TEACHING SPEAKING: AN UNATTAINABLE DREAM OR AN IMPLEMENTABLE APPROACH?

While speaking is one of the most aspired competences in the learning of a foreign language, it still remains one of the most neglected skills in EPIC instruction today due to the difficulty of its teaching and assessing.

In my presentation I would like to elaborate on SMBK’s experience in teaching and assessing speaking. Since 2018 we have included an oral one-to-one interview in our advanced aleph classes as part of the final mark (15%). To prepare for the task, we teach speaking through such interactive tasks as interviews, role plays, general and mini group debates and discussions. These activities are integrated in teaching reading, writing and listening. The final 2-minute interview includes a factual question based on the texts and TEDs we discuss during the term and a personal question on the same topic (do you agree/disagree? what do you think etc). The list of topics is known beforehand but the students do not know in advance which question they will get. The assessment criteria are based on speaking can-dos and discussed with the students at the start of the term.

After the first trials we see that this practice has several advantages. It motivates students to speak in class improving their oral skills and also encourages them to read the texts of the term and complete TED tasks. In addition, it facilitates the retention of the text vocabulary. We have also faced some difficulties and restrictions that will be discussed in the talk.