1. SPEAKING WILSON BURGOS AROCA MARTHA LILIANA CARRILLO ARIAS
Candidates to Master’s Degree
on English Didactics
Surcolombiana and Caldas Universities Agreement
Neiva, November 2009

2. SPEAKING
THEORY
CHARACTERISTICS
STRATEGIES
ACTIVITIES

3. THEORY According to Bailey and Savage, 1994.
Speaking in a second or foreign language has often been viewed as the most demanding of the four skills.
Canale and Swain (1980) proposed that the teaching of speaking must aim at the development of the communicative competence.
Oral skill classes at all levels are often structured around functional uses of language.

4. CHARACTERISTICS Formal and informal language
Stress and intonation
Sounds
The organization of the speech
Formal and informal language
Pauses and fillers
Syntax and vocabulary of speech

5. Low or uneven participation
Inhibition to speak
Low or uneven participation
Mother tongue use
Nothing to say
PROBLEMS

6. STRATEGIES Teach to students compensatory strategies.
Keep a balance between accuracy and fluency.
Integrate speaking with other linguistic skills.
Vary the tasks
Create a safe
environment to speak
Make connections with real life situations
Consider the level and the perceived needs of the students when doing speaking
Encourage students to seek for opportunities to practice speaking
Teach to students compensatory strategies.
STRATEGIES

7. STRATEGIES Choose the topic and the task carefully.
Give instructions or training in discussion skills.
Keep students speaking the target language
Base tasks on comprehensible language
STRATEGIES

8. WHILE SPEAKING POST SPEAKING PRE SPEAKING
Plan and organize for speaking
Choosing a speaking topic
Determining a purpose and audience
Determining format
WHILE SPEAKING
Engaging students in interactions with peers and other audiences.
Engage in formal and informal speaking situations
POST SPEAKING
Reflection about students performance (critical thinking)
Reflect upon performance
Giving feedback

9. ACTIVITIES SPEAKING Conversations Discussions Interviews Role plays
Speeches

10. ACTIVITIES SPEAKING Describing pictures Solving a problem
Things in common
Solving a problem
Pictures differences

11. Useful websites for Speaking
This webpage includes speaking activities such as role-plays, “Find someone who...” speaking activities, information gap activities, examination rubrics for ESL oral tests, and discussion questions.
This British Council and BBC webpage has a varied set of activities for speaking. Once you type it, go to try and then to activity and finally to speaking.
This webpage provides several speaking activities for your students to discuss. Topics such as abortion, AIDS, immigration among others are available. You type the webpage and the discussion topics are alphabetically ordered.
This webpage provides English teachers with a variety of speaking activities for oral communication such as English for specific purposes, everyday English, consonant sounds, vowel sounds, business English, dialogues, arts, sports, entertainment, current events among other areas.

12. Bibliography Kenworthy, J (1987). Teaching English Pronunciation.
Brown, G and Yule, G. (1983). Teaching the spoken language. Cambridge University Press.
Lazaraton, A. (2001). Teaching Oral skills.
Bailey, K.M. and Savage, Eds. (1994). New Ways in Teaching Speaking. Alexandria, VA:TESOL.
Murphy, J.M. (1991). Oral Communication in TESOL. Integrating Speaking, Listening and Pronunciations TESOL Quarterly 25 (D1):
Riggenbach, H. (1999). Discourse Analysis in the Language Classroom. Volume 1. The Spoken Language. Ann Arbor, MI: University of Michigan Press.
Underhill, N. (1987). Testing Spoken Language. A Handbook of Oral Testing Techniques. Cambridge University Press.