Identifying listening and speaking

skills in the syllabus

1.0 LISTENING AND SPEAKING

By the end of Year 3, the component on listening and speaking aims at developing
pupils’ ability to listen and respond to stimulus with guidance, participate in daily
conversations, listen and demonstrate understanding of text, talk about stories heard;
and listen and follow simple instructions. The learning standards for listening and
speaking range from the discrete sound, word and phrase recognition to an
understanding of chunks of heard texts. Listening and speaking are seen as core
skills of early literacy. Pupils should be taught how to listen carefully as well as feel
encouraged to speak from the basic level of sound, word, phrase and move on to
structural sentences in various situational contexts. At every stage, the stress, rhythm
and intonation patterns need to be used correctly. In addition, pupils are also
encouraged to recognise, understand and use verbal and non-verbal communication.
Oral communication practice by means of repeating, responding, understanding and
applying what pupils have heard sensitises their senses to be ready for
communication.
• Relationships are established through the ability to
communicate by listening first then speaking thoughts,
ideas and feelings. It is hoped that, by the end of primary
school, pupils should become confident speakers who can
communicate clearly, appropriately and coherently in any
given context. Pupils need to listen carefully and respond
to what others say and think about the needs of their
listeners. Social conventions in listening and speaking such
as turn taking, politeness and courtesy need to be
observed. These are crucial especially in group discussions
where viewpoints and opinions are exchanged. The use of
various text types is recommended; ranging from teacher-
simulated texts to media broadcasts and authentic
dialogues
 REFLECTION
• As a teacher, which would you consider more
important when teaching: accuracy or
fluency?
• As a teacher, which would you consider more
important when testing: accuracy or fluency?
• Can you think of an activity that focuses on
accuracy which can be used to test L&S skills
•
– What will the focus of the activity be?
– Grammatical accuracy?
•
• Can you think of an activity that focuses on
fluency which can be used to test L&S skills?
– What will the focus of the activity be?
– Ability to communicate? What about errors made?
 Feedback
THE SKILLS OF PROVIDING CONSTRUCTIVE FEEDBACK
• What is feedback?
• Why feedback?
• How to provide constructive feedback?
• Exercise?
• Innovations in methods of feedback?
• Take home message?

What is a feedback?
• Why Feedback?
• Provision of important information to the pupil.
• A stimulus for further learning and training.
• Show pupil the level of their performance.
• Address the weaknesses and deficiencies of the pupil.
• Decide the progress of the pupil.
• An effective method to evaluate the whole program.
• Characteristics of Good Feedback
CONSTRUCTIVE
APPROPRIATE

Constructive Feedback
• Constructive feedback can help the trainee to improve in their knowledge, skills and attitudes
• It can help them to rate their learning in a realistic way
• It can help them to be more self-regulated about their learning
• It should be focused on behaviour rather than the person, and on observations rather than
inferences or judgments

• Appropriate Feedback
• Feedback should be completed as soon as possible after the event, before they forget details of the
events
• Confidentiality and privacy should always be respected
• Check if the feedback has been understood
• More than one approach is preferred (e.g. visual and verbal in the same time)
• 4.9 HOW TO PROVIDE AN APPROPRIATE CONSTRUCTIVE FEEDBACK

• A FEEDBACK SANDWICH
• A feedback which starts with a positive statement, followed by a negative
statement and finished with a positive statement
• POSITIVE -----> NEGATIVE -----> POSITIVE

• Recommended feedback techniques in giving feedback

• Create a respectful, friendly, open-minded unthreatening climate
• Elicit thoughts and feelings before giving feedback
• Be non-judgmental
• Focus on behaviour and specific observed facts
• Give right amount of feedback
• Suggest ideas for improvement
• Base feedback on well-defined, negotiated goals
• A constructive & appropriate feedback is an essential tool to improve performance
• Some Questions To Think About
• Look at an existing language test (listening and speaking), evaluate it in
terms of the various criteria for a communicative test:
• Is the test communicative? Why do you say so?
• Does it focus on both the listening and speaking skills?
• What is the focus of the test --> accuracy or fluency or both?
• Is the activity suggested appropriate?
• Does it truly measure the pupils’ ability to communicate?
• Is there any way to resolve the dilemma of giving large-scale
communicative tests and still maintaining a sense of practicality (the
feasibility of scoring thousands of tests relatively quickly and cheaply)?
• Computers are revolutionizing the testing industry. Can computerized tests
meet communicative test criteria? In what way can the addition of an
interactive video component to a computerized test help to meet those
communicative criteria?