Teaching Speaking in Integrated-Skills Classes

Transcription

1 Teaching Speaking in Integrated-Skills Classes ELI HINKEL Framing the Issue Teaching learners to speak another language means helping them develop specific sets of interactional and communication skills, because spoken communication takes place in real time. Different types of learners have important and divergent needs if they are to learn to speak effectively. For example, all students need to engage in casual or classroom communication, and business majors (or professionals) are often required to make presentations and respond to questions. International students need to teach classes, address their students concerns, and be prepared to think on their feet. Practically all second language (L2) speaking requires the development of speech-processing and oral production skills, which almost always include accurate pronunciation, grammar, and vocabulary, as well as information sequencing and discourse organization. Teaching L2 speaking and interactional skills usually plays a more prominent role in English-speaking settings than in those where English is taught as a foreign language. One of the reasons for this disparity is rooted in the tradition of the grammar translation methodology that, in various regions around the world, has continued to dominate L2 teaching for many decades. Another, no less important, reason is that L2 speaking and interactional skills can be slighted where many EFL learners simply do not have a practical need for L2 speaking. According to Levelt s (1989) highly acclaimed study, from a psycholinguistic perspective, speaking (also called oral production) involves four fundamental processes: conceptualization, utterance formulation, articulation, and self-monitoring. The first stage, conceptualization, deals with the speaker s background knowledge. Formulation draws on language skills such as having the lexical and grammatical means (i.e., the words, phrases, and sentences) to express meaning. Articulation is to do with pronouncing and pacing sounds according to the L2 sound system. Self-monitoring involves monitoring one s own speech, ultimately for the purpose The TESOL Encyclopedia of English Language Teaching. Edited by John I. Liontas (Project Editor: Margo DelliCarpini; Volume Editors: MaryAnn Christison and Christel Broady) John Wiley & Sons, Inc. Published 2018 by John Wiley & Sons, Inc. DOI: / eelt0256

2 2 Teaching Speaking in Integrated-Skills Classes of self-repair. Thus teaching L2 speaking integrated with other skills can enhance learning in a variety of ways: It may help learners expand their background knowledge in a content area, may increase their vocabulary and grammar repertoire, and may improve their pronunciation. However, according to Skehan (1998), focusing on the development of one aspect of language skills can and often does affect the quality of another. That is, when people are learning L2 speaking integrated with other skills, their language abilities are not likely to progress at even rates. For example, when learners work to improve their speaking fluency, the accuracy of their language use may lag behind. Or, when the teaching and learning focus is on the uses of vocabulary and grammar, pronunciation and articulation may not be encouraged. Typically, in integrated L2 speaking instruction some subsets of skills advance faster than others. The teacher needs to take into account such uneven skill development when designing integrated-skills courses. Instruction in L2 speaking can be integrated into various types of language skills. One of the most common options is to combine the teaching of speaking and listening, or speaking and reading, in which learners discuss their content material in large or small groups or present oral reports. Teaching speaking can also be incorporated with writing when the instructional tasks include both oral and written production. L2 speaking can be blended with work on pronunciation, pragmatics, and learning about culture. Teaching it is most frequently integrated with that of closely related language skills such as listening, which occurs at an initial stage: learners practice receptive skills before moving on to spoken language production, which builds on listening comprehension. Given the large number of options for teaching L2 speaking integrated with other skills, only two are examined here: integrated instruction in speaking and listening; and speaking and learning L2 pragmatics. Making the Case Integrating Listening and Speaking In the context of real and meaningful communication, one typically needs to listen and comprehend L2 speech and speak at a very fast pace. That is, both bottom-up and top-down language processing are required (Hinkel, 2006). The term bottomup processing refers to trying to comprehend what is said or written by focusing on incremental elements of language, such as basic units of sounds, words, or grammar. The term top-down processing refers to focusing on broad matters of language, such as the topic, background knowledge and information, and the context. Typically, listening instruction in an English language classroom has addressed bottom-up skills, but a top-down focus that enhances learners background knowledge of a content theme (or topic) is important for promoting L2 speaking skills in context. For instance, learners can be asked to listen for ideas and respond to the content, formulate questions, or expand on the topic. In such instruction learners

3 Teaching Speaking in Integrated-Skills Classes 3 need to understand the information (top-down processing) and produce oral language, which requires both bottom-up and top-down strategies. The teacher s job is to make the listening texts useful for the development of speaking skills. That is, the extent of the skill s integration into teaching is often determined by the flexibility of the content and its practical usefulness for speaking activities and practice. Preparing to speak plays an important role in the ongoing process of helping learners develop L2 skills. Both bottom-up and top-down processing of listening texts can help students prepare background information and ideas, think about the necessary vocabulary and grammar, and organize the discourse or structure their conversational exchanges. In designing integrated listening speaking tasks, the following aspects of the activity should be considered: the topic of the listening text and the information needed to prepare for speaking; the attendant lexical (words and phrases) and grammatical attributes of the aural and the oral texts; and the discourse pattern of the speaking component (e.g., a discussion, a presentation, or, possibly, a role-play). Preparing to speak can be a valuable language practice. Constructing speaking texts, practicing them, and being engaged in communications about the oral task provide additional opportunities for production practice. When working with interactional listening texts, for example, learners should pay careful attention to various repeated conversational devices, expressions, and phrases that are employed by speakers or hearers. To promote the integration of listening and speaking skills in instruction, listening practice can serve as a springboard for speaking activities. Additional foci of such practice can include expanding one s vocabulary range and one s grammatical accuracy in oral production. All of these methods, combined, can lead to more effective L2 communication. Integrating Speaking, L2 Pragmatics, and Sociocultural Norms of Speaking According to Celce-Murcia and Olshtain (2000, p. 19), pragmatics deals very explicitly with the study of relationships holding between linguistic forms and the human beings who use these forms. That is, pragmatics addresses the connections between the language used to express an idea or a social function (e.g., a request, an apology, or an invitation) and the participants, contexts, situations, and settings of an interaction. In language learning and usage, pragmatic and cultural competences are closely related and require learners to use language in socioculturally appropriate ways. An important consideration in teaching L2 socioculturally appropriate (or inappropriate) elements of communication is that there are many ways to express social functions: for example, asking for directions or scheduling an appointment can have a number of linguistic forms (Hinkel, 2014). In social interactions conventionalized, frequently repeated, and routine expressions play a prominent role (they are called speech acts and have specific social functions). Such routine expressions typically have various social purposes: they

4 4 Teaching Speaking in Integrated-Skills Classes can be requests, announcements, compliments, or responses to compliments (e.g., What a nice sweater! It looks great on you. Thanks, I like it too). These expressions can be direct or indirect and thus vary in their degree of politeness, or even comprehensibility. For example, I am completely lost is an indirect speech act that can mean that the speaker is likely to ask for directions to their destination. However, if the hearer does not fully grasp the pragmatic function of this expression, then the speaker s communicative goal (that is, to get street or road directions) may not be achieved. All in all, the number of routines and their functions is truly very large; there are, for example, routines for beginning and ending conversations, for nominating and changing topics, for moving from one room to another, for locating chairs to sit on, for offering and accepting drinks or assistance, or for coming, leaving, staying, and even being indecisive (e.g., I can t decide/make up my mind). In the teaching of integrated L2 speaking and sociocultural norms, the foci of instruction consist of two overarching instructional goals: the linguistic form and the social and interactional function. The sociocultural purpose of various types of routine expressions, such as requests, apologies, compliments, and complaints, can be found in most integrated instruction in L2 speaking. The linguistic form of conversational routines the bottom-up elements is one of the most easily accessible and common aspects of teaching L2 effective speaking in social conversations. For example, expressions such as Give me a pencil versus Would you happen to have an extra pencil? or Could I borrow a pencil if you have another one? can be productively examined for the elements of their grammatical and politeness forms and for the effects of these forms on the hearer. The pragmatic function of these expressions is the same (i.e., to convey a request), but the form of expression is likely to lead to different social outcomes. In teaching integrated L2 speaking and pragmatics, in order to increase learners productive range, many language textbooks, listening texts, and even test-preparation materials spotlight the linguistic form of routine expressions and idiomatic phrases and that of text excerpts or short dialogues. In designing integrated L2 speaking courses, activities, and opportunities for language practice, it is important to keep in mind that learners may have divergent needs and goals. For this reason, the functions of routines and the purposes of spoken communications are also likely to differ. For example, learners who need to make presentations, give talks, or make formal announcements in their educational or professional careers typically have learning needs that are different from those of learners who plan to interact socially or casually, for example on campus, at the office, or in other contexts where conversations take place. Pedagogical Implications When teaching integrated L2 skills in general, and speaking skills in particular, pre-teaching the needed vocabulary and grammar constructions and providing examples can often help learners manage the demands generated by the process of learning to improve multiple L2 skills. Additional means of supporting integrated

5 Teaching Speaking in Integrated-Skills Classes 5 listening speaking teaching are modeling these skills, demonstrating how they can be deployed in the context of an activity, and ensuring that learners have adequate time to prepare while dealing with the increased demands created by the skill integration. A word of caution is necessary. Textbooks for teaching L2 speaking strive to present a controlled and level-appropriate range of texts, ideas, vocabulary, and grammar. However, even within such a controlled thematic and linguistic scope, learners may have listening and comprehension difficulties related to the vocabulary or to cultural concepts that are specific to the listening context. Materials that are particularly challenging because of various cultural considerations may not be well suited for integrated speaking instruction. Learners cannot be expect to speak fluently on matters they are not closely familiar with or cannot readily relate to: for example, dating customs, country- or nation-specific holidays, leisure activities such as white-water rafting, rock climbing, skiing, ghosts and ghost stories, being a vegetarian, or alternative lifestyles. The different language-learning goals of students necessarily call for different types of integrated L2 speaking instruction. Combining listening practice with learning L2 speaking represents one of the most fruitful avenues for learning to notice both the bottom-up and the top-down elements of a listening text, which can be subsequently used in spoken production. Different types of integrated L2 speaking instruction also place different demands on learners and their attendant L2 skills, such as listening, reading, writing, or pronunciation (Richards, 2008). Overall, three important considerations typically need to be addressed in the integrated teaching of L2 speaking. The first one in terms of priority is to identify learners needs and goals, then to determine what types of skills are best suited for integration. The second consideration is to establish the teaching focus and to identify effective teaching and learning strategies and techniques that enable learners to achieve their learning goals: this can be done by providing opportunities for suitable and productive practice. It is rarely possible to achieve similar rates of skill improvement in integrated teaching. For this reason, the third important consideration is the types and extent of trade-offs that are almost always unavoidable when working on multiple and integrated language skills simultaneously. SEE ALSO: Teaching Bottom-Up and Top-Down Strategies; Teaching Pronunciation in Integrated Skills Classes; Teaching Speaking in EFL Environments; Teaching Speaking in ESL Environments; Teaching Spoken Register References Celce-Murcia, M., & Olshtain, E. (2000). Discourse and context in language teaching. New York, NY: Cambridge University Press.

6 6 Teaching Speaking in Integrated-Skills Classes Hinkel, E. (2006). Current perspectives on teaching the four skills. TESOL Quarterly, 40(1), Hinkel, E. (2014). Culture and pragmatics in language teaching and learning. In M. Celce- Murcia, D. Brinton, & M. Snow (Eds.), Teaching English as a second or foreign language (4th ed., pp ). Boston, MA: National Geographic Learning. Levelt, W. (1989). Speaking: From intention to articulation. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press. Richards, J. (2008). Teaching speaking and listening. Cambridge, England: Cambridge University Press. Skehan, P. (1998). A cognitive approach to language learning. Oxford, England: Oxford University Press. Suggested Readings Canale, M., & Swain, M. (1980). Theoretical bases of communicative approaches to second language teaching and testing. Applied Linguistics, 1, Hinkel, E. (1999). Culture in second language teaching and learning. Cambridge, England: Cambridge University Press. Hinkel, E. (2009). Integrating the four skills: Current and historical perspectives. In R. B. Kaplan (Ed.), Oxford handbook in applied linguistics (2nd ed., pp ). New York, NY: Oxford University Press. Saville-Troike, M. (2003). The ethnography of communication: An introduction (3rd ed.). Malden, MA: Blackwell.