Tools and Settings
Content
Questions and Tasks
A friend and colleague of mine who is an accomplished physics professor at a large research university in the United States recently went to Japan on an academic exchange. The main purpose of his trip to Japan was to do research in physics. Nevertheless, after he’d been in Japan a few weeks, he was approached by some Japanese acquaintances and asked to teach an English conversation class—not at the university but in the community. Even though he had been speaking English all of his life and his life work involved teaching, he felt rather inadequate. He had never taught the English language to anyone, and he had no idea where to begin. Nevertheless, he wanted to be polite and helpful to his Japanese friends, so he couldn’t refuse their request. They were very happy and told him that the class would begin the following week. My friend ended up having the Japanese students make chocolate chip cookies in class. That was a tasty, creative, and culture-based solution!
As you work through this unit, you will…
If you have learned well, your conversation class will be both enjoyable for those involved and effective in helping them improve their English skills.
The main objective of most conversation classes is to get the English learners to talk-in English, of course. With some groups this is easy, with others it is more challenging.
The keys to success include…
The remainder of this section will talk about each of these topics in turn.
Choosing an appropriate topic is crucial. Appropriateness depends not only on the subject matter's interest to the students but also on the level of linguistic ability needed to talk about it, as well as its cultural content.
1.1 Topic Selection (Getting student input)
1.2 Topic Selection (Student background knowledge—linguistic and cultural)
1.3 Topic Selection (Some common, popular topics)
For a conversation class to succeed, the interpersonal atmosphere in the group must be supportive. To speak up and participate in a conversation in a language that is foreign to them, people need to feel free to take risks without fear of embarrassment. (See Unit 22, Language Learning Strategies.)
2.1 Class atmosphere (Avoid drawing attention to students’ mistakes)
2.2 Class atmosphere (Don’t let students intimidate each other)
People learn to speak a language by speaking it. One of the purposes of your conversation class is to maximize the time that you students speak English, and not their native languages. Getting them to speak English with each other, however, can be difficult—especially if class members speak the same native language.
3.1 Speaking in English (English as a Second Language settings)
3.2 Speaking in English (English as a Foreign Language settings)
There are a few other things you need to know about managing your conversation class in order to make it run smoothly and well. (See also, Unit 11, Managing classes of English language learners.)
4.1 Class management (Avoid teacher domination)
4.2 Class management (Keeping some students from dominating others)
In free conversations among language learners, it is inevitable that they will make mistakes—sometimes many mistakes. However, if you interrupt the flow of conversation to correct every mistake, you will quickly kill the conversation and intimidate your students. The conversation will cease, and so will the usefulness of your class.
5.1 Responding to mistakes (Addressing errors without interrupting)
5.2 Responding to mistakes (Echo correction)
That’s it. That’s “the least you should know” about conducting effective and enjoyable conversation groups. Of course, there is much more that you will learn later—from other sources or from your own experience.
Here is a video clip of a conversation class led by a novice teacher. This particular class was in Guadalajara, Mexico.
As you view this video clip of an EFL conversation class, think about each of the following questions.
Here is what other people have said after viewing and reflecting on this video clip.
Here’s where you get additional information on the topics presented in this unit.
Here are some other units in this program that relate to topics we have addressed in this unit.
If you want additional information on any of these topics, you might consider looking at these units.
Here are some published books that have proven to be helpful resources for teaching conversation classes:
Tina Kasloff Carver and Sandra Douglas Fotinos. A Conversation Book 1: English in Everyday Life. (4th ed.) Pearson/Prentice-Hall. “This book presents picture dictionary-type pages, along with conversation and grammar practice, that provide readers with the vocabulary and speakinq skills they need for everyday life” ISBN 0131722395
Keith Folse and Jeanine Ivone. More Discussion Starters: Activities for Building Speaking Fluency. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 2002. “More Discussion Starters includes more of the same type of quirky conversation activities for upper-level ESL/EFL students. Like its predecessor, each unit in More Discussion Starters contains exercises that provide speaking interaction about a central topic or idea, and most require students to work together in pairs or small groups to reach a conclusion about a topic. Though most of the topics in the text are serious (corporal punishment, abortion, and gun control), many others deal with lighter topics (humor and culture). The activities, tasks, and topics chosen for this book are real situations from all over the world. Most of the units in this book introduce a problem or controversial topic at the beginning of the unit. This is then followed by a series of exercises designed to prepare all of the students so that they can express their ideas at the next class meeting. A unit usually includes several kinds of oral fluency activities, such as problem-solving tasks, court cases, "finish the story," role plays, "put the story together," small group discussions, and oral presentations.” ISBN 978-0-472-08855-3
Keith Folse. The Art of Teaching Speaking. University of Michigan Press, 2006. “What elements make a speaking activity successful? Which tasks or activities really help build speaking fluency? What does the research show regarding speaking activities? What mistakes do ESL teachers often make in speaking activity design? In this highly accessible and practical resource, Keith S. Folse provides a wealth of information to help ESL/EFL teachers design and use speaking tasks that will actually improve students’ speaking fluency.” ISBN 0-4720-3165-1
Glen Alan Penrod. Touchy Situations: An Advanced Conversation Text for ESL Students. Dymon/Delta, 2002. “Your friend has bad breath (but doesn't know it); you are married but would rather be single; Johnny is caught playing with matches; you are a perfectionist and your roommate is a slob. Yikes! What do you do? This situation-based conversation text provides challenging--sometimes touchy--topics in an effort to help students bridge the gap between controlled and free expression. Incorporating four main lesson formats (information gap activities, small group discussion, face-to-face role plays, and discussion and presentation), each of the 20 lessons takes approximately 90 minutes to complete.” ISBN 0-9637742-0-4.
Nancy Ellen Zelman, Esq. Conversation Inspirations: Over Two Thousand Conversation Topics (2nd rev. ed.). Brattleboro, VT: Pro Lingua Associates, 1996. “Over 2000 conversation topics. Role plays, interviews, talks, group creativity, proverbs & superstitions, chain stories, find out, get your partner, discussions.” “The more than 2400 topics range all the way from the universal - human nature and interpersonal relationships - to the culturally vital - cutting edge issues in North American society and how people from other cultures feel about them and deal with them.” ISBN 0-86647-094-8 (Revised and expanded in 2005: ISBN 0-86647-195-2).
If you have suggestions for other resources (books, websites, etc.), please send them to BTRTESOL@byu.edu