Speaking

Objective: The area the speaking is important to  communicate with other people. Ours  objectives are:

•          Show a series of recommendations for you to communicate with others when you are talking besides that can express your ideas and thoughts.
•          Demonstrate effective word choice, vocabulary, idioms, grammar and sentence structure allowing accurate communication of meaning in written work.
•         Articulate in conversation and oral presentations clearly organized ideas and supporting evidence in a vocabulary appropriate to the target audience.
•          Recognize their own verbal mistakes and correct them.

Speaking

Speaking is "the process of building and sharing meaning through the use of verbal and non-verbal symbols, in a variety of contexts". Speaking is a crucial part of second language learning and teaching. Despite its importance, for many years, teaching speaking has been undervalued and English language teachers have continued to teach speaking just as a repetition of drills or memorization of dialogues. However, today's world requires that the goal of teaching speaking should improve students' communicative skills, because, only in that way, students can express themselves and learn

“Let go of self-consciousness; speak as much as you can. We make many mistakes when speaking our L1, but that doesn’t stop us from speaking.” -Cecilia Lemos

Why do we need to speak English?

Need confidence! Improve your English.

Learning to speak English well may be the best thing you can do to improve your life.

English may not be the most spoken language in the world, but it is the official language in a large number of countries. It is estimated that the number of people in the world that use in English to communicate on a regular basis is 2 billion! 

English is the dominant business language and it has become almost a necessity for people to speak English if they are to enter a global workforce, research from all over the world shows that cross-border business communication is most often conducted in English. Its importance in the global market place therefore cannot be understated, learning English really can change your life.

Make new friends and professional relationship: English is a great way to meet new people, especially those from other countries. The internet has opened a world of opportunities to get to know people all over the world. It’s easy to meet and develop friendships with new friends by chatting or doing language exchanges or simply leaving comments on your favorite blogs.

To travel the world: English is predominately the language used for international travel. As noted above, English is spoken by many people as a first or second language all over the world. So no matter where you travel—even to non-English speaking countries—it is highly likely that some of the locals will speak English. You will also feel safer and more confident knowing English if you don’t know the local language. Not only will English help you get around but it will also make it easier for you to interact with other travelers.

It's entertaining: There are more movies, films and books written in English than in other languages. Although some of these works are translated, dubbed or subtitled, many are not or there is quite a delay with the translation. If you can speak English, you get to enjoy the latest releases before they are translated. Like listening to English music? In terms of popular music, music from British and American musicians and bands are frequently broadcast around the world.  It’s a lot more entertaining and fun when you can also understand the meaning of the lyrics and cultural references in the songs. English opens up a world of fun and entertainment to those who can understand it.

Activities To Promote Speaking

Discussions

After a content-based lesson, a discussion can be held for various reasons. The students may aim to arrive at a conclusion, share ideas about an event, or find solutions in their discussion groups. Before the discussion, it is essential that the purpose of the discussion activity is set by the teacher. In this way, the discussion points are relevant to this purpose, so that students do not spend their time chatting with each other about irrelevant things.

Role Play    

One other way of getting students to speak is role-playing. Students pretend they are in various social contexts and have a variety of social roles.

Simulations

Simulations are very similar to role-plays but what makes simulations different than role plays is that they are more elaborate. In simulations, students can bring items to the class to create a realistic environment.

Information Gap

Information gap activities serve many purposes such as solving a problem or collecting information.  Also, each partner plays an important role because the task cannot be completed if the partners do not provide the information the others need. These activities are effective because everybody has the opportunity to talk extensively in the target language.

Brainstorming

On a given topic, students can produce ideas in a limited time. Depending on the context, either individual or group brainstorming is effective and learners generate ideas quickly and freely. The good characteristics of brainstorming is that the students are not criticized for their ideas so students will be open to sharing new ideas.

Storytelling

Students can briefly summarize a tale or story they heard from somebody beforehand, or they may create their own stories to tell their classmates. Story telling fosters creative thinking. It also helps students express ideas in the format of beginning, development, and ending, including the characters and setting a story has to have. Students also can tell riddles or jokes.

Interviews

Students can conduct interviews on selected topics with various people.

Story Completion

This is a very enjoyable, whole-class, free-speaking activity for which students sit in a circle. Each student is supposed to add from four to ten sentences. Students can add new characters, events, descriptions and so on.

Reporting

Before coming to class, students are asked to read a newspaper or magazine and, in class, they report to their friends what they find as the most interesting news.

Playing Cards

In this game, students should form groups of four. Each suit will represent a topic.

Each student in a group will choose a card. Then, each student will write 4-5 questions about that topic to ask the other people in the group.

Picture Narrating

This activity is based on several sequential pictures.

Picture Describing

Another way to make use of pictures in a speaking activity is to give students just one picture and having them describe what it is in the picture. This activity fosters the creativity and imagination of the learners as well as their public speaking skills.

Find the Difference

For this activity students can work in pairs and each couple is given two different pictures.

Public Speaking Strategies:

Here are a few strategies pertinent to public speaking: Be prepared. Know your topic well. Develop rapport. Smile and maintain eye contact with your audience. Take note of your audience. Notice when your audience agrees with you or looks puzzled or confused. Develop visuals. When it is appropriate, use overheads, slides, handouts, and demonstrations. They can add drama, reduce your stress, and reinforce your speech. Just make sure the type on your visuals is large enough to read, the projector works, and you have practice working with the visual aids. Prepare your prompters. Don't memorize the speech, but be well versed on your topic that you are comfortable just talking about it. Prepare notes to prompt yourself. Put key phrases down in large letters, with stories and quotes on note cards. Practice. Rehearsal is everything! Practice the speech several times out loud, in front of a mirror, an empty classroom, or to friends. Practice speaking slowly and calmly, but louder than usual. Vary the pitch and speed for emphasis. Avoid unecessary words. Use clear, concise words. Don't use pauses as fillers, irritating non-words, or overused, annoying slang, such as "uh", "um", "you know", "stuff like that", "sort of", "like", and so on. Use pauses for emphasis; then take a deep breath and go on. Review your performances. Ask your instructor and other students for feedback. Be open to learning and strive to improve. Videos on body language, overcoming nerves, vocal variety.  How Ted Talk Help us learn English?