Tập huấn Thay sách Anh 12 - 2008

Point out the problems with speaking activities and solutions to such problems... List the activities/tasks often used in the three main stages/phases of the lesson plan for teaching sp

TEACHING SPEAKING

Presented by

QUESTIONS FOR DISCUSSION

1 What kind of speaking should students do?

2 State the characteristics of a successful speaking

activity

3 Point out the problems with speaking activities and

solutions to such problems

QUESTIONS FOR DISCUSSION

4 How should you correct speaking?

5 List the activities/tasks often used in the three main

stages/phases of the lesson plan for teaching speaking

 Follow-up activity

In groups, choose one speaking task in the textbook

(Tieng Anh 12 nang cao), then make a lesson plan for teaching your 12-grade students.

KIND of SPEAKING

1. Speaking as controlled language

practice.

a. Repetition – class work

e.g It’s nice to meet you.

b. Question and answer exchange- Pair

work or class work

e.g environment protection

Speaking tasks as controlled language practice

2 Speaking as free practice

Students are using any and all the language at

their command to perform some kind of oral task

 Information gap – Pair work

e.g Describe and draw

b. Survey – Group work

2 Speaking as free practice

c Discussion – Group work

e.g Single family versus extended family

d Role play – Pair work

e.g Interviewer and interviewee in a job

interview

Speaking tasks as free practice should be

Top-down and bottom-up processing

 Top-down processing

- The speaker brings to the international

communicative act a set of pre-supposition about the situation, the participants in the exchange, and the expected outcome of the exchange

- The speaker bases on their background knowledge

of the sociolinguistics, rules of appropriacy and the focus on intended message with respect to the

listener’s situation to make choices that form the

spoken product

Top-down and bottom-up processing

- The speaker initiates the interaction with a

communicative intention This is to be

realized through utterances

- The speaker makes use of his own language knowledge, speaking skills, and

communication strategies to form the spoken product (utterances)

The roles of the teacher

Prompter

- Teacher can help students and the activity

to progress by offering discrete suggestions

- Students won’t feel frustrated when

coming to a dead end of language or ideas

if teacher’s help doesn’t disrupt the

discussion or forcing them out of role

The roles of the teacher

maintain a creative atmosphere.

Teacher should not take over the classroom so

that students lose opportunities for speaking.

The roles of the teacher

Feedback provider

Teacher should avoid overcorrection Helpful and gentle correction may get students out of difficult

misunderstanding and hesitations.

Characteristics of a successful

speaking activity

According to Ur (2002:120), the characteristics of a

speaking activity that make teachers judge it

1 Much learner’s talk

It seems obvious that learners should talk as much as possible during the

allotted time for speaking activity

However, teacher’s talk or pauses

takes most of the class time instead.

2 Even participation

All learners have a chance to speak and contribute to the discussion In a classroom discussion a small

number of talkative participants have little opportunity to play the role of

the dominant ones

3 High motivation

Learns are highly motivated They

are interested in the topic, eager and willing to speak because they have something new to say about it.

4 Acceptable level of language accuracy

Learner’s utterances are ‘relevant,

easily comprehensible to each other and of an acceptable level of

languages to express themselves in

a successful speaking activity.

The value of role play as a class activity

 Controlled role play

+ Improvising dialogues/cued dialogues

+ Interviews based on the text

 Free role play

Topics and situations for free role play

The value of role play as a class

activity

 Role play gives a chance to use language

in new contexts and for new topics.

 Role play helps teachers build on

something that students naturally enjoy.

 Role play encourages students to use

natural expressions and intonations as well

as gestures.

Problems with speaking activities and solutions to such problems

A. Problems

1 Inhibition

Learners find it difficult to say things in

a foreign language in the classroom because they are shy or perhaps they are afraid of making mistakes, of

Problems with speaking activities and solutions to such problems

2 Nothing to say

Learners often complain that they cannot think of anything to say Usually, they have no motive to express themselves because they feel guilty that they should be speaking

3 Low or uneven participation

In a large group, learners have very little talking time because of some dominant

Problems with speaking activities and solutions to such problems

4 Mother-tongue use

Learners tend to use mother tongue if they are grouped with those having the same language, and particularly talking in small groups because they find it easier and more natural to speak

their mother tongue than a foreign language

Teachers then would find it difficult to get

B SUGGESTED SOLUTIONS

1 Use group work

This increases the amount of learner’s talking time even though learners may slip into their mother tongue in their talk; and teachers cannot totally control such a thing.

B SUGGESTED SOLUTIONS

2 Base the activity on easy language

The level of language needed for discussion should be easier The participants find it easy to recall or produce the language, then they can speak fluently It would be good if

essential vocabulary is pre-taught and

B SUGGESTED SOLUTIONS

3 Make a careful choice of topic and

task to stimulate interest.

Teachers should select interesting topic and task for learners to discuss

or perform If the purpose of the discussion is clear, the participants will be more motivated

5 Keep learners speaking the target language

Teacher might appoint a monitor to remind the participants to use the target language, or she/

HOW TO CORRECT SPEAKING?

 During speaking activities in controlled

language practice, teachers often correct every

time there is a problem to achieve accuracy.

 However during speaking activities in free

language practice, teachers cannot do the

same thing because the ultimate purpose here is

to achieve fluency Thus, teachers should

HOW TO CORRECT SPEAKING?

+ watch, listen while speaking activities are taking place.

+ note down good points as well as

shortcomings (i.e students couldn’t make themselves understood or make serious mistakes that cause communication

breakdown).

HOW TO CORRECT SPEAKING?

+ ask students point out their own mistakes and if they can correct the mistakes by themselves when the activity has finished.

+ write down the mistakes on the board or give

the mistakes individually to the students

concerned.

+ avoid singling students out for particular

criticism.

HOW TO CORRECT SPEAKING?

If teachers interrupt students constantly for correcting mistakes they will destroy the

purpose of the speaking activity and take the communicativeness out of the activity.

In short, the general principle of watching and listening so that teachers can give feedback later is usually much more appropriate.

Three main stages/phases of the lesson plan for teaching speaking

1 Pre-speaking (Presentation

stage/phase)

Activities/Tasks include

 Question-Answer Exchange

 Communication games (Information gap)

 Discussion (buzz groups)

Three main stages/phases of the lesson plan for teaching speaking

2 While-speaking (Practice/stage/phase)

Activities/Tasks include

 Cued dialogue/Controlled role play

Three main stages/phases of the

lesson plan for teaching speaking