games may be paper-based or computer-based.
Advantages

Attractive.
Games provide attractive frameworks for learning activities. They are attractive
because they are fun! Children and adults alike tend to react positively to an invitation to
play.

Novel.
As a departure from normal classroom routine, games arouse interest because of their
novelty.

Atmosphere.
The pleasant, relaxed atmosphere fostered by games can be especially helpful for
those (such as low achievers) who avoid other types of structured learning activities.

Time on task.
Games can keep learners interested in repetitious tasks, such as memorizing
multiplication tables. What would otherwise be tedious drill becomes fun.
87
Supplement
Dictation
Traditional dictation - where you read a text aloud and the learners must write it
down accurately - is often quite unpopular with learners. It can feel like an unfair test.
Could we make it more enjoyable and useful? Maybe the key question is: Who does
what? Usually the teacher makes all the decisions about a dictation. How about turning
the tables? Let the learners choose the text. Or let them decide how many times it
should be read. Or who should read it. In fact, could the learners choose everything and
then dictate to the teacher? Here are a few ideas:
Keywords dictation
Find an interesting short story and underline fifteen to twenty of the most
important words in it (e.g. key nouns and verbs). Dictate these words to the class, but
don't tell them the original story. They now must make a new story that uses those
words, in exactly the original order and the original form you dictated. At the end, the
class can swap stories, reading or telling them. You could also tell them the original if
you wanted.
Collocation dictation
Prepare a list of between ten and twenty useful two-word collocations (i.e. words
that naturally go together like traffic jam). For the dictation, read out one word from each
collocation (e.g. traffic). Learners must not write this word (check that they don't cheat!),
but instead write a collocation - a word that goes with it (e.g. a learner might write light
or policeman or heavy to go with traffic). When you have read the whole list, put the
learners into small groups. They can compare their answers, see if they can remember
the original collocating words and decide if all their collocations are good or not.
Wall dictation
Choose a short printed text. Divide the class into 'readers' and 'writers'. Pair each
reader with a writer; writers sit down, readers stand. Stick the text up on a wall far away
from the writers so that they cannot possibly read it. (If you have a large class, you'll
need to place more than one copy of the text in different places.) Each reader walks to
the text, reads and memorises part of it and then goes back to their writer to dictate it.
The writer writes it down, asking any relevant questions about words, spellings,
punctuation, etc. Whenever necessary the reader goes back and reads more and
returns for more dictation. The pair is aiming to write the most accurate text they can.
It's a race, and students tend to get quite competitive about it. You may need to set
some rules, such as 'Walk - no running', 'No shouting across the room'. Students swap
88
roles about halfway through. (By the way, the popular staff-room name for this activity is
'Running dictation'!) Variation: Use one text, but cut it into separate sentences. Write a
letter (A, B, C, etc.) randomly next to each sentence. Place these cut-up texts around
the room in different locations so that students have to read all of them, one by one.
When pairs have all the pieces written down, they should work together to work out the
correct order for a complete coherent text.
The 'bad cold' dictation
Explain that you have a bad cold today (sneeze or cough a bit to prove it!). Tell the class
that you're going to do a normal dictation, but if you have to sneeze or cough (and they
can't hear a word), they should write any good word that fits the space. For example, you
might dictate 'Last Thursday, Maria decided to have some [cough] for breakfast.' The
learners could write the sentence with a word like eggs or cornflakes or whisky instead of
the cough.
The wild dictation
Dictate a numbered list of descriptions of words, like this: 'No. 1 - the name of a
male pop star; No. 2 - an adjective describing some food; No. 3 - a verb of movement,
No. 4 - a kind of animal,' etc. The learners should write down answers to these prompts,
e.g. Robbie Williams, salty, swim, kitten, etc. When the lists are finished, dictate a short
story you have prepared, but with appropriate gaps (into which the learners will write their
own previously chosen words), e.g. 'A car drove up to the zoo and stopped suddenly and
No. 1 got out. He looked really No. 2 as he started to No. 3 towards the No. 4's cage',
etc. You'll get some very funny stories. Don't forget to prepare both the story and the list
of word descriptions before the lesson.
Dictogloss
For many teachers, this is a favourite technique. But note that it's one activity
where it's important that students really understand the instructions before they start.
Choose a short text that is longer than the students could completely remember,
e.g. about twenty words at Elementary level. The text could include an example of a
grammatical item you are interested in. Tell the class that you will read a dictation at
normal speaking speed and you will read it only once.
Students probably won't believe this - so check that they do! Then check that
students understand that they may find this difficult but must keep quiet and not distract
others by complaining, sighing, etc.! Read the text at a normal pace, then give students
about three minutes to write down everything they remember - words, phrases, etc. It's
important that students get a good, quiet time to do this. They must not compare during
89
this phase. When they have finished, invite students to compare with another, then later
to come together as a class to see if they can reconstruct the entire text at the board.
The aim is to get as close to the meaning of the original as possible. It is a
very interesting task, which may feel impossible to students and teachers at the start, but
which proves to be an excellent group-building activity.
Living tape recorder
Draw some tape recorder controls on the board (e.g. a symbol for a Play button,
a Rewind button and a Stop button). Introduce yourself as a 'living tape recorder'. Get
two students to stand near the board to control the 'tape recorder' while you read the
dictation. Members of the class can call out to ask the 'controllers' to 'press' the buttons.
You ignore anything said, but strictly obey any button presses. In this way, you will read
the dictation, rewinding, replaying, rewinding, etc., until the students are happy that they
all have the dictation. It's a bit chaotic at first, but it's great after that!
Sound-effects recordings
Sound-effects recordings are a useful teaching resource. These are recordings
that have hardly any words on, but instead contain a sequence of noises such as
crashes, bumps, bangs, whistles, screams, etc. Heard together, they may add up to a
story. There are many commercial recordings of this type or you could make your own.
Making your own 'sound sequence' tape.
Plan a sequence of between seven and ten distinctly different easy-to-make
sounds. Choose noises that will be loud and easy to record, for example, a set of plates
being dropped, rather than a glove. Do some test recordings. If possible, use a recorder
that doesn't set an automatic recording level, otherwise you will get very 'hissy'
recordings when no one is speaking.
This is an example sound sequence:

Someone says 'Shhhh!'

Noisy footsteps.

Something breaking.

Someone moving with difficulty, grunting, etc.

Someone rapidly opening and closing a number of boxes, drawers, etc.

Someone saying 'Oh!'

Lots of things being dropped.

Someone running.

Someone saying an amused'Ah-ha!'
Story-building
90
Learners listen to the sequence, then in pairs work out what they think the story is. They
then compare with others and try to agree a consensus story. Groups tell their versions to the class.
91
Testing and Teaching
The aim of this lecture

To think about language testing as a tool

To provide information about language testing

To reflect on testing language competence and communicative skills26.
A definition of a “language test” is a tool for measuring language
performance in learners (Bachman, L., and Palmer, A. 1997. Language Testing in
Practice. p. 8) A fundamental principle in language testing is “correspondence
between language test performance and real world language use”.
It is important to understand the difference between testing and teaching. In some
ways the two are so interwoven and interdependent that it is difficult to tease them
apart.
Every instructional sequence, has a testing component to it, whether the tests
themselves are formal or informal. That is, teachers measure or judge learners' competence all the time and, ideally, learners measure and judge themselves 27.
Whenever a student responds to a question or tries out a new word or structure,
you might be testing that student.
Written work is a test. Oral work is a test. Reading and writing performance are
tests.
How, then, are testing and teaching different?
The difference lies in what we'll call formal and informal testing. The above
examples referred to informal testing: unplanned assessments that are made as a
course moves along toward its goals.
Pedagogically, it is very important to make the distinction between teaching and
formal testing, especially from the point of view of principles of intrinsic motivation. For
optimal learning to take place, students must have the freedom in the classroom to
experiment, to try things out, to "test" their own hypotheses about language without
feeling that their overall competence is being "judged" in terms of these trials and
errors.
We cannot escape from the informal testing that naturally ensues while we teach,
formal testing places a different set of expectations on students. Formal tests are the
tournament games, or the "recitals," that periodically occur in the learning process.
М. Н. Аверина, Современный урок иностранного языка, Ярославль, 2004
H. Douglas Brown, Teaching by Principles: An Interactive Approach to Language Pedagogy, San
Francisco State University, 1994, p. 373-390
26
27
92
The Principles Towards Creating Intrinsically Motivating Tests
1. The principle of giving students advance preparation.
This may sound simple, but much too often teachers do little to help students to
prepare for a test. Tests, by their very nature, are anxiety-raising experiences. Students
don't know what to expect. And they may not be aware of test-taking strategies that
could help them. So, the teacher's task in creating intrinsically motivating tests is to be
an ally in the preparation process.
He can do even more:

Provide information about the general format of a test

Provide information about types of items that will appear

Give students opportunities to practice certain item types

Encourage a thorough review of material to be covered

Offer advice on strategies for test preparation

Offer advice on strategies to use during the test itself

Give anxiety-lowering reassurance.
2. The principle of face validity
Sometimes students don't know what is being tested when they tackle a test.
Sometimes they feel, for a variety of possible reasons, that a test isn't testing what it is
"supposed" to test. Face validity means that the students, as they perceive the test, feel
that it is valid. You can help to foster that perception with:
1. a carefully constructed, well thought-out format
2. items that are clear and uncomplicated
3. directions that are crystal clear
4. tasks that are familiar, that relate to their course work
5. a difficulty level that is appropriate for your students
6. test conditions that are biased for best-that bring out students'
best performance.
3. The principle of authenticity
Make sure that the language in your test is as natural and authentic as possible.
Also, try to give language some context so that items aren't just a string of unrelated
language samples. Thematic organization of items may help in this regard.
Also, the tasks themselves need to be tasks that they have practiced and feel
comfortable with. A classroom test is not the time to introduce brand new tasks,
because you won't know if student difficulty is a factor of the task itself or of the
93
language you are testing.
4. The principle of "washback"
"Washback" is the benefit that tests offer to learning. When students take a test,
they should be able, within a reasonably short period of time, to utilize the information
about their competence that test feedback offers. Formal tests must therefore be
learning devices through which students can receive a diagnosis of areas of strength
and weakness. Their incorrect responses can become windows of insight about further
work. Your prompt return of written tests with your feedback is therefore very important
to intrinsic motivation.
One way to enhance washback is to provide narrative evaluations of test
performance. Many teachers, in our overworked (and underpaid) lives, are in the habit
of returning tests to students with a letter grade or a number score on it, and
considering our job done. In reality, letter grades and a score showing the number right
or wrong give absolutely no information of intrinsic interest to the student whatsoever.
Grades and scores reduce a mountain of linguistic and cognitive performance data to
an absurd minimum. At best they give a relative indication of a formulaic judgment of
performance as compared to others in the class-which fosters competitive, not
cooperative learning.
Some Practical Steps to Test Construction
1. Test toward clear, unambiguous objectives.
You need to know as specifically as possible what it is you want to test.
Sometimes teachers give tests simply because it's Friday or it's the third week of the
course. This is no way to approach a test. Carefully list everything that you think your
students should "know" or be able to "do," based on the material that students are
responsible for.
2.
Draft your test.
A first draft will give you a good idea of what the test will look like, how students
will perceive it (face validity), the extent to which authentic language and contexts are
present, the length of the listening stimuli, how well a story line comes across, how
things like the cloze testing format will work, and other practicalities.
4.Revise your test.
At this stage, you will work through all the items you have devised and ask a
number of important questions:

Are the directions to each section absolutely clear?
94

Is there an example item for each section?

Does each item measure a specified objective?

Is each item stated in clear, simple language?

Does each multiple choice item have appropriate distracters, that is, are the
wrong items clearly wrong and yet sufficiently "alluring" that they aren't
ridiculously easy?

Does the difficulty of each item seem to be appropriate for your students?

Does the sum of the items and and test as a whole adequately reflect the
learning objectives?
95
5.
Final-edit and type the test.
Ideally, you would try out all your tests on some students before actually
administering it. In our daily classroom teaching, the tryout phase is virtually impossible.
And so you must do what you can to bring to your students an instrument that is, to the
best of your ability, practical, reliable, and valid. So, after careful completion of the
drafting phase, a final edit is in order.
In your final editing of the test before typing it for presentation to your class,
imagine that you are one of your students taking the test. Go through each set of
directions and all items slowly and deliberately. Time yourself as you do so. Often we
underestimate the time students will need to complete a test. If the test needs to be
shortened or lengthened, make the necessary adjustments. Then make sure your test
is neat and uncluttered on the page, reflecting all the care and precision you have put
into its construction.
6. Utilize your feedback after administering the test.
After you give the test, you will have some "information about how easy or difficult
it was, about the time limits, and about your students' affective reaction to it and their
general performance. Take note of these forms of feedback and use them for making
your next test.
7. Work for washback.
As you evaluate the test and return it to your students, your feedback should
reflect the principles of washback discussed earlier. Use the information from the test
performance as a springboard for review and/or for moving on to the next unit.
Three Criteria of a Good Test
1. A good test will seem fair and appropriate to the students (and to anyone who
needs to know the results, e.g. head teacher, other teachers, employers,
parents, etc.).
2. It will not be too troublesome to mark.
3. It will provide clear results that serve the purpose for which it was set.
Types of tests and testing
Generally we distinguish two main categories of tests:
You could test:

the students' progress over the course so far (a progress test
/achievement test);
96

their general level of English, without reference to any
course (a proficiency test) 28.
Most internal school tests tend to be progress tests; most external ones (e.g.
state or international exams) are usually proficiency tests.
You can test anything that has been studied; this usually means the four language
systems and the four language skills. Remember your students' course has probably
included not only reading and writing, grammar and lexis, but also speaking, listening,
phonology and function. Somehow tests often seem to focus far more on the first four than
the last four.
Traditional 'pen-and-paper' tests are usually made up of two types of questions:

discrete item tasks (i.e. testing specific individual language points);

integrative tasks (i.e. a number of items or skills tested in the same question).
These can be marked in two ways:

objectively (i.e. there is a clear correct answer, and every marker would give the
same marks to the same question);

subjectively (i.e. the marking depends largely on the personal decision of the
marker; different markers might give different marks for the same question).
Discrete items are likely to be marked objectively; integrative tests are more likely to
be marked subjectively. Some questions may involve elements of both.
Language systems are easier to test objectively; language skills tend to be tested
subjectively.
Let’s consider proficiency tests, progress or achievement tests, diagnostic
tests and placement tests.
Proficiency tests measure learners’ language ability regardless of the training
they may have had or the vocabulary and topics they may have studied. Proficiency
tests are not based on the contents of a language course but rather on the general
knowledge of the target language and culture.
Achievement tests are directly related to the language courses taught to the
examinees. The purpose of achievement tests is to judge upon the success of individual
learners or groups in achieving the objectives of the language course. Achievement
tests are always “course related” meaning course contents and objectives.
28
Jim Scrivener, Learning Teaching, Macmillan Books for Teachers, 2007, p. 302-308
97
Diagnostic tests identify students strengths and weaknesses. They provide the
teachers with the information on what further teaching is necessary and what problems
the students might have in coping with the instruction demands.
Placement tests provide information that helps to place the students at the most
suitable stage of the teaching curriculum, bearing in mind their level of the language
achieved so far. (Adapted from Hughes, A., 1996. Testing for Language Teachers. p. 921).
Performance-based testing
Instead of just offering paper-and-pen-cil single-answer tests of possibly hundreds
of discrete items, performance-based testing of typical school subjects involves:

open-ended problems

hands-on projects

student portfolios

experiments

labs

essay writing

group projects.
To be sure, such testing is time consuming and therefore expensive, but the
losses in practicality are made up for in higher validity. Students are tested as they
actually perform the behavior itself. In technical terms, higher content validity is
achieved as learners are measured in the process of performing the criterion behavior.
In the ESL context, performance-based testing means that you may have a
difficult time distinguishing between formal and informal testing. If you do a little less
setting aside of formally structured times labeled as "tests" and a little more formative
evaluation during students' performance of various tasks, you will be taking some steps
toward meeting some of the goals of performance-based testing.
Interactive language tests
The language version of performance-based testing comes in the form of various
interactive language tests. Students are assessed in the process of creatively
interacting with people. This means that tests have to involve people in actually
performing the behavior that we want to measure.
Paper and pencil multiple choice tests certainly do not involve test takers in
speaking, requesting, responding, interacting, and in combining listening and speaking,
or reading and writing. Interactive testing involves them in all of the above rather than
relying on the assumption that a good paper and pencil test taker is a good overall
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language performer.
Testing Techniques29
Gap-fill
Gap filling refers to tasks where the test-takers are given separate sentences
with some words or phrases deleted. The task is to restore the missing words. In these
tests answer keys can sometimes have more than one answer for a space. Some
missing words can have a structural value for the sentence (e.g. prepositions or
conjunctions). Other words can have full lexical meaning. Sometime a list of the words
can be given to the test-takers to be used in filling in the gaps. In such cases the
number of words in the list is usually larger than the number of gaps in the text.

Single sentence
Fill in the blanks. Use only one word in each space.
I'd ……. go to the cafe than the pub.
Answer: rather
(If answers of more than one word are allowed, then other answers are
possible; instructions need to be clear!).

Using given words
Put one word from the list below in each gap. thought
switched
unlocked
arrived
He (1) ………. home late that night. As he (2) ………..the front door, he (3)…….
he heard a noise in the sitting room. He tiptoed carefully into the room and
(4)….. on the light.
Answers: 1 arrived 2 unlocked 3 thought 4 switched
 Using other clues (e.g. pictures, anagrams, first letters, lines indicating how
many letters in word, etc.)
He looked through the …………… and was amazed to see that she had finally come
……….. .(Students have pictures of a window and a house.)
Answers: window, home.

Transformation of a given word
He could produce no ……………. evidence to support his argument, (photograph)
Answer: photographic
29
М. Н. Аверина, Современный урок иностранного языка, Ярославль, 2004
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Cloze
A cloze test is a gap-fill exercise using a longer text and with a consistent number
of words between gaps (e.g. every ninth word). The word 'cloze' is often incorrectly used
to describe any gap-filling task.
Cloze procedure involves deleting a number of words in the whole text,
requiring the test-takers to restore the original words. The procedure of based on the
assumption of gestalt psychology that human psyche tends to “complete the closures”
in the elements of the surrounding world that is being perceived. This makes the cloze
procedure authentic to cognitive processes. The first short passage of the text is usually
left not mutilated. After this brief “lead-in” approximately every seventh word is deleted.
Disadvantages of the test are that some words prove more difficult to restore than
others. There could be more than one answer for any one gap. It is not always easy to
say what language area (grammar, lexis, prepositions etc) or skills (receptive or
productive) are actually measured by the cloze procedure.
Exploratory task:
Do the cloze procedure and comment on the difficulties that you have experienced
The amount of physical education taught in primary schools is
decreasing because of the government's emphasis on the "three R’s",
according to a survey. It shows that half a million hours of …lessons
were lost in the past year because more …was spent on literacy and
numeracy. Teachers have warned that more PE time could be… from
September, as schools concentrate more on … numeracy.
Multiple choice
Choose the word or phrase which best completes each sentence.
If I went to Jakarta, ………. buy some jewellery.
a I'll bl
c I will dl'd
Answer: d
(Multiple choice is, of course, a very widely used testing technique and can be
used for more than simple gap-filling tests.)
Multiple-choice tests have a “stem” (the basic and unaltered part of the
sentence) and a number of “options” , only one of which is correct. The other options
are wrong in the particular context and are called “distracters”.
The advantages of the multiple-choice test are that they can produce a reliable
and economical scoring. A test can include a fairly long list of items and increase the
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reliability of procedure, thus decreasing the randomness of the results.
The disadvantages of the multiple-choice test are that it checks only
recognition knowledge. Guessing can have an effect on the scores. The plausible
(looking correct) distracters are not always available and this makes test writers include
“fool-proof” distracters. The “correct answer” can in quite a few cases be questioned.
Exploratory task:
Choose the correct answer of the multiple choice and comment on your difficulties

Why hasn’t your mother come? A/ can’t
–
Well,
she
said
she B/ won’t
______________ leave the baby.
C/ couldn’t
D/ wouldn’t
Matching (pictures, words, sentence pieces, labels, etc.)
Matching is a test format when students are given a list of items, which they
have to match with the other list of words, phrases, sentences, paragraphs or visual
images. The disadvantage of it is that once the test-takers have successfully made
sufficient amount of matches, the remaining pairs can be guessed more easily and the
last pair will be correct by default.

Pictures and words
Write the correct word under each picture
(sketches of transport)
car bike ship motorbike van lorry caravan plane

Placing words in correct sets, lists, etc.
Put the following words in the correct list: water, cheese, wine, lemonade, lunch, bread,
butter, supper

Grammatical labelling
Mark each sentence a, b or c depending on the tense used, a = present
perfect; b = past simple; c = present progressive
1. He's just come back.
2. I've never been to the Andes.
3. When did you go there?
4. I'm living in Vienna at the moment. Answers: la
2a
3b
4c

Putting jigsaw pieces together
101
Which beginning goes with which ending?
1.He planted a. the stones and weeds.
2.She picked b. some beautiful red apples.
3.She dug up c. the seeds in three separate rows.
Probable answers: 1 c 2 b 3 a
Note that some other answers are linguistically possible (e.g. 3b), though they
make less sense or seem more unlikely.
Sentence Transformation

Using given words
Starting with (or making use of) a given word or words; changing the form, but
keeping the meaning
He liked the theatre but hated the play.
Although...
Answer: Although he liked the theatre, he hated the play.

Following a given instruction
Change this sentence so that it describes the past.
She's looking closely at the sculpture, trying to decide if she likes it.
Possible answer: She looked closely at the sculpture, trying to decide if she liked it.
Sentence Construction and Reconstruction

Rearranging words
brother / much / he's / than / his / taller Answer: He's much
taller than his brother.

Using given words
Although /1 / bad headache / go / concert
Possible answer: Although I have a bad headache, I'll still go to the concert.

Finding and correcting mistakes
o Cross out the incorrect word.
When I will visit you, I'll see your new baby. Answer: When 1wUl visit
you, I'll see your new baby.
o Rewrite this sentence in correct English.
I am enjoy swimming at the swimming pool of the sports centre.
Possible answer: I enjoy swimming in the sports centre swimming pool.

Situational
You want to borrow some money from a colleague. What question would you ask?
I wonder………. borrow…… _ ?
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Possible answer: I wonder if I could borrow ten dollars?
Two-Option Answers

True/false
Often used after a reading passage e.g. Paul wanted to visit the cattle.
True/False?)

Correct/incorrect
Write * if the following sentence is in correct English. If it is incorrect put a X. They always
play football on Sundays.
Answer:

Defined options
Jill is a fifteen-year-old schoolgirl. Mary is a one-year-old baby. Write J next to the things
that belong to Jill. Write M next to the things that belong to Mary. (List of words: teddy,
Walkman, calculator, cot.)
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Information transfer
Information transfer means that the test-takers have to transfer material from
the text on to a chart, table or map. Such like tasks are sometimes performed in real life
settings (arranging information during a lecture or finding out the details of the train
timetable) and therefore can be viewed as authentic.
Exploratory task:
Do the following information-transfer test and comment on your experience. “You
are a road-safety officer. Listen to the story about a road accident and draw a sketch
picture of the situation” (After Hughes, A. 1996. Testing for Language Teachers. CUP.
P. 138)
I was riding along the street and a little boy ran into the road from my
right. He ran out from between the two buildings on my right. One
building is on the corner. The next one to it is the Post Office. When the
boy ran out, I turned left away from him and hit one of the parked cars. It
was the second car back from the cross road on the left. It was parked
right outside the police station. The policeman heard the bang and came
out at once.
Draw your sketch map here:
The main road
Ordering tasks (sequencing)
Ordering tasks (sequencing) are typically used to test the ability of arranging a
discourse (stretch of an oral or written utterance) in a logically organized chain. The
students are presented with a mutilated text, in which the order of elements is jumbled.
The task is to restore the logical sequence. The problem with “sequencing tasks” is that
in some cases there can be more than one way of ordering the textual elements.
Exploratory task:
Do the “sequencing” test and comment on your experience. Mark the time you
needed to perform the test. “The following comes from a Scotland Yard electronic file.
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Due to the computer error all the sentences have come in the wrong order. Restore the
original text”.
A. The spokeswoman said: "The items were of no personal or
sentimental value. At no time was the security of any members of the
Royal Family compromised."
B. No details have been formally released on what the items were, to
whom the office belonged or when the alleged incident took place.
C. A Buckingham Palace spokeswoman said: "This is a matter for the
police."
D. A Scotland Yard spokeswoman said items of "intrinsic value" were
thought to have been taken from an office within the palace, the official
home of the Queen.
E. At no time was the security of any members of the Royal Family
compromised.”
Editing tests
Editing tests consist of sentences or text passages, in which errors have been
introduced. Test-takers are to identify the errors and to write out the missing or
erroneous elements at the end of each line. The main difficulty with this type of test is to
ensure that an element deemed as erroneous by test writers should indeed be
erroneous with all exceptions excluded.
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Testing Communicative skills
Testing Writing
Testing writing pursues the goal of testing the ability to write. The following
tasks are taken from popular tests: “You are asked to give a talk about your life abroad.
Write down what you will tell the people”, “Write your own thoughts on the saying
“Brevity is the mother of talent”, “Being born into a wealthy family: a curse or a
blessing?” etc. “Testing writing can include the operations of completing, describing,
explaining, comparing and contrasting, reasoning on paper in written form.
Completion is done with the forms that may turn out to be useful in the real world. E.g.
You want to join a travel club so that you can travel cheaper. Complete the application
form:

Mr. or Ms.______________________________________________________

Family name____________________________________________________

Date of birth____________________________________________________

Nationality_____________________________________________________

Present address__________________________________________________

Occupation_____________________________________________________

Which UK airport will be most convenient to you?______________________

Which
county/s
are
you
intending
to
travel
to?__________________________

Proposed
date
of
departure__________________________________________

Proposed
duration
of
stay
outside
the
UK_______________________________

Reason
for
journey_________________________________________________

How do you intend to pay for your ticket (in cash, by check
etc)?____________

How
did
you
hear
of
our
travel
club?__________________________________

Date
Signature
Describing format is used to test students’ abilities to describe their message to
an addressee. E.g. You have got a picture that you want your friend to use as a logo.
There is no way you can show the picture. Write a description of the image that you
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want to be used as a logo.
Explaining format is often used in the “letter-of-complaint” task. The subject of
testing in this case can be the ability of the test-takers to describe the matter of
complaint and the ways to put it right.
Contextual format means that the examinees are given brief notes of a public
address and the task is to “unfold” these brief entries into full text.
Written response format consists in the task to read a letter from an official or a
clerk and to write a response, focusing on the chunks of the text, which have been
underlined. The “legend” for the response is provided. This can be “biography data”,
“previous letter sent to the clerk by the test-taker”, “background situation for this
exchange of letters” etc.
Comparing and contrasting format is used to test the ability to write a
“balanced argument”, in which all “pros” and “cons” are equally represented.
Reasoning is tested in writing essays (techniques of “testing writing” can be found in
Hughes, A. 1996. Testing for language Teachers. p. 75-100).
Exploratory task:
Write six short stories (each student writes only one story), describing the
experience on the road and having in mind one of the given headings A-F. Do not write
heading! Put your stories together and try to match the numbers of the texts and the
headings. Have you been successful in writing the text adequate to the chosen
heading?
A. Driving on an icy road.
B. An accident on the road.
C. A jam on the road.
D. A terrible fog.
E. Your old car.
F. Coming to help.
Testing Oral Ability
Testing oral ability has the objective of measuring the language performance in
oral interaction. Oral tests represent a population of oral tasks that the candidates are to
be able to perform. These tasks are expected to elicit behavior, that exposes the oral
ability of the test-takers and that can be scored validly and reliably. Oral behavior that is
to
be
scored
includes
expression
(thanks,
apologies,
attitudes,
opinions),
manipulation (directions, instructions, persuading, advising, warning, complaining,
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banning and permitting), eliciting (information, clarification, explanation), narrating
(sequence of events, story-telling, eye-witness accounts). Oral test types can be a
monologue, a dialogue and a multi-participant interaction. Criteria for scoring the
performance at a certain level of language acquisition include accuracy,
appropriacy, range (of the language), flexibility, size.
Exploratory task:
Ask your peer to share with you “the most memorable event of yesterday”. Use
the criteria of the “top performance” given below to assess the performance of your
partner. Reflect on the criteria as the assessment tool.

Pronunciation is clearly intelligible.
Accuracy
Grammatical and lexical accuracy
is generally high. There some
errors

that
do
not
destroy
communication.
Appropriacy
The
language
is
generally
appropriate to function. The overall

intention of the speaker is always
Range
clear.
A

fair
range
of
language
is
available to the candidate. No overt
Flexibility
search for words is evident.
A candidate is able to take the

initiative in the conversation, to
Size
adapt to new topics, to change the
subject.
Language turns are fairly short but
there is some evidence that more
complex utterances and longer
discourse can be produced.
(Hughes, A. 1996. Testing for language Teachers. CUP. P. 102)
There are three general formats for testing oral ability:

interview,

interaction with peers

response to an image, written or heard text.
Interviews can be structured and unstructured. Structured interview means
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having predetermined questions with limited possible answers. Unstructured interview
means that the questioning is guided by the responses to the previous questions.
Interviews can be administered on a certain topic or cover a wider range of themes.
Interaction can be arranged between the two test-takers discussing a topic,
giving explanations or making plans. E.g. “Discuss how you make an omelet”. “Describe
a stapler”. “Explain how to use a public pay-phone”. Candidates can be asked to
assume roles in a particular situation. A protracted exchange between the two
candidates can be stimulated by the following task: “You want your mother to increase
your pocket money, but she is resistant to the idea. Try to make your mother change
her mind”. Discussion between the candidates can also be an important source of
information about their language performance. E.g. “Your school can spend money on
either of the items to improve facilities: video equipment, a mini bus, computer
equipment, a sauna, library resources. Discuss with your partner all the advantages and
disadvantages of each suggestion and try to reach agreement on the most suitable
decision”.
Response to a picture can take the form of description and comment (a picture
is expected to be either vague in its form and reference, or deep in the message). A
response can be given to a text for reading.
Exploratory task:
A response can be given to a recorded text of the telephone talk. A candidate is to
restore what the other person on the phone is saying. Perform the activity and reflect on
the difficulties

Hello. What can I do for you?

___

Hold on a moment. What’s the name of the play?

___

When’s it on exactly?

___

Sorry, to mention it, but in what range are you prepared to pay for the
ticket?

___

Well, what night would you like to go?

___

O.K. That’s all right. Hope you will have a nice evening out. Bye.
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In order to assess the fluency of oral ability, the following scales can be used:
background
knowledge,
vocabulary
sufficiency,
grammar
adequacy,
message
communication, interactive skills, logic of the utterance, fluency. Grades are given for
every scale. Only when examines can be relied upon to score with consistent accuracy
video-recordings, should they be entrusted with “live scoring” (Hughes, A. 1996. Testing
for language Teachers. p.101-115).
Testing Reading
The following operations are necessary to test if the task is to evaluate
candidates’ language performance in reading: scanning the text to locate specific
information, skimming the text to obtain the gist, identifying examples in support of an
argument, restoring the sequencing relations between parts of the text, inferring from
the text.
Techniques for testing reading include multiple-choice, sequencing, cloze,
information transfer, comments, drawing conclusions. In the multiple choice tests
the candidates give evidence of successful reading by ticking off one out of a number of
alternatives (usually out of three, four or five alternatives).
True-False questions are just a variety of the multiple choice format. E.g.
“Choose the picture (A, B, C, D), which the following text describes”. In the cloze test
the task is to complete the gaps in the text.
Exploratory task:
Do the following cloze activity and reflect on the problems you had with completing
the gaps in the text. “A man goes out of prison … twenty years. He decides to
go … to the neighborhood where he lived. … he gets there he cannot … the
place. Everything has changed a …. The places he used to … have all
disappeared. Even the pub has ….He is very tired and would like to have … to
eat. He goes into a small … and has a coffee and a sandwich. When he takes …
his wallet he finds a … ticket in it. He then remembers that the … thing he had
done before being arrested was to take a … of shoes to the shoemaker's. He …
to go there and try. What a wonderful thing! The shoemaker is still at the …
place. He gets into the shop and tells the … that about twenty years before he
… him a pair of shoes to have them …. The shoemaker has a look at the ticket
and …: "O.K. Come back tomorrow. They will be ready then." Some things …
change” (Answer key: after, back, when, recognize, lot, know, moved,
something, cafe, out, shoe, last, pair, decides, old, shoemaker, gave, fixed,
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says, never).
Information transfer demands on the candidates to supply information from the text
in a table, map, picture etc.
Exploratory task :
Read the text and draw a picture of the eye from description.
Text
Picture
“The eye is the second most
complex part of the body after the
brain. We all have a blind spot in
each eye
where the optic nerve
leaves the back of the eye-ball - the
retina. The iris (the colored part of
the eye) consists of more than
25,000 nerve endings, all of which
are connected to the brain. There
is a small opening in the front part
of
the
eye-ball
-
the
cornea,
through which the light gets into
the eye and onto the retina. This
opening is covered with a lens. The
eyelid covers two-thirds of the eyeball”
Restoring the sequencing relations between the parts of the text can be
done in at least two ways. Candidates can be given a rambled order of text fragments,
which they are expected to rearrange in the correct sequence. As an alternative, the
candidates are given a text and a separate passage. Their task is to decide where in the
text this separate passage belongs.
Testing listening
All the task that has been set for listening should be done “while-listening”. The
tape is usually played twice. A couple of minutes are allowed after the tape has been
stopped for the test-takers to go over their answers once again. The candidates are to
perform the following operations: listen for specific details, obtaining a gist of what
they hear, follow directions, follow instructions, interpret the text. Techniques for
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testing listening can include multiple-choice, sequencing, information transfer,
instruction and direction following, comments, drawing conclusions (Hughes, A.
1996. Testing for language Teachers. CUP. P.134-140)
Exploratory task 2.10
Follow the directions, draw a map and put a cross where the bank is.
Street map:
Get off the bus, turn right, go up
nearest crossing, far corner of
next crossing – supermarket.
Down – roundabout. Cross the
street on which you stay. Take left,
then right. Go straight. Second
building from the corner. NatWest
Bank.
(After Heaton, J. 1999. Classroom Testing. Longman. P. 50)
112
Testing Grammar
Testing grammar can be done with multiple choice items, paraphrase (say it
differently using a different beginning of the sentence or a different word), sentence
completion, cloze procedure (e.g. testing the knowledge of prepositions or articles),
error correction etc.
Exploratory task :
Read the text below and look carefully into each line. Some of the lines are correct, and
some have a word, which should not be there. If a line is correct, put a tick . If a line
has a word that should not be there, write this word in the right column.
Sentences
Tick
or word
a) Last Sunday was definitely not a good day for me.
b) It was all started when I got into my car and it refused
to start.
c) I immediately realized that I had left the lights on.
d) I telephoned to my friend and he came round and
helped me start it.
e) I then drove into town to see my brother.
f) I waited for him for an hour despite of the freezing
weather
g) There was nothing I could do but drive back home
h) He did not even apologize himself for not waiting for
me
(After Paran A. 1996. First Certificate Gold. Practice Exam. Longman. p. 41).
Testing Vocabulary
Testing vocabulary is essential to demonstrate linguistic skills. Test tasks can
include synonyms (Choose the alternative ABCD, which is closest in meaning to the
given words. E.g. Gleam: a/shine, b/glitter, c/glare, d/glittering. Answer key: “gleam” has
the implication of feeling joy. That is why “shining” is closest in meaning to it).
Definition task can have a multiple choice format (“Loathe” means a/ to dislike
intensely, b/ to hate the look of, c/ to feel sick at the smell of. Answer key: “to dislike
intensely” is the best definition).
Gap filling or cloze procedure can also be used in testing the vocabulary.
Tasks with pictures can be as follows: Write down the names of the objects that you
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see in the picture. This technique is restricted to concrete nouns. Another technique is
elicit words from definitions (E.g. … is a person who performs operations on patients.
… is what becomes of boiling water. … is what a coward needs. Answer key: surgeon,
steam, courage).
Exploratory task :
Read the text below and decide which answers ABCD best fit each space
Text
Answers
The findings of a 1 … survey 1. a/late b/recent c/latest d/fresh
showed that teenagers do not 2. a/included
spend as much money as their
b/contained
c/counted d/numbered
parents suspect. The survey 2 … 3. a/entire b/all over c/complete
three hundred teenagers from 3 …
d/the whole
Britain. Although they have more 4. a/gaining
cash, worry about debt is 4 …
among
the
teenagers.
5
…
c/increasing d/building
The 5. a/careful
economic recession seems to have
encouraged
b/heightening
attitudes
b/suspicious
c/reserved d/cautious
to
money.
(After Paran A. 1996. First Certificate Gold. Practice Exam. Longman. P.16-17)
Psychological Testing
Psychological testing is sometimes used in teaching English.
The purpose of psychological testing in the communicative language lessons is
to boost the discussion about learners individual characteristics.
Tests Can Aid Learning
It is quite obvious that tests have a useful place in an interactive, communicative
curriculum. Tests need not violate any of the principles of cooperation and studentcenteredness. They in fact become indispensable components of a curriculum. Tests
can aid learning in a number of ways:

Tests can increase motivation as they serve as milestones of student
progress.

Tests can spur learners to set goals for themselves, both before and
after a test.

Tests can aid the retention of information through the feedback they give
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on learners' competence.

Tests can provide a sense of periodic closure to various units and
modules of a curriculum.

Tests can encourage students' self-evaluation of their progress.

Tests can promote student autonomy as they confirm areas of strength
and areas needing further work.

Tests can aid in evaluating teaching effectiveness.
Glossary
Achievement tests measure the command of the course studied
Cloze tests offer the test-takers a task to complete the gaps in a coherent discourse
Concurrent validity is coincidence of the testing results with the results obtained by
other means including teacher’s continuous assessment
Consistency is agreement between parts of the text in terms of difficulty and results
Construct validity is the ability of the test to measure what it claims to measure (e.g. a
test claiming the ability to measure speaking performance is not to measure lexical or
grammar competence instead)
Contextualization tests offer the test-takers a task to produce an oral or written
discourse out of a graphical form (tables, graphs, charts etc)
Diagnostic tests measure strengths and weaknesses of the test takers
Gap-filling tests offer the test-takers a task to complete the gaps in sentences
Information-transfer tests offer the test-takers a task to transfer information from a
text into a graphical form (tables, graphs, charts etc)
Interactive tests consider the background knowledge and other individual traits of the
test-takers
Matching tests offer the test-takers a task to find consistent pairs of language samples
(another option is to find consistent pairs of language and pictures)
Multiple choice tests offer the test-takers a choice of the correct answer out of a
number of “distracters”
Ordering tests offer the test-takers a task to sequence correctly randomized parts of a
discourse
Placement tests are used to find the right stage of the curriculum for the learners and
to teach them the adequate language difficulty level
Practicality is convenience of the test as a measuring tool (time saving etc)
Proficiency tests measure general language competence
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Reliability is permanence of measuring results produced by the same test in different
circumstances (testing speaking and writing is less reliable, than testing reading and
listening)
Test is a tool for measuring success of performance or ability to do it
Testing format is the design of a test
116
References and further reading
Alderson, Ch.,. C. Clapham and D. Wall. 1996. Language Test Construction and
Evaluation. CUP
Bachman, L. 1990. Fundamental Considerations in Language Testing. OUP
Bachman, L., and A. Palmer. 1997. Language Testing in Practice. OUP
Brown, G. and G. Yule. 1997. Teaching the Spoken Language. CUP
Heaton, J. 1988. Writing English language Tests. Longman
Heaton, J. 1999. Classroom Testing. Longman.
Hughes, A., 1996. Testing for Language Teachers. CUP
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Assessment
Concepts of Assessment30
Assessment is used in the sense of the assessment of the proficiency of the
language user. All language tests are a form of assessment, but there are also many
forms of assessment which would not be described as tests. Evaluation is a term which
is again broader than assessment. All assessment is a form of evaluation, but in a
language programme a number of things are evaluated other than learner proficiency.
These may include the effectiveness of particular methods or materials, the kind and
quality of discourse actually produced in the programme, learner/teacher satisfaction,
teaching effectiveness, etc.
There are three concepts that are traditionally seen as fundamental to any
discussion of assessment:

validity,

reliability

feasibility.
Validity is the concept with which the Framework is concerned. A test or
assessment procedure can be said to have validity to the degree that it can be
demonstrated that what is actually assessed (the construct) is what, in the context
concerned, should be assessed, and that the information gained is an accurate
representation of the proficiency of the candidates(s) concerned.
Reliability, on the other hand, is a technical term. It is basically the extent to
which the same rank order of candidates is replicated in two separate (real or
simulated) administrations of the same assessment.
What is in fact more important than reliability is the accuracy of decisions made
in relation to a standard. If the assessment reports results as pass/fail or Levels
A2+/B1/B1+, how accurate are these decisions? The accuracy of the decisions will
depend on the validity of the particular standard (e.g. Level Bl) for the context. It will
also depend on the validly of the criteria used to reach the decision and the validity of
the procedures with which those criteria were developed.
If two different organisations or regions use criteria related to the same standards in
order to inform their assessment decisions for the same skill, if the standards
themselves are valid and appropriate for the two contexts concerned, and if the
1.
Common European Framework of Reference for Languages: Learning, Teaching, Assessment, Council
of Europe, Modern Languages Division, Strasbourg, Cambridge University Press, 2001
118
standards are interpreted consistently in the design of the assessment tasks and the
interpretation of the performances, the results in the two systems will correlate.
Traditionally the correlation between two tests thought to assess the same construct is
known as 'concurrent validity'.
This concept is obviously related to reliability, since unreliable tests will not correlate.
However, what is more central is the extent of communality between the two tests
regarding what is assessed, and how performance is interpreted.
It is with these two questions that the Common European Framework is concerned.
The issue relates to different kinds of assessment in different ways. There are many different kinds and traditions of assessment. It is a mistake to assume that one approach
(e.g. a public examination) is necessarily superior in its educational effects to another
approach (e.g. teacher assessment). It is indeed a major advantage of a set of common
standards - such as the Common Reference Levels of the Framework - that they make
it possible to relate different forms of assessment to one another.
An assessment procedure also needs to be practical, to be feasible.
Feasibility is particularly an issue with performance testing. Assessors operate
under time pressure. They are only seeing a limited sample of performance and there
are definite limits to the type and number of categories they can handle as criteria. The
Framework seeks to provide a point of reference, not a practical assessment tool. The
Framework must be comprehensive, but all its users must be selective.
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Types of Assessment
A number of important distinctions can be made in relation to assessment. The
following list is by no means exhaustive. There is no significance to whether one term
in the distinction is placed on the left or on the right.
Table 1. Types of assessment
Achievement assessment
Proficiency assessment
Ò»éùµ»ñÙ³Ý ·Ý³Ñ³ïáõÙ
È»½íÇ ïÇñ³å»ïÙ³Ý ·Ý³Ñ³ïáõÙ
Norm-referencing assessment
Criterion-referencing assessment
ÜáñÙ³ïÇí Ûáõñ³óÙ³Ý ·Ý³Ñ³ïáõÙ
â³÷³ÝÇß³ÛÇÝ ·Ý³Ñ³ïáõÙ
Mastery learning assessment
Continuum CR
Úáõñ³óÙ³Ý í³ñå»ïáõÃÛ³Ý ã³÷³ÝÇ-ß³ÛÇÝ
â³÷³ÝÇß³ÛÇÝ ·Ý³Ñ³ïáõÙ ³ëïÇ׳-ݳ߳ñÇ
·Ý³Ñ³ïáõÙ
ÑÇÙ³Ý íñ³
Continuous assessment
Fixed assessment
Þ³ñáõÝ³Ï³Ï³Ý ·Ý³Ñ³ïáõÙ
ÎáÝÏñ»ï å³ÑÇ ·Ý³Ñ³ïáõÙ
Formative assessment
Summative assessment
Ò¨³íáñáÕ ·Ý³Ñ³ïáõÙ
²Ù÷á÷Ç㠷ݳѳïáõÙ
Direct assessment
Indirect assessment
àõÕÕ³ÏÇ ·Ý³Ñ³ïáõÙ
²ÝáõÕÕ³ÏÇ ·Ý³Ñ³ïáõÙ
Performance assessment
Knowledge assessment
γï³ñáճϳÝáõÃÛ³Ý ·Ý³Ñ³ïáõÙ
¶Çï»ÉÇùÝ»ñÇ ·Ý³Ñ³ïáõÙ
Subjective assessment
Objective assessment
êáõµÛ»ÏïÇí ·Ý³Ñ³ïáõÙ
úµÛ»ÏïÇí ·Ý³Ñ³ïáõÙ
Checklist-rating assessment
Scale-rating
êïáõ·³Ã»ñÃÇÏÇ ÑÇÙ³Ý íñ³ ÇÙ³óáõÃÛ³Ý êïáõ·³Ã»ñÃÇÏÇ ÑÇÙ³Ý íñ³ ÇÙ³óáõÃÛ³Ý
³ëïÇ׳ÝÇ áñáßáõÙ
³ëïÇ׳ÝÇ áñáßáõÙ
Impression assessment
Guided judgement
îå³íáñáõÃÛáõÝ
àõÕÕáñ¹íáÕ ¹³ïáÕáõÃÛáõÝ
Holistic assessment
Analytic assessment
ÀݹѳÝñ³Ï³Ý ·Ý³Ñ³ïáõÙ
ì»ñÉáõÍ³Ï³Ý ·Ý³Ñ³ïáõÙ
Series assessment
Catagory assessment
Þ³ñù»ñÇ ·Ý³Ñ³ïáõÙ
γñ·»ñÇ ·Ý³Ñ³ïáõÙ
Assessment by others
Self-assessment
²ÛÉáó ÏáÕÙÇó ·Ý³Ñ³ïáõÙ
ÆÝùݳ·Ý³Ñ³ïáõÙ
120
Achievement assessment/proficiency assessment
Achievement assessment
is the assessment of the achievement of specific
objectives - assessment of what has been taught. It therefore relates to the
week's/term's work, the course-book, the syllabus. Achievement assessment is
oriented to the course. It represents an Internal perspective.
Proficiency assessment on the other hand is assessment of what someone can
do/knows in relation to the application of the subject in the real world. It represents an
external perspective.
Teachers have a natural tendency to be more interested in achievement
assessment in order to get feedback for teaching. The advantage of an achievement
approach is that it is close to the learner's experience. The advantage of a proficiency
approach is that it helps everyone to see where they stand; results are transparent.
In communicative testing in a needs-oriented teaching and learning context one can
argue that the distinction between achievement (oriented to the content of the course)
and proficiency (oriented to the continuum of real world ability) should ideally be small.
To the extent that an achievement assessment tests practical language use in relevant
situations and aims to offer a balanced picture of emerging competence, it has a
proficiency angle. To the extent that a proficiency assessment consists of language and
communicative tasks based on a transparent relevant syllabus, giving the learner the
opportunity to show what they have achieved, that test has an achievement element.
Norm-referencing (NR)/criterion-referencing (CR)
Norm-referencing is the placement of learners in rank order, their assessment
and ranking in relation to their peers.
Criterion-referencing is a reaction against norm-referencing in which the
learner is assessed purely in terms of his/her ability in the subject, irrespective of the
ability of his/her peers.
Norm-referencing can be undertaken in relation to the class (you are 18th) or the
demographic cohort (you are 21,567th; you are in the top 14%) or the group of learners
taking a test.
Mastery CR/continuum CR
The mastery criterion-referencing approach is one in which a single 'minimum
competence standard' or 'cut-off point' is set to divide learners into 'masters' and 'nonmasters', with no degrees of quality in the achievement of the objective being
recognised.
The continuum criterion-referencing approach is an approach in which an
121
individual ability is referenced to a defined continuum of all relevant degrees of ability in
the area in question.
There are in fact many approaches to CR, but most of them can be identified as primarily a 'mastery learning' or 'continuum' interpretation. Much confusion is caused by
the misidentification of criterion-referencing exclusively with the mastery approach. The
mastery approach is an achievement approach related to the content of the
course/module. It puts less emphasis on situating that module (and so achievement in
it) on the continuum of proficiency.
The alternative to the mastery approach is to reference results from each test to the
relevant continuum of proficiency, usually with a series of grades.
Continuous assessment/fixed point assessment
Continuous assessment is assessment by the teacher and possibly by the
learner of class performances, pieces of work and projects throughout the course. The
final grade thus reflects the whole course/year/semester.
Fixed point assessment is when grades are awarded and decisions made on
the basis of an examination or other assessment which takes place on a particular day,
usually the end of the course or before the beginning of a course. What has happened
beforehand is irrelevant; it is what the person can do now that is decisive.
Formative assessment/summative assessment
Formative assessment is an ongoing process of gathering information on the
extent of learning, on strengths and weaknesses, which the teacher can feed back into
their course planning and the actual feedback they give learners. Formative
assessment is often used in a very broad sense so as to include non-quantifiable
information from questionnaires and consultations.
Summative assessment sums up attainment at the end of the course with a
grade. It is not necessarily proficiency assessment. Indeed a lot of summative
assessment is norm-referenced, fixed-point, achievement assessment.
The strength of formative assessment is that it aims to improve learning. The
weakness of formative assessment is inherent in the metaphor of feedback. Feedback
only works if the recipient is in a position (a) to notice, i.e. is attentive, motivated and
familiar with the form in which the information is coming, (b) to receive, i.e. is not
swamped with information, has a way of recording, organising and personalising it; (c)
to interpret, i.e. has sufficient pre-knowledge and awareness to understand the point at
issue, and not to take counterproductive action and (d) to integrate the information, i.e.
has the time, orientation and relevant resources to reflect on, integrate and so
122
remember the new information. This implies self-direction, which implies training
towards self-direction, monitoring one's own learning, and developing ways of acting
on feedback.
Such learner training or awareness raising has been called evaluation formatrice
Direct assessment/indirect assessment
Direct assessment is assessing what the candidate is actually doing. For
example, a small group are discussing something, the assessor observes, compares
with a criteria grid, matches the performances to the most appropriate categories on the
grid, and gives an assessment.
Indirect assessment, on the other hand, uses a test, usually on paper, which
often assesses enabling skills.
Direct assessment is effectively limited to speaking, writing and listening in interaction,
since you can never see receptive activity directly. Reading can, for example, only be
assessed indirectly by requiring learners to demonstrate evidence of understanding by
ticking boxes, finishing sentences, answering questions, etc. Linguistic range and
control can be assessed either directly through judging the match to criteria or indirectly
by interpreting and generalising from the responses to test questions. A classic direct
test is an interview; a classic indirect test is a cloze.
Performance assessment/knowledge assessment
Performance assessment requires the learner to provide a sample of language
in speech or writing in a direct test.
Knowledge assessment requires the learner to answer questions which can be
of a range of different item types in order to provide evidence of the extent of their
linguistic knowledge and control.
Unfortunately one can never test competences directly. All one ever has to go on is a
range of performances, from which one seeks to generalise about proficiency.
Proficiency can be seen as competence put to use. In this sense, therefore, all tests
assess only performance, though one may seek to draw inferences as to the underlying
competences from this evidence. However, an interview requires more of a 'performance'
than filling gaps in sentences, and gap-filling in turn requires more 'performance' than
multiple choice. In this sense the word 'performance' is being used to mean the
production of language. But the word 'performance' is used in a more restricted
sense in the expression 'performance tests'.
Subjective assessment/objective assessment
Subjective assessment is a judgement by an assessor. What is normally meant
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by this is the judgement of the quality of a performance.
Objective assessment is assessment in which subjectivity is removed. What is
normally meant by this is an indirect test in which the items have only one right answer,
e.g. multiple choice.
Holistic/analytic assessment
Holistic assessment is making a global synthetic judgement. Different aspects
are weighted intuitively by the assessor.
Analytic assessment is looking at different aspects separately.
There are two ways in which this distinction can be made:

in terms of what is looked for;

in terms of how a band, grade or score is arrived at.
Systems sometimes combine an analytic approach at one level with a holistic
approach at another.
a) What to assess: some approaches assess a global category like 'speaking' or 'interaction', assigning one score or grade. Others, more analytic, require the assessor
to assign separate results to a number of independent aspects of performance. Yet
other approaches require the assessor to note a global impression, analyse by different categories and then come to a considered holistic judgement. The advantage
of the separate categories of an analytic approach is that they encourage the
assessor to observe closely. They provide a metalanguage for negotiation between
assessors, and for feedback to learners. The disadvantage is that a wealth of
evidence suggests that assessors cannot easily keep the categories separate from
a holistic judgement. They also get cognitive overload when presented with more
than four or five categories.
b) Calculating the result: some approaches holistically match observed performance to
descriptors on a rating scale, whether the scale is holistic (one global scale) or analytic (3-6 categories in a grid). Such approaches involve no arithmetic. Results are
reported either as a single number or as a 'telephone number' across categories.
Other more analytical approaches require giving a certain mark for a number of
different points and then adding them up to give a score, which may then convert
into a grade. It is characteristic of this approach that the categories are weighted,
i.e. the categories do not each account for an equal number of points.
Series assessment/category assessment
Category assessment involves a single assessment task (which may well have
different phases to generate different discourse as discussed in section 9.2.1.) in which
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performance is judged in relation to the categories in an assessment grid: the analytic
approach outlined in 9.3.11.
Series assessment involves a series of isolated assessment tasks (often
roleplays with other learners or the teacher), which are rated with a simple holistic
grade on a labelled scale of e.g. 0-3 or 1-4.
A series assessment is one way of coping with the tendency in category assessments
for results on one category to affect those on another. At lower levels the emphasis
tends to be on task achievement, the aim is to fill out a checklist of what the learner can
do on the basis of teacher/learner assessment of actual performances rather than
simple impression. At higher levels, tasks may be designed to show particular aspects
of proficiency in the performance. Results are reported as a profile.
Assessment by others/self-assessment
Assessment by others: judgements by the teacher or examiner.
Self-assessment: judgements about your own proficiency.
Learners can be involved in many of the assessment techniques outlined above.
Research suggests that provided 'high stakes' (e.g. whether or not you will be accepted
for a course) are not involved, self-assessment can be an effective complement to tests
and teacher assessment. Accuracy in self-assessment is increased (a) when
assessment is in relation to clear descriptors defining standards of proficiency and/or (b)
when assessment is related to a specific experience. This experience may itself even
be a test activity. It is also probably made more accurate when learners receive some
training.
The main potential for self-assessment, however, is in its use as a tool for motivation
and awareness raising: helping learners to appreciate their strengths, recognise their
weaknesses and orient their learning more effectively.
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