Korean Job Discussion Forums

[katydid]

These have always been the bane of my existence! I guess I think to myself, a whole hour of nothing but talk off the top of our heads, that can not be a class! Or can it? I have heard of people who teach a bit of grammar in their classes, like how to use a conditional clause, to bolster the free talking part of the class.
I knew of one girl who played nothing but songs for her students and then had the students discuss them...I used to give my students a lot of advice columns, ask them what kind of advice they would give, and then what they thought of Dear Abby's advice...but I have always felt I am doing nothing for my students.
When you get a free talking class, how do you manage it? Is there some sort of guideline/syllabus you personally like to follow, or do you like to see where "How was your day?" takes you?

[rapier]

You have to teach them some new vocab first, then give them an enjoyable activity in which to put it to use.
This is the best theory, but difficult to put into practice if you keep running out of ideas because the students are too fussy to do them....

[kimcheeking]

Free talking class is a joke - it is not possible.

If you want to run a free talking class, walk into class and tell your students to talk. Then say nothing, just wait. When they ask what to talk about tell them it's free talking class go ahead talk. Do it for the whole class.

Next class go in with a prepared lesson that you would normally teach - you will never again be asked to have a free talking class. If students want to do it again then tell them you will teach them pragmatics (politeness or other things and incorportate it into roleplays)

[Emma Clare]

I teach voluntary conversation classes to students between 19-25. I started off using the Interchange book, and having structured lessons... but we got half way through and decide to chuck it. We now do free talk for nearly all the lessons. It's their choice! My students just want to be able to talk like I do, they want to learn slang, streetwords, idioms etc. None of them are the least bit interested in talking like a textbook. I correct their grammar as we go, either by explaining it to them, or by writing it down and showing them. I also get them to do roleplays and introduce them to new vocab and phrases appropriate to the situation.

I guess it's easier to talk to peope my own age, but we just talk about whatver comes into our heads. Sometimes about what we did at the weekend, or general stuff, but often I'll introduce a topic of some kind. They also want to know what life is really like in the West so there's a lot of cultural comparison. We don't shy away from anything, and we talk about sex, relationships, drug use etc because they know that people generally aren't so conservative about such things in the West. It helps that their English is pretty good though and I have a few real characters in my classes that make things pretty interesting at times. But yes, there are plenty of days when I'm tired and would rather just teach from a text book than be made to have 'conversation' for 3 hours straight!

[The Lemon]

[Zyzyfer]

You've got to build students up to that stage where they can talk freely with each other. Whether it be using some exercises from this website/forum, or using a book as a temporary guideline, you've got to establish a relationship between the students first. Once this is established, and they've built up enough confidence with each other to no longer feel quite so embarassed(also requires some support from you), they will be far more open to talking freely.

For over a month, I thought that my afternoon class was worthless, because the students never seemed to be improving. Then I compared their lesson yesterday to the first lesson we ever did, and I realized just how much more comfortable they are with the way class goes. I can even teach them new vocabulary on the fly and expand on root phrases, as well as get into idioms and even a little bit of slang. I taught my students about how we call pigeons "rats with wings" when one of them mentioned that pigeons are a lot like rats, and they thought it was the most hilarious thing they've ever heard.

The best ways to build a good class rapport that I've found are interactive(hands off teacherwise) speaking exercises and physical activities...for kids, anyways. They'll feel comfortable being silly around each other really fast and drop all of the silly pretentious class arrangements they make lickity split.

[kimcheeking]

[some waygug-in]

I agree with Lemon about advanced/post advanced students. But my experience has been that students of all levels always want to have free talking classes even when they can not handle them.

I second that. The problem is not "free-talking" as such, but it is more a problem of students whose abilities are not sufficient to support a steady flow of conversation.

What did you do yesterday? - mmmm I'm sleep.

What did you do this morning? - mmmm I'm study.

What do you do? - mmmmm I'm watching TV.

An hour of this day after day can be quite painful. It is my belief that students who can't read and understand the vocabulary and sentence structure of "at the very least" Interchange 3, have no business asking for free talking classes.
That being said, I don't see anything wrong with having short segments of your classes devoted to open conversation, but not too much.
Anyway, that's my 2 cents.

cheers

[the_beaver]

In any free-talking class I always tell the students on the first day that the Beaver doesn't play that game.

At the minimum I prepare questions about some topic or article but I never rely on them to discuss the weather or whatever comes up because there are far too many pregnant pauses which I have to fill -- that results in my talking too much and the students talking too little.

[t bear]

Free talking classes are a pain. I have one everyday for my last class, with usually about 8 thirteen year olds. All they want to do is 'play game teacher', which I often end up doing as its often dufficult to get a sentence in english out of them. Usually I go in with a topic to ask about, what is your favorite animal? Whats the biggest animal you've seen, etc. If they seem to be trying hard I finish up with a game.
If anyone has any suggestions for class material I would love to hear them.

[Mr. Pink]

By free talking do you mean shooting the sheet? Or you prepare something to discuss "freely"...like discussion topics?

How big of a class are you talking?

The best shoot the sheet class I ever had was with businessmen, they only wanted to talk about girls, what you do with girls, and drinking. Was funny as hell...they wanted to learn how to pick up girls in English etc.

[schwa]

Maybe 'free-talking' is a misnomer & what the students & director in fact are looking for is a 'conversation' class. Theres a difference. Freetalk suggests no theme or direction but a good conversation involves both.

Agreed, it takes time & a comfort level to get students attempting to express experiences & opinions. But I'd argue, from experience, that with enough gentle coaxing & encouragement its possible to get students of almost all levels communicating outside the strictures of textbook exercises.

Key one: having an intimate knowledge of your students' capabilities & being able to ask leading questions at their level without being condescending.

Key two: having a sense of their interests, & being able to nudge that a step further.

Key three: introducing a varied range of topics. A bit of forethought is a good thing ('next time we're going to talk about ...') & simple vocabulary handouts are useful. I especially like a page of related small drawings -- you can mine each one for associations then move on.

Sometimes you dont even need that much. I had a group of 8-year-olds I started from basic phonics & less than 2 years later I could enter the classroom, ask 'Who wants to tell me a story?' & every hand would go up. 50-minute classes, 3 times a week, & sometimes we opened our books to talk about the pictures, but often we didnt need to.

Middleschool kids -- can be roused out of their adolescent funk. If you sink to their hormonal mood, youre doomed, but if you can cajole, tease, & play with them -- be fun without being foolish -- you can get them talking. They really have lots to say.

Beginning adults can be a joy. In my experience theyre not so selfconscious about making mistakes & have a lot of life experience (& half-remembered english) to work from. Give them a topic they have opinions on & theyll work hard to get their ideas out. I dont worry about Korean in the classroom -- let them ask their classmates in Korean how to say something -- its good exercise & it keeps things relaxed.

Advanced adults -- well, I'm a little tough on them but even they like to play simple games & talk about much-rehearsed subjects. Give them a simple format & let them run with it. Sometimes you gotta push them a bit & sometimes you gotta know when to sit back.

My main point being, its entirely possible to get just about any class up to text-free lessons to the benefit of all involved, but it takes time & trust. I have no training as a teacher but I've run with instinct & I'm gratified with results. I've witnessed some amazing progress. You can make a difference.


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[ratslash]

are a pain in the rear! how can you do free-talking with people who can only just ssay "my name is....." but then they complain to my manager and say that they want to do more free-talking! how can we do free-talking when you can't speak english?!?!?

[schwa]

But they can say more than that. Your job is to get it out of them.

[ratslash]

yeah, but to do that they have to learn the vocab. not the structures, i can correct that as they say it. but vocab, you know, would help.