Encouraging Conversational English

As an educator, I feel that confidence using correct conversational English is one of the most useful tools I can give my students. In order to master the sentence patterns and vocabulary required for day-to-day

communication, students must not only answer my questions aloud, but also ask questions and converse with their teacher and classmates. I thus try to create a student-centered learning environment which gives each student as many opportunities to speak as possible.

I have noticed that students’ comprehension skills (i.e. listening and reading) can be exceptionally high, while their speaking ability and fluency are quite low. This results from a learning environment in which the teacher speaks for the majority of class time. When students are only expected to listen to their teacher and say one-word answers, their conversational ability and spoken grammar skills quickly regress. If a student does not have the opportunity to speak freely and speak often, they cannot practice and improve their skills. Taking this into consideration, I try to decrease the time I speak in class in order to increase the students’ time to practice their spoken English. .

My goal is for students to speak and think by themselves as much as possible. Repeating what I say and memorizing answers do not help them think critically. I therefore often answer my students’ questions with more questions. For example, if they read an unfamiliar word and ask its meaning. I will not say “This word means…” but rather, “Look at the word in the sentence. Use the words nearby to help you. What do you think it might mean?” This way, students use context and their critical thinking skills to answer the question by themselves. This also gives them another opportunity to speak rather than listen to my answer. .

It is crucial to give students time to practice sentence patterns and conversational English. It is then my responsibility to correct their mistakes and help them say it properly the next time. Only when students have the opportunity to learn from their mistakes can they improve.

內湖分校
AP2
Erin Burkett
University of Pittsburgh, Linguistics and
Speech-Language Pathology, CELTA