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Catedra de Limba şi literatura engleză

EFL Methodology for English students, year II

DEVELOPING SPEAKING SKILLS


Literate people have a number of different language abilities: speaking, listening,
writing and reading. Speaking and writing involve language production and are therefore
often referred to as productive skills. Listening and reading involve receiving messages and
are often referred to as receptive skills.
The four major language skills are summarised in the following chart:
MEDIUM SPEECH WRITTEN WORD

S RECEPTIVE Listening comprehension Reading comprehension


K
I
PRODUCTIVE Speaking Writing
L
L
However, this is a very general picture of language skills. Very often language users
employ a combination of skills at the same time. In conversation, for instance, speaking and
listening happen simultaneously. People may also read and write at the same time, they may
make notes or write something based on what they are reading.
From a pedagogic perspective, it does not mean that skills should be treated
separately, either. Very often one skill cannot be performed without another. Moreover,
competent users need a number of sub-skills for processing the language that they use and
are faced with. As in most of the cases, a certain language experience involves the use of
different skills; classroom teaching will have to reflect this. Even when our activities focus on
one particular skill, the focus can later shift to one or more of the other skills. The principle of
integrating skills – where focus on one skill leads to practice in another – should constantly
be followed, and although there are activities where individual skills may be treated
individually the principle of integration should be borne in mind.

Key Concepts: communication, accuracy vs. fluency, controlled practice, less


controlled practice, freer practice.

By the end of this lecture you should:


• have a clear idea of the nature of the speaking skill
• be aware of the problems encountered by your pupils when developing their speaking
skill in English
• know the meaning of the term ‘communicative competence’
• be aware of the ‘accuracy vs. fluency’ debate.
• know about a wide range of classroom activities to develop accuracy and fluency
• have explored several options in the identification and correction of mistakes in both
accuracy and fluency activities.

The speaking skill in communication


A great deal of what English teachers do in their classes can be considered
communicative, and their general objective is to develop their pupils’ communicative
competence. In fact many teachers would probably say that they follow the Communicative
Approach. They might however find it difficult to say precisely what they mean by this, or to
define communication, as definitions can vary.

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Building on Hyme’s theory, Canale and Swain (1980) propose that communicative
competence includes grammatical competence, discourse competence, sociolinguistic
competence, and strategic competence, which reflect the use of the linguistic system and the
functional aspects of communication, respectively.

sociolinguistic discourse
competence competence
communicative
competence

strategic linguistic
competence competence

Linguistic competence is the ability to manipulate the system of the language.


Sociolinguistic competence is the awareness and ability to adapt all use of language to a
communicative context. In combination, these two competences can be said to form
communicative competence. Two other competences, strategic competence and discourse
competence, are also involved.
Why and when do we speak?
In considering the role of speaking as it relates to communication, and the relevance
of speaking to language teaching, we have to answer a few questions: a) why and when we
speak, b) what the speaking skill involves, and c) what factors influence speaking.
A large percentage of the language learners study English in order to develop
proficiency in speaking. The ability to speak a foreign language well is a very complex task if
we try to understand the nature of what appears to be involved. To begin with, speaking is
used for many purposes, and each purpose involves different skills.
We speak in order to:
• get information about things or people
• explain, instruct, direct
• get something done
• express judgement, opinions, feelings
• promote warmth, friendship, etc
• relate events, anecdotes,
• give descriptions, etc.

Can you think of other reasons for speaking? List them in the space
provided below.

When we use casual conversation, for example, our purposes may be to make social
contact with people, to establish rapport, or to engage in chitchat. When we engage in
discussion with someone, on the other hand, the purpose may be to seek or express
opinions, to persuade someone about something, or to clarify information. In some situations,
we use speaking to give instructions of how to get things done. We may use speaking to
describe things, to complain about people’s behaviour, to make polite requests, or to
entertain people with jokes and anecdotes. Each of these purposes (functions) for speaking
implies knowledge of the rules that account for how spoken language reflects the context or
situation in which speech occurs, the participants involved and their specific roles and
relationships, and the kind of activity that speakers are involved in. Thus, the factors which
influence the speaker’s language choices are: a) the interlocutors (speaker and listener); b)
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the code (shared language of the interlocutors); c) the message topic and the message form,
the setting / situation, the function of each utterance as it relates to what has been said
before, to what each interlocutor assumes the other already knows, to the intended message
of the speaker. The interlocutors’ attitudes towards each other are also important.
Language macrofunctions
The functions of spoken language are interactional and transactional. Remember that
the primary intention of the former is to maintain social relationships, whereas that of the
latter is to convey information and ideas. In fact, much of our daily communication remains
interactional. Being able to interact in a language is essential and what we can do with
language is endless. Roman Jakobson (Closing statements: Linguistics and Poetics, Style in
language, T. A. Sebeok, New York, 1960) defined six functions of language (or
communication functions), according to which an effective act of verbal communication can
be described:
• referential: describing a situation, object or mental state, talking about the world, the
past, etc.;
• expressive (also called "emotive" or "affective"): expressing emotions, imagination,
opinions, etc., adding information about the speaker's internal state;
• conative (also called “directive”): engaging the addressee directly and best illustrated
by vocatives and imperatives; influencing other people’s behaviour (e.g. request for
permission, order, instructions)
• poetic: using language creatively (especially in literature and humour); focuses on "the
message for its own sake"[3] and is the operative function in poetry as well as slogans.
• phatic: promoting human warmth; using language for the sake of interaction. The
Phatic Function can be observed in greetings and casual discussions of the weather,
particularly with strangers.
• metalinguistic (also called ‘metalingual” or “reflexive): using language (what Jakobson
calls "code") to discuss or describe itself; talking about the language one is using (e.g.
‘John’ is the subject of the sentence).
Each macro-function can be sub-divided into the functions we can identify in our
everyday interactions with people. The directive, descriptive, expressive and phatic macro-
functions and their many sub-divisions, are the most likely to be relevant to the average
general English pupil.

What does communication involve?


Communicating involves two types of activity that take place almost simultaneously:
planning and execution. It is a combination of linguistic and cognitive sub-skills, social and
cultural awareness, and confidence.
Linguistic sub-skills
The speakers have the ability to discriminate and manipulate sounds and sound
sequences in order to produce fluent, intelligible speech and to use accurate and meaningful
stress and intonation. They also have the ability to make linguistic choices at the level of
vocabulary and grammar, and at the level of style and register, to form natural and
meaningful sentences, appropriate to one’s communicative purpose in a given situation.
The linguistic sub-skill involves the language competence, which is an umbrella
concept that includes increasing expertise in morphology, syntax, vocabulary and mechanics
(basic sounds, syllables, pronunciation of words, intonation and stress). In order to convey
meaning, EFL learners must have the knowledge of words and sentences: they must
understand how words are segmented into various sounds, and how sentences are stressed
in particular ways. Thus, grammatical competence enables speakers to use and understand
English-language structures accurately and unhesitatingly, which contributes to their fluency.

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In addition to grammatical competence, EFL learners must develop discourse
competence, which is concerned with intersentential relationships. In discourse, whether
formal or informal, the rules of coherence and cohesion apply, which aid in holding the
communication together in a meaningful way. One needs an ability to perceive and process
stretches of discourse, and to formulate representations of meaning from referents in both
previous sentences and following sentences. Therefore, effective speakers should acquire a
large repertoire of structures and discourse markers to express ideas, show relationships of
time, and indicate cause, contrast, and emphasis. With these, learners can manage turn
taking.
Cognitive sub-skills
The cognitive sub-skills involve formulating language in the mind as a representation
of the intended meaning. This involves planning on three levels: discourse, utterance and
constituents.
Discourse takes account of the kind of communication the speaker is participating in
(e.g. joke telling; conversation; giving instructions, etc.), the situational and linguistic context,
the features of conversation and the cohesion of the utterances. Efficient speakers make
linguistic choices (grammatical, lexical, and phonological) appropriate to context, follow the
conventions of spoken discourse and adopt a suitable communication strategy. They know
how to check whether the listener is interpreting the message correctly and, if necessary, can
do repairing.
The meaning of the planned utterances, is considered in terms of what function they
will have (e.g. requesting, checking, advising, etc.), the topic of the overall communication
(e.g. politics, bringing up children, etc.), what information can be taken as known and what
needs to be considered as new and how the message will be conveyed stylistically (e.g.
straight, ironical, understated, etc.)
Speakers also need to make choices referring to specific constituents: linguistic items
(lexical units, structures, stress, intonation), and to organising these in the right order.
For native speakers planning and execution is generally a spontaneous process,
though speech errors, repetitions, hesitations, and false starts indicate that people often start
speaking before a constituent is completely planned.
Social and cultural awareness
Knowledge of language alone does not adequately prepare learners for effective and
appropriate use of the target language. Learners must have competence which involves
knowing what is expected socially and culturally by users of the target language; learners
must acquire the rules and norms governing the appropriate timing and realization of speech
acts. Understanding the sociolinguistic side of language helps learners know what comments
are appropriate, how to ask questions during interaction, and how to respond nonverbally
according to the purpose of talk.
Effective speakers are aware of social rules, show sensitivity to rules of behaviour
(e.g. turn-taking and giving attention signals) when participating in conversations, and can
select an appropriate style and register for a given situation, purpose, and listener. They are
aware of the value system of their interlocutors and show the ability to accompany speech
with appropriate meaningful non-verbal communication such as facial expressions. They are
also aware of intonation and politeness formulae in promoting good relationships.
Strategic skills/competence is perhaps the most important of all communicative
competence elements. They refer to the ability to compensate for imperfect knowledge of
linguistic, sociolinguistic and discourse rules. As far as speaking is concerned, strategic
competence refers to the ability to know when and how to take the floor, how to keep a
conversation going, hoe to terminate the conversation, and how to clear up communication
breakdown as well as comprehension problems.

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Nonlinguistic communication
Diversity in interaction involves not only verbal communication, but also non-linguistic
elements such as gestures and body language/posture and facial expression which
accompany speech.

What do you understand by confidence as a linguistic sub-skill?

Developing communicative competence in the classroom


The interactive behaviour of EFL learners is influenced by a number of factors.

Factors affecting oral communication


Age or maturational constraints
Age is one of the most important determinant factors of success or failure in foreign
language learning. Krashen, Long and Scarcella (1982) argue that acquirers who begin
learning a foreign language in early childhood through natural exposure achieve higher
proficiency than those beginning as adults. The adult’s progress seems to level off at a
certain stage, a phenomenon which is called “fossilisation” – the permanent cessation of
language development. This shows that the aging process itself may affect or limit adult
learners’ ability to pronounce the foreign language fluently with native like pronunciation.
Adult learners do not seem to have the same language-specific endowment or propensity as
children for acquiring fluency and naturalness in spoken language.
Aural medium
Listening plays an extremely important role in the development of speaking abilities.
Speaking feeds on listening, which precedes it. Usually, one person speaks, and the other
responds through attending by means of the listening process. In fact, during interaction,
every speaker plays a double role – both as listener and as a speaker. If one cannot
understand what is said, one is certainly unable to respond. So, speaking is closely related to
or interwoven with listening, which is the basic mechanism through which the rules of
language are internalised. The fleetingness of speech, together with the features of spoken
English – loosely organised syntax, incomplete forms, false starts, and the use of fillers –
undoubtedly hinders EFL learners’ comprehension and affects the development of their
speaking abilities.
Sociocultural factors
From a pragmatic perspective, language is a form of social action because linguistic
communication occurs in the context of structured interpersonal exchange, and meaning is
thus socially regulated. In other words, shared values and beliefs create the traditions and
social structures that bind a community together and are expressed in their language. Thus,
to speak a language one must know how the language is used in a social context. Each
language has its own rules of usage as to when, how, and to what degree a speaker may
impose a given verbal behaviour on his or her conversational partner. Because of the
influence or interference of their own cultural norms, it is hard for non-native speakers to
choose the forms appropriate to certain situations (e.g. paying compliments).
In addition, oral communication involves a powerful nonverbal communication
system, which sometimes contradicts the message provided through the verbal listening
channel. Because of the lack of familiarity with the nonverbal communication system of the
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target language, EFL learners don not know how to pick up nonverbal cues. As a result,
ignorance of the nonverbal message often leads to misunderstanding (e.g. “Let’s get together
for lunch sometime” said with an indifferent facial expression).
Affective factors
The affective factors related to foreign language learning are emotions, self-esteem,
empathy, anxiety, attitude, and motivation. Foreign language learning is a complex task that
is susceptible to human anxiety, which is associated with feelings of uneasiness, frustration,
self-doubt, and apprehension. Speaking a foreign language is public, especially in front of
native speakers, is often anxiety-provoking. The sensitivity of learners to making mistakes, or
fear of “losing face” is the explanation for their inability to speak English without hesitation.

Oral practice activities


Since most EFL learners in Romania learn English in their own culture, practice is
available mainly in the classroom. So, a key factor in the learners’ development is the
opportunity to speak in the language-promoting interaction. English teachers must arouse in
the learners a willingness and need or reason to speak. Many people outside the world of FL
teaching have the impression that running a discussion class is something anyone can do –
you don’t need any training or experience, you just go in and talk! The truth is that very often
students have no interest in the subject, no relevant knowledge or experience, no motivation,
no desire or perceived need to speak about it or they even experience slight panic as they do
not have time to think. As a result of all these, they have nothing to say.
A possible way of stimulating learners to talk is to provide them with extensive
exposure to authentic language through audiovisual stimuli and with opportunities to use the
language. Teachers should also integrate strategy instruction into interactivities, providing
information about communicative strategies to raise learners’ awareness about their own
learning styles so that they can tailor their strategies to the requirements of the learning
tasks.
Features of speaking activities
In designing activities, teachers should consider all the skills conjointly as they
interact with each other in natural behaviour, for in real life as in the classroom, most tasks
should be manipulative, meaningful, and communicative, involving learners in using English
for a variety of communicative purposes. Specifically, speaking activities should:
1. be based on authentic or naturalistic source materials;
2. enable learners to manipulate and practise specific features of language;
3. allow learners to rehearse, in class, communicative skills they need in the real
world;
4. activate psycholinguistic processes of learning.
Consequently, when organising a speaking activity, we need to bear in mind
questions like:
• Is the activity promoting real communication? How natural can communication be in the
classroom?
• What aspects of non-linguistic communication are my pupils showing: facial expression,
gesture, tone of voice?
• What different registers of language can be practised in this activity? What range of
styles and registers do they need?
• Do my pupils need to learn to communicate to the same degree of complexity and
subtlety?
• To what extent does effective communication depend on linguistic accuracy?

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and also
• Is the subject relevant and interesting?
• Do the students know anything about the topic or are they provided with information to
give substance to the topic?
• Do they feel motivated to talk about the topic?
• Do they feel that they really want to say something?
There may be no certain answers to these questions. However, they develop an
awareness and an understanding of the issues which currently circulate in language
teaching.
Types of input for speaking activities
Based on the criteria above and on the answers to the above questions, the following
types of input appear to be particularly relevant to eliciting spoken-language production:
aural, visual, material and culture awareness (Kang, 209-10).
Aural oral activities
Aural materials such as news reports on the radio have to be fine-tuned to a level
accessible to particular groups of learners. These materials can be used in some productive
activities as background or as input for interaction. The pupils are directed to listen to taped
dialogues or short passages and afterwards to act them out in different ways.
Visual oral activities
Because of the lack of opportunity in foreign language settings to interact with native
speakers, the need for exposure to many kinds of scenes, situations, and accents as well as
voices is critical. This need may be met by audiovisual materials such as films, videotapes
and soap operas. They can provide a) the motivation achieved by basing lessons on
attractive and informative content material; b) the exposure to a varied range of authentic
speech (different registers, accents, intonation, rhythms, and stresses; and c) language used
in the context of real situations, which adds relevance and interest to the learning process
(Carrasquillo, 1994). While watching, students can observe what levels of formality are
appropriate or inappropriate on given situations. Similarly, they can notice the nonverbal
behaviour and types of exclamations and fill-in expressions that are used. Also, they can pay
attention to how people initiate and sustain a conversational exchange and how they
terminate an interactive episode. Subsequent practice of dialogues, role-playing, and
dramatizations will lead to deeper learning.
Visual stimuli can be utilised in several ways as starter material for interaction to elicit
opinion-expressing activities.
Likewise, nonverbal videos can be played to have students describe what they have
viewed. While watching, students can focus on the content and imitate the model’s body
language. In this way the students will be placed in a variety of experiences with
accompanying language. Gradually, they will assimilate the verbal and nonverbal messages
and communicate naturally.
Material-aided oral activities
Appropriate reading materials facilitated by the teacher and structured with
comprehension questions can leaf to creative production in speech. Storytelling can be
prompted with cartoon strips and sequences of pictures. Oral reports or summaries can be
produced from articles in newspapers or from some textbooks. Similar material input such as
hotel brochures, can be used for making reservations; menus can be used for making
purchases or for ordering in a restaurant. Language input for communicative tasks can be
derived from a wide range of sources. This will help learners deal with real situations that
they are likely to encounter.

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Culture awareness oral activities
Culture plays an instrumental role in shaping speaker’s communicative competence,
which is related to the appropriate use of language (e.g. how native speakers make an
apology and what kind of form the apology takes). Appropriateness is determined by each
speech community, by the shared social and cultural conventions of a particular group of
speakers. Therefore, it is essential to recognize different sets of culturally determined rules in
communication. Many cultural assumptions which are presupposed by the native speakers
need to be drawn explicitly to the attention of speakers from other cultures. Thus, teachers
can present situations in which there are cultural misunderstandings that cause people to
become offended, angry, and confused. Learners can be asked to analyse and determine
what went wrong and why, which will force them to think about how people in the target
culture act and perceive things. This will inevitably provide a deeper insight into that culture.

Accuracy vs. fluency


Speaking activities may have several aims, but usually the main aim is to provide an
opportunity for the learners to practise speaking, with more attention to improving fluency
than to getting accurate sentences.
Accuracy activities are activities in which you aim for the pupils to concentrate on the
language they are using. These include manipulating, practising and ‘freely’ using particular
items of language (e.g. a substitution drill to practise the form of the present perfect, an
elicited dialogue to practise apologising, a ‘free stage’ to practise conditional II; etc.)

Accuracy Fluency

Fluency activities are activities where you want the pupils to concentrate on what
they are using the language for. Language is seen as a tool to be used to fulfil whatever the
pupils are engaged in doing (e.g. a pupil is explaining to a classmate how to do something).

What choices will you make when deciding for an accuracy or a fluency
activity?

All these choices have implications on how the activity contributes to the pupils’
overall speaking skill in all its various dimensions.
In the course of teaching both accuracy and fluency must be worked on and
developed, and must both be a part of your teaching at any level. In some activities, e.g.
semi-controlled practice, it may well be difficult to separate the two. It is however difficult to
work effectively on both at once. It will be helpful if you decide what the main priority is for
any given activity. Both advanced classes, which are already relatively fluent, and early levels
classes may need emphasis on accuracy work. Fluency activities may be graded to the
abilities of the pupils, both in terms of the level and amount of language needed to complete
the task and in terms of the amount of autonomy your pupils are able to cope with. What is
important is to give classes of all levels opportunities to use language creatively and for their
own purposes.
There are times in class when a focus on accuracy (and greater use of instant
correction) is appropriate. There are other times when the focus is on fluency. At these times
instant correction is less appropriate and could interfere with the aims of the activity. The
teacher needs to be clear about whether her main aim is accuracy or fluency, and adapt her
role in class appropriately.

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If the main aim is to get the students to speak, one way to help would be for teachers
to reduce their own contributions. The less teachers speak, the more space it will allow the
learners. It could be useful to aim to say nothing while an activity is underway, and save any
contribution for before or after.
Similarly, getting out of the way might be a help. If the teacher stays at the front of
the class, visible and clearly keeping an eye over everything, that might put students off
talking. Watching unobtrusively but with interest form a back corner may be a good idea. The
more involved the teacher is, the more she will end up doing the communication rather than
the students. There are times when the teacher can be most helpful by forcing students to
face problems themselves.
Whether an activity is accuracy or fluency-biased may not depend on the activity
itself, but on the way in which you set it up: are the pupils told to use particular language or
are they free to use any language at their disposal? Similarly, the kind of feedback you give
may determine whether the pupils see the activities in terms of accuracy or fluency.

Types of speaking activities


The activities primarily designed for oral practice are grouped according to the
degree of control exerted by the teacher over the pupils’ language choice. They show a
gradual move from very controlled to ‘freer’. Many of the activities are flexible in this respect,
i.e. you may choose to exercise more or less control according to their aims and the pupils’
needs. Teachers generally follow the traditional model of language teaching, which attempts
to realise the principles of staging learning. This model is:
• presentation (including controlled oral practice)
• less controlled oral practice (also called ‘guided creativity’ or ‘semi-controlled oral
practice’)
• freer stage. In this stage the focus may still be on the language being practised. You will
select activities that are likely to produce the language that has recently been presented and
practised. In fluency activities, this is not the case.
Practice can be graded from very controlled to semi-controlled to freer practice. This
progression gives the pupils the chance to see when and how they need to use the target
items in real life and to become more independent language users. Some activities will be
accuracy based, i.e. aimed at the correct production of specific language, but as we move
along the continuum from controlled to free, there are increasing opportunities for the pupils
to practise and develop fluency. This will occur whenever they are more interested in the
content of what they are saying than in the forms they use, when they are engrossed in an
activity and concentrating on carrying out a task.
Generally speaking, the speaking practice activities that you organise will offer your
pupils the chance to both practise specific language items and develop the speaking skill
itself, which will be useful to them in communication.
If for example, your pupils are involved in an activity where they choose an
appropriate apology for a variety of situations, they will be practising both specific apologetic
formulae and will be making linguistic choices appropriate to context. In other words, you aim
at either accuracy or fluency or at some point along the continuum that connects them.
Thus a basic procedure for a communicative speaking activity might be:
1. Teacher introduces and sets up activity (teacher centre-stage).
2. Students do activity (teacher out of sight, uninvolved)
3. Teacher gives and gets feedback, does follow-on work, etc. (teacher centre-stage
again).

A. Controlled practice activities

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The aim of controlled oral practice activities is to provide practice in manipulating and
discriminating sounds, stress, intonation, formal components (e.g. word order) and in
reinforcing and discriminating meaning. Controlled oral practice is essential. ‘Controlled’
refers to the control and limitation on the range of language choice open to the pupils while
practising, and not to the degree of authority you impose on the class. It promotes fluidity with
sounds and sound sequences, with rhythm and intonation. It can also promote fluidity with
stock phrases (e.g. “How do you do?”, “Do you mind if I...”).
Controlled oral practice activities allow the pupils to experiment with a language
structure within a limited range of choice. At the same time, they give the teacher the chance
to provide correction on grammar and phonology.
Though many controlled practice activities are usually done with the teacher as
focus, most can be extended into pairs practice to increase the amount of practice each
individual pupil gets. It may be necessary to demonstrate the activity in open pairs (i.e.
across the class) before letting pupils practise in closed pairs. This is particularly true of
information gap activities.
a) Repetition practice. A variety of drills may be employed at the controlled practice
stage of a lesson, usually starting with choral and individual repetition practice and then
extending into substitution drills, often followed by a question and answer drill. Repetition and
substitution practice is based on the model provided by the teacher. The pupils repeat in
chorus or individually the model given. In the substitution drills, you also provide the new
word.
What procedure would you use for a question and answer drill?
Compare your answer with the one suggested at the end of the unit.

b) Action chain/ Chain drill. One way of ensuring a lot of question practice is to do
the drill as an ‘action chain’ or ‘chain drill’. Pupils sit in a circle and P1 asks P2, P2 asks P3,
and so on. It is essential to set this up clearly, and it helps to keep all the prompt or picture
cards moving in the same direction.
c) Mingling activity. Another way of maximising practice is to extend the drill into a
mingling activity, where pupils walk around the class asking their questions to as many other
pupils as possible. This can also be a question and answer drill in which the pupils may
respond to written or picture prompts or, depending on the nature of the questions, may be
giving genuine (‘communicative’) answers based on their own experience.
d) The ‘Information Gap’ technique can be applied to question and answer
practice. If you ask the pupils to give answers based on their own experience (e.g. about their
likes or dislikes) there is a natural ‘information gap’ as the questioner probably does not know
the answer. For other types of material the ‘information’ gap may be supplied by the teacher.
Example
Pupils A and B have the same account of the life of Jim Walter, but each account has
different pieces of information blanked out. The target structures are Past Tense Simple and
wh- question forms. The level of study is elementary.

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Pupil A Pupil B
15th May 19…, Jim Walter 15th May 1970, Jim Walter
was born in …, Great Britain. was born in Brighton, ….
1977: He started school 19…: He started school.
1999: He married Ella Burns. 1999: He married………, etc.
Pupils A has to ask: Pupil B has to ask:
What year was Jim Walter born? When did he start school?
Where was he born?, etc. Who did he marry in 1999?, etc.

Existing materials can be easily adapted to make information gap material, by typing
out the material with gaps included.
e) Imposed dialogues. At a low level, an imposed dialogue may be used as a way
of giving very controlled practice. Here is a basic procedure for such a dialogue:
a) Establish situation and characters, then use listening drill;
b) Organise repetition drill sequence to establish: first line, second line, first +
second lines together, third line, first + second + third lines together, etc., up to maximum six
– seven lines. The idea is for the pupils to learn the dialogue by drilling it, so that they are
able to say it to each other in pairs by the end.
Example
The aim of the activity is to practise Could I have…, How much? and food vocabulary
(countables and uncountables).
Customer: Good morning.
Shopkeeper: Good morning.
Customer: Could I have five apples please?
Shopkeeper: Certainly, sir.
Customer: How much are they?
Shopkeeper: 10p each, sir. 50 pence please.
Customer: Thank you.

Once the dialogue is established, give each ‘customer’ three other items to buy and
each ‘shopkeeper’ three other prices.
How much drilling is advisable and when depends on the level of your pupils and the
nature of the language item (easy vs. difficult). In drilling, the language choice is kept to a
minimum through the linguistic and situational limits set up by you. In this way the practice of
a particular rule can be focussed on. In controlled activities the primary aim is fluidity, i.e. the
rapid and accurate production of patterns or sentences. Within the limitations on choice,
some creativity and real communication are, however, possible.
Mechanical, meaningful and communicative drills
Many drills provide merely mechanical practice of form, but this is not true of all drills.
A drill is mechanical when the sentence(s) being practised have no context and the prompts
that generate the manipulations of form are provided at random either by the teacher or the
material (as in repetition, substitution and transformation drills). Such practice is useful in
promoting language fluidity.

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Meaningful drills provide both context, and the mechanical manipulation necessary
for accurate fluidity. Although designed for paired practice, they are not truly communicative
Why cannot meaningful drills be considered communicative?

Communicative drills, combine the mechanical practice and context principles, but
also add the ‘information gap’ principle.
Meaningful and communicative drills and imposed dialogues can promote
reinforcement of meaning.
Personalisation of controlled practice activities
Even at the controlled stage of the lesson, you may allow your pupils some
opportunity to experiment with the language more freely and creatively. You may ask them,
for instance, to add their own examples at any stage in the controlled practice.
It is also common practice to include a ‘personalisation’ stage towards the end of the
initial presentation stage, where the pupils relate the language they are learning to their own
lives and experience. For instance, if they have been working on “there is / there are” in the
context of rooms and furniture, they may at this stage describe their own rooms. Or; if the
structure is “used to do” they can talk about their childhood, education, former habits, etc.
Some structures, however, may be difficult to personalise. At the personalisation stage the
activity is usually quite short so as not to demand too much of the pupils.
Correction in controlled practice activities
As an alternative to you always giving the corrected model, other pupils in the class
can be called upon to give the correct version as a model. However, correction during this
stage has to be mediated through you.
What advice would you give your friend about how to organise
correction during the language presentation stage of the lesson?

Controlled practice and communicative language teaching


Drills are lively and snappy if done with vitality, technical precision, and humour. They
are good for varying pace and practising quick pronunciation or form. Pupils like drills
because they are ‘safe’, i.e. they have little chance of making mistakes. Drills, however, can
be predictable, mechanical and unnatural.
The preoccupation with communicative teaching has made some teachers believe
that the communicative activities equip the pupils with the chosen language item(s), which
can be internalised more efficiently in communicative activities. This assumption has led to a
rejection of controlled practice activities. However, the pupils need opportunities for controlled
practice, followed up with further semi-controlled practice in later lessons.
B. Less controlled practice activities
The aim of less controlled practice activities is to offer either more pronunciation
practice or more practice of recently learned language. They provide context to reinforce the

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meaning of recently learned language or in making linguistic choices. Thus the pupils may
become more linguistically independent.
Though some part of these activities will be teacher-centred (e.g. setting it up, drilling
for intonation, etc.) pair work is likely to play a great part in this stage of the lesson.
Correction in less controlled practice activities
Correction will still be necessary for target items, but your pupils may now be able to
correct each other to a large extent. You will still be needed for some correction (e.g.
intonation, pronunciation of lexical items not included in the controlled stages) and as a
resource for the language needed by individual pupils or groups.
Adapting controlled practice activities for less controlled practice
A number of activities used for controlled practice may be adapted for less controlled
practice. For example, an information gap may be based on a jigsaw reading. Thus it will
provide pupils with the opportunity to use target items in new contexts.
Similarly, dialogues may be handled in a less controlled way. Instead of using an
imposed dialogue, you may use a) a cued dialogue, b) a completion dialogue or c) an elicited
dialogue. These activities can be used to revise and consolidate structures, vocabulary, or
functional exponents, to give pupils an opportunity to practise making linguistic choices, to
help them assimilate new language into their existing ‘pool’ or to develop their use of rhythm
and intonation.
Examples
a) Cued dialogues will be acted out.
Pupil A Pupil B
You meet B in the street You meet A in the street
Greet B Greet A
Ask B where he is going Say you are going for a walk
Suggest somewhere to go together Reject A’s suggestion. Make a different suggestion.
Accept B’s suggestion Express pleasure

(after W. Littlewood Communicative Language Teaching, CUP)

b) In a completion dialogue activity, half the pupils get one part of the dialogue,
the other half get the other part. In pairs or groups the pupils work out possible responses.
Then they re-form in new pairs so that the two roles interlock, and they read out the
utterances they have devised. The original prompt dialogues are set aside during this
interlock session. The ensuing dialogue is usually coherent and the pupils intrigued by their
own ingenuity.
Pupil A Pupil B
Two sisters – one has just arrived home Two sisters - one has just arrived home
and looks ill. and looks ill.
Jenny: You look awful Sue! Jenny: …………………………………..!
Sue: …………………………………. Sue: I feel awful.
Jenny: What on earth’s the matter? Jenny: …………………………………?
Sue: ………………………………… Sue: I’ve got a dreadful stomach-ache.
Jenny: Have you eaten anything unusual? Jenny: ………………………………….?

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Sue: …………………………………. Sue: No, nothing special, only that
Chinese meal last night.
Jenny: That’s probably what caused it. You Jenny: ……………………………………
should go and lie down. Sue: Yes, I think you’re right, I will.
Sue: …………………………………

c) An elicited dialogue is usually based on blackboard drawings, pictures, or


mime. The length of the dialogue will depend on the pupils’ level. Be prepared to allow for
slight variations in each line if your pupils offer appropriate alternatives during the eliciting
phase.
Set scene and characters, pre-teach essential vocabulary, then give first prompt (e.g.
mime, picture or drawing) and ask What does he say? Select one of the pupils’ offers, elicit
any necessary correction, have it repeated, and then standardise it yourself for pronunciation,
rhythm and intonation. Give the pupils individual practice and correction. Move on and give
prompt for second line, asking And what does she say? Elicit, correct, standardise, and
practise. Now there are two lines, so give the pupils open pair practice. Elicit third line,
following the same procedure, leading again to open pair practice of all three lines. Elicit
fourth, fifth lines, etc. and use the same procedure, until the entire dialogue has been elicited
and practised. Finally, the pupils go into closed pairs to practise the dialogue and finish by
acting it out in front of the class.
A: Good afternoon. I’d like a double room please.
B: Yes sir. Would you like a bath and colour television?
A: Yes, please.
B: Would you like breakfast in your room tomorrow morning?
A: No, thank you. How much is it going to cost?
B: Er ... £50 sir.
A: etc.

Example
Use a drawing or a picture as a prompt: man and woman at hotel counter. Say :‘This
is Mr. O’Connor. Where is he? And who’s this?’ Point to the pupils and gesture two fingers.
Ask: What does Mr. O’Connor say to hotel receptionist? Possible elicitations from pupils:
a. Hello, I can find here a room for two persons?
b. Excuse me, have you in this hotel a double room?
c. Good evening I want a room for two people.
Choose one elicitation and mould it by prompts or gestures until it is linguistically and
sociolinguistically correct. This is then used as the model and it is drilled. The other lines are
prompted and elicited in a similar way.
Narrative building
Elicited narratives can be used to revise and consolidate structures or vocabulary.
They give the pupils an opportunity to practise making choices, to practise continuous
speaking, or to help them assimilate new language into their existing pool of language. There
are two types of elicited narratives: i) blackboard drawings, pictures, or sounds, and ii) mime
stories.
i) Blackboard drawings, pictures, or sounds. Select or draw a series of
pictures and find a story or monologue to fit, containing natural use of structure or
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vocabulary. Set scene, characters, time and context. Pre-teach necessary vocabulary.
Display first picture on blackboard, prompt, select elicitations, standardise, practise, recap,
and move on. Display second picture on blackboard and repeat the same procedure. Be
careful that link-words are practised too. Finally recap whole story ensuring linking of
sentences.
To exploit group work: a) mix up pictures and ask the pupils to sort them out
themselves; b) leave out the key picture and ask the pupils to supply the missing element; c)
give the pupils random flash cards which they have to sequence; d) give a written story or
joke chopped up and ask them to reconstruct it.
ii) Mime stories. Develop a set of clear instruction gestures. Use a mimeable
story containing natural use of structure or vocabulary. Establish instructions and check if the
pupils have understood. Pre-teach vocabulary if necessary. Set scene, characters and time
context clearly. Mime each stage clearly - elicit, select, standardise, practise, recap, move on
to next mime. Follow the same procedure. Make sure sentences are linked naturally. Recap
whole story, ensuring sentence linking where necessary and involving as many pupils as
possible.

What activities would you use as follow-up for narratives?

Even less controlled narrative building


Pupils need practice in other aspects of monologues, and in particular in discourse
linking and in different discourse types, e.g. joke telling, explanations, instructions, directions,
relating events, or telling anecdotes.
Narrative building of this type is a pre-communicative activity. It helps the pupils to
cope with problems of tackling monologues, but it is not a natural or authentic activity, as we
seldom tell stories or relate events from pictures.
Think of a situation where the pupils may recount an event naturally, e.g. going to a
police station to report something, reporting something to a newspaperman, or giving
reasons for being late for school. Feed in narrative devices, such as “You’ll never guess what
happened next!” or “Do you know what happened next?” plus responses: “No, what?” or
“Really?” Leave the story open-ended for the pupils to carry on in groups or for homework.
What advice would you give a friend who is going to use a narrative in
the lesson?

Games
Language games are an ideal activity for providing semi-controlled practice, as the
nature of the game tends to restrict the actual language used. Some games are so limited in
the language they require that they can be used for controlled practice e.g. “Spot the invisible
fly”, where you choose the location of the fly and the pupils guess, asking “Is it on my nose /
in your bag / under the table?” etc. The winning pupil chooses the next location.
Most games, however, allow for some choice in the language used. Playing the
game may lead naturally to the use of language items the pupils have not come across in
other classroom activities, but which may be useful to them in other circumstances. These

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phrases may be pre-taught, or taught as they crop up in the game. (Pupils often, for example,
want to know the verb to cheat or the phrase “It’s your turn”, etc.)
Depending on the way you set up the activity, some games may be adapted to
provide freer practice.
Example “Alibi”
Two pupils are accused of a crime that took place within a fixed period of several
hours the day before. They go out of the room and plot their joint alibi, while the ‘police’ who
remain in the classroom prepare questions to ask them. The suspects are then questioned
one at a time and the police try to break their alibi. If you prompt, help or correct in the
preparation stage, the activity is semi-controlled. If, however, the class are left to their own
devices, the game allows for freer practice, as they can ask any questions they want.

C Freer practice. Speaking for fluency


We have looked at speaking mainly as a way of providing practice in producing
specific language items. We also need to consider how speaking practice in class can help
prepare the pupils for communicating naturally in real life.
One may speak fluently and easily and yet not necessarily be able to communicate
effectively in all situations. It is important therefore to choose the activities very carefully so
that you give your pupils sufficient practice in the kinds of conversations they will need to take
part in real life.
Many kinds of speaking activities involve patterns your pupils will need outside the
classroom. You will need to make the selection and ensure the balance. Such patterns are in
operation in both monologues and dialogues. So it will be helpful for you to highlight these
patterns, possibly via a listening text. Also, you will need to highlight the reactions of the
listener (noises, questions, etc.) For instance, you need to teach the language used to give
helpful feedback to someone telling a story. At low levels the reactions taught might be
simply “Mm” (with appropriate intonation) or “Really”, while at higher levels a greater range
could be included.
Examples
Tell a story and pause at intervals to encourage your pupils to respond appropriately.
Another option is to give them possible reactions accompanying the script of story: the pupils
in groups will decide which reactions can fit where. Offer such reactions as: “Ah”, “Oh, I see”,
“Hum!” “Typical!”, “Really!”, “What happened?”, “Good idea”, “Oh!”, “Very wise”, “Yes, of
course”, “What?”, “No, of course not”, “I know what you mean!”, “How awful / terrible /
dreadful!”, “Oh dear, I see!”, etc.
For freer practice, your pupils can tell their own stories (prepared as homework) and
others respond or encourage them.
The aims of the freer activities can be to increase the pupils’ ability to deal with the
unpredictable, to give them maximum opportunity for self-expression, for the exploitation of
their language resources and for the practice of their communicative skills. They encourage
pupils’ independence and risk-taking rather than risk-avoiding strategies. They give them
more practice in making linguistically and socially appropriate choices. Your role in such
activities is of advisor, facilitator, monitor, or guide.
At the ‘freer stage’, the pupils’ choice of language is not directly prompted by you.
The activities are likely to lead naturally to the production of the target language. However,
some teachers like to preface the activity with instructions like “Try to use the language we
have been practising” or “Try to use the Past Perfect”, etc. In general, the success or
otherwise of a free practice activity depends on how far the pupils ‘get into’ the activity, and
this basically depends on a few factors.

Anca Cehan 16
What are, in your opinion, the factors that will determine the success of
a freer practice activity?

While many of the more controlled practice activities can be adapted for freer
practice, certain activities are particularly suited to this stage of the lesson.
a) Information gaps. If, for example, you are working on reported speech, you
might base your work on a ‘jigsaw’ reading or listening. The pupils, in groups, could listen to a
number of ‘candidates’ (no more than three) being interviewed for the same job and would
then re-group to choose the successful applicant. At this stage it would be natural for them to
use reported speech to pool their information. Similarly, the groups could read statements
made by witnesses of an accident (or suspects for a crime, etc.) and after re-grouping they
would decide who was responsible.
b) Problem solving. Information-gap activities involve the pupils in making a
decision. Thus their ‘free speaking’ has a definite aim, and they have a task to complete. This
motivating principle can also be exploited in specific problem-solving activities.
Examples
i) Tell the class “There’s a dead man in the middle of a road with a pack on his back”. The
class must find out what happened from you, but you can only answer “Yes” or “No”. Thus
the class will get a lot of practice in asking past simple questions. [Answer: his parachute
didn’t open].
ii) Survival problems. From a list of 20 items, the pupils choose six which would help
ensure their survival on a desert island or on the moon. If treated as hypothetical questions,
these will lead naturally to practising the Conditional II. If on the other hand, the pupils are on
a sinking ship, the Conditional I or will for spontaneous decisions is more likely to occur.
c) Games. Though most games, by their very nature, imply some measure of
control, they may well allow the pupils a wide choice of language and may be very
appropriate as free stage activities. ‘Alibi’ for example can easily be set up as a freer practice
of past tenses.
d) Discussions. A discussion will offer your pupils free practice in the language of
agreeing or disagreeing, but discussion topics can be chosen to lead naturally to a variety of
other language areas. Thus a discussion of the future of the world ecological problems is
likely to involve future tenses, and Conditionals I and II. A discussion of the merits and
importance of past discoveries and inventions will lead to the use of the Conditional III.
These examples are more suitable for higher level pupils. For lower levels discussion
topics need to be carefully chosen to ensure that the pupils have sufficient language at their
disposal to express their views. Discussion is possible however with quite early levels if the
topic is geared to pupils’ personal knowledge and the vocabulary required is not too complex.
Discussions on different cultural customs, celebrations and common superstitions can prove
fruitful at quite early levels.
Some discussions may involve an element of role-play. The classic example is the
‘balloon debate’ where the members of the class represent famous people (or jobs /
professions) trapped in a balloon (or rocket or nuclear shelter) where resources will only
allow one to survive, so each must justify their own existence and talk the class round to
choosing them.

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e) Drama. Drama is an excellent way to get students using the language. It
essentially involves using the imagination to make oneself into another character, or the
classroom into a different place. It can be a starting point for exciting listening and speaking
work and it can be utilized as a tool to provide practice in specific grammatical, lexical,
functional or phonological areas.
By bringing the outside world into the classroom in this way we provide a lot of useful
practice (in cafes, shops, banks, business, streets, parties, etc.) that would otherwise be
impossible. There can also be a freeing from the constraints of culture and expected
behaviour; this can be personally and linguistically very liberating.
Success or failure of drama activities depends crucially on the perceived attitude of
the teacher and of the other students; without a certain degree of trust, acceptance and
respect the chances for useful work are greatly diminished.
What is the difference between a role-play and a simulation?

Six types of drama activity are commonly found in ELT classrooms:


• Role-play. A role-play is a drama-like classroom activity in which pupils take on the
role of different participants in a situation and act it out. For instance, they may play a waiter
or shop assistant and they may be involved in developing an actual character or attitude.
Students may act out scenes using their own ideas or from ideas and information on role-
cards.
• Simulation. A simulation is a large-scale role-play. As with role-plays, the pupils may
or may not be required to take on a new persona. These classroom activities reproduce or
simulate real situations in which the pupils have various tasks or problems to solve. This
often involves group discussion and some dramatisation. They can extend over a period of
several days and may also incorporate reading, listening and writing skills as well as
speaking. Role-cards are normally used and there is often background information as well.
The intention is to create a much more complete, complex, ‘world’ (a business company,
television studio, government body, etc.).
Both role-plays and simulations may be chosen to promote the use of particular
language points, of differences in style and register.
• Acting play scripts. Short written sketches or scenes are acted by the students.
• Prepared improvised drama. Students in small groups invent and rehearse a short
scene or story and then perform for the others.
Setting up the activity carefully is crucial to the success of any freer activity. In role-
play and discussions it is unlikely that all stages would be accomplished in one lesson. Here
are some tips:
1. Input: give input, informational or linguistic, checking use and understanding
2. Materials: choose them carefully to ensure relevance, interest, and motivation
3. Instructions: make them clear and simple.
4. Roles: give appropriate roles to the pupils, taking care not to give dominant
roles to either quiet or dominant pupils
5. Preparation time: allow your pupils the time to think, prepare, formulate
language and ideas (in groups or individually, in class or at home)
6. Class management: plan the use of props and the seating. Your role will be in
the background (monitoring, advising or participating as a peer)

Anca Cehan 18
7. Learner’s language: make notes of mistakes, and use them as a basis of future
remedial work.
8. Feedback: organise remedial work, use written consolidation, a summary of
topic points, and a summary of language points.

What kinds of questions do you need to ask yourself when using


discussions, role-plays and simulations?

Feedback on fluency-developing activities


The aim at this stage is for the pupils to produce language naturally and fluently.
Once the activity is under way you will intervene as little as possible, generally only if
communication breaks down entirely. Feedback on language performance will be given after
the activity has been completed and is based on your notes, made while monitoring.
Unobtrusive correction or help with language may sometimes be supplied during the activity,
perhaps by passing the pupil concerned a note.
Is correction of mistakes in structure or functional exponents an appropriate follow-up
to a fluency activity? This is a question that you will decide in relation to the needs of your
pupils, but a few points are worth considering here:
1. pupils may expect this type of feedback
2. the focus has been on communication, so mistakes may not have interfered
with the pupils’ successful completion of the task and may therefore be irrelevant
3. feedback can be given on how successful communication was
4. where the pupils have struggled to communicate, some help or repair work will
be needed. This could be given in a later lesson rather than as instant feedback.
Here are some ideas for correction work after a fluency activity:
• the teacher writes up a number of sentences used during the activity and discusses
them with the students.
• the teacher writes a number of sentences on the board. She gives pens/ chalks to the
students and encourages them to make corrections.
• the teacher invents and writes out a story that includes a number of errors she
overheard during the activity. She hands out the story the next day and the students,
in pairs or groups or as a whole class attempt to find the errors and correct them.
• the teacher writes out two lists headed ‘A’ and ‘B’. On each list she writes the same
ten sentences from the activity. On one list she writes the sentence with an error; on
the other list she writes the corrected version. Thus the correct version of sentence 3
might be on either list ‘A’ or ‘B’ and the other list has an error. The teacher divides the
students into two groups, ‘A’ and ‘B’, and hands out the appropriate list to each group.
The groups discuss their own list (without sight of the other list) and try to decide if
their version of each sentence is correct or not. If it is wrong they correct it. When they
have discussed all the sentences, the groups can then compare the two sheets.

Summary
Here is a simple framework for integrating practice in communication, offered by
William Littlewood in Communicative Language Teaching:

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Structural activities (1)
Pre-communicative activities
Quasi-communicative activities (2)
Functional communication activities (3)
Communicative activities
Social interaction activities (4)
(after William Littlewood, Communicative Language Teaching)

Your pupils will need preparation for communication. The activities geared to the
easy manipulation of structures (e.g. substitution drills) and the practice activities which do
not necessarily involve real communication (e.g. info gaps activities) are ‘bridging’ activities.
The pupils will then be ready to practice in communicative activities (functional
communication activities and social interaction activities.)
In functional communication activities the pupils are using language for the purpose
of carrying out a task (e.g. solving a problem, reaching a consensus, etc). This type of
communication practice will be complemented by social interaction activities where the pupils
simulate the kind of conversations situations they may be involved in outside the class and
may need to choose appropriate styles, intonation patterns, etc. Role-plays and simulations
are examples of this category.
Littlewood points out that there is no clear dividing line between these different
categories; they represent differences of emphasis rather than distinct divisions. Also, at any
level all four types of activity may be employed but graded in scope and difficulty to the needs
and abilities of the pupils.

Further Reading
Canale, M., and Swain, M. 1980. “Theoretical bases of communicative approaches to
second language teaching and testing”. Applied Linguistics, 1, 1 – 47.
Carrasquillo, A. L. 1994. Teaching English as a second language. A resource guide. New
York: Garland Publishing.
Harmer J., 2001, The Practice of English Language Teaching, Longman

Krashen, S. D., R. Scarcella, and M. Long (Eds.) 1982.Child – adult differences in second
language acquisition. Rowley, MA: Newbury House.
Littlewood W. 1981, Communicative Language Teaching, CUP
Richards, Jack C. and Renandya Willy A., 2002. Methodology in Language Teaching.
Cambridge: CUP.
Shumin, Kang. “Factors to consider: Developing Adult EFL Students’ Speaking Abilities” in
Richards, Jack C. and Renandya Willy A., 2002. Methodology in Language Teaching.
Cambridge: CUP.

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