CePA 2014
IN- SERVICE TRAINING
HANDOUT 3
Developing young
learners' oracy skills – part 1
PART A – Theoretical Framework
Learning
to Speak
According to Carol
Read, speaking is a complex skill and the difficulty for children learning a
foreign language should not be underestimated. Although children are very good
at imitating, they are still developing their first language and L1 often interferes
in the process of learning a second language and this can cause trouble.
At the same time, it
is vital to take into consideration the children's age, their cognitive and
emotional development when planning activities for the classroom. If our aim is
to encourage our students to use the target language we must expose them to different
models and give them opportunities to speak English as soon and as much as they
can. In this way their self-esteem increases as they feel they are making
progress.
The Initial
Stages
It is important to
follow a routine in our lessons as these provide students with many
opportunities for natural language acquisition. These routines help children
feel secure and confident in the classroom. As children become familiar with
what is expected of them they act with greater autonomy and use the language
more naturally.
Everyday routines may
include:
-greeting and
starting the lesson;
- calling the role
and checking what the weather is like;
- doing different
types of activities during the lesson e.g. doing pair or group work, doing
circle time or reading time, playing some games, etc.
- giving out or
collecting materials.
- tidying up and
ending the lesson.
We should also give
our students English “to take away”. i.e. easy chunks that students pick up
easily and take with them. First lessons should include greetings,
introductions, simple exchanges, etc. The language presented at the beginning
is basically formulaic. Check the chart below:
Songs
& Chants & Rhymes
Children love music,
rhythm and movement. The use of songs, chants and rhymes contribute to young
children´s overall social, linguistic, physical, cognitive and emotional
development. Songs, rhymes and chants play an important role when children
start to learn a foreign language as they present language in ways which are
natural, spontaneous and enjoyable. Children learn songs, chants and rhymes
very easily and with time and meaningful repetition students are able to extract lines from the songs or chants and
use these more naturally in other contexts.
EXAMPLES OF CHANTS
A) Cloudy Day
Cloudy day, it’s a cloudy day
The sky is dark and the sun is away
Cloudy day, it’s a cloudy day
The only color in the sky is gray.
B)
Sunny Day
Sunny day, it’s a sunny day.
The sun is shining! Let’s go and play!
Sunny day, it’s a sunny day.
I am happy! Hooray!
C)
Mr Elephant
An elephant goes like this, likethat.
He is very big. He is very fat.
He has no fingers. He has no toes.
But goodness gracious, what a nose!
D) The Family
This is the house.
Open the door.
Look at the family
And say Hello!
Spoken
interaction and spoken production
The oracy skills can
be divided into two areas:
a) Spoken
interaction: it refers to
the ability to ask and answer questions and handle interactions with others.
b) Spoken
production: it refers to the
ability to produce language, for example, in a description, in an account or
when retelling a story.
It is important to
develop children´s competence in both areas in order to build up confidence and
lay the foundations for further learning.
Students' needs
In order to develop their oracy skills, students need
Ø Models of language use to
listen to, to notice and to appropriate.
Ø Tons of opportunities for
repeated listening.
Ø Plentiful opportunities to
say the words or phrases.
Ø Feedbackonproduction.
Effective
support for children's foreign language discourse skills
Ò Supportthroughmotivatingtopics.
Ò Support through task
structure / framework.
Ò Supportthroughlanguagepractice.
Framework for
speaking activities
Whatever the children's age, it is important to provide frameworks for
speaking activities which encourage them to use the English for real purposes
rather than simply practise language for its own sake.
When a situation is presented, it is important to brainstorm language
that can be used in the situation and give students a framework to help them
frame their ideas. This framework can be written on the board and it provides
some ideas to help students frame what message they would like to convey. Example:
students have to describe their routines at the weekend.
After a general discussion, students have time to think about their own
messages. A simple framework on the board can guide them:
MY WEEKENDS – sample framework
I usually…………………………………………………….
I never………………………………………………………
My favourite moment of the
weekend is ……………………… because…………………..
Speaking activities which are personalized tend to increase children's
willingness to participate and help to make learning more memorable. They must
have something they want to say.
N.B.
Part B – Practical
Part
How to develop a
clear and solid sequence of activities
The chart on pages 8
and 9 shows a typology of speaking activities that go from tightly controlled
use of the language to a more natural use. The gap between children speaking L1
and L2 is a large one but with practice students will gradually build up their
confidence and their spoken language. They need a wide variety of activities,
different patterns of interaction and opportunities to maximize talk in the
classroom in order to sustain speaking. We need to develop a repertoire of
activities providing a balance between control and creativity, repetition and
more natural use and provide varied models of spoken English.
A well designed and
planned sequence of tasks should include:
-
tasks
which present a very controlled use of the language
-
tasks
which present a less controlled use of the language
-
and
tasks which lead to a more natural and spontaneous use of the language.
GROUP
ACTIVITY
1)
Teachers watch two
videos “Pete the Cat” and “Mr Bean at the Cinema” before the session.
2)
In the in-training
session they work in groups and design a sequence of activities for one of the
videos. This sequence should start with tasks which are very controlled at the
beginning and should end with a task in which students use the language more
freely.
3)
Each group presents
their sequence.
4)
We discuss the
sequences presented and comment on each one.
IMPORTANT
A sequence for each video is
presented attached (pages 6 and 7 - after bibliography) with this handout.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
Brewster J., Ellis G., Girard D. (1992) The Primary English Teacher’s Guide.
Penguin English Guides.
Ur, P. (1996) A Course in Language Teaching. Cambridge: CUP.
Harmer, J. (2007) How to teach English.Pearson.
Read, C. (2007) 500 Activities for the Primary Classroom.Macmillan Books for
Teachers.
Cameron, L. (2001) Teaching Language to Young Leaners. Cambridge University Press.
IN-SERVICE TRAINING SESSION 3
Developing Young Learners' Oracy
Skills
How to design an
effective sequence of tasks – from more controlled to less controlled work.
VIDEO
– PETE THE CAT
Task 1
Part a) Watch the
video. Look at Pete's shoes below and colour them. You can only use the colours
mentioned in the story.
Part b) Now order the shoes following the order they
appear in the story.
Teacher's action in part 1: what colour did you use?
Students mention the colours they used to colour the shoes.
Students say “red” , “blue”, etc.
Teacher's action in part 2:
what is the order of the shoes? What is number 1? etc… Now students say
“red shoes”, “” blue shoes”, etc.
Task 2
Imitate Pete the Cat.
Part a) Students watch the story
again and imitate the line “I love my white shoes”
They imitate Pete in all the
lines of the song.
Part b) Students add a line to
the song using a different colour.
Task 3
(if the aim for task 4 is to talk
about favourite clothes, it is advisable to revise this vocabulary area through
a matching task or scrambled words activity, etc)
Revision of clothes.
Task 4
Students draw their favourite
item of clothing and show it to the class. They will say the line “ I love
my…………....”
VIDEO
– Mr Bean in the Cinema
Task 1
Students watch the video and then
order the sentences below.
·
Mr Bean wants to leave the cinema.
·
Mr Bean is happy.
·
Mr Bean has something to drink.
·
Mr Bean gets scared.
Task 2
Students read the sentences and
correct the information that is wrong.
·
Mr Bean goes to the cinema alone.
·
Mr Bean watches a comedy.
·
Mr Bean buys only one basket of popcorn.
·
Mr Bean cries and cries during the movie.
Task 3
Freeze a scene and
describe it.
Task 4
Talk about you. Say what films
you like, what you usually eat and drink when you watch a movie, how you feel
when you watch a comedy or a horror movie, etc.
The teacher may use a framework
to help students prepare the talk.
TYPOLOGY OF SPEAKING ACTIVITIES
Source: The Primary English Teacher's Guide (by Jean
Brewster)
