SKKN ome activities to help grade 7 students at Ly Nhat Quang lower secondary school develop speaking skill in extra lesson in the afternoon

13 Because of the importance of speaking skill, I personally think that all teachers of English mustn't neglect the importance of teaching students how to speak Englishsensibly.. In addi

EDUCATION AND TRAINING BUREAU OF DO LUONG

LY NHAT QUANG LOWER SECONDARY SCHOOL

DEVELOP SPEAKING SKILL

IN EXTRA LESSONS IN THE

III Picture description

IV Retelling story

V Discussion:

VI Interview

VII Table completion.

D CONCLUSION

A THEORETICAL BACKGROUND.

English, an international language, has been a compulsory subject at secondaryschools in Vietnam in the past few years All students want to learn English well tohave a better future Along with improving grammar, students need to improve theirlanguage skills: listening, speaking, reading and writing For me, the main target oflearning a foreign language is to communicate with people who cannot speak ourmother tongue

Communication is divided into two forms- speaking and writing In real life,when speaking, people express their emotions, feelings more easily than writingbecause people can use their facial expressions, gestures as well as body language

Speaking is "the process of building and sharing meaning through the use ofverbal and non-verbal symbols, in a variety of contexts" (Chaney, 1998, p 13)

Because of the importance of speaking skill, I personally think that all teachers

of English mustn't neglect the importance of teaching students how to speak Englishsensibly

Speaking is a crucial part of foreign language learning and teaching Despite itsimportance, for many years, teaching speaking has been undervalued and Englishlanguage teachers have continued to teach speaking just as a repetition of drills ormemorization of dialogues However, today's world requires that the goal of teachingspeaking should improve students' communicative skills, because, only in that way,students can express themselves and learn how to follow the social and cultural rulesappropriate in each communicative circumstance In order to teach foreign languagelearners how to speak in sensible ways, some speaking activities are provided below,that can be applied to English as a foreign language classroom settings, together withsuggestions for teachers who teach oral language

When teaching speaking, we all know some common activities such as

Discussions; Role Play; Simulation; Information Gap; Brainstorming; Storytelling; Interviews; Story Completion; Reporting; Picture Narrating; Picture Describing; Find the Difference

However, if students, especially grade 7 - student, want to perform the activitiesmentioned above, they need to acquire a quite a large range of vocabulary andgrammar In addition, to enable students to perform above activities, teachers have tocreate interesting, sensible speaking activities so that all students can feel relaxedwhen involving the activities Teachers also need to motivate students by giving themgood encouragement, compliments

B PRACTICAL BACKGROUND.

In fact, very few students can speak English fluently after studying it for 4years at lower secondary school I have observed some of colleagues' teaching lessonsand through observation, I have realized some difficulties that teachers and studentshave

With experience of teaching English for more than 12 years, I still find it ratherhard to design speaking activities so that all students can get involved So, I have triedmany methods and then I can learn what I have done with a class and then I canimprove in other classes

3 Advantages and disadvantages when applying my experiences and innovations

a Advantages:

- I am a young teacher so I am always enthusiastic with my English teaching job and Ialways want to find something new, interesting for my students My love for mylovely students is also a kind of motivation for me to try my best to help them

- Many of my students are eager to learn how to speak English well so that they cancommunicate with foreigners when they have chance

- More and more students and their parents are aware of the importance of speakingskill

- My collogues as well as other teachers in my school always give me goodencouragement and support

- My experience is more or less still limited

- Teaching aids and time are also a big problem as I still need more time and teachingaids to prepare a contented lesson for extra class in the afternoon

- Quite a few students are too weak to speak English as they don't know muchlexicology as well as lacking grammar structures

- The number of students in a class is still big while we can't move chairs and desks asthe way we want

C SOLUTIONS

To help my students improve their speaking skill, I can't do it in a day or two On thecontrary, it took me months, even years to draw some following experiences andinnovations

I Pair- work on topics given

Aim: To help students ask and answer using questions from brainstorming stage to

create communicative activities

Time to carry out: 20 minutes

Preparation:

+ Teacher: Vocabulary of jobs, good questions to explore personal information

+ Students: Get to know some information about the person they want to act

1 Asking and answering about personal information

As we know, teachers of English often ask their students to work in pair asking andanswering about their personal because this activity is quite important and interesting

Last semester, after students have learnt Units 1,2,3 in English 7, in an extralesson in the afternoon, I asked students in class 7 B to work in pair asking andanswering about their personal information I gave them some clues such as: name,age, job, accommodation, family, telephone number, favorite pastimes I alsoreminded students some phrases to ask their friends back to increase thecommunicative target Such as:

How/ What about you?

And you?

And your

For weak class, I asked all class to build up the questions before they asked eachother Questions as following:

What's your name?

How old are you?

Where do you live?

How far is it from your house to school?

How do you go to school?

How many people are there in your family?

What's your telephone number?

What do you do in your free time?

Unluckily, I found my students feel quite bored with this activity because theydid learn how to answer these questions in the morning so during their working time,

I walked around to take notes what their answers were

First, I asked all students in class to work in pairs simultaneously and then Irequired some pairs to present their dialogues in front of the whole class

Here are some of the dialogues I noted down during that lesson

* First, I heard two students called Huyen and Quyen make their dialogue asfollowing:

Huyen: What's your name?

Quyen: My name is Quyen

Huyen: How old are you?

Quyen: I'm 11 years old

Huyen: What do you do?

Quyen: I'm a student

Huyen: Where do you live?

Quyen: I live in Da Son

Huyen: How far is it from your house to school?

Quyen: It's about 1 km

Huyen: How do you go to school?

Quyen: I go to school by bike

Huyen: How many people are there in your family?

Quyen: There are four people in my family

Huyen: What's your telephone number?

Quyen: 0383 871 256

Huyen: What do you do in your free time?

Quyen: I play badminton

Obviously, two students named Huyen and Quyen made a good dialoguebecause they could use all questions needed to ask about personal information Butthey still felt bored with this activity since they have been in the same class for nearlytwo years and they have known each other very well That's why when listening toQuyen's answer, Huyen showed no surprise or not much interest because she couldguess what Quyen's answers were

* Next, I observed 2 students named Nam and Hai

Nam: What's your name, Hai?

Hai: My name is Hai And your name, Nam?

Nam: My name is Nam How old are you?

Hai: I'm 11 years old And you?

Nam: I'm 11 What do you do?

Hai: I'm a student And you?

Nam: I'm a student Where do you live?

Hai: I live in Do Luong town How about you?

Nam: I live in Do Luong town How far is it from your house to school?

Hai: It's about 2 km How about your house?

Nam: It's about 2 km How do you go to school?

Hai: I goto school by bike And you?

Nam: I go to school by bike How many people are there in your family?

Hai: There are four people in my family And your family?

Nam: There are five people in my family What's your telephone number?

Hai: 0383 871 345 And your telephone number?

Nam: 0383 871 254 What do you do in your free time?

Hai: I play soccer And you?

Nam: I watch TV

Happily, two students Nam and Hai made a better dialogue than Huyen andQuyen's because they did use phrases like: How about you? And you? to ask hisfriend but they still found this activity a bit uninteresting because they were neighborsand they knew clearly about each other They knew each other so clearly that theymade a very funny mistake when asking questions:

Nam: What's your name, Hai?

Hai: My name is Hai And your name, Nam?

From the dialogues students in class 7B made, I thought I had to find a betterway, a more interesting thing but students can still have to practice asking andanswering personal information without feeling bored So when I taught class 7 D (aweaker class), I also asked the whole class to build up questions as I did in class 7 B.The I asked students to act if they were new to each other So each student have threeminutes to note down the name, job, accommodation they liked They may act ifthey were famous singers, actors or actress Then I asked students in class 7D

to change their seats so that they could ask the person they wanted to know more Ialso reminded students to use phrases given to ask his/ her new friend to increasecommunicative target and encouraged them to be creative in using questions

And here are two dialogues I noted down:

(Dialogue made by Sang and Duc Duc is A Sang is B)

A: Hi Nice to meet you

B: Hi How do you do What's your name?

A: My name is Messi And your name?

B: My full name is Ngo Kien Huy How old are you?

A: I'm 27 years old How about you?

B: I'm 24 What do you do?

A: I'm a soccer player And you?

B: I'm a singer Where do you live?

A: I live in London And you?

B: I live in Ho Chi Minh city How do you often go to work?

A: I go to work by bus How about you?

B: I go to work by car, sometimes by bus How many people are there in your family? A: There are three people in my family How about your family

B: There are two people in my family My mother and I So what do you so in your

free time?

A: I play basketball Sometimes I go swimming And you?

B: I sometimes play video games Sometimes, I play table tennis.

With the way I used for students in class 7D, I found that all students wereeager to work together to make dialogues Although they couldn't cover all personalinformation needed, their dialogues were more colorful and more lively Therefore, tomotivate students first to feel like taking part in speaking activity, then gradually toimprove their speaking skill as well as their confidence, teachers really need to createartificial activities which are new and interesting to them and above all, teachers have

to create activities that are suitable for students' levels

Pair- work in teaching and learning English is not new and can be called a dailyactivity but how teachers make students get involved in this kind of activity eagerly is

a big problem to many teachers

With the way I used for students in class 7 D can be used in many lessons withother topics relating to exploring personal information

2 Pair- work about future plan using " will"

Aim: - To help students express their future intention using "will" after learning

Preparation:

+ Teachers: Information / flashcards about places of interest in their province or

country Questions to ask about holiday in the future

+ Students: Revise the use, form of "will" at home first

Steps:

When I taught class 7 B First, I asked students to speak out some questions toask their friends about their plans for a holiday next summer Here are questionsstudents in class 7B presented

Where will you go next summer?

How will you go there?

Who will you go with?

Where will you stay there?

How long will you stay there?

What will you do there?

Will you buy any souvenirs and take any photos?

Then, I asked all students to work in pair simultaneously I walked around class tocheck and help but I found that most of students in class 7B said they would go toCua Lo as they hadn't been to anywhere else and they didn't know much about otherfamous places Therefore, their dialogues were almost the same They didn't talkabout other places as I expected When I carried out the same lesson in class 7A, Iasked students to say out the place they wanted to visit such as Hanoi, Ho Chi Minhcity , then I provided some information about those places

you can get there by car/ bus/ train / plane (from Vinh city)

Hanoi: you can visit: Sword lake, One Pillar pagoda, Ho Chi Minh's

Mausoleum, Ba Dinh Square,

you can try: Hanoi Pho, Com cakes,

Similarly, I provided some flashcards containing some necessary information aboutsome places to my students so that they can use

After students had worked simultaneously, I asked some pairs to present theirdialogues and I was very glad to find that some pairs made very good dialogues Here

is one of those

I noted down a dialogue between Hoang and Nhung as following:

Hoang: Hi, NHung Where will you go this summer?

Nhung: I will go to Ho Chi Minh city

Hoang: How nice! Who will you go with?

Nhung: I will go with my parents and my brother

Hoang: How will you go there?

Nhung: We will go there by train

Hoang: Where will you stay in Ho Chi Minh city?

Nhung: We will stay at a small hotel

Hoang: How long will you stay there?

Nhung: We will stay there for a week

Hoang: What will you do in Ho Chi Minh city?

Nhung: We will visit Nha Rong Harbor, Dam Sen Water Park, Tien Spring park and

go to a music live show And we'll try a lot of specialties in Ho Chi Minh city Hoang: Will you buy any souvenirs and take any photos?

Nhung: Of course, we will I will have a gift for you and I will show you my photos Hoang: Great Have a good trip

Nhung Thanks How about you?

Hoang: This summer, I will go to Hanoi with my parents We'll go there by bus We'll stay at my uncle's house for 4 days I think we will visit you can visit: Sword lake, One Pillar pagoda, Ho Chi Minh's Mausoleum, Ba Dinh Square, And we'll try Hanoi Pho, Com cakes, We'll take some photos and buy some gifts I'll give you a nice gift

Nhung: Thanks Enjoy your journey

Once again, if teachers want their students to be interested in speakingactivities, they have to create new, interesting and suitable ones Moreover, to besuccessful in one activity, teachers must have good knowledge in that filed andprepare what is essential to help students in case they get stuck in exploringinformation

Application: