One Step at Time: Presentation 1 TEACHING SPOKEN LANGUAGE: Why, What and How Background Why Spoken Language Matters Teaching Spoken Language What to Teach How to Teach Creating a Language-Learning Environment Teaching Language Systematically Making Language Teaching Manageable 1

Teaching Spoken Language: Why, What and How BACKGROUND One Step at a Time is:  a structured teaching programme for developing spoken language in the early years and primary school through the active use of spoken language in the classroom  a whole-school programme for children aged 3 and 9, but can also be used with single classes and/or older children  an all-needs programme, providing differentiated teaching for all children in mainstream education 2

Teaching Spoken Language: Why, What and How BACKGROUND This session covers:  why spoken language matters  knowing what to teach  knowing how to teach it  making it manageable in the mainstream classroom 3

Teaching Spoken Language: Why, What and How WHY SPOKEN LANGUAGE MATTERS Spoken language is crucial for:  communication  teaching  learning  literacy  thinking  social and emotional development 4

Teaching Spoken Language: Why, What and How WHY SPOKEN LANGUAGE MATTERS Competence in spoken language is increasingly an issue for schools.  Spoken language is particularly important in the early years and continues to develop through the school years  It is a crucial pre-literacy skill, and a continuing literacy-support skill  Increasing numbers of children are coming into school lacking basic spoken language skills  The demands on their understanding and use of spoken language increase as they progress through school  Children who start behind are likely to fall further behind 5

Teaching Spoken Language: Why, What and How WHY SPOKEN LANGUAGE MATTERS Competency in spoken language needs to be:  the main educational priority at ages 3 to 5  a joint priority, with literacy, from 5 onwards  for all children 6

Teaching Spoken Language: Why, What and How TEACHING SPOKEN LANGUAGE But spoken language is a complex system:  not fully understood  seldom included in teacher training  difficult to teach in classroom settings  because of the quantity and complexity of the language that children need to know;  and because the normal conditions of language learning are difficult to reproduce in a mainstream classroom 7

Teaching Spoken Language: Why, What and How TEACHING SPOKEN LANGUAGE Teachers need to know:  what to teach  how to teach it  how to manage it, as well as everything else 8

Teaching Spoken Language: Why, What and How WHAT TO TEACH Spoken language is huge and complex. To teach it effectively we have to be selective. We need an educational model that identifies:  the essential language skills that children need for progress through school  in the order they need them for their learning 9

Teaching Spoken Language: Why, What and How WHAT TO TEACH 10

Teaching Spoken Language: Why, What and How WHAT TO TEACH: Content Vocabulary is vast, too big to assess or teach comprehensively, but key elements include:  early vocabulary  the vocabulary of properties and relations  the vocabulary of feelings and emotion  topic vocabulary Grammar is complex, difficult to assess, and probably impossible to teach directly. Key elements include:  question forms  verb forms 11

Teaching Spoken Language: Why, What and How WHAT TO TEACH: Use Conversation skills are crucial for:  communication and social development  teaching and learning  other language skills Listening skills are crucial for:  learning  understanding  the development of reading 12

Teaching Spoken Language: Why, What and How WHAT TO TEACH: Use Narrative skills (extended talk) are crucial for:  coherent thought and expression  development of writing Discussion skills are crucial for:  thinking  social understanding  emotional literacy 13

Teaching Spoken Language: Why, What and How WHAT TO TEACH: Fluency  Children also need fluency in all these skills.  This means practice, repetition and over-learning. 14

Teaching Spoken Language: Why, What and How WHAT TO TEACH 15

Teaching Spoken Language: Why, What and How HOW TO TEACH Spoken language is normally learnt through:  close personal interaction  active physical involvement, using  familiar things and activities  prompting, encouragement and reward  repetition, repetition, repetition 16

Teaching Spoken Language: Why, What and How HOW TO TEACH These conditions are difficult to recreate in schools. We need to reproduce them where we can, and compensate for them where we cannot. We can do this by:  creating a language-learning environment  providing systematic teaching of spoken language 17

Teaching Spoken Language: Why, What and How CREATING A LANGUAGE-LEARNING ENVIRONMENT A language-learning environment is one where  children’s talk, including spontaneous talk, is valued, not just allowed but actively encouraged  children feel secure, comfortable and confident, willing and able to express themselves in whatever way they can 18

Teaching Spoken Language: Why, What and How CREATING A LANGUAGE-LEARNING ENVIRONMENT A language-learning environment can be created by:  developing a more interactive, conversational style of teaching  using children’s talk as a way of teaching and learning, e.g.  classroom discussion, Do and Review or Plan, Do and Review  partner work and independent discussion groups  maximising opportunities for informal conversation with individual children  making the most of those that exist  creating new ones where we can  and involving everyone 19

Teaching Spoken Language: Why, What and How CREATING A LANGUAGE-LEARNING ENVIRONMENT Everyone includes parents. Schools should explain to parents:  the importance of spoken language for their children’s education  what they can do at home to help develop it  how One Step at a Time works and what it is trying to achieve,  how parents can help their children with specific skills at home and provide opportunities for parents to work with children in the classroom under staff guidance, where possible. 20

Teaching Spoken Language: Why, What and How TEACHING LANGUAGE SYSTEMATICALLY But schools can also teach spoken language  using the same techniques that parents use to teach their children  but using them explicitly and systematically  and therefore more efficiently and more effectively. 21

Teaching Spoken Language: Why, What and How MAKING LANGUAGE TEACHING MANAGEABLE To do this, schools and staff need something that will:  take the difficulty and uncertainty out of language teaching  guide them in what to teach, when to teach it, how to teach it, and how to assess children’s development and progress  embody the expertise needed to teach spoken language  and enable staff to develop that expertise themselves through active experience in the classroom but above all  be easy to implement and manage in mainstream classrooms 22

Teaching Spoken Language: Why, What and How MAKING LANGUAGE TEACHING MANAGEABLE Spoken language can be made more accessible to schools by using a teaching programme that:  identifies the skills most needed for progress in school  and provides  explicit teaching and learning objectives  appropriate teaching techniques  simple ways of assessing development and reviewing progress 23

Teaching Spoken Language: Why, What and How MAKING LANGUAGE TEACHING MANAGEABLE A teaching programme must also be:  flexible: adaptable to the needs of different schools, different teachers and different children  easily manageable in the classroom:  reflecting and supporting the wider curriculum  building on existing classroom practice and activities  without adding significantly to teachers’ workloads, or requiring additional resources or special expertise This is what One Step at a Time aims to do. 24