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[Glenski]

In a high school setting, how can you present English so that students practice their speaking skills in a way that you can measure? Classes with 25-45 students just aren't conducive to one-on-one interview tests with the kids. Even a 1-2 minute test of that nature kills 2 or 3 class periods (mine are only 45 minutes long), and if there is only one teacher taking care of the class, it is difficult to keep the other students occupied and focused on something productive while the teacher is presenting the oral quiz.

Ideally, individual performance should be measured, but I have had a hard time finding something usable, so I've resorted to small skits or mini-presentations involving 2-3 students. That still takes up 2-3 class periods, but it's more entertaining to the audience.

[eslHQ]

that's a tough one. you may try giving them 2 quizzes at the same time.

For example, have each student give a 1-2 minute presentation or speech and have the other students listen for and make notes of the mistaktes the speaker makes. you could give the listening students half a point for every error they hear the speaker make. they will be forced to listen and the points will be added on to their overall speaking quiz score (because you can't talk to someone if you don't know what they are saying). therefore the audience (your class) will be quiet and listen and you might be able to get through a couple dozen students in a period.

one grade for speech and one grade for listening for errors of other speakers.

let us know what you did and how it worked

eric

[Roger]

Glenski, you are one of the most experienced and knowledgeable teachers in this forum - and never too haughty to ask a question yourself!

I am currently teaching "adults" to speak; my students range in age from 20 to 22 and are university students. When I asked them "are you ladies or girls/ gentlemen or boys?" the unanimous answer in most classes was: "We are boys/girls!"

That says a little about their expectations and maturity.
I decided to teach them the most basic things, and they need them!

Today, they were asked to make a presentation of what they think about their future. As a matter of fact, most are pretty clueless - no joke and no hyperbole! They think that passing final exams entitles them to GOOD jobs, no matter whether they studied a major that is geared to their future employment or not.

You want to know how I make them talk; here is:
out of some 45 to 50 students, I select 4 to 6 every time to make a presentation, and these guys get a mark which counts towards their final score. Yes, not everyone is made to talk in every lesson; nor would they want to do that. But I do involve them all - I divide them into groups.
The presentation candidates have to come to the front and select their partners - I typically say "choose 2 girls and 3 boys", and laughing they set off finding their partners. THen I sit them as far apart as possible so that they can brainstorm among themselves with as little interference from their neighbours as possible.
Only one of them - the one I asked to come to the front - will speak.

In order to make those speeches as standardised as possible I have one of each group copy questions from my textbook; today's questions were:
- What do you want to do?
- How do you want to develop your future career?
- What kind of job do you find interesting?
- What kind of company do you want to work for? Why?
- Will your major determine your career choice?

The purpose of these presentations was to make my students focus on precise questions and to communicate with each other in English; they had to addres each and every single question.
It worked pretty well although some students did have difficulties arising out of the fact that they had next to zero experience working and earning their own salary; one girl didn't know that "major" was a noun, and she formed a new sentence "Yes, my career is a major determined choice" - clearly she didn't understand the question.
The students not asked to make a presentation had to repeat the speakers' answers - a challenge that forced them all to listen carefully. There were some that failed to listen - and I found them out and made them stand up until they were able to reproduce the answer or the question.
My course is called "Listening & Speaking", not just "Speaking English"; I make it a special point to remind them every time that LISTENING is as important as speaking. For most, this is new.

[ls650]

I have a small red book called "Conversation Inspirations" by Nacy Ellen Zelman (published by Pro Lingua Associates). It's chockful of ideas for dialogues, debates, role plays, interviews, etc.

With a large class, I often put several different ideas for dialogues on the board, then have the students work in groups to write scripts and perform them in class.

[Glenski]

eslHQ,
Thanks for the idea. However, here's how I work out the logistics of your proposal.

10 students give a 1-2 minute speech or presentation. With 40 kids in the room, that's 40 x 10 = 400 papers I have to sift through every time I do this. And, for each kid to complete just one speech, I'm looking at a grand total of 1600 pieces of paper from the audience alone. Even in my smallest classes of 25, that means 625 pieces of paper for each speech.

And, of course, they speak pretty horribly, so the odds that some can even detect errors, let alone describe them, are pretty low. And, the speakers themselves will have low scores because despite five years of English classes, most can't (or won't) speak well.

Roger,
Thanks for the kind words. I'm never too shy to ask the blatantly obvious questions.
I have a hard time understanding what you have your kids do. First you talk about speeches (which I feel are individual efforts), then you talk about finding partners to brainstorm. Can you clarify? Plus, how do you measure the presentations? And, you wrote that the audience has to repeat the speaker's answers. How do you evaluate this? My key point for this thread is in measuring performance.

ls650,
I will look into that book, although I don't think there's much different from the many others that I have already read. More to the point, however, is what I asked Roger. Whatever you have the students do, how do you quantitate their speaking ability? Writing scripts and performing them sounds like a team effort, and if one person in the team is weak, he/she drags down the other.

[ls650]

You simply have to do the best you can to cope with the numbers. Give 'em lots of opportunities to work with different people. I would mark them as simply as possible on a scale of one to 10. In a group situation with a large number of students, you simply don't have time to devote to giving a detailed assessment to dozens of students. Leave the detailed individual marking scheme for mid-terms and finals.

[eslHQ]

[Deconstructor]

Here�s what I do: Students are put in groups of four and given a magazine or newspaper article with appropriate difficulty and length. Students must chunk the article and divide in four parts as they answer a number of questions and delve into the ideas in the article. Once prepared, they form a panel and must present their article to the entire class. The role of each member is to present his/her part of the article as if they were experts in the given field. The role of the class is to be critical and ask questions at the end of the presentation. No one has a passive role and everyone is graded.

The presentation is recorded. I take it home and listen again for clarity, fluency, vocabulary use, sentence complexity, article detail and organization.

This can be done with any level. The teachers must choose the appropriate material. That�s all.

The methodology of this activity is a bit more complex than what I described. It takes quite a few classes to prepare and present. If anyone is interested, PM me and I�ll be more than happy to share the wealth in detail.

If feasible, students get to hear their own presentations with the teacher as the latter points out areas to work on; if not, then only a report is written or recorded on the same tape by the teacher.

[Tamara]

This is an issue in our program, too. We're an ESL program in North Carolina, USA. We're required to show improvements or goal achievements for each student to maintain our government funding (without which we'd all be out of jobs). It's easy to get improvements for reading and writing, just by doing reading comprehension tests and writing exercises. However, a speaking test hasn't yet been developed.

One idea I have but haven't worked up yet is to collaborate with all the instructors to make a separate checklist for each level. The checklist will cover speaking capabilities each student should be able to master by the end of a semester. The instructor would have a directed conversation with each student individually, checking off the items a student is able to use "correctly." Again, towards the end of the semester, the same conversation and the same checklist would be used to determine improvements. Since our program has a computer lab (which is where I work) instructors could use that time (usually 1-2 hours a week) to interview individual students while the rest are occupied at the computers.

This is all very hypothetical and subjective, I know.

[Glenski]

Deconstructor,
I'd like to know as many details as possible, so please explain more fully. I have 4-6 classes like this, so 40 kids x 4 or 6 = 160-240 taped recordings to go through, which is a LOT of work.

[Glenski]

[Gordon]

Glenski, why don't you have your class work on a project while you are testing your students? If your classroom is big enough have the testing go on on one part of the room while the class is working on another part. If the students misbehave than tell them you will deduct marks from them and if they are quietly working (working being the key here and not using their keitais) than they get bonus marks.
I usually test students ingroups of 6 where they work with a partner in a situation you have set up for them. For 30-35 students this will probably take you 2 classes. Perhaps not a waste of time, but testing is a necessary evil.
I really don't think there is a magic solution to test 40 students orally in an hour. If so, I too want to hear.

Another possibilty is have your class do presentations in 2 groups. Presentations are done simultaneously while you walk between the 2 groups and monitor. I don't know your class dynamics if this would work or not.

[Glenski]

[guest of Japan]

In my previous high school I gave two test at the end of each semester. On was a written test and the other was a one on one speaking test. With an average of 35 students it took two 90 minute class periods. I did the speaking tests in the hall while the other students watched a movie. The school was an extremely low level school, so real work would not have worked. The speaking test was similar to the EIKEN 3rd level speaking test. For some students it was the only time they ever spoke a word of English. Some just stared at their shoes as I went through the questions. It was an extremely tedious process, that my school really wanted me to do.
The scoring was done on a simple rubric. The scale was 1 to 5, with 5 being the highest, for each question. There were five questions total. With higher level students and the absence of a written test, I think this method could be done in 90 minutes.

In my current school we only do listening tests, and this seems a much better way to go.

I rather like the method you are already using.

[Gordon]

Glenski,
Grade the interviews on some criteria such as:
1. clarity of speech (they are comprehendable),
2. use of the target language they have learned in class (I tell them ahead of time that I would like to see them use some of the things we have learned in class and I give examples),
3. fluency or ease of speaking (I know rather difficult, but they can aspire to something) and have helped there partner along. A good spaeker needs to be a good listener
4. they have answered what was intended, not gone off topic

Make each criteria out of 5

This is just a guideline, add any other criteria you feel is most suitable.

The reason I have students in groups of 6 is so you can move from 1 partner to another and it saves you time from getting new students all the time. Also you don't have to repeat yourself as much from giving directions and they see others model the activity too.

I give them a guided question such as: Ask your partner about where they would like to travel Where would they go? What would they do?
This is after a unit on travel.