3 key strategies to improve speaking Skills

The most prepared language teachers have been language students at one time. I have been a student of many languages over the years, most recently, of Mandarin Chinese. One thing that I have noticed when communicating in a second or other language is that I imagine how my language teachers over the years might express what I want to express. As it happens, when I began my Mandarin study, the Mandarin Chinese model that I most often heard was that of an older female teacher. She repetitively modelled questions, answers, vocabulary, and common expressions for the whole class and for each student in their turn. As a result, some people used to note that I would speak Mandarin like a middle-aged Taiwanese woman! Nonetheless, I have been able to use that model to communicate with other Mandarin speakers, each of whom I have also been able to use as a language model, thereby giving me more ability to adapt myself to different situations. As a language teacher, many of your students will come into class with some models already, but some will not. Either way, your modelling of the language will make your students more versatile communicators and give them a solid foundation to pursue their language goals in the future. 

  While modelling is important, no language class should feature an instructor modelling language for the entire period. Students should be invited to interact with the instructor in the initial modelling period, and then encouraged to interact with their classmates in the target language. Interviews are an effective way of encouraging students to use the models that they have heard in a focused way, with prescribed questions and a range of possible answer formats. In the interviews, students will be able advise each other on their pronunciation and clarity because they will not be able to provide answers if they can’t understand the questions. Indeed, it is at this point that students can begin using their classmates as models, while they negotiate the meaning of their partners’ questions and answers with the instructor’s intermittent guidance as he or she circulates among the student pairs or groups.

    Interviews will be a source of stress for language students, not only because of the language requirements to fill the information gaps, but also because of the social pressure of talking to someone they might not know very well in a new language. Once they have completed their interviews, the instructor needs to take advantage of the increased heart rates in the room to get the students to perform in front of the group. It may be a role-play or a presentation. Either way, make it clear that the audience will share some of the pressure. Audience members will have to listen carefully to the performances and answers specific questions about them. Teachers can write a few example questions and answer formats on the board, so that the audience members will be able to handle their task with more confidence and accuracy.