Topic 7 LA LENGUA EXTRANJERA ORAL. LA COMPLEJIDAD DE LA COMPRENSION DEL SENTIDO GLOBAL EN LA INTERACCIÓN ORAL: DE LA AUDICIÓN A LA ESCUCHA ACTIVA Y SELECTIVA. LA TOMA DE PALABRA: DE LA REPRODUCCIÓN IMITATIVA A LA PRODUCCIÓN AUTÓNOMA.

TABLE OF CONTENTS 0. Introduction 1. Spoken Language 2. Listening Comprehension: from hearing to active understanding General Principles in Teaching/Learning Listening Comprehension Intensive and Extensive Listening Strategies for Developing Listening Skills Goals for Teaching Listening Using Authentic Materials and Situations Developing Listening Activities Assessing Listening Proficiency 3. Speaking: from imitation to autonomous production Goals and Techniques for Teaching Speaking Strategies for Developing Speaking Skills Developing speaking Activities 4. Conclusion

Introduction Using a foreign language effectively requires having a number of different abilities. Linguists have identified four major abilites, which they call linguistic skills. The major skills are: listening, reading, speaking and writing. They may be classified in two ways: in relation to the medium In relation to the activity of the speaker. SKILL MEDIUM AURAL/SPEECH VISUAL/WRITTEN RECEPTIVE listening reading PRODUCTIVE speaking writing

1. Spoken language A general overview of the importance of speech and the abilities that are required to produce it. Spoken language is the most obvious aspect of language and can be defined as the universal material of human language. For many hundreds of thousands of years human language was transmitted and developed entirely as spoken means of communication.

At a very basic level, spoken language demands the physiological abilities to be able to use our speech and auditory organs properly (speech mechanisms + ear). On top of this physiological level we have the psychological level, where our linguistic skills are situated (brain). Psychological skills of speaking communicative abilities for talk and listen Physiological abilities required for speech hearing and speaking /speech production + perception/ /Widdowson/

From hearing to active listening From imitative speaking to autonomous talking

2. Listening comprehension: from hearing to active understanding In order to analyse the oral skills, we will first deal with listening skills. Listening is the language modality that is used most frequently. Adults spend almost half of their communication time listening. Students may receive as much as 90% of their in-school time through listening.

2.1. General principles in teaching listening skills Let us begin by discussing the general principles to be followed when teaching listening comprehension. 2.1. General principles in teaching listening skills The following principles must be borne in mind when designing a listening class: Definite goals, carefully stated. Step by step planning: from simple hearing-based activities to more complex understanding based. Active students’ participation: immediate feedback on pupils’ performance. Stress conscious memory work. Teach, not test.

2.2. Intensive and Extensive Listening If we want our pupils to be efficient listeners we must give them enough practice in both intensive and extensive listening. 2.2. Intensive and Extensive Listening Extensive Listening The language level is within students’ capacity and they listen for pleasure and interest. Can be long or short. Do not require direct control of the teacher. Intensive Listening: The most widely used Students listen with the aim of collecting and organizing the information. Contains more concrete information and often not so easy to understand. Short passages, played several times.

Let us now discuss the strategies that must be developed when working on listening comprehension. 2.3. Strategies for Developing Listening Skills Top-down strategies Are listener-based activities The listener taps into background knowledge of the topic. Top –down strategies include: listening for the main idea, predicting, summarizing, etc. Bottom-up strategies Are text based The listener relies on the language of the message Bottom-up strategies include: listening for details, recognizing cognates, recognizing word-order patterns. Metacognitive strategies Deciding which listening strategies will serve best. Monitor the selected strategies. Evaluate if they have achieved their listening comprehension goals.

2.4. Goals of Teaching Listening The main goal: Let us now concentrate on the goals instructors must have when teaching listening. 2.4. Goals of Teaching Listening The main goal: Produce students who can use listening strategies to maximise their comprehension of aural input, identify relevant and non-relevant information, and tolerate less than word-by-word comprehension. To accomplish this goal, instructors focus on the process of listening rather on its product.

2.5. Using Authentic Materials and Situations Authentic Materials and Situations prepare students for the types of listening they will need to do when using the language outside the classroom.

2.6. Developing Listening Activities Let us now examine steps to be followed when preparing listening activities. 2.6. Developing Listening Activities Complete recall of all the information in an aural text is an unrealistic. MAKE YOUR LISTENING TASKS SUCCESS-ORIENTED TO BUILD-UP STUDENTS’ CONFIDENCE. How to do it: Construct the listening activity around a contextualised task. Define the activity’s instructional goal and type of response. Check the level of difficulty of the listening text. Use pre-listening activities. Match while-listening activities to the instructional goal, the listening purpose, and students’ proficiency level.

3. Speaking: from imitation to autonomous production According to Stovall (1988), many language learners regard speaking ability as the measure of knowing the language. They regard speaking as the most important skills. Speaking involves THREE AREAS OF KNOWLEDGE: Mechanics The use of the right words in the right order Functions when clarity off message is essential and when precise understanding is not required Social and cultural rules and norms Who is speaking to whom, in what circumstances, about what, and for what reason.

3. 1. Goals and Techniques for Teaching Speaking Let us now examine the techniques and goals for teaching speaking. 3. 1. Goals and Techniques for Teaching Speaking Use of a BALANCED ACTIVITIES APPROACH that combines language input, structures output, and communicative output (Hadley, 2001). LANGUAGE INPUT In form of teacher talk, listening activities, reading texts, language heard and read outside the class, etc. May be content oriented or form oriented. STRUCTURED OUTPUT Focuses on the correct form. Students may have options, but all of them require the use of specific language items. COMMUNICATIVE OUTPUT The learner’s main purpose is to complete a communicative task. The criterion of success is whether the learner gets the message across. Accuracy is not a consideration unless the lack of it interferes with the message.

3.2. STRATEGIES for Developing Speaking Skills Let us now examine the most important strategies instructors can use to help their students develop listening skills. 3.2. STRATEGIES for Developing Speaking Skills USING MINIMAL RESPONSES Minimal responses: predictable, often idiomatic phrases that conversation participants use to indicate understanding, agreement, doubt, etc. Help students to focus on what the other participant is saying. RECOGNIZING SCRIPTS Some communication situations are associated with a predictable set of spoken exchanges / SCRIPTS. Students can predict what they will hear and what they will need to say in response. USING LANGUAGE TO TALK ABOUT LANGUAGE Encouraging students to use clarification phrases in class when misunderstanding can help them to gain confidence.

3.3. Developing Speaking Abilities Finally we will examine the procedures to be followed when preparing activities devoted to practising speaking 3.3. Developing Speaking Abilities Instructors need to combine structures output activities with communicative output activities. Structured Output Activities + Communicative Output Activities Error correction and increase of accuracy Opportunity to practice language use more freely INFORMATION GAP JIGSAW ACTIVITIES ROLE PLAYS DISCUSSIONS

Structured Output Activities: Information gap An information gap activity is an activity where learners are missing the information they need to complete a task and need to talk to each other to find it. Example  Learner A has a biography of a famous person with all the place names missing, whilst Learner B has the same text with all the dates missing. Together they can complete the text by asking each other questions. Information gap activities are useful for various reasons. They provide an opportunity for extended speaking practice, they represent real communication, motivation can be high, and they require sub-skills such as clarifying meaning and re-phrasing. Typical types of information gap activities you might find include; describe and draw, spot the difference, etc.

Famous Artists: This information gap covers some famous artists and the passive voice.

Shapes: This information gap covers 10 basic shapes plus prepositions.

Newspaper Headlines: Students ask each other if they've heard the news and then relay the headlines to their partners.

Structured Output Activities: Jigsaw activities In a jigsaw, the class is divided into several teams, with each team preparing separate but related assignments. When all team members are prepared, the class is re- divided into mixed groups, with one member from each team in each group. Each person in the group teaches the rest of the group what he/she knows, and the group then tackles an assignment together that pulls all of the pieces together to form the full picture, hence the name jigsaw.

Communicative Output Activities Allow students to practise using all of the language they know in situations that resemble real settings. In these activities, students must work together to develop a plan, resolve a problem, or complete a task. The most common types are: role-plays and discussions.

Role plays In role-plays students are assigned roles and put into situations that they may eventually encounter outside the classroom. Student A You are booking into a hotel. Elements Book in to the hotel - you have a reservation. Complications You are on your own. You want a shower. You want breakfast in the morning. You have an early meeting and must not be late. Student B You are a hotel receptionist. Elements Welcome the guest. Find them a room. Complications You can't find their reservation. You only have a double room with bath available.

Discussions To succeed with discussions: Prepare the students: give them input Offer choices: let students suggest the topic for discussion. Set a goal or outcome: a group product (a letter to the editor) or individual reports. Use small groups instead of whole/class discussions. Keep in short: give students a defined period of time (not more than 8-10 minutes) Allow students to participate in their own way. Do topical follow-up: have students report to the class on the results of their discussion. Do linguistic follow up: give feedback on linguistic aspects.